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There were trials in Nuremberg (1945–46) and in Tokyo (1946–48), and even in Istanbul, gallows were erected in July 1919 to execute Young Turks responsible for the Armenian genocide. That said, one could legitimately wonder why the authorities of Ahmed al-Chareh had been so slow to set the judicial machinery in motion. Was he hesitant to punish the abuses committed against an entire people by the Al-Assad dynasty of tyrants and their inner circles? The question was all the more pressing given that more than twenty officials—both top figures and lesser ones, if you’ll pardon the expression—had been arrested and were languishing in prison awaiting trial. Then, on April 26, the first public hearing opened in Damascus with this statement from Judge Fakhr al-Din al-Aryane: “Today, we begin the first trials under transitional justice in Syria.” A brief comparison Who would not wish for our neighbor Syria to hold public trials that, by condemning the criminals of the Baathist regime, would deliver not vengeance but justice? And for that, should it not avoid taking the Iraqi or Lebanese models as examples? Let us recall that in Iraq, in 2006, what took place was a sham trial—the notorious kangaroo trial of Saddam Hussein. He was executed hastily after his conviction in the Dujail case, before the trial concerning the 1988 Halabja affair—where chemical weapons were used against civilians—had been completed. As a result, the Kurds, like many relatives of the victims, were deprived of a sound administration of justice, which might have eased their profound sense of injustice: a proper trial can help in the process of mourning. As for Lebanon, an exceptional country that endured fifteen years of simmering civil war and foreign occupations, the approach was even more expeditious and far more terse: the 1991 amnesty law wiped away the horrors committed with a single stroke of the pen*. Waiting for Bashar, Maher, and the others Should we believe things will be different in Syria? In any case, Syrian courts do not rest on Sundays, since it was on such a day that the first hearing of a process destined to expose the horrors of the fallen regime was held in Damascus. Two notable figures, however, were absent: the deposed president Bashar al-Assad and his brother Maher. They had vanished, like so many other perpetrators who now live comfortably—whether in Russia, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, or even, we are told, in Germany, Sweden, and Belgium. The criminals of the regime who will escape justice in their own country number in the thousands. “Fall guys” will pay in place of those who planned and ordered massacres and systematic torture—the hallmark of the Syrian prison system. Transitional justice and the rule of law? Trials are necessary, if only for their cathartic effect—but not as acts of revenge dictated by the law of retaliation. The “transitional justice” emphasized by Judge al-Aryane must not take the form of settling scores; it must establish the truth, compensate victims, and pave the way for national reconciliation. But is this anything more than wishful thinking? In our youth, our teachers warned us against illusions and idealism. For, like charity, justice in practice can only ever be “partial and biased.” *Some crimes, such as those committed against political, religious, or diplomatic figures, were not, however, covered by the amnesty law.

On a scale of 1 to 10, optimism regarding a breakthrough in the US-Iranian talks in Islamabad remains below average, with Tehran and Washington still at the stage of exchanging conditions and demands. The official Iranian agency, IRNA, revealed on Friday that the Islamic Republic submitted a new proposal for resuming negotiations to the United States on Thursday evening via the Pakistani mediator, which are supposed to bring a lasting end to the war. IRNA did not give details on the content of the Iranian offer while the Iranian Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, got in touch with his Saudi, Qatari, Turkish, Egyptian, Iraqi, and Azerbaijani counterparts. According to Iranian media, he reportedly informed them of an upcoming new round of talks with the United States, even as President Donald Trump announced to reporters at the White House that he was not satisfied with the new Iranian document. "They want a deal because they no longer have military capabilities, but I am not satisfied with their proposals. We'll see what happens," he stated, before clarifying: "They are asking me to accept things that I cannot accept." The new submitted document constitutes a counter-proposal to the one Washington had submitted to Iran earlier in the week. The American news site Axios thus recalls that on Monday, White House envoy Steve Witkoff sent to the opposing party, still via the Pakistani mediator, amendments to Iranian proposals rejected earlier by President Donald Trump. Tehran said it was willing to reopen the Strait of Hormuz but proposed postponing the nuclear talks to a later date, whereas this issue is central for both the United States and Israel. Steve Witkoff therefore reintroduced the nuclear issue to the text being considered. Also according to Axios, among the modifications made to the Iranian document is the demand that Tehran commit to not transferring enriched uranium out of its damaged nuclear facilities, nor resuming activities at these sites, throughout the duration of the negotiations. Tehran, for its part, strangled by the blockade imposed by the United States on its ports, refuses to resume talks as long as the American siege is not lifted. Which of the two will be led to make concessions? For the time being, both sides seem to be digging their heels in, under the worried eyes of Israeli leaders who fear a certain American flexibility that Donald Trump brushed aside by affirming that the military option is still not ruled out. Tel Aviv remains in favor of a "surgical" military operation capable of dealing a death blow to the Mullah regime -one of the primary objectives of the war launched on February 28- and annihilating the Iranian nuclear program once and for all. For now, Tehran and Washington therefore continue to say they are in favor of talks, but while continuing the exchange of threats. Through the head of its judiciary, Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei, Iran on Friday once again rejected any policy "imposed under threat" while saying it remained open to dialogue with the United States. "We do not approve of war in any way, we do not want war, we do not want it to continue. The Islamic Republic has never shied away from negotiations (...) but we will certainly not accept having a policy imposed on us," Mr. Ejei stated in a video broadcast on the judiciary's website, Mizan Online. He indicated that Iran is "absolutely not willing to renounce its principles and values in the face of a malicious enemy in order to avoid war or prevent it from continuing." Believing that the United States had "obtained nothing" during the war, he insisted that Tehran would not "yield" during negotiations. On Wednesday, President Donald Trump warned that the Iranians had "better get smart and fast!" by mentioning the possibility of an extension to the maritime blockade "for several months," according to a senior White House official. American sanctions Meanwhile, American pressure is mounting. On Friday, just hours after receiving the text of the new Iranian proposals, Washington once again imposed sanctions on Friday against six individuals and more than 20 entities, all linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Iranian financial structure. But at the same time, Washington has slightly reduced its military presence in the region. One of the three American aircraft carriers deployed to the Middle East, the USS Gerald Ford, deployed for the war in Iran, has left the region, a US official said on Friday, with two other such vessels remaining positioned there. The world's largest aircraft carrier is currently in the US European Command area of responsibility, according to the official, who estimated the number of US Navy ships remaining deployed in the Middle East at twenty. This count includes the aircraft carriers USS Abraham Lincoln and USS George Bush. Does this mean the United States has given up on strikes against Iran? The answer is obviously negative, as this redeployment could be a simple military tactic. The fact remains that the American president does not intend to seek authorization from Congress to continue the war against Iran. Friday indeed marks the 60-day deadline after which Donald Trump must, in principle, request this authorization. Before reporters at the White House, he announced that he was not going to do so. In any case, Democrats find themselves powerless to enforce this constitutional obligation, as they do not have the majority in Congress. Asked if he was considering new strikes against Iran, he simply replied: "Why would I tell you?"  Continuous escalation in South Lebanon On the Lebanese front, the escalation continues in South Lebanon, where the Israeli army has relentlessly bombarded numerous sites attributed to Hezbollah and carried out extensive demolition operations that have not spared historical and archaeological sites. The Israeli army blew up an old monastery and a school run by nuns in Yaroun, as well as the historical site of Chamah, which houses the maqam of Chamoun as-Safa, along with a historical fortress. Violent raids were carried out against a large number of villages, notably Habbouche, whose residents had earlier been called to evacuate the area. Around ten people were killed in this locality. Hezbollah reacted by launching, in turn, explosive drones and rockets against Israeli positions in the new buffer zone established by Tel Aviv at the border. This new wave of violence, which has become a daily occurrence, was followed by a vast exodus towards Sidon and Beirut, with many Southerners fearing a widening of the conflict. While the Israeli army acknowledged having difficulties countering the threat of Hezbollah's explosive drones, the pro-Iranian group announced that it had successfully dispatched reinforcements to South Lebanon. During an interview with a group of journalists, including AFP, the group's media relations director, Youssef el-Zein, revealed that these reinforcements did not use routes controlled by the Lebanese army, specifying that "other access points south of the Litani have not been closed." "We are convinced that the army is a national army," which "will not enter into a confrontation with Hezbollah," he said. According to the official, if Israel was able to infiltrate deep into Lebanese territory, it is because "the resistance had handed over its weapons south of the Litani" and "its infrastructure, including tunnels, were destroyed." But he assured that Hezbollah had been able to "rebuild its forces" after the last war with Israel and that it was "prepared for a long battle." When asked about Hezbollah's recent use of fiber-optic explosive drones against the Israeli army, Youssef al Zein said it was a "tactic" of the group. "We know the enemy's superiority, but at the same time we take advantage of its weak points," he said. Mr. Zein, who replaced Afif Naboulsi, killed in an Israeli strike on Beirut in November 2024, indicated that these drones were "manufactured in Lebanon." Attacks carried out using these drones have left two dead and several wounded over the past three days. On the political level, the showdown continues between the State and Hezbollah. The parliamentary bloc of this group, chaired by MP Mohammad Raad, once again rejected, in very harsh terms, any direct dialogue between Lebanon and Israel, castigating what it called "the destructive policy of a declining power" and boasting of having "succeeded in establishing a new military equation against Israel." The prospects for launching talks between Beirut and Tel Aviv were reviewed during the meeting that President Joseph Aoun had on Friday with the US Ambassador in Beirut, Michel Issa, who had previously met with the Lebanese Prime Minister, Nawaf Salam. These two meetings come the day after the announcement made by President Trump, according to which the Lebanese-Israeli negotiations are expected to start within two weeks. But Lebanon's position remains unchanged: No talks as long as Tel Aviv has not ended its attacks against Lebanese localities and infrastructure in the south of the country. President Aoun reiterated this condition to the diplomat.

In a forthcoming series of articles, we intend to shed light on the current situation through the lens of history, steering clear of impassioned, ideological, or romanticized narratives that overlook the realities on the ground. Our aim is to give readers the tools to draw their own conclusions. In this context, it is high time to seriously challenge the sterile rhetoric of “resistance” – not with counter-rhetoric, but through a deeper approach that champions the rule of law, which can only be built on sovereignty. The first three articles presented a reinterpretation of the events surrounding Hezbollah's rise to power, from the Taif Agreement through Operation “Settling of Accounts” and the “July Agreement” (1993), up to the eve of its second war with Israel. Stage 5: From the “April Understanding” to a War of Attrition Following the “April Understanding” of 1996, Hezbollah – emboldened by Iran and Syria – relentlessly pursued the war of attrition it had launched in 1991 against the Israeli army and the South Lebanon Army (SLA). Its stated objective was the liberation of the Israeli-occupied “security zone,” yet the campaign also served another purpose: to derail peace negotiations from which Iran had been excluded. At the same time, Washington’s position remained unchanged since the Madrid and Oslo conferences, which aimed to establish a lasting peace in the Middle East. To initiate and sustain this process, successive US administrations consistently sought to prevent any large-scale Israeli retaliation to Hezbollah attacks, wagering instead on the Syrian-Israeli peace track. The toll of this war of attrition proved heavy for all parties. Between 1996 and 2000, Israel lost 193 soldiers, the SLA 175, and Hezbollah 375. The deadliest single episode for Israeli forces came in February 1997, when two helicopters carrying troops from Sayeret Matkal, an elite Israeli army unit, collided en route to south Lebanon. The crash killed 73 soldiers – the heaviest toll in the army’s history. The shock it triggered led Israeli public opinion to question the human cost of maintaining the “security zone.” In September of the same year, 16 Israeli commandos from the elite Shayetet 13 unit were caught in a Hezbollah ambush at Ansariya, about 20 kilometers south of Saida; 12 were killed. The incident underscored Hezbollah’s tactical sophistication, bolstered and directly overseen by officers from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Combined with the helicopter disaster, it deepened in Israel a sense of a war without a clear horizon. One consequence was the emergence of the grassroots “Arba Imaot” (“Four Mothers”) movement, founded by mourning mothers of fallen soldiers. The issue thus shifted from the military sphere to a broader societal and moral debate, in which withdrawal from Lebanon became a political demand. The “Four Mothers” campaign forced Israeli leaders and electoral candidates to take a public stance on an unconditional withdrawal from Lebanon. Shimon Peres, followed by Benjamin Netanyahu and then Ehud Barak, before and after taking office as prime ministers, converged on a single message: withdrawal from Lebanon. In January 1998, Benjamin Netanyahu, then prime minister, declared that “Israel is prepared to accept UN Security Council Resolution 425 (1) , provided an agreement can be reached with Lebanon guaranteeing the security arrangements required by Tel Aviv.” A month later, he added: “What we must do is leave Lebanon. What the world must do is threaten the Syrians if they support attacks against us.” Within the ranks of the SLA, concern was mounting. The militia increasingly anticipated an Israeli withdrawal, particularly as Tel Aviv’s forces in the security zone had been significantly scaled back. The election of Ehud Barak in May 1999 – on a platform advocating the return of Israeli troops – marked an acceleration of the withdrawal process. Barak had pledged to bring his forces home by July 2000. Stage 6: For Damascus and Baabda, the Israeli withdrawal was a “Zionist conspiracy” In early January 2000, Bill Clinton brought together Ehud Barak and Farouk al-Sharaa, the Syrian foreign minister, in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. It marked the only direct Syrian-Israeli negotiations in history, and ended in failure. During the talks, Western and Israeli intelligence services learned that Damascus had authorized Tehran to rearm Hezbollah and expand its offensive capabilities through the immediate and sustained delivery of equipment and ammunition to Damascus airport. Syrian trucks then transported the materiel to Hezbollah depots in Lebanon, under the watchful – and acquiescent – eye of Lebanese President Emile Lahoud, who was fully aligned with Hafez al-Assad’s regime. Despite this, Ehud Barak ordered his army not to target the depots supplied by the Syrians and, more importantly, not to strike Syrian assets themselves. He hoped that peace talks with Damascus would resume at a later stage. Shortly afterwards, after the Israeli army attempted to assassinate Hezbollah’s military leader in south Lebanon, it carried out heavy retaliatory strikes. The Israeli security cabinet authorised a series of air raids against Hezbollah, but issued a strict prohibition on targeting Syrian objectives. This approach earned Ehud Barak praise from Martin Indyk, then US ambassador to Israel and former Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs. Barak, moreover, missed no opportunity – in public and in private – to signal that he was pursuing a strategy for Israel’s withdrawal from Lebanon. In response, senior figures within the Assad regime mounted an intensive campaign through their Lebanese allies, insisting that the Israeli withdrawal proposal was part of a “Zionist conspiracy” aimed at containing Syria in the same way Iraq was being contained by the United States. In the months that followed, Emile Lahoud stepped up his interventions, denouncing what he viewed as a dangerous Israeli tactical manoeuvre. He argued that an Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon without a parallel withdrawal from the Golan Heights amounted to a trap. On 9 March 2000, he declared: “Israel’s declared plans to withdraw from Lebanon are intended to sabotage the peace process.” He added that any Israeli withdrawal would be “the product of Lebanese support for the resistance (Hezbollah) and of the unity of the Lebanese-Syrian position,” rather than a genuine commitment to peace. The paradox of Emile Lahoud’s regime lay in its full backing of Hezbollah’s guerrilla campaign to “liberate the south,” while effectively ignoring the peace process. It did not, in fact, favour an Israeli withdrawal, as the continued occupation served three key objectives: legitimising Syria’s own presence in Lebanon, sustaining Hezbollah’s narrative of resistance, and keeping Israel mired in the “Lebanese quagmire” until the Golan Heights were returned to Syria. At that time, Hezbollah’s dominance over state institutions was still embryonic, even though the group already possessed significant military capabilities. It was Syria, however, that exercised full control over the Lebanese state. (to be continued) (1) UN Security Council Resolution 425 was adopted following Israel’s invasion of southern Lebanon, which came in response to guerrilla operations launched against Israel by Palestinian armed groups operating from Lebanese territory. These attacks had been ongoing since 1969. Resolution 425 calls for Israel’s immediate and unconditional withdrawal from Lebanon, as well as the deployment of 3,000 troops of UNIFIL (the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) at the time. Read also: Hezbollah-Israel: An Endless War in Whose Interests? (3) Hezbollah-Israel: An Endless War in Whose Interests? (2) Hezbollah-Israel: An Endless War in Whose Interests? (1)

It is striking to observe the persistence with which the “Islamic Republic” insists that it negotiates on Lebanon’s behalf and claims credit for the ceasefire in that country. This is attested by the declaration of Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi who, in a phone call to President Nabih Berri, stated that “the cessation of Israeli aggressions against Lebanon is covered by our agreement with the Americans.” It is no coincidence that Araghchi chose to call Berri specifically, as if to signal that the Speaker of Parliament has become Iran’s last remaining refuge in Lebanon. This Iranian stance toward Lebanon reveals a bankruptcy without precedent, all the more so since there is in reality no genuine ceasefire. All that is happening is that Israel continues its war against Lebanon, a war that Hezbollah itself originally provoked. In this phase, Israel is concentrating its operations on territories south of the Litani River, occasionally extending them to the western Bekaa with targeted strikes. In short, what exists is not a ceasefire but the ongoing prosecution of a war that the Hebrew State is conducting while accommodating certain American demands. Israel is currently sparing Beirut, in conformity with the wishes of President Donald Trump, who harbors particular calculations regarding Lebanon and wishes to treat it as a country he claims to “love.” This approach appears to stem from personal motivations rather than from concerns related to Iran, and is driven above all by the desire to see any negotiations between Lebanon and Israel succeed. Worth noting in this regard is that Trump personally insisted on hosting the latest round of preliminary talks between Lebanon and Israel at the White House rather than at the State Department. The Iranian position on Lebanon gives some measure of the illusions in which the “Islamic Republic” remains captive. Foremost among them is the belief that Lebanon is still subordinate to its will. Tehran refuses to acknowledge that Lebanon has moved to an entirely different place. What it declines to recognize is that Lebanese political decision-making is no longer under its dominion, particularly since its withdrawal from Syria. The “Islamic Republic” disregards the fact that Lebanon needs to rid itself of Hezbollah’s weapons and, beyond that, to reach security arrangements with Israel in order to seriously undertake the return of the southerners displaced from their villages, or what remains of them. It equally ignores the fact that Lebanon cannot survive under the shadow of a ticking time bomb represented by more than a million displaced southerners who have lost everything they owned. The most essential dimension of the Lebanese reality is absent from the Iranian vision: on one side, the suffering of the people of the South; on the other, Israel’s determination to alter the very character of the southern land. The manner in which Israel destroyed a two-kilometer Hezbollah tunnel in Qantara stands as living proof of this — it was not simply a matter of demolishing an underground structure, but of physically reconfiguring the terrain itself. Unable to keep all of Lebanon within its grasp and in the wake of Hezbollah’s military defeat, Iran has now focused its attention on Nabih Berri, who is these days taking pains to distinguish his positions from those of President of the Republic Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam. Berri accommodates Iranian wishes under the pretext of preserving communal unity, rather than adopting the Lebanese national stance that the combined weight of domestic, regional, and international circumstances demands. He resorts to formulations such as his support for indirect negotiations with Israel, without asking himself how such indirect negotiations could possibly secure the recovery of territory through an Israeli withdrawal from approximately five percent of Lebanese land still under occupation. Will the Iranian maneuver, which uses the Speaker of Parliament to link Lebanon to the American-Iranian negotiations that have themselves been reduced to indirect talks, succeed? The answer is that such a maneuver is destined to fail, given the reality on the ground, where Israel daily destroys what remains of predominantly Shi’ite villages with the aim of establishing a buffer zone in southern Lebanon. Ultimately, whoever follows the Iranian logic, whether Nabih Berri or anyone else, serves only the logic of occupation and its entrenchment — nothing more. It is no secret that Hezbollah feeds on occupation; its conduct confirms as much, since it did everything in its power to bring it back. It is Hezbollah that deliberately engineered the “Gaza support war” on October 8, 2023, the consequences of which are well known, including the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah and virtually the entire senior leadership of the party, without need to revisit the pager operation or what it revealed of Israel’s knowledge of Hezbollah’s internal structure and the residences of its commanders. Neither Hezbollah nor Iran, which stands behind it, has drawn any lesson from the results of the “Gaza support war.” The “Iran support war,” launched on March 2, 2026, only compounded the disaster: Israel expanded its occupation. The question that lingers is how a figure such as Nabih Berri, endowed with all his political experience, can persist in following an Iranian policy that has reached a total dead end rather than supporting the national position embodied by Joseph Aoun and Nawaf Salam. It is difficult to understand the stance of the Speaker of Parliament at a moment when Lebanon needs more than ever to affirm its break with Iran, rather than continuing to pay the price for the misdeeds of the “Islamic Republic” since the very first day of its establishment in 1979. Has the Lebanese Speaker of Parliament not taken note of the fact that Iran recently launched most of its arsenal of missiles and drones… in the direction of the Arab Gulf states, and not in the direction of Israel?

When Israeli officials threaten to treat southern Lebanon like Gaza, the statement is not only reckless but politically revealing, exposing the extent to which regional escalation has become entangled with domestic calculations inside Israel while simultaneously reflecting Lebanon’s own structural paralysis. Such rhetoric should be dismissed for what it is—electoral posturing dressed as strategic doctrine—yet it cannot be separated from a far more consequential reality: Lebanon has once again been dragged into a war it did not choose, by an actor that does not answer to the state and does not bear the costs of its decisions in any accountable way. There is no meaningful comparison between Gaza and southern Lebanon, not because the scale of destruction differs, but because the political architecture underpinning each case is fundamentally distinct. Gaza is governed by an authority that openly claims ownership of its military posture, whereas Lebanon remains trapped in a dangerous inversion where the state carries the burden of war without exercising sovereign control over the instruments that produce it. The ongoing confrontation along the southern border is therefore not simply a bilateral conflict between Israel and Hezbollah, but rather the manifestation of a deeper crisis in Lebanese governance, where the absence of a unified decision-making authority has turned the country into an arena rather than an actor. Israel’s military conduct in the south, particularly its systematic targeting of infrastructure and tunnel networks, is often framed as a security necessity, yet in practice it resembles the forcible implementation of international resolutions through overwhelming firepower. The persistent reference to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701 is not incidental; it underscores the extent to which Israel now claims to be enforcing, by unilateral means, obligations that the Lebanese state has failed or refused to implement. This dynamic not only erodes Lebanon’s already fragile sovereignty, but also places the state in the untenable position of being simultaneously judged and bypassed by external actors who no longer distinguish between state institutions and the armed group that operates alongside them. What makes this moment particularly perilous is the widening gap between official narratives and lived realities on the ground. The Lebanese military has repeatedly signaled compliance with the framework that was meant to demilitarize the area south of the Litani River, yet ongoing developments suggest either a failure of enforcement or a lack of political will to confront violations. This ambiguity has created a vacuum in which competing claims proliferate, allowing Israel to justify continued operations while enabling Hezbollah to sustain its own narrative of deterrence and resistance. In such an environment, truth becomes secondary to utility, and facts are selectively mobilized to serve pre-existing agendas rather than to inform policy. The consequences of this dissonance are not confined to the battlefield; they extend into the social and political fabric of Lebanon itself. Displacement from the south has exposed the extent of infrastructural collapse and the impossibility of sustaining civilian life under current conditions, while the repeated evacuation of residents—often at the urging of the very actors who claim to defend them—reveals a troubling pattern in which populations are treated as expendable variables in a broader strategic calculus. The humanitarian dimension of this conflict, though frequently invoked, remains subordinated to the imperatives of maintaining a theater of confrontation that serves interests beyond Lebanon’s borders. At the heart of this crisis lies a more uncomfortable truth, one that Lebanese officials have been reluctant to articulate with clarity: the erosion of sovereignty is no longer an abstract concern but a lived condition, shaped by the entrenchment of non-state military power and its integration into a regional axis led by Iran. The presence of decision-makers who operate outside the framework of Lebanese accountability mechanisms, and whose priorities are aligned with external strategic objectives, has effectively transformed parts of the country into extensions of a broader geopolitical contest. This reality complicates any attempt to negotiate a ceasefire or de-escalation, as it raises the fundamental question of who, exactly, has the authority to commit Lebanon to peace. It is within this context that the debate over negotiations must be understood. The insistence by some that engaging in talks constitutes betrayal reflects a political culture that has long conflated diplomacy with weakness and valorized perpetual confrontation as a marker of national dignity. Yet the alternative—continuing a war without a clear objective, without state consent, and without a viable path to resolution—offers little more than the promise of further destruction. Negotiations, in this sense, are not a concession but a necessity, provided they are anchored in a coherent vision of state authority and backed by a willingness to address the root cause of the current impasse: the existence of an armed entity operating independently of national command. International and regional actors, particularly those in the Arab Gulf, have made their position increasingly explicit. Financial assistance and reconstruction support will not flow into a system perceived as subordinated to militia control, nor will political backing be extended to a state that cannot assert its own primacy in matters of war and peace. This conditionality, often criticized as external pressure, is in fact a reflection of a broader consensus that stability cannot be built on ambiguity, and that sovereignty cannot be selectively applied. Lebanon now stands at a crossroads that it has approached many times before but never fully confronted. The choice is not between war and peace in the conventional sense, but between continuing to exist as a fragmented arena for competing powers or reconstituting itself as a state capable of making—and enforcing—its own decisions. As long as the monopoly over violence remains contested, every ceasefire will be temporary, every reconstruction effort provisional, and every claim to sovereignty incomplete. The path forward is neither easy nor immediate, but it begins with a simple, often avoided acknowledgment: a country that does not control its weapons cannot control its future.

The United States and its Israeli ally threatened yesterday to resume strikes against Iran in order to force the Islamic Republic to return to the negotiating table. Despite the truce and initial talks on April 11 in Islamabad, diplomacy is still struggling to prevail. According to the American site Axios , President Donald Trump was to be briefed by Centcom (US Central Command) commander Brad Cooper on possible new military operations against Iran. The goal is to carry out a decisive military action. The options presented to him by the Centcom chief include a wave of strikes targeting infrastructure, but also the possibility of taking control of the Strait of Hormuz, possibly with the participation of US ground forces, according to the site, which cites two sources close to the matter. The specter of a return to strikes has prompted some countries, such as the United Arab Emirates, to issue fresh warnings to their citizens, asking them to avoid traveling to Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon. It has encouraged those who are there to leave. Although a ceasefire has been in effect since April 8, the United States is imposing a blockade on Iranian ships in retaliation for Tehran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world's consumed hydrocarbons transited before the conflict. Echoing the reports from Washington, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz warned that Tel Aviv might “have to act again” against Iran so that it does not “become a threat to Israel again” . The Iranian response was not long in coming: incendiary statements followed one another late in the day. Starting with the Supreme Leader, who claimed that the United States had suffered a “shameful defeat” against his country: “Two months after the largest military deployment and aggression led by the tyrants of this world in the region, and after the shameful defeat of the United States, a new chapter is opening” for the Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei declared in a written message. Wounded in strikes, he has not been seen in public since his appointment. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, for his part, denounced the American blockade, which he said he views as an “extension of American military operations” . The same victorious tone was heard from the commander of the Aerospace Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Majid Moussavi, who warned on state television that even a “brief” enemy operation would lead to “painful, prolonged, and extensive strikes” . Major energy crisis The war of words was quick to sow panic in the markets. The rise in tensions sent oil prices soaring: Brent crude briefly surpassed $126 a barrel on Thursday, an unprecedented level since 2022, during Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Indeed, the repercussions of the blockade of Hormuz are being felt a bit more every day by the global economy, amid creeping shortages, surges in inflation, and downward revisions in growth. “The world is facing the most severe energy crisis in its history,” judged the head of the International Energy Agency, Fatih Birol. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres also expressed alarm at the “stranglehold” on the global economy due to the paralysis of the strait. And the European Central Bank warned against the “intensification” of risks to inflation and growth in the eurozone. Lebanese-Israeli talks “within two weeks” On the Lebanese front, 15 people were killed in Israeli strikes in the south of the country, while President Joseph Aoun condemned Israel's “persistent violations” of the truce, which went into effect on April 17. “Israeli violations persist in the south despite the ceasefire, along with the demolition and leveling of homes and places of worship, as the number of victims climbs day by day,” President Aoun denounced. At the political level, the gap continues to widen between President Aoun, who is determined to conduct direct negotiations with Israel, and Hezbollah, which opposes them and is campaigning against him. President Trump announced during a press conference on Thursday a resumption of talks between Lebanese and Israelis in Washington “within two weeks,” while in Beirut, the US Embassy stressed on its X account that Lebanon today is “at a historic turning point” . According to the embassy, the upcoming dialogue represents for the country “a historic opportunity, allowing its people to take matters back into their own hands and build a sovereign and independent nation” . For the US Embassy, direct negotiations will allow Lebanon to have “solid guarantees for a restoration of national sovereignty, the preservation of its territorial integrity, and the security of its borders” . They are also likely to “ensure humanitarian and reconstruction support” . Affirming that Washington is willing to support Lebanon in this task, the embassy encourages the country to “be the sole master of its own destiny” .