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BEIRUT: As a tenuous ceasefire took hold in Gaza this month, Israel launched more airstrikes on southern Lebanon — 11 months into a ceasefire there.
The bombardment of a construction equipment business killed a Syrian passerby, wounded seven people including two women, and destroyed millions of dollars worth of bulldozers and excavators.
The Oct. 11 strikes would be an anomaly in most countries not at war. But near-daily Israeli attacks have become the new normal in Lebanon, nearly a year after a US-brokered truce halted the latest conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.
Some see a likely blueprint for the Gaza ceasefire, with ongoing but lower-intensity conflicts. On Sunday, Israel struck Gaza after it said Hamas fired at its troops, in the first major test of the US-brokered truce.
Mona Yacoubian, director of the Middle East program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, described the Lebanon scenario as a “lessfire” rather than a ceasefire.
Lebanon “could well serve as the model for Gaza, essentially giving leeway to Israeli forces to strike whenever they deem a threat without a full resumption of conflict,” she said.
A ceasefire with no clear enforcement
The latest Israel-Hezbollah conflict began the day after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel triggered the war in Gaza. The militant group Hezbollah, largely based in southern Lebanon, began firing rockets into Israel in support of Hamas and the Palestinians.
Israel responded with airstrikes and shelling. The low-level conflict escalated into full-scale war in September 2024.
The ceasefire on Nov. 27, 2024, required Lebanon to stop armed groups from attacking Israel and Israel to halt “offensive” military actions in Lebanon. It said Israel and Lebanon can act in “self-defense,” without elaborating.
Both sides can report alleged violations to a monitoring committee of the US, France, Israel, Lebanon and the UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL, but the deal is vague on enforcement.
In practice, Israel has largely taken enforcement into its own hands, asserting that its strikes in Lebanon target Hezbollah militants, facilities and weapons.
Israel says it aims to stop the badly weakened group from rebuilding. Lebanese officials say the attacks obstruct its efforts to get Hezbollah to disarm by giving the group a pretext to hold onto its weapons.
Lebanon also says Israel’s strikes, including the Oct. 11 one, often harm civilians and destroy infrastructure unrelated to Hezbollah.
Lebanon’s health ministry has reported more than 270 people killed and around 850 wounded by Israeli military actions since the ceasefire. As of Oct. 9, the UN human rights office had verified that 107 of those killed were civilians or noncombatants, said spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan.
No Israelis have been killed by fire from Lebanon since the ceasefire.
From Nov. 27, 2024, to mid-October, UNIFIL detected around 950 projectiles fired from Israel into Lebanon and 100 Israeli airstrikes, spokesperson Kandice Ardiel said. During the same period, it reported 21 projectiles fired from Lebanon toward Israel. Hezbollah has claimed one attack since the ceasefire.
Conflicting narratives
After the Oct. 11 strikes in Msayleh, Israel’s army said it hit “engineering equipment intended for the reconstruction of terrorist infrastructure in southern Lebanon.”
Lebanese authorities, Hezbollah and the equipment’s owner disputed that.
“Everyone in Lebanon, from all different sects, comes to buy from us,” owner Ahmad Tabaja told journalists. “What have we done wrong?”
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun called the strikes “blatant aggression against civilian facilities.” Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri accused Israel of seeking to prevent communities’ reconstruction. Lebanon complained to the UN Security Council.
A few days later, Israel struck a cement factory and a quarry, claiming Hezbollah planned to use it to rebuild its infrastructure.
Last month, an Israeli strike hit a motorcycle and a car carrying a family in Bint Jbeil. It killed Shadi Charara, a car salesman, three of his children — including 18-month-old twins — and the motorcyclist, and badly wounded Charara’s wife and oldest daughter. It was among the highest death tolls since the ceasefire, sparking particular outrage because of the children.
“My brother was a civilian and his children and wife are civilians, and they have nothing to do with politics,” said sister Amina Charara.
Israel’s military said it was targeting a Hezbollah militant, whom it did not name, but acknowledged that civilians were killed.
Even when the target is a known Hezbollah member, the military necessity can be disputed.
Earlier this month, an Israeli drone strike killed a Hezbollah member who was blinded last year in Israel’s exploding pagers attack, along with his wife. Israel’s army said Hassan Atwi was a key official in Hezbollah’s Aerial Defense Unit. Hezbollah officials said he had played no military role since losing his eyesight.
The end of ‘mutual deterrence’
Hezbollah was formed in 1982, with Iranian backing, to fight Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon at the time. Israeli forces withdrew in 2000, and Hezbollah grew into one of the region’s most powerful non-state armed groups.
In 2006, Hezbollah and Israel fought a month-long war that ended in a draw. For the next 17 years, “there was a tense calm ... that was largely due to mutual deterrence,” said Nicholas Blanford, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council’s Middle East program.
Strikes in Lebanon were generally understood to be off limits. Both sides wanted to avoid another damaging war. Now that equation has changed.
Though Blanford said Hezbollah could still deliver blows to Israel, the group’s “deterrence has been shattered by the recent war,” he said.
In an interview with The Associated Press last month, Hezbollah political official Mohammad Fneish said the prospect of coexisting with daily Israeli attacks is “not acceptable.”
But the group has largely limited itself to calling on Lebanon’s government to pressure Israel with what Fneish called “its political, diplomatic or other capabilities.”
He added: “If things develop further, then the resistance leadership is studying matters, and all options are open.”
Yacoubian, the analyst, said she didn’t see the situation in Lebanon changing any time soon, “barring a breakthrough in behind-the-scenes negotiations brokered by the US”
With the Gaza ceasefire, she said, the difference could be the “significant role” of fellow mediators Qatar, Egypt and Turkiye.