On a coastal road in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, Reem Hussein’s family have taken refuge on the ground. They were displaced from the southern suburbs of Beirut on March 1, as the war between Israel and the Iran-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah began to escalate.

Reem, 60, used to work selling tissue paper from a small street stall. But the intensifying war forced her to flee with her five family members, and they have since taken the ground as their shelter.

Hussein says, “They used to sit at home while I went out to work. I would bring them food and whatever they wanted with me, but now I am sitting in the street.”

Reem’s family is no different from many other families who were displaced after Lebanon was drawn into the the war in the Middle East, when Hezbollah opened fire in retaliation against the assassination of Iran’s Supreme Leader. This sparked an Israeli attack that has killed around 500 people in Lebanon, according to Lebanese authorities, with the death toll rising by about 100 people daily.

Hussein describes how their breakfast today after displacement compares with their days before the war began, saying: “I used to make kibbeh and stuffed grape leaves, and we would prepare tabbouleh and fattoush with grilled meat. The difference is like between the sky and the earth, and now we are eating like this.”

Escalating hostilities have forced nearly 700,000 people to flee their homes in Lebanon over the past week, a U.N. agency said on Monday (March 9).

The Israeli military has in recent days ordered people out of the southern suburbs, a swathe of south Lebanon, and parts of the eastern Bekaa Valley region - all areas that have served as political and security strongholds of Shi'ite Muslim Hezbollah.

Production: Khalil Ashawi, Hamuda Hassan, Yazan Kalach/Reuters