As widely expected, Israel did not withdraw from southern Lebanon on January 26.
Under the 60-day ceasefire agreement, Israel was supposed to cede its positions to the Lebanese army before pulling out. But as the deadline for its withdrawal approached, Israel notified representatives of the oversight committee that monitors the ceasefire — the United States, France, Lebanon and UNIFIL, the United Nations Interim Peacekeeping Force in Lebanon — that it would not withdraw on schedule because neither the Lebanese army nor Hezbollah had complied with its terms.
Israel claimed that Lebanon’s army had fallen short of fully deploying in southern Lebanon so that Hezbollah does not regroup and reestablish its presence there. Israel further charged that the Lebanese army had not destroyed Hezbollah’s military infrastructure in the south or seized all its weapons there.
As for Hezbollah, Israel accused Hezbollah of failing to redeploy north of the Litani River, a distance of some 30 kilometers from the Israeli border.
Lebanon countered that its army has removed rubble, disposed of unexploded bombs and rebuilt roads in places where it deployed. Lebanon also said it could not meet its obligations until Israeli forces withdraw. According to UNIFIL, Israel still occupies about 70 percent of the areas it captured during the war and has yet to dismantle six bases.
Lebanon’s new president, Joseph Aoun, urged the United States and France to pressure Israel to withdraw on time. Hezbollah condemned Israel’s announcement as a “flagrant violation” of the truce and an “infringement on Lebanese sovereignty.”
On January 24, the United States recognized Israel’s concerns and called for a “short, temporary extension” to the ceasefire, which has been repeatedly violated by Israel and Hezbollah. Subsequently, the Trump administration announced that the deadline for Israel’s withdrawal had been extended to February 18.
In the meantime, hundreds of pro-Hezbollah Lebanese civilians who tried to reach their villages on January 26 and 27 in defiance of warnings by the Israeli army were shot. In all, 26 people were killed and and 150 were wounded. These were the worst incidents of violence since the end of the most recent war in Lebanon, which broke out with Israel’s invasion of southern Lebanon on October 1 after nearly a year of cross-border fighting.
These armed exchanges were initiated by Hezbollah — Iran’s chief proxy in its Axis of Resistance in the Middle East — in a tangible show of solidarity with Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The fighting led to the evacuation of tens of thousands of Israelis and Lebanese from northern Israel and southern Lebanon
During the course of the war, Israel bombed Hezbollah bases throughout Lebanon, decimated its political and military leadership in Beirut, and destroyed the bulk of its rockets and much of its weaponry near the Israeli border.
Having been badly battered, Hezbollah broke ranks with Hamas and agreed to abide by a truce brokered by U.S. diplomat Amos Hochstein. It went into effect on November 27.
After Israel delayed its withdrawal, Hezbollah found itself on the horns of a dilemma. If it accepted the postponement of Israel’s withdrawal, Hezbollah would be perceived as weak. If it resumed the war, it risked not only a wave of unpopularity inside Lebanon, but a ferocious Israeli response. In the end, Hezbollah adopted a middle-of-the-road approach, rejecting Israel’s decision, but doing nothing about it.
Hezbollah was presumably aware that the majority of Lebanese do not want to see a resumption of the war, which gravely damaged Lebanon’s economy.
Hezbollah may have been deterred by Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz. He warned that Israeli strikes in the future would not differentiate between Hezbollah sites and critical infrastructure in Lebanon.
With that imperative in mind, Aoun, a former army general, declared that only the Lebanese state has the “right to monopolize the possession of weapons,” control its southern border, and “implement international resolutions.”
Nawaf Salam, the new prime minister whose candidacy Hezbollah had previously blocked, concurs with the policies of Aoun, who has described his election as “a new phase in Lebanon’s history.”
Hezbollah still retains a grip on Lebanese politics, but its leverage has been significantly eroded since the war. In plain language, this means that Hezbollah may no longer be able to call the shots and drag Lebanon into another war with Israel.
After 19 years, Lebanon may finally be ready to implement United Nations resolution 1701, which was passed in the wake of the second Lebanon war in 2006. Calling for Hezbollah’s disarmament and the withdrawal of its forces north of the Litani, this resolution was ignored by Hezbollah. The weak and ineffectual Lebanese government was powerless to enforce its implementation.
This untenable situation may change now that the dynamics in the Middle East have been upended.
Hezbollah’s ally, the Syrian regime of President Bashar al-Assad, has fallen ignominiously and has been replaced by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), an Islamist regime intent on avoiding friction with Israel. In the last few weeks, HTS has seized shipments of weapons bound for Lebanon, thereby cutting off Hezbollah’s arms smuggling routes on the Syrian-Lebanese border.
Hezbollah’s patron, Iran, has been considerably weakened due to Israel’s military successes in Lebanon, Assad’s ouster, and Israeli air strikes, which destroyed Iranian air defence batteries.
What all this means in strategic terms is that Hezbollah has been cut down to size and no longer wields the power and influence it once enjoyed.
If Aoun and Salam are successful, Lebanon can begin the lengthy rebuilding process, while displaced Israelis and Lebanese can return to their homes in the Galilee and southern Lebanon.
These signposts of progress would theoretically enable Israel and Lebanon to demarcate their land border and, possibly, usher in an era of peace and stability.