Lebanon Is Also Burning

BEIRUT – Following Donald Trump’s apparent threat to hit Iran with nuclear weapons Tuesday night, as part of his unprovoked war of aggression on that country, he abruptly announced a two-week cease-fire between the U.S. and that country, reportedly mediated by Pakistan. However, per the terms announced by the Iranian government, the deal was conditional on Lebanon’s inclusion under the umbrella of peace.

Twelve hours later, Israel launched at least 160 bombs at targets all across Lebanon within a span of just ten minutes, killing more than 300 people and injuring over 1,000, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health. The death toll continues to rise. It marked the deadliest Israeli attack since the beginning of the war back in 2023, underscoring the fact that Israel’s attacks are unlikely to stop, and hence the cease-fire is not likely to hold. Sure enough, on Wednesday afternoon Iran announced that the Strait of Hormuz would once again be closed because of Israel’s violation of the terms. Then on Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he ordered his cabinet to begin direct negotiations with the Lebanese government, but they retorted that a cease-fire is necessary first. If these negotiations take place, it would be a historic event since Lebanon doesn’t recognize the state of Israel and has never had direct negotiations.

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So warplanes and missiles still roar overhead every few minutes over Beirut. Dahiyeh, the southern suburb of the Lebanese capital long controlled by Hezbollah, is now reduced to a ghost town following the daily bombings. Buildings are ruined or lie flattened to their foundations, debris is everywhere, and most people have fled. Fear has taken root among the remaining population. Inside overcrowded shelters, tensions run high, as fighters argue with shopkeepers, demanding they switch off surveillance cameras.

Lebanon has been on edge since late February, when the United States and Israel launched their war against Iran, and that conflict rapidly spilled over into Lebanon. When Israeli and American forces assassinated Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on February 28, Hezbollah—a hybrid of political party and paramilitary force allied with Iran that has historically controlled much of southern Lebanon—retaliated by launching rockets and drones at an Israeli air defense base south of Haifa.

Since then, Israel has expanded both its war and its presence in Lebanon. Its campaign now includes ground incursions, so far limited, apparently aimed at establishing a demilitarized buffer zone south of the Litani River, which is about 20 miles north of Lebanon’s southern border, possibly extending a few miles further to the Zahrani River. This would leave something like a quarter of Lebanon’s current territory under Israeli control.

The broader region has been radically destabilized by the war and the resulting closure of the Strait of Hormuz by Iran. Lebanon is now feeling the full weight of those repercussions, facing yet another Israeli offensive. In the view of many observers, neither the United States nor its Israeli ally is seeking democracy or the well-being of local populations. Rather, their objective appears to be the creation of a new regional order even more dominated by Washington and Tel Aviv by reducing all their regional enemies to ruin and penury—even if it might have backfired spectacularly this time by allowing Iran to seize control of the strait and impose a toll on it.

This latest war is part of a long history of Israeli military action in Lebanon. Most immediately, back in 2024 an Israeli attack killed Hezbollah’s leader, Hassan Nasrallah, along with many other leaders. Since then, the group has re-emerged militarily, though significantly weakened. Its new secretary-general, Naim Qassem, lacks the political influence and popular appeal of his predecessor.

Thanks to that weakness, in a historic shift, the Lebanese state agreed as part of a November 2024 cease-fire to disarm Hezbollah. Even so, since that day Israeli forces have continued near-daily strikes across Lebanon, killing hundreds, abducting dozens, and wounding thousands more. All told, Israeli forces have committed more than 15,000 cease-fire violations across land, sea, and air.

While Hezbollah and its supporters argue that the group has the right to respond, it is also clear that it entered the conflict as part of a broader geopolitical agenda, without a unified national consensus. Key decisions were made without proper attention to Lebanon’s internal realities, at a time when the country was still struggling to recover from a previous war.

Taking advantage of Lebanon’s fragile sectarian balance, Israel has heavily targeted areas with large Shiite populations in an effort to widen the gap between Hezbollah and its base, and more broadly, between the group and Lebanese society as a whole. This effort has been reinforced by a significant propaganda and psychological warfare campaign, including the aerial distribution of leaflets urging civilians to disarm Hezbollah.

The Party of God Under Strain

Ali Jezzini, a 35-year-old analyst who frequently writes for the outlet Al Mayadeen, which is critical of Israel, says Hezbollah has made a series of “micro-level decisions” that have cost it its social contract within Lebanon.

“Since 1982, Hezbollah has functioned as a resistance force deeply embedded in society,” he explains from Café Barzakh in Beirut. “It played a key role in rebuilding the country after the civil war and Israeli occupations, supported the families of martyrs, and created jobs.”

According to Jezzini, this civilian network is precisely what the United States and Israel are trying to undermine. “They argue that these institutions are tied to military activity, but that’s not true,” he says.

After Hamas attacked Israel on October 7th, Hezbollah joined the conflict a day later, dragging Lebanon into more than a year of war. At the time, Israel used the narrative that Lebanese citizens had been pulled into a war that was not their own, in an effort to separate the population from Hezbollah. However, after the cease-fire, Hezbollah managed to repair what Jezzini calls the “damaged social contract,” particularly as Israeli strikes continued to hit civilian infrastructure, even after the war had ended.

That same strategy is now being applied in the current war, but on a broader scale. “The goal is to defeat Hezbollah politically,” Jezzini says. “By targeting its financial structure, they prevent it from compensating people after the war, which generates anger within its social base.”

“The ideological core will support them no matter what,” he adds, “but the periphery can drift away.”

At the start of the war, when Hezbollah launched six warning rockets into Israel, there were many complaints within its own community, but that later changed. “Israel is trying to break the middle class,” Jezzini argues, pointing to strikes on buildings in Bashoura and Jnah, central-Beirut neighborhoods outside designated bombing zones. “These are not ideological strongholds, they’re being targeted because they are beneficiaries of stability.”

“What worries me most is that civilians are being targeted,” he says, referring to the killing of more than 50 paramedics, three journalists, and over 1,700 people who were killed in densely populated areas, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health. “Israel attacked police officers, municipal workers, everything that makes up the civilian structure, they have their own interpretation of international law and what constitutes a legitimate target.” The objective seems to be to coerce Lebanese society into quashing Hezbollah through collective punishment of what remains of its middle class, after a devastating economic collapse that started in 2019.

Solidarity Despite Everything

The full evacuation of Dahiyeh and much of southern Lebanon is fueling tensions among the country’s 18 religious communities. More than 1.2 million people, roughly 25 percent of the population, have been displaced and redistributed across other regions.

At the same time, the Lebanese state’s inability to manage the crisis, contain Hezbollah, or bring Israel to the negotiating table is worsening the situation. The national army simply lacks the military capacity to impose order or assert control.

And yet solidarity persists despite political and ideological differences.

Dozens of grassroots initiatives have emerged to deliver food, clothing, and mattresses to displaced families, many of whom are sheltering in temporary facilities or sleeping in tents along Beirut’s Zeytuna Bay. Cars and pickup trucks arrive along the waterfront to distribute donations collected for those most in need.

“This solidarity is the clearest expression of national unity,” says Hussein Ibrahim, a writer for Al Akhbar, another outlet critical of Israel, speaking on a rainy afternoon. Still, he acknowledges that Lebanon’s social fabric is extremely fragile. “The distribution of power is very delicate, to the point that reaching consensus is extremely difficult,” he adds.

Public opinion on the war varies widely in a country still trying to heal from its civil war. “Large sectors of the population do not want war, while others see it as an existential struggle,” he says. He also notes that all political actors have external intermediaries who often disregard Lebanon’s national interests, resulting in deep internal divisions.

Despite everything, there is a shared understanding that Israel represents a major threat to the country’s integrity and existence. “That creates a common cause,” he says, “and explains why a certain level of solidarity still exists.”

Fractures Within Society

Amid these social fissures, old tensions rooted in the civil war are re-emerging. Groups such as the far-right, Christian-based Lebanese Forces have regained visibility, with graffiti appearing in neighborhoods like Achrafieh and Furn el-Shebbak. On April 6, an Israeli bomb killed two Lebanese Forces officials in Ain Saade, Beirut, and their funeral the next day turned into a Christian protest against Hezbollah, with many accusing them of being terrorists.

Still, Ibrahim considers these expressions marginal. “There is no real basis for a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis [who make up about 70 percent of the population], because they have their own grievances with Israel,” he says.

Hezbollah still appears to maintain a solid social base, but frustration is growing among many of its supporters, particularly over its decision to enter the war in support of Iran. At the same time, there is widespread anger at the Lebanese state for its lack of humanitarian response.

At the Camille Chamoun Sports City Stadium, a dozen children play on the soccer field, running through empty stands and entrances. Outside, hundreds of tents shelter families displaced from southern villages. Maryam, 37, arrived with her family from Baara Sheet after driving more than a day, following Israel’s evacuation order that affected half a million people.

“Hezbollah started a final battle, we didn’t ask for it, but we also can’t live under constant threat from Israel,” she says. “Now we’re living like beggars, without proper food, without being able to bathe, freezing, and the government isn’t helping us.”

Beside her, a new neighbor, Zein, a young farmer whose family land now lies abandoned, offers a different perspective. “I don’t like Hezbollah, but we have no choice but to wait,” he says. “It’s the second year we’ve lost our harvest. We’re tired of war.”

Butros, a shopkeeper from the Christian-majority village of Qalaya near the Israeli border, has a very different view: “Israel is excellent, it will help us remove the cancer of Hezbollah. It’s destroying our lives.”

Meanwhile, southern Lebanon has become a vast battlefield, particularly around the hilltop town of Khiam, where Israeli forces have encountered fierce resistance. A few kilometers from Khiam, near the southern border, a group of Druze, Christian, and Sunni villages submitted a declaration to the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), stating they would not evacuate and would remain neutral after the Lebanese army withdrew.

“We are neutral in the larger war between major actors,” says Qassem Qadri, mayor of Kfar Shouba, another small border village. “But we are Arabs, and we will not be free until the Palestinian issue is resolved and refugees can return home.”

He notes the strategic importance of the region: “This is a mountainous area that opens routes toward Syria, the Bekaa Valley, and access to the Golan Heights.” While some villagers have joined Hezbollah, he insists there are no active military operations in his area.

Can Israel See Reason?

At the highest levels of Lebanese politics, an intense internal debate is unfolding. Since October 7th, Israel had been pressuring the Lebanese state to continue the disarmament of Hezbollah and extract further concessions, particularly by advancing efforts to normalize relations between the two countries.

These measures are part of a broader political strategy adopted by Lebanon’s president and government since early 2025, under pressure from Western and regional powers. The aim has been to increase pressure on Hezbollah by weakening its financial networks and informal channels.

Ali M’rad, a lawyer from the Shiite community and adviser to President Joseph Aoun, is part of a team working on cease-fire negotiations under heavy pressure from the United States and France. “Hezbollah never accepted that we were defeated in 2024, and they never disarmed as agreed,” he says. “This was bound to lead to new confrontations.”

At the same time, he acknowledges the limits of the Lebanese state. “For many reasons, the state is too weak to confront Hezbollah. They effectively control parts of it, and that makes any internal confrontation extremely dangerous.”

He argues that Hezbollah has lost its role as a regional nonstate political actor. “The social contract is broken, they can no longer guarantee security, reconstruction, or the return of displaced people.”

Yet the Lebanese population sees no viable alternative. Neither the state nor Hezbollah is capable of meeting basic needs.

Regarding French President Emmanuel Macron’s push to normalize relations with Israel, M’rad is blunt: “We don’t want a peace agreement with Israel, but we may be forced into one because the balance of power is not in our favor,” he said.

“Our priorities are clear: first, stop the war; second, Israeli withdrawal; third, the right of return; and fourth, reconstruction,” he says. “We are calling for negotiations, but they’ve been rejected—for now. Eventually, someone will come to the table.”

That may or may not be true, now that Israel has seemingly decided to use Lebanon as a convenient lever to prevent a cease-fire between the U.S. and Iran. Indeed, its indiscriminate bombing campaign has already undermined one of its major achievements. It had previously demanded that Lebanon classify Hezbollah’s actions as illegal, and surprisingly, the Amal Movement, a Shiite political party and hitherto close ally of Hezbollah, supported the government’s position. Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, an Amal member, bitterly criticized Hezbollah for its decision to enter the regional war.

But now relations between the two groups seem to be mending after Israel’s latest round of strikes killed 20 Amal members. Berri is now sounding conciliatory, facing what is seen as an existential threat to the Shiite community. In that context, Netanyahu’s sudden desire for negotiations seems less than sincere. Across Lebanese society at large, all of Israel’s attempts to divide and conquer are at risk as it becomes quite clear Israel has little or no interest in peace.

However, “the problem with a peace agreement in Lebanon is how it will affect internal stability,” M’rad says. “Anti-Israeli sentiment is real, and Israel’s leadership is not diplomatic; they want another Gaza,” he mentioned days before the latest cease-fire failure.

To achieve its objectives, Israel’s war in Lebanon may continue for the foreseeable future, especially with strong backing from the United States. Even if a cease-fire with Iran is eventually reached, Netanyahu has already stated that Israeli forces intend to remain in Lebanon and possibly beyond.

But as M’rad concludes: “Lebanese society will resist. People will not accept occupation.”