Disarming Hezbollah means allowing Lebanon to become Israeli-US vassal state

By Denijal Jegić

Last week, the Lebanese government adopted an American proposal, which dictates the disarmament of the popular resistance movement Hezbollah.

Hostility toward the movement’s weapons, which represent an imminent threat to the Israeli regime, has been peddled among some hegemonic media for the past months, during a time of heightened American-Israeli control over Lebanon.

On the same day that the Lebanese cabinet announced this decision, yet another Israeli airstrike killed and injured several citizens. These Israeli airstrikes have remained a daily occurrence for the past months, in continuous violation of the so-called “ceasefire” which took effect on November 26 and which Hezbollah, on the other hand, has adhered to.

Hezbollah, which has supported the state’s claimed attempt to restore sovereignty, rejected the calls for complete disarmament and asked the government to focus on the ongoing Israeli aggression against Lebanon.

Similarly, the majority of Lebanese people oppose the disarmament of Hezbollah if there is no alternative defensive strategy, according to a recent poll. The overwhelming majority of 72 percent do not see the Lebanese Army alone as capable of confronting Israeli aggression, while 76 percent do not believe that diplomacy alone can deter aggression.

In a passionate and powerful speech on Friday, Sheikh Naim Qassem, the Secretary-General of Hezbollah, made it emphatically clear that the resistance will not surrender its weapons while the occupation and aggression against Lebanon persist.

Stripping Lebanon, its resistance, and people of defensive weapons means “facilitating the killing of the resistance fighters and their families as well as their expulsion from their homes.”

He criticized the Lebanese government for implementing US orders and serving the Israeli project and warned it against “dragging the army into internal strife.”

Sheikh Qassem noted that Hezbollah would continue to fight against the US-Israeli project, while urging the Lebanese government to focus on confronting the aggression and rebuilding the country rather than handing it “to an insatiable Israeli aggressor or an American tyrant with limitless greed".

Disarming Hezbollah is a US-Israeli goal

The Lebanese government has presented the envisioned disarming of Hezbollah as a step toward building a strong state that should have a monopoly over weapons in the country.

This measure would also effectively fulfill US dictates and is in line with imperialist visions of Western Asia, which could pave the way to a complete surrender to Israeli hegemony. The fact that people living under military occupation have the right to resist barely comes up in this discourse.

Ownership of weapons is widespread in Lebanon, but apparently only those weapons that can be pointed at the Israeli regime are seen as a grave danger. Hezbollah has, for decades, used its weapons to defend Lebanon from the Israeli regime.

In fact, Hezbollah emerged in the 1980s as an armed resistance movement against the very Israeli military occupation of South Lebanon, decades after the Zionist colonial project had instituted its genocidal conquest of Palestine and Western Asia.

Besides being a military force, political party, and socio-political organization, Hezbollah emerged from and is part of the people. The movement has been instructive in the liberation of the South in 2000 and has defended Lebanon against continuous Israeli aggressions, including during Israel’s 2006 war against Lebanon.

Its military capacities have by far exceeded those of the Lebanese Armed Forces. The armed resistance movement has represented a forceful deterrent against the advancing apartheid regime.

Following Hezbollah’s intervention in the ongoing genocide in Palestine in October 2023, the Israeli regime intensified its aggression against Lebanon, resulting in a large-scale war in the fall of 2024.

Thousands of Lebanese were killed and injured and far over a million civilians were internally displaced due to Israeli terrorism. 

Occupation, aggression sugarcoated as ‘ceasefire’

While a “ceasefire” has been officially in place since November, the term “ceasefire” can only be understood as a euphemism for the continuity of Israeli terror.

As of July 2025, 4,151 Israeli ceasefire violations had been recorded, which claimed 228 lives and injured 475 others. These Israeli breaches have so far entailed 1,891 ground violations, 2,136 aerial violations, and 124 maritime violations.

Although the Lebanese government sporadically condemns some of the Israeli violations, it has remained passive, while its focus has been on the disarmament of the resistance.

Indeed, as Lebanon is also suffering from the aftermath of the war, the reconstruction of the country and US and Arab investment into its economy are tied to the disarmament of Hezbollah, which also represents a strategic Israeli goal.

Effectively, Lebanon today is under an ongoing Israeli military occupation, characterized by Israeli aerial control. Of course, it is worth noting that the Tel Aviv regime, as it continues its live-streamed genocide in Palestine, exists outside of any legal frameworks and so-called “international law”.

It is out of question that the Israeli regime would never respect a ceasefire, or any other agreement, with Lebanon. In fact, the apartheid regime is transparently fantasizing about its expansion of the greater Israel project, which also sees Lebanon under Israeli control.

Turning Lebanon into an Israeli proxy

At the core is the long-standing imperialist goal to submit the region to full Israeli hegemony. ‘Israel’ was not able to face Hezbollah in a battle on the ground. Its plans for a ground invasion of Lebanon faced fierce resistance and failed.

The Israeli regime now benefits from US power to pressure the Lebanese state to complete what the regime itself has not been able to achieve.

At the height of the large-scale Israeli military assault on Lebanon in October 2024, Netanyahu addressed the Lebanese people in a speech while carpet bombing them.

The ICC fugitive incited the Lebanese people against the resistance, asking them to “take back” their country and “return it to a path of peace and prosperity” for the sake of a better future for their children, claiming “You have an opportunity to save Lebanon before it falls into the abyss of a long war that would lead to destruction and suffering like we see in Gaza.”

Meanwhile, the preposterous Zionist disinformation which promises prosperity for surrender, and which confuses cause and consequence, has become a mainstream subject among some of Lebanon’s political and media elites. Absurdly, there is an argument that demilitarization, in the face of a genocide, would lead to “peace” and “stability”.

The disarming of Hezbollah, and effectively Lebanon, would eliminate an imminent deterrent against the Israeli regime and guarantee that Lebanon would not be able to decisively resist and defend itself in the face of a genocidal threat.

These plans are in line with the current developments in the region that have brought forward a Western-backed regime in Syria, which, while under constant Israeli bombardment, appears eager to sign a “normalization” deal with the apartheid regime.

Meanwhile, the US administration has hinted at an expansion of the so-called “Abraham Accords” between Arab regimes and the Israeli regime.

Given the broader geopolitical situation, in the imperialist design of the region, Lebanon is envisioned to be a weak and passive entity under Israeli hegemony that could serve as a protective shield for the apartheid regime, like other surrounding Arab regimes.

As the Israeli regime continues its brutal genocide of Palestinians in Gaza and its aggressive warfare against the people of the region, it remains lucidly transparent about its broader goals.

“Israel” is a constantly expanding colony that seeks to occupy more land and eliminate everything that stands in the way of its settler-colonial conquest. Lebanon remains a primary target.

Denijal Jegić is a researcher and author based in Beirut. He holds a PhD in American Studies. His work focuses on colonialism, resistance, and media representations with a particular emphasis on Palestine. He is the author of the book “Trans/Intifada: The Politics and Poetics of Intersectional Resistance.”

(The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of Press TV.)

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