After a devastating 66-day war that led to thousands of Lebanese civilian casualties, millions of displaced persons, and the destruction of dozens of Lebanese villages, the ceasefire agreement on the conflict in Lebanon that came into effect on 27 November 2024 was supposed to bring relief.
Instead, Israel began to violate it from day one. Today, nearly a year later, it continues to do so brazenly, emboldened by the lack of any restraints from its Western backers. Lebanese civilians in the south of the country are still being killed by Israeli strikes, while Israeli forces remain ensconced on five hills in southern Lebanon, affording them a vantagepoint to monitor the surrounding valley.
Hizbollah has honoured its side of the deal. It has ceased retaliatory attacks and, in coordination with the Lebanese army, has withdrawn from the area south of the Litani River, allowing the army to take up its former positions near the southern border.
But true to Israel’s long tradition of shifting the goalposts, Tel Aviv is now conditioning its pullout from Lebanon on the complete disarmament of Hizbullah, a demand that was not included in the ceasefire agreement.
Taking advantage of US President Donald Trump’s re-entry to the White House and with the assistance of pro-Israeli US envoys to Lebanon Morgan Ortagus and Tom Barrack, Israel has been able to impose its re-interpretation of the agreement and push Beirut into the position of having to bow to the new conditions.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, who assumed office last January, has pledged to work with Hizbullah to bring all its arms under the control of the state. The understanding has not yet been put into effect, nor have plans been devised to do so. Although Aoun had said that 2025 would be the year in which the state asserted its monopoly over the arms in the country, it appears that his pledge will remain unfulfilled before the year is out.
Against the backdrop of the Israeli abuses, Hizbullah wrote an open letter addressed to the president, prime minister, and speaker of parliament in Lebanon, stating that it opposed plans that would strengthen Israeli control over the country by conditioning withdrawal from the five hills on Hizbullah’s disarmament.
The letter also urged the Lebanese government not to engage in any negotiations with Israel over occupied Lebanese territory and instead to exert the necessary pressure to compel Israel to fulfil its commitments under the ceasefire agreement, just as Hizbullah met its commitment to withdraw from south of the Litani River.
The Lebanese resistance movement held that the merger of arms under Lebanese state control can only be achieved, not under Israeli domination and coercion, but through a free national consensus, a principle that it continues to uphold.
Lebanon remains deeply divided over the question of Hizbullah’s arms. Many believe that yielding to Israeli dictates will not only fail to spare Lebanon from harm but will also render the country perpetually hostage to Israeli hegemony.
Others counter that Hizbullah’s weapons have failed to protect Lebanon and instead have dragged it into a war that left the south once again ruined, further occupied, and its people displaced.
Some supporters of stripping the resistance movement of its arms argue that Lebanon’s security could be ensured through Arab and international alliances, which would deter Israeli aggression. To such an argument, many point to the devastation in Gaza as a vivid reminder of the impotence of such arrangements in protecting civilians from Israel’s rampages.
Hizbullah supporters further maintain that it was the resistance movement’s military strength that prevented Israel from launching a full-scale ground incursion earlier. Voluntarily surrendering this deterrent would leave Lebanon defenceless and vulnerable to the Israeli occupation of even more territory, perhaps up to the Litani River as several Israeli officials have called for.
Some unanswered questions remain: how was Hizbullah defeated? How was Israel able to locate and assassinate its leaders? How did Israel manage to penetrate its command and military structure? Does that intelligence breach persist?
Israel’s ultimatums relayed through its American intermediaries are growing more frequent, warning that Lebanon’s deadline to disarm Hizbullah is nearing its end. Some believe that this is the buildup to a new aggression with the aim of forcing Hizbullah to surrender its arms.
Hizbullah has dismissed such threats, asserting that if Israel acts on them, it will be surprised by the size of the movement’s military response. It is impossible to verify whether it has rebuilt its arsenal and recovered from its losses in terms of its military command and of key allies like former Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad.
But even if it has, it remains uncertain whether its renewed capacities are safe from the intelligence breaches that crippled it militarily last year.
In an effort to curb the Israeli bid to reignite the Lebanese front, Egyptian Intelligence Chief Hassan Rashad visited Beirut, where he met with the Lebanese president, prime minister, parliamentary speaker, and army command.
Though little information has been disclosed regarding the substance of these meetings, it appears that the purpose was to develop a set of ideas aimed at stabilising the situation and outmanoeuvring Israeli ruses by empowering the Lebanese army, reducing Hizbullah’s military visibility, and promoting domestic cohesion.
The Egyptian effort was received positively, especially given Cairo’s success in brokering a relative de-escalation in Gaza. Beirut has since sent a detailed response to Rashad’s proposals, which suggests that he may return to resume the discussions.
On the other hand, the scope or limitations of any Egyptian mediating effort between Lebanon and Israel has been the subject of heated debate. Hizbullah staunchly rejects entering any talks with Israel, arguing that to do so would grant Israel the recognition it failed to achieve through war.
President Aoun, however, insists that Lebanon is committed to the principle of negotiation and will not revert to military options. Parliamentary Speaker Nabih Berri maintains that the only acceptable format is technical, military-level talks, conducted under the mechanism already endorsed in the ceasefire agreement.
This mechanism, which entails US, French, and UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon)-mediated talks between Lebanese and Israeli military officers, has so far proven ineffective at halting Israeli aggression, let alone securing the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the five occupied hills.
While the negotiations and measures needed to defuse the escalation along the Lebanese front are critical in the short run, a more crucial dialogue must occur within Lebanon concerning the future of the state, the role of the army, and the practical application of the state’s monopoly on the legitimate recourse to force.
This has been a long-deferred obligation, primarily because Lebanon’s diverse political players are bent on advancing their own agendas without making compromises. Hizbullah appears to believe that time is on its side and that if it remains firm in the face of pressures to undo it, it will survive this precarious moment with its military capacities intact.
Its opponents see this as an opportunity to intensify pressure on Hizbullah with US backing and strengthen their own position domestically, even if that plays into Israel’s hands. Others argue that Lebanon’s salvation lies in neutrality and avoiding entanglement in regional conflicts. A group of MPs has proposed amending the constitution to add a preambular clause guaranteeing Lebanon’s political neutrality and nonalignment in military blocs.
Amid the major transformations that have swept the region, mere resilience is no longer the answer. What Lebanon needs is structural transformation to develop the capacity to adapt to changing circumstances. The longer it avoids this need, the more it risks missing the historic opportunity to be part of the region’s future reconstruction and recovery.
The following comparison may be unwelcome to Lebanese ears, but it is striking that Syrian Interim President Ahmad Al-Sharaa, who not that long ago had a price on his head as a wanted terrorist, is now received at the White House, while Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, a career army officer, has not enjoyed such recognition.
As the Gulf states and international partners prepare a comprehensive reconstruction drive in Syria after 14 years of war, Southern Lebanon lies in ruins, its residents unable to return to inspect their destroyed homes while Israeli drones prowl the skies.
Others might counter that southern Syria is not much better off. It is still being attacked by Israel, which has doubled the territory it has occupied in the Syrian Golan Heights with little hope that it will ever be restored to Syria.
Nevertheless, one cannot escape the comparison: two countries long aligned with the Iranian axis of which one is recovering and reaping the benefits of realignment, while the other remains politically paralysed, unable to forge a national consensus to assert state control over military affairs and avert the tragedy of another round of war.
* A version of this article appears in print in the 13 November, 2025 edition of Al-Ahram Weekly
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