Israel-Lebanon deal may entrench stalemate rather than end war

BEIRUT, Jun 30: A security deal between Israel and Lebanon risks entrenching a stalemate rather than resolving Israel's underlying conflict with Hezbollah by tying Israel's pullout from southern Lebanon to the Iran-aligned group's disarmament, a condition regional analysts and politicians say is unattainable.

At its core is a bargain few see as workable: Hezbollah has flatly rejected disarmament, and no Lebanese government has the power to enforce it.

With Hezbollah unlikely to disarm, analysts say Israel has political cover to keep an open-ended military presence in southern Lebanon, which it invaded after Hezbollah fired at Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Tehran over the war in Iran.

The deal leaves the Lebanese state trapped between obligations it cannot meet and sovereignty it cannot fully reclaim, the analysts say.

The framework deal also collides with Lebanon’s political realities, asking a fragile sectarian state to confront the most powerful armed faction in the country despite a post�"civil war system built on power-sharing rather than coercion.�" REUTERS