The Israel Defense Forces carried out multiple strikes across Southern Lebanon this week, targeting the Hezbollah terrorist movement’s rocket-launching sites and training camps.
According to the IDF, the operation also neutralized tunnel shafts used for weapons storage at locations where “unusual military activity” had been identified in recent months.
These ongoing military actions underscore Israel’s continued efforts to prevent Hezbollah from rebuilding its arsenal and infrastructure despite the November 2024 ceasefire.
This persistent cycle of rearmament and military response highlights the friction between regional security realities and recent diplomatic assertions of progress by the Lebanese Government.
The current Lebanese government is effectively incapable of moving on to the next stage of disarmament, even if they choose to, IDF Col. (ret.) Jacques Neriah, a special analyst at the Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs, told JNS.
“Hezbollah has made it completely clear that north of the Litani, there will be absolutely no disarmament or demilitarization,” he said. He added that it is “highly unlikely that the current Lebanese government has the will to challenge Hezbollah in a serious way on this position,” effectively leaving a vast portion of the country under the group’s military control.
Neriah went on to explain that the political situation in Beirut has reached a “dead end,” with a government that is fundamentally incapable of enforcing nationwide disarmament.
He maintains that Lebanese leaders “know that if they implement their policy, it will lead to military confrontation,” a move that would likely “break down the Lebanese army and leave the entire country with sectarian squabbles and civil war.” Ultimately, Neriah concludes that the “solution for the Hezbollah problem will never come from the Lebanese government.”
LAF claims victory in southern Lebanon
On Jan. 8, 2026, the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) declared the completion of the “first phase” of a plan to disarm Hezbollah, specifically covering the territory between the Israeli border and the Litani River.
The LAF stated it had “achieved the objectives” of this phase in an “effective and tangible way,” asserting that it had extended operational control over the south, apart from specific hilltop positions still held by Israeli troops.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun emphasized that this deployment was intended to affirm that “decisions of war and peace” belong exclusively to the state and to “prevent the use of Lebanese territory as a starting point for any hostile acts.”
A Lebanese security source further told Reuters that the announcement signaled that no group would be able to launch attacks from the south, as the LAF intended to “permanently prevent armed groups from rebuilding their capabilities.”
While the military set a year-end deadline to clear non-state weaponry, it acknowledged that work remains to clear unexploded ordnance and tunnels, with the long-term goal being to extend disarmament to the rest of Lebanon. This progress was publicly lauded by Dutch U.N. Special Coordinator Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert, who described the LAF’s assumed control south of the Litani as “undeniable progress.”
The truth on the ground
Analysts from the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) have expressed significant skepticism regarding the permanence and transparency of the LAF disarmament efforts.
Senior Fellow David Daoud argued that the report of progress carries little weight unless it “signals the start of an ongoing, consistent pattern of normalizing public seizures of Hezbollah’s assets and military installations” accompanied by clear metrics showing these actions are “degrading the group’s arsenal, stymying its regeneration efforts, and constraining its freedom of action.”
Without such evidence, he warned the move would likely end up as “another disappointing cosmetic action on the part of Beirut.” Similarly, Senior Fellow Edmund Fitton-Brown noted that the Lebanese government’s own admission that “work in the sector is still ongoing” betrays a lack of sufficient progress.
He suggested that Beirut may be attempting to “finesse this, securing national credit by obtaining concessions from Israel while continuing to procrastinate,” a strategy he labeled a “forlorn hope” given Israel’s firm opposition to allowing Hezbollah the latitude to reconstitute as a cross-border threat.
Professor Hillel Frisch, an expert on the Arab world at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, also challenged the validity of recent military milestones, calling claims of a fully disarmed southern Lebanon “completely inaccurate.”
Frisch told JNS that “there are entire tunnel networks and underground systems” that the LAF have failed to touch. Frisch attributed this failure to a combination of “a lack of will, untrustworthy units and a lack of ability to confront Hezbollah militarily” on the part of the LAF.
Neriah added that beyond the LAF’s failures, Israel’s aerial campaign had also failed in stopping the group from rearming.
Neriah told JNS that 14 months after the ceasefire, Hezbollah has largely recovered from its war with Israel, having successfully “gathered recruits, rebuilt its factories for missiles and drones, and reorganized its chain of command.” According to Neriah, the organization is now “getting closer and closer to being in completely fighting form.”
The Israeli government and military establishment, for its part, characterized the Lebanese claims relating to southern Lebanon as “encouraging” but “far from sufficient.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office asserted that the ceasefire agreement brokered by the United States explicitly mandates that Hezbollah be fully disarmed, a requirement deemed “imperative for Israel’s security.” Hezbollah is “rearming faster than it is being disarmed,” utilizing Iranian support to rebuild its terror infrastructure, said the Prime Minister’s Office.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry alleged “regrettable” cooperation between some LAF units and Hezbollah, arguing that “extensive Hezbollah military infrastructure still exists south of the Litani River.” It released video evidence identifying reestablished military assets in the town of Beit Lif.
The litany of IDF strikes on active Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon evidences that the declarations of the Lebanese government did, in fact, overstate the strength of their position vis-à-vis Hezbollah. The week of January 5 to 11, during which the LAF declared its mission complete, saw a significant intensification of Israeli military activity in Lebanon. According to the FDD, the IDF operated in 37 locales, conducting over 37 airstrikes, nine drone strikes and multiple artillery strikes.
Hezbollah shifting north
The extensive airstrikes throughout January indicate a significant Hezbollah presence south of the Litani; however, IDF records from December 2025 do suggest that the LAF may have had some success in distancing Hezbollah from the Israeli border.
According to the Galilee-based Alma Research and Education Center, during the final months of 2025, the IDF shifted the focus of its operations in Lebanon, moving most of its strikes from south of the Litani River to areas north of the river for the first time since the ceasefire began.
In December, the IDF carried out 40 rounds of airstrikes across Lebanon (the fewest per month since November 2024), including 19 north of the Litani, 16 south of the Litani and five in the Beqaa region. These strikes targeted weapons storage facilities, Radwan Unit training compounds, rocket launching sites and military structures. December’s operations resulted in the elimination of 11 Hezbollah operatives, one Amal operative and one Lebanese operative from the Quds Force Operations Unit 840.
Despite this shift in the operational center of gravity, the IDF still operated extensively in southern Lebanon throughout late 2025. Recent reports indicate that troops from the Multi-Dimensional Unit under the 91st Division conducted operations in southern Lebanon to prevent Hezbollah’s entrenchment, focusing on intelligence collection and the dismantling of terrorist infrastructure. Additionally, the military conducted 11 ground operations in villages along the border to thwart the renewal of infrastructure used for weapons collection and intelligence gathering.
Between a rock and a hard place
Experts explained that the Lebanese government’s attempts to turn their minor success in southern Lebanon into a pass to move on to later stages of the ceasefire agreement may in fact be placing them between a rock and a hard place.
FDD Research Fellow Hussain Abdul-Hussain contended that even if one were to assume the area south of the Litani had been cleared, which he maintained is “absolutely not the case,” Hezbollah remains “heavily armed throughout the rest of the country, with its chain of command intact and working on regaining its strength.”
He emphasized that Lebanon can only stave off a looming war with Israel by “comprehensively and transparently disarming Hezbollah” in all parts of the country.
Hezbollah, for its part, has vocally rejected any disarmament efforts beyond the southern border region. Senior Hezbollah political official Mahmoud Qmati warned that government attempts to disarm the group nationwide could lead to “instability, chaos, and perhaps even civil war.”
The organization maintains that the 2024 agreement applies only to southern Lebanon and refuses to engage in “talk or dialogue” regarding any territory north of the Litani until Israel withdraws from five hilltop positions, ceases carrying out consistent airstrikes, and releases detained Lebanese citizens.
Frisch agreed that “the current Lebanese government has many issues” and “is definitely not going to be the solution to disarming Hezbollah.”
However, Frisch noted that in his view, “they seem to actually want to stabilize Lebanon, even if they are too weak and paralyzed to actually confront Hezbollah.” Frisch concluded that “even with these downsides, considering the alternatives, they are definitely the best option.”
