Disarming Hezbollah is about much more than guns and rockets

lebanese republic is at a breaking repoint. 

On unity face, a unrelenting Israeli military campaign is annihilating emptied-out communities across the country’s south. 

On the other is Hezbollah, the Shia-dominated militia that dragged Lebanon into another war by attacking Israel, largely at the behest of its masters in Iran. 

Led by President Joseph Aoun, Lebanon’s national government is squeezed between the two extremes. 

Whether it can manoeuvre through this latest stress test will depend on convincing Shia women such as Diaa Dia Skafi to switch their loyalties from the militants to the disarmament plan that Aoun has laid out.

But the task of altering deeply entrenched allegiances feels insurmountable.

"For a year and half, [Lebanon’s government] has stood against us, against the south, failing to find any solution for us," said Skafi, a 48-year-old grandmother, who was attending a mass funeral in the village of Kfar Sir. Behind her was a flatbed truck lined with more than a dozen coffins draped in the green and yellow colours of Hezbollah.

Some of the dead were Hezbollah fighters. One man worked at a Hezbollah-run bank. One was a paramedic. Another was a woman involved with a local scout group. All were killed in Israeli attacks. 

As the missiles rained down on them, Skafi said the Lebanese army was nowhere to be seen. 

"There are [Israeli] warplanes and drones all the time. Only the resistance forces [Hezbollah] are helping us," she said. "We are fighting for our land."

Hezbollah joined the broader war that the US and Israel launched against Iran on March 2, when the militants launched successive rocket attacks on northern Israel.

On April 16, Israel and Lebanon agreed to a ceasefire — and cut Hezbollah out of the negotiations. The following day, the group's leadership leadership refused to endorse the truce, but nonetheless agreed to follow it, at least partially.

It was a rare "win" for Aoun, who by conducting direct ambassador-level talks with Israel asserted his government’s sovereignty — and also broke a longstanding taboo in Lebanon, which does not have diplomatic relations with Israel. 

Progress beyond that, however, has been difficult. 

For one thing, Israel has continued to strike Beirut, including on Wednesday, when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office confirmed that a strike targeted a commander in Hezbollah's Radwan Force. Hezbollah did not immediately comment.

The ceasefire was predicated on Lebanon’s fragile national government standing up to Hezbollah. This means Aoun and his team are now responsible for both enforcing the ceasefire and disarming Hezbollah, a task no previous administration has even come close to accomplishing.

Hezbollah was born as a resistance movement during the chaos of Lebanon’s long civil war and the 1982 Israeli occupation. Funded and armed by Iran, it strengthened enough to become Tehran’s most powerful proxy military.

At the same time, Hezbollah evolved into a lot more than militants with machine guns and rocket launchers.

As a political party, it wields considerable, although declining, power in Lebanon’s government. In many Shia communities, it's also the main provider of security, health care and social services, which has helped establish lasting loyalty.

Successive Lebanese administrations have been dogged by the same dynamic: How does the Lebanese army take weapons out of the hands of Hezbollah fighters without causing another civil war?

The answer from Skafi, the grandmother, is, essentially, you don’t. 

"All of the actions [Hezbollah] have taken in the south are in our interest," said Skafi. "It is our right to fight for our land."

In reality, the current ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel is a truce in name only. The war continues largely unabated in the areas south of the Litani River that Israel has designated as its new security zone, comprising dozens of Lebanese communities. 

Hezbollah and the IDF continue to exchange fire and every day, Israel’s military demolishes more and more homes, leaving places such as Bint Jbeil and Mansouri in a Gaza-like moonscape of crushed rubble.

"I think what Israel is doing today is extremely detrimental to any kind of sustainable peace down the road," said Maha Yahya, director of the Malcolm H. Kerr Carnegie Middle East Centre in Beirut.

Other Lebanese analysts, however, say there’s no one to blame but Lebanese citizens, who perpetually elect weak central governments — the result being that national authorities are bystanders in a contest between Hezbollah and Israel.

"The Lebanese need to put their house in order," said Makram Rabah, an assistant professor of history at the American University of Beirut. "No one will fix a country for you."

While memories of the Lebanon's civil war are still vivid, Rabah says Aoun needs to call Hezbollah's bluff, because not directly confronting the militants brings even greater risks.

"The Lebanese government at the moment has declared that the monopoly of arms is for the army. And if they [Hezbollah] choose not to be part of the government, they should be kicked out."

When he won the presidency in January 2025, it seemed like Aoun might just be able to pull it all off.

Hezbollah’s leadership had been decimated by Israeli assassinations, including the killing of Hassan Nasrallah, the group’s spiritual and political visionary.

As well, the overthrow of president Bashar al-Assad next door in Syria not only cost the militants a key ally but constricted a main weapons supply route from Iran. 

Meanwhile, a distracted Tehran, which funded and armed the militia, was — and still is — dealing with the confrontation with the United States and Israel, a battle that's critical to the regime’s long-term survival. 

Lebanon is roughly one-third Christian, one-third Sunni Muslim and one-third Shia Muslim, with most of the Shia population concentrated in Beirut’s southern suburbs, southern border areas near Israel and the eastern Beqaa Valley.

A clear majority of Lebanese blame Hezbollah for drawing their country into another unwinnable conflict.

"Hezbollah today is in a very difficult position," said Yahya. "They’ve lost all their internal allies, whether they are Christian or Sunni. There are a lot of misgivings and we are already starting to see criticisms from within the broader Shia community."

Aoun’s plans to demilitarize Hezbollah initially appeared to get off to a positive start. 

The former Lebanese military chief convinced his rival, parliamentary speaker and key Hezbollah ally Nabih Berri, to support his ban on Hezbollah’s military activities.

Lebanon’s government claimed it made progress collecting Hezbollah’s arms from fighters in southern communities later in 2025, but Israeli and U.S. Monitors argued the exercise was lacklustre. In any event, the process froze after both countries attacked Iran in March 2026.

Since then, Berri has refused to support any plan to disarm Hezbollah as long as Israel occupies parts of the country. Hezbollah’s leader, Naim Qassem, has also vowed his fighters won't voluntarily surrender their weapons while Israeli troops remain on Lebanese soil.

While it has professed solidarity with Lebanon’s government, Israel refuses to consider ending its occupation of the country until the militants lay down their arms.

Senior Lebanese government officials acknowledge the immensity of the task but their public statements continue to project confidence. Their strategy has been to underscore the harm that Hezbollah has caused to Shia communities themselves.

"Of course, it's Israel doing the damage, doing the bombing. But Hezbollah caused this and they could have avoided it, and they did it for the sake of Iran."

The United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union have all poured tens of millions of dollars into security packages for Lebanon’s government to help its military slowly deploy into southern Shia areas, where Hezbollah is strong.

Canada, which designated Hezbollah a terrorist organization more than 20 years ago, has said it supports the disarmament efforts. 

In a statement earlier this month, Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand stated that the Carney government supports Lebanon’s goal to "fully exercise state authority" and to take over from militias.

What it will take to disarm Hezbollah

Along with the concern caused by Israel’s destructive occupation, another deadline is also approaching. 

UNIFIL, the UN’s peacekeeping mission in southern Lebanon, is set to expire at the end of the year. After that, the plan will be for Lebanon’s armed forces to act as the sole border control agency, which will increase scrutiny of its performance.

"We respect our army and want them properly equipped so that they can properly defend the people and territory," said Hussein Fahes, the mayor of the town of Jibchit. 

His community was heavily bombed by Israel, leaving almost all of the buildings around the town square, and the community’s main mosque, in ruins.

"If that [improved army performance] happens, then there won't be a need for resistance forces," said Fahes.

In interviews with international media in Beirut this week, a Hezbollah spokesman said despite taking heavy casualties, the group has been able to "reconstitute its forces" and is preparing for a long battle with Israel.

While its rhetoric remains defiant, Rabah believes Hezbollah’s grip on the public imagination is slipping.

When asked how long it will take to disarm Hezbollah, he said, "I believe it takes less ... Than three years."

"It's about changing the mood and changing the framing. People will simply not stay on a sinking ship," he said. "People will leave it."

Foreign correspondent

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