Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun. File
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FILE – Former President Donald Trump returns from a lunch break at Manhattan Criminal Court, May 28, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson, Pool, File)
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A man inspects the site of an Israeli strike in the southern suburbs of Beirut, Lebanon on Thursday (April 9, 2026).
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The Lebanese government has been critical of Iran and accuses its elite Revolutionary Guard of operating in Lebanon alongside the Hezbollah militant group and dragging the country into another war with Israel.
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Israeli soldiers gather next to military vehicles on the Israeli side of the border with Lebanon, amid escalation between Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel, and amid the U.S.-Israeli conflict with Iran, in northern Israel, on March 17, 2026.
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Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. File.
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Lebanon’s Army will fully disarm Hezbollah near the border with Israel within three months, Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi told AFP on Tuesday (September 9, 2025) in an interview that provided details of a plan rejected by the militant group.

In August, the Lebanese government, under pressure from the United States and Israeli strikes, ordered the military to draw up disarmament plans which cabinet said last week the Army would begin implementing, without disclosing details.

Raggi said Army chief Rodolphe Haykal presented a five-stage plan that would ensure the Lebanese state has a monopoly over weapons in the country.

The first stage should take “three months… during which the removal of weapons will be completed south of the Litani River”, around 30 kilometres (20 miles) from Israel, Raggi said.

“There will be no warehouses, no weapons, no weapons transfers, no fighters, and no display of arms” in the area by the end of November, he said.

During the first phase, the army will implement security measures across the country, he added.

The army will “tighten and increase the number of checkpoints, prevent the movement and carrying of weapons… but without conducting raids, arresting individuals, or confiscating weapons from warehouses”, Raggi said.

“At the very least, the movement of weapons from one area to another will be prohibited.”

Raggi said the next four phases of the plan will see disarmament in other regions, including Beirut and the eastern Bekaa, “but without timelines”.

Hezbollah has been severely weakened by a year-long conflict with Israel, including two months of open war, that destroyed part of its arsenal and decimated its leadership.

It has along with its allies in the government opposed the disarmament push, which Lebanon says is part of a ceasefire deal that ended the war last November.

In June, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said that the Lebanese army had dismantled more than 500 Hezbollah military positions and weapons depots in the south, where the group built a large number of tunnels and still holds sway.

Limited capabilities

Last week, Information Minister Paul Morcos told journalists that the army will implement its disarmament plan “in accordance with the available capabilities, which are limited in terms of logistics, material and human resources”.

Referring to the end-of-year deadline, Raggi said army chief Haykal has briefed the government that there are insufficient “human, material, or technical capabilities to be able to do everything within that period, and that he needs more time”.

In August, Lebanon approved a US proposal that laid out the timeline and mechanism for dismantling Hezbollah’s arsenal, and stipulated Israel’s total withdrawal from Lebanon.

Lebanon said last week that “the Israeli side has not yet shown any commitment” to the contents of the American proposal presented by envoy Tom Barrack.

It insisted any progress on implementation was conditional on other parties, primarily Israel.

Lebanon remains bound to disarm the Iran-backed group regardless, Raggi said, explaining that “arms monopoly is not linked to Barrack’s proposal” but a matter of state policy.

Diplomatic pressure

Last year’s truce, based on a 2006 UN Security Council resolution that said all non-state groups should be disarmed, called for the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon and an end to strikes on the country.

But Israel has repeatedly bombed its northern neighbour since and kept soldiers deployed in five border areas it deems strategic.

Raggi said Lebanon is exerting diplomatic pressure to push Israel to stop its attacks and withdraw its troops.

Hezbollah has strongly rejected the disarmament bid, accusing the government of implementing US and Israeli directives.

Before the war and the overthrow of its Syrian ally Bashar al-Assad shifted the balance of power in the region, Hezbollah was the most powerful political force in Lebanon, able to sway and disrupt governments.

It was the only group to keep its weapons after Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, doing so in the name of resistance against Israel, which occupied the south until 2000.

Published – September 09, 2025 10:02 pm IST

An Israeli tank is positioned on the Israeli side of the Israel-Lebanon border. File.
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Israel attacked the Hezbollah militant organization in the Bekaa region of Lebanon.

Beirut:

The Israeli military is all but certain to miss a Sunday deadline to withdraw from southern Lebanon under a ceasefire deal that ended its war with Hezbollah two months ago.

Under the terms of the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire that took effect on November 27, the Lebanese army is to deploy alongside United Nations peacekeepers in the south as the Israeli army withdraws over a 60-day period that ends on Sunday.

On Saturday, the Lebanese army said a delay in implementing the agreement was the “result of the procrastination in the withdrawal from the Israeli enemy’s side”.

Israeli forces have left coastal areas of southern Lebanon, but are still present in areas further east.

The deal stipulates that Hezbollah pull back its forces north of the Litani River — about 30 kilometres (20 miles) from the border — and dismantle any remaining military infrastructure in the south.

But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said on Friday that “the ceasefire agreement has not yet been fully enforced by the Lebanese state” and so the military’s withdrawal would continue beyond the Sunday deadline.

“The withdrawal process is conditional upon the Lebanese army deploying in southern Lebanon and fully and effectively enforcing the agreement, with Hezbollah withdrawing beyond the Litani River,” a statement from Netanyahu’s office said.

It added that “the gradual withdrawal process will continue in full coordination with the United States”, a key ally and one of the monitors of the ceasefire.

The Lebanese army said it was “ready to continue its deployment as soon as the Israeli enemy withdraws”.

‘Scorched Earth’

Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Fayad said on Saturday that Israel’s “excuses” were a pretext to “pursue a scorched earth policy” in border areas that would make the return of displaced residents “impossible”.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, who took office earlier this month, spoke on Saturday with his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron, whose government is also involved in overseeing the truce.

According to a statement from his office, Aoun spoke of the “need to oblige Israel to respect the terms of the deal in order to maintain stability in the south”.

Aoun also said Israel must “end its successive violations, including the destruction of border villages… which would prevent the return of residents”.

Macron’s office, in its summary of the conversation, said the French president had called on all parties to the Lebanon ceasefire to honour their commitments as soon as possible.

The fragile ceasefire has generally held, even as the warring sides have repeatedly traded accusations of violating it.

The Israeli military has continued to carry out frequent strikes which it says targeted Hezbollah fighters, and Lebanese state media has reported that Israeli forces were carrying out demolitions in villages they control.

The November 27 deal ended two months of full-scale war which had followed months of low-intensity exchanges.

Hezbollah began trading cross-border fire with the Israeli army the day after the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel by its Palestinian ally Hamas which triggered the war in Gaza.

Israel intensified its campaign against Hezbollah in September, launching a series of devastating blows against the group’s leadership and killing its longtime chief Hassan Nasrallah.

Hezbollah warned on Thursday that “any violation of the 60-day deadline will be considered a flagrant violation” of the ceasefire agreement and “an infringement on Lebanese sovereignty”.

The group refrained from any threat to resume attacks on Israel but said the Lebanese state should use “all means necessary… to restore the land and wrest it from the clutches of the occupation”.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)