As negotiations between Washington and Tehran intensify around a possible framework agreement to end the current US-Israeli war on Iran, Lebanon has emerged as one of the key sticking points.
Iranian and Pakistani sources told The New Arab this weekend that draft proposals under discussion include ending the war “on all fronts”, including Lebanon, alongside wider ceasefire arrangements and nuclear negotiations.
But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has strongly resisted the idea of folding Lebanon into any broader settlement with Tehran.
“In last night’s conversation with President Trump, the Prime Minister emphasised that Israel will maintain freedom of action against threats in all arenas, including Lebanon,” an Israeli political source told Reuters on Sunday.
The comments came amid concerns inside Israel that a broader US-Iran understanding could constrain Israel’s war on Lebanon.
Crushing the ‘Axis of Resistance’
For Israel, Hezbollah is not simply a Lebanese armed group but the most powerful military force in the Iran-backed ‘Axis of Resistance’ – the network of groups opposing Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and its genocidal war on Gaza.
Israeli officials increasingly view dismantling Hezbollah as central to breaking regional armed opposition to Israeli military dominance.
Following the 7 October attacks and the Gaza war, Hezbollah opened a low-intensity front against Israel in support of Gaza, prompting escalating Israeli strikes and eventually renewed war across southern Lebanon.
Many analysts, therefore, see Israel’s campaign against Hezbollah not only as a border-security issue but as part of a broader effort to remove military deterrence against Israeli operations in Gaza and elsewhere.
The Lebanon paradox
Yet many argue Israel’s strategy contains a major contradiction.
While Israel publicly says it wants Hezbollah weakened and the Lebanese state strengthened, some say many of its actions simultaneously undermine the institutions capable of eventually containing Hezbollah permanently.
Israel ultimately fears not only Hezbollah itself, but the emergence of a strong, sovereign Lebanese state capable of independently controlling southern Lebanon, negotiating from a position of strength and restricting Israeli military freedom of action.
Maha Yahya, director of the Carnegie Endowment’s Middle East Centre, argued in an interview with The New Yorker that Lebanon’s government had already begun taking unprecedented steps against Hezbollah before Israel’s latest escalation.
“If Israel were interested in weakening Hezbollah further, they would have engaged diplomatically with the government,” Yahya said.
According to Yahya, Beirut had begun expanding army control south of the Litani River while moving toward asserting a state monopoly over weapons.
Israel instead continues strikes during what was supposed to be a ceasefire and period of US-brokered diplomacy with the Lebanese government, while maintaining military positions inside Lebanon and insisting on preserving long-term operational freedom
Occupation and strategic depth
Israel’s military posture increasingly suggests it may favour permanent strategic dominance over reliance on Lebanese sovereignty alone.
Israeli forces have maintained operational zones deep inside southern Lebanon during ceasefire arrangements, raising fears of a renewed long-term buffer zone or de facto occupation similar to Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon between 1982 and 2000.
There are fears that Israel’s obliteration of towns and villages within the buffer zone, as well as its cleansing of civilians, means permanent occupation.
That earlier occupation helped give rise to Hezbollah itself, which emerged as a resistance movement against Israeli military control.
An analysis published by The Atlantic warned that prolonged occupation or efforts to force Lebanon into an Israeli sphere of influence could ultimately revitalise Hezbollah politically and militarily.
“The only alternative to a Hezbollah-dominated Lebanon is a strengthened and sovereign Lebanese state,” the article argued.
Water, gas and geography
Some analysts also point to strategic geography and resources as factors shaping Israel’s approach.
Recent Israeli military maps and buffer-zone proposals have reportedly overlapped with maritime areas connected to Lebanon’s Qana gas field, a potentially vital future source of revenue for Lebanon’s struggling economy.
There have been concerns raised over the Litani and Wazzani rivers, strategically important water sources in southern Lebanon.
Some within Lebanon fear Israeli control over expanded security zones could eventually allow Israel to influence or divert regional water resources.
Collective punishment and deterrence
Another major criticism of Israel’s campaign is that it increasingly appears aimed not only at Hezbollah fighters, but at Hezbollah’s broader civilian support base within Lebanon’s Shia population.
Israeli bombardment and evacuation orders displaced more than a million people during the latest conflict, killing over 3000, with large parts of southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs heavily damaged.
“There’s an element of targeted punishment of the Shia community,” Maha Yahya told The New Yorker, arguing that some of the areas targeted by Israel were overwhelmingly residential and civilian in nature.
Many warn that widespread destruction and displacement risk pushing sections of Lebanese society back toward Hezbollah after years of frustration with the group.
