When Odie Arbel saw news reports that Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to a cease-fire, he felt a mix of relief and worry about the prospect of returning to Kibbutz Yiftah, just over a mile from the Israeli-Lebanese border.
He was excited about seeing the view of Mount Hermon from his home and the smell of grilled meat on his barbecue, he said, but he worried that the tight-knit community that existed before the war would be gone.
“We don’t know what we will be returning to,” said Mr. Arbel, 77. Families who left temporarily and enrolled their children in schools elsewhere, he noted, might choose to stay away permanently.
The cease-fire agreement has cast a light on what lies ahead for tens of thousands of displaced residents of northern Israel who have been moving between hotels, rentals and friends’ and relatives’ homes for more than a year.
It has made those residents wonder about the social fabric of their communities and whether they should return home at all. Some express worry that it is still not safe to go back, while others sound more hopeful.
Orly Gavishi-Sotto said that she, her husband and three daughters hoped to return to Hanita, a hilltop kibbutz with a view of the Mediterranean Sea, but added that she was worried the deal would leave Hezbollah in a position in which it can still threaten Israelis.
“Do I believe in UNIFIL and the Lebanese military? No,” Ms. Gavishi-Sotto, 46, said, referring to the United Nations peacekeepers and the U.S.-backed Lebanese armed forces, the entities that the agreement makes responsible for keeping Hezbollah out of the border region in Lebanon.
Referring to the aftermath of the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah conflict, she added: “When we tried that after the last war, Hezbollah armed itself and built tunnels. What will be different this time?”
Hezbollah started firing at Israeli positions in northern Israel more than a year ago in solidarity with Hamas, its ally that ignited the war in Gaza. In the succeeding months, Israel and Hezbollah exchanged cross-border fire, but Israeli forces exponentially increased their attacks against the Lebanese militant group in September and invaded southern Lebanon in October. Hezbollah responded by firing deeper into Israel.
The cease-fire deal calls for Israel to withdraw from Lebanon and for Hezbollah to move north, in effect creating a buffer zone between the two sides.
Avichai Stern, the mayor of Kiryat Shmona, a city near the border, criticized the agreement and predicted that many residents would elect not to return.
“I don’t dispute that we’ve achieved a lot in the war. But what happens the minute we withdraw?” Mr. Stern said in an interview late Tuesday. “They’ll return to the same place, just a minute from the border, with a clear line of sight — ready to conquer northern Israel.”
Mr. Arbel, however, said he believed that Israel would be making a mistake if its forces pushed deeper into Lebanon, risking becoming entangled in a war of attrition. The most important thing, he said, was whether Israel would act with force against any attempt by Hezbollah to reconstitute itself near the border.
“This is the main question now,” he said.
Lior Shelef, 42, a resident of Kibbutz Snir in the Galilee Panhandle, said the Israeli military had achieved as much as it could in Lebanon.
“We have accomplished what we came in to do,” he said. “Nothing matters more to me than bringing my family back to Snir, back to our home.”
Still, he said that his family would not return to the kibbutz immediately, and he predicted that it would take at least a few months to make the transition back.
Idan Ishach Erez returned months ago to Betzet, a moshav, or cooperative village, just over a mile from Lebanon, but she said that she hoped the cease-fire would finally bring quiet for her family.
“We would like to hear the birds chirping outside, not rocket sirens,” said Ms. Ishach Erez, 42, an owner of a dried fruit factory.
Rockets and drones fired by Hezbollah have set off air raid sirens in northern Israel for more than a year, sometimes several times in the same town in a single day.
Ms. Ishach Erez said that she was conflicted about whether Israel had made the right decision in agreeing to a cease-fire.
“If you ask me in general, I think we still could have accomplished more,” she said. “But if you ask me as a mother, it was time to bring our kids home.”
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