Israel’s Efforts To Prevent Hezbollah From Rearming Could Be Blueprint for Ridding Gaza of Hamas Weapons

As Israel considers widening its already intense military operations targeting Hezbollah’s attempts to rearm, will its efforts in Lebanon be a blueprint for the disarming of Hamas in Gaza as well?American and Israeli officials have been disappointed with the Lebanese government’s implementation of its vow to disarm Hezbollah. On Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netayahu’s cabinet met to contemplate new military action north of the border. “We will not allow Lebanon to become a renewed front against us, and we will act as necessary,” the premier told reporters earlier. As talk of military action in Lebanon intensifies at Jerusalem, Washington is distributing to members of the United Nations Security Council a draft resolution to back President Trump’s plan for Gaza. In it, a proposed International Stabilizing Force would ensure “the process of demilitarizing the Gaza Strip,” according to a text of the draft that was leaked to Axios. Yet, just as the Lebanese army is failing at the task of disarming Hezbollah, few in Israel expect the yet-to-be-formed, mostly Arab Gaza force to be able — or even want — to disarm Hamas. Both the Lebanese government and the envisioned authority in the Strip might rely on the one party that is motivated, and has the firepower to perform that difficult task.On Monday, the Israel Defense Force targeted Hezbollah operators in southern Lebanon, including a top commander of its elite Radwan force, Mohammed Ali Hadid, who was killed in the Nabatiyeh district. At least 300 Hezbollah terrorists have been killed in such operations since last year’s cease-fire between Israel and Lebanon, according to the northern Israel-based Alma research center. “The Israeli military is doing a lot in Lebanon, and if it senses that its operations are not enough, it will intensify those efforts further,” Alma’s founder, Sarit Zehavi, tells the Sun. Washington, she adds, is supporting the IDF, and even as Beirut politicians protest against violations of sovereignty, they too are aware that Israel is doing a job that they must do, but cannot. “It’s the only pathway” for President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon “to restore his sovereignty,” a Lebanese-born researcher at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, Hussain Abdul-Hussain, tells the Sun. Mr. Aoun said recently “that if he sends the army on Hezbollah, there will be a civil war,” Mr. Hussain adds, “so this leaves him just one choice, which is Israel doing the work for him.”The Beirut government has tasked the Lebanese armed forces with fully disarming Hezbollah, as stipulated in the cease-fire agreement that ended the hostilities. Since that time, though, Hezbollah has at most agreed to conceal its weapons, but not to disarm.Hezbollah officials indicate they might allow the Lebanese armed forces to exert authority in the area near the border with Israel, south of the Litani River. Yet, Israelis are detecting intense rearming activity just north of the river, as well as at Hezbollah’s strongholds at the Beqaa valley and southern Beirut. Hezbollah is “playing with fire,” the defense minister, Israel Katz, said Sunday, accusing Mr. Aoun of “dragging his feet.”In November 2024, the IDF conducted intense attacks against Hezbollah, eliminating much of its rocket and missile arsenal and killing the top echelon of its command structure, including its chief, Hassan Nasrallah. Similarly, in the two-year Gaza war, Israel significantly degraded Hamas’s firepower and eliminated its top military echelon.On both fronts, though, once a cease-fire was reached, the terrorist organizations quickly moved to reassert power and rearm in areas of control. America has mostly backed Israel’s attempts at preventing these efforts. The new UN proposal for Gaza seems to be a part of that effort. “This is a very different proposal” than past Security Council resolutions, a former Israeli deputy ambassador to the UN, Daniel Carmon, tells the Sun. The Arab countries that would participate in the international force “need the cover of the UN” to send troops, he adds, “but the architecture is of a force not under UN control.”Earlier this year the Security Council voted to dissolve, by the end of next year, the failed UN Interim Force in Lebanon, which since 2006 has been charged with helping the Lebanese Army disarm Hezbollah. Instead, Hezbollah has long used Unifil positions in southern Lebanon as cover for its military activities. That is why giving the UN no role in the efforts to disarm Hamas is “well deserved,” Mr. Carmon says. The promise of disarming terrorist groups after they wreaked havoc on the Middle East in their efforts to destroy Israel is unlikely to be realized by any international group, whether controlled by the UN or merely backed by it. That task, in the end, will be left for Israel.

Israel’s Efforts To Prevent Hezbollah From Rearming Could Be Blueprint for Ridding Gaza of Hamas Weapons

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