Lebanon

By John Nagle, Queen’s University Belfast and Drew Mikhael, Queen’s University Belfast Lebanon’s parliament elected a new president on January 9 after a two-year political deadlock and 13 failed attempts. Joseph Aoun met the threshold for victory in the second round of voting after his rival, a Hezbollah-backed candidate called Suleiman Frangieh, withdrew from the […]

Hizbullah

Iran’s Axis Crumbles as Hezbollah Falters and Assad Falls.

Foreign Policy in Focus

By Imran Khalid | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus ) – The dramatic sequence of events that began on October 7, 2023, with Hamas’s strike in Israel, has cascaded through the Middle East, toppling regimes and reshaping the region’s fault lines. On the very day Israel and Hezbollah agreed to a ceasefire halting hostilities […]

Hizbullah

How Israel’s regional War contributed to the Fall of Bashar al-Assad in Syria

The Conversation

By Daniel L. Douek, McGill University (The Conversation) – When Hamas strategist Yahya Sinwar ordered the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 Israelis, he was planning to deal a mortal blow to an Israel weakened by internal divisions. Sinwar, killed by Israeli forces in Gaza a year later, likely did not imagine […]

Hizbullah

Truce in Lebanon: Can Diplomacy Rise from the Ruins?

Medea Benjamin and Nicholas J.S. Davies

( Code Pink ) – On November 26th, Israel and Lebanon signed an agreement for a 60-day truce, during which Israel and Hezbollah are both supposed to withdraw from the area of Lebanon south of the Litani River. The agreement is based on the terms of UN Security Council resolution 1701, which ended the previous […]

Israel

US Arms Used in Illegal Israeli Strike on Lebanese Journalists, raising Questions of American Liability

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch – (Beirut, November 25, 2024) – An Israeli airstrike in Lebanon on October 25, 2024, that killed three journalists and injured four others was most likely a deliberate attack on civilians and an apparent war crime, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch determined that Israeli forces carried out the attack using an […]

Featured

Lebanon Ceasefire underlines that both Israel and Hezbollah Lost the War

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – When Iran and Iraq were fighting each other in the 1980s, with neither regime being much liked in Washington, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger is said to have remarked, “The tragedy is that both sides can’t lose.” Actually, of course, in most wars both sides lose, and certainly the […]

Israel

Israeli Attacks on Lebanese Medics Apparent War Crimes: Israel’s Allies should Suspend Arms Sales

Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch – (Beirut) – The Israeli military has repeatedly attacked medical workers and healthcare facilities in Lebanon, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch documented three attacks, involving apparent war crimes, in which Israeli forces unlawfully struck medical personnel, transports, and facilities, including paramedics at a civil defense center in central Beirut on October […]

Featured

If one Thing can Unite Sunnis and Shiites in Lebanon, it is Israeli Aggression

Mohamed Jegham

Istanbul (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Prior to the recent Israeli attacks on Gaza and Lebanon, the popularity of Hezbollah, within and outside of Lebanon had seen a steep decline over the years, mainly because of its governing policies inside Lebanon and its Iran-inspired foreign policy outside. However, over the last year, the continuous […]

Displaced and Refugees

Cross-Border Refuges: Cyclical Displacement between Lebanon and Syria

The Conversation

By Jasmin Lilian Diab, Lebanese American University | – (The Conversation) – The escalation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah since September 2024, and Israel’s bombing of civilian areas across Lebanon, have unleashed a profound humanitarian disaster. The mass displacement of over 1 million people, including Lebanese citizens, migrant workers and Syrian and Palestinian refugees, […]