BEIRUT — A year after the ceasefire was declared between Lebanon and Israel, the country remains suspended in a fragile limbo, caught between persistent security threats, entrenched political fractures, and mounting international pressures.

The so-called ceasefire ended the 66-day confrontation, but it did not bring genuine stability. Instead, it froze a volatile landscape where Israel continues to violate Lebanese sovereignty, leaving southern Lebanon devastated and diplomatic initiatives oscillating between conditional offers and implicit threats.

South Lebanon bears lasting scars 

On the ground, south Lebanon bears visible and lasting scars. Over 96,000 displaced residents remain unable to return to their homes due to ongoing Israeli occupation of frontline areas, sporadic shelling, and widespread village destruction. 

24 border villages are now partially or entirely empty, while reconstruction efforts remain piecemeal at best.

The economic toll is staggering: damages to buildings and infrastructure exceed $3.4 billion, and the broader impact on southern Lebanon surpasses $5 billion. 

For many communities, this trauma is not new. Since 1948, waves of displacement—from the Hula massacre to the 1978 “Litani Operation,” the 1982 invasion, the long occupation until 2000, the 2006 war, and now the 2024 conflict—have created a “double memory”: one of uprooting and one of rebuilding. Homes are reconstructed not merely as shelters, but as vessels of identity, resilience, and Resistance.

Israel’s maneuvering

The military dimension of the conflict remains central. Since the ceasefire, Israel has committed over 10,000 violations of Lebanese territory, including thousands of airstrikes and incursions, systematically breaching UN Resolution 1701.

Tel Aviv’s objective is crystal clear: control five strategic zones (Blat, Jal al-Deir, Dawawir, Hammams, and al-Buna), whose elevated terrain offers fire-control dominance over southern villages up to the Litani River.

Historically devastated and subjected to rebuilding bans, these areas form what Israel envisions as a “military belt” shielding colonial settlements in the Upper and Western Galilee.

Even a single rocket from south of the Litani, however rudimentary, threatens these settlements, fueling Israel’s enduring ambition to reshape realities on the ground.

Simultaneously, Israel tests the Syrian front, signaling a willingness to regionalize the confrontation—demonstrating that Israel has never sought genuine negotiations but rather tactical leverage in service of broader strategic goals.

The illusion of mediation

Political negotiations in Lebanon are equally entangled. External actors, particularly Egypt, have attempted to mediate, framing their role as preventing a larger Israeli escalation. Discussions often focus on “removing pretexts” that Israel could use to justify deeper incursions—potentially as far as the Awali River.
Yet behind the façade of mediation lies a deeper truth: Israel’s ambitions are unapologetically maximalist. Its goal is not compromise but to rewrite the legacies of 2000 and 2006, imposing a vision of “border security” rooted in the ideology of Greater Israel. 

Such ambitions are invariably facilitated by the U.S., transforming Israel into a regional instrument for reshaping the Middle East according to Washington’s strategic blueprint.

Meanwhile, three variables, indeed, define Lebanon’s current vulnerability:
1. Internal division: Lebanon’s fragmented political landscape weakens its negotiating position, exposing state institutions to U.S.–Israeli pressure for sovereign concessions, while domestic factions compete to reshape internal power balances under the guise of reform. This plays directly into an external objective: eroding the resistance’s popular base and steering Lebanon toward a settlement of weakness.
2. The latest conflict: While critics emphasize losses in southern communities, they understate the military achievements: for 66 days, Israeli forces were unable to hold strategic points, and rocket deterrence was reasserted.
3. Regional mediation: Arab involvement, particularly Egypt’s, increasingly echoes U.S. messaging, warning Lebanon of collapse and isolation should it refuse Israeli “guarantees.” Rather than shielding Lebanon, this integrates the region into a broader U.S.–Israeli project aimed at redefining the Middle East at the expense of Arab sovereignty.

One year after the ceasefire, Lebanon exists in a suspended reality. War has not ended, diplomacy has not succeeded, and pressure has yet to force capitulation. The real struggle is internal: Lebanon must reassess the past year, consolidate a unified national strategy, and reaffirm its sovereign right to defend its land. 

Without such recalibration, others—primarily Israel as the U.S. proxy—will determine Lebanon’s fate, cementing weakness over sovereignty and vulnerability over deterrence.

It is here that the words of martyr Hezbollah Secretary-General Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah resonate profoundly: “The conclusion of this battle is the great historic divine victory. Netanyahu, Galant, Ben Gvir, and Smotrich are leading their entity to ruin—driving it to a third collapse, according to their own writings. This reckless, selfish, narcissistic, and erratic leadership will bring this entity to a deep abyss. Yet before the future of this great battle, I say: days, nights, weeks, months, and perhaps years—this is a long and immense battle with this entity, but its horizon and outcome are clear. The fighters, the believers, the patient, the conscientious, and the wounded see it, and the martyrs from above bear witness to it today.”