Lebanon<\/a> who were displaced or lost loved ones in the war, turned to, it was Hezbollah. Many did so because they believed in it; others because the absence of the state left them little alternative.<\/p>\nAs the Lebanese state tries to reassert its authority, it finds the country deeply divided. It faces a challenge that extends far beyond disarming Hezbollah, which the US and Israel are pushing it to do.<\/p>\n
The state must contend with Hezbollah\u2019s deep-rooted social welfare system and persuade its supporters that it can provide security \u2013 even as continuing Israeli occupation and attacks undermine the state\u2019s claim that it can protect Lebanon.<\/p>\n
The latest round of war has hardened existing divisions over Hezbollah. The group\u2019s supporters accuse the government of humiliating Lebanon by negotiating directly with Israel and not responding to its attacks. Hezbollah\u2019s opponents blame the group for provoking a war by launching rockets at Israel on 2 March, triggering Israel\u2019s invasion and current occupation.<\/p>\n
\u201cHonestly, I don\u2019t care about the state. Before, we used to say: \u2018They should speak, they should do something.\u2019 Now, whether they speak, or don\u2019t speak, it makes no difference to us,\u201d said al-Ashkar. Her home was blown up during a nominal ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel in 2024, and her village was occupied by Israel until its withdrawal in 2000.<\/p>\n
For Mustapha Hamze, a 66-year-old doctor from the outskirts of Nabatieh, a stronger state would make a difference. Neither Hezbollah\u2019s weapons nor the government\u2019s diplomacy has helped him access his home, which he fled in the early days of the war. The last time he tried, an Israeli drone fired on him.<\/p>\n
\u201cIsrael says it wants peace, that\u2019s a lie. But Hezbollah also needs wars, these groups live through war. They have weapons and they take everything from you. They resemble one another,\u201d said Hamze. \u201cThere is no other strong political organisation. [Hezbollah] wants everyone to be with them and under their wing, anything else is unacceptable.\u201d<\/p>\n
But he also has little faith in the Lebanese state\u2019s ability to defend his rights. He has applied for safe passage to visit his home through the Lebanese army, which has a place in a deconfliction mechanism that includes Israel, but has yet to receive it.<\/p>\n
Lebanese officials know one of their biggest challenges will be convincing people to place their faith in the state \u2013 particularly supporters of Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis needs to be a whole-of-government approach. For supporters of Hezbollah, you are talking about three generations of social indoctrination. You have to start with the culture, then inclusion in government, and then we can talk about security,\u201d a senior Lebanese security official said on condition of anonymity.<\/p>\n
The Lebanese government is using the three \u201cpilot zones\u201d \u2013 areas handed back to the Lebanese army from Israeli occupation \u2013 as prototypes of communities where it is trying to rebuild trust in the state.<\/p>\n
Reconstruction in these areas, mostly destroyed by Israeli shelling, is following a different blueprint from previous wars. The army is not allowing the southern council, a government body closely tied to the Hezbollah-allied Amal movement, to conduct reconstruction as was the case in the past.<\/p>\n
A damaged mosque in the village of Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh on 13 August. Photograph: Wael Hamzeh\/EPA<\/p>\n
Instead, it is the Lebanese army taking charge of rebuilding roads and repairing infrastructure. This way, the security official said, the state is visible and citizens will turn to Beirut, rather than Hezbollah. And, the army can fulfil its obligations under the pilot zone agreement by ensuring that infrastructure projects are not being used for military purposes.<\/p>\n
But the state\u2019s narrative is undermined every time Israel shells Lebanese land \u2013 which happens several times a day \u2013 and it does not respond. Last week, Israeli troops blew up the municipal building, a public school and a clinic in eastern Zawtar, in view of one of the three pilot zones, Zawtar al-Gharbiyah.<\/p>\n
The cash-strapped state also cannot match the extensive social services Hezbollah has to offer.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe got medical treatment, free medicine, blood tests from Hezbollah and Samidoun [an affiliated aid group]. As for the state, we haven\u2019t gotten anything from them. And the army\u2019s hands were tied by the government,\u201d said Tia Abdalah, a displaced resident from the border village of Aitaroun. Although she was not affiliated with Hezbollah, she said the group gave her family monthly cash stipends, as well as aid boxes.<\/p>\n
Lebanese officials are painfully aware of the limits of their ability to stop Israeli bombing; they are determined to go through the diplomatic process regardless. But without Israel\u2019s withdrawal from south Lebanon, they fear the legitimacy of the state will collapse.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe pilot zones won\u2019t work unless there is a clear timetable for withdrawal. We want to push out Hezbollah, but we don\u2019t want to appear as if we are playing the role of the South Lebanese Army,\u201d said the security official, referencing Israel\u2019s proxy that aided its occupation of south Lebanon from the 1980s until 2000.<\/p>\n
To people such as al-Ashkar, whose husband died in what she sees as the fight to defend Lebanon from Israel, the state offers little promise of security.<\/p>\n
\u201c[Israel] calls [the army] on the telephone and tells them: \u2018Leave the village,\u2019 so they leave the village. Then there\u2019s nobody left defending it \u2026 Sometimes you feel they\u2019re working for the Israelis,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fatima al-Ashkar used toys to explain to her children that their father had been killed. She arranged toy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":595864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,43],"class_list":["post-595863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=595863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/595863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/595864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=595863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=595863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=595863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}