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Lebanese Army Walks Political Tightrope to Disarm Hezbollah
A Lebanese military vehicle drives, after Israeli troops withdrew from most of south Lebanon, in Mays al-Jabal, near the border with Israel, southern Lebanon, Feb. 19, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mohammed Yassin
Lebanon’s army has blown up so many Hezbollah arms caches that it has run out of explosives, as it races to meet a year-end deadline to disarm the Iran-backed Shi’ite terrorist group in the south of the country under a ceasefire agreed with Israel, two sources told Reuters.
The explosives shortage, which has not been previously reported, has not stopped the army quickening the pace of inspection missions to search for hidden weapons in the south, near Israel, the two said, one of whom is a security source and the other a Lebanese official.
It would have been unimaginable for Lebanon’s military to embark on such a task at the zenith of Hezbollah‘s power just a few years ago, and many observers were skeptical even after the ceasefire agreement.
But Hezbollah was hit hard by Israel’s war last year, which killed thousands of fighters and the upper echelons of both the military and political wings, including leader Hassan Nasrallah. The war also killed more than 1,100 women and children and destroyed swathes of Lebanon’s south and east.
The US has kept up pressure on Lebanon to disarm Hezbollah, which is designated a terrorist group by Washington. President Donald Trump’s deputy Middle East envoy Morgan Ortagus is in Beirut this week to discuss momentum on disarmament with Lebanese officials.
As they wait for US deliveries of explosives charges and other military equipment, Lebanese troops are now sealing off sites they find instead of destroying them, said one of the sources and two other people briefed on the army‘s recent activities.
Their searches yielded nine new arms caches in September, the two other briefed officials said. The security source said dozens of tunnels used by Hezbollah had also been sealed and more soldiers were being steadily recruited to deploy to the south.
Reuters spoke to 10 people including Lebanese officials, security sources, diplomats, and a Hezbollah official, all of whom said the army expects to complete its sweep of the south by the year’s end.
Meeting the deadline would be a considerable feat for an institution once unable or unwilling to stop Hezbollah rebuilding a military presence near Israel after a previous war in 2006 – and for a country in which Hezbollah was once the dominant political force.
ARMY STEPS CAUTIOUSLY ELSEWHERE IN LEBANON
Progress in the rest of the country looks far less certain.
Despite its advances, the army wants to avoid inflaming tensions and to buy time for Lebanon’s politicians to reach a consensus about the group’s arsenal in other parts of the country, a second Lebanese official who is close to Hezbollah and two security sources said.
It has not published images of the work destroying weapons caches, or even said the weapons belong to Hezbollah.
Under the November 2024 ceasefire that ended more than a year of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, Lebanon agreed that only state security forces should bear arms in the country. That would mean fully disarming Hezbollah.
Hezbollah has publicly committed to the ceasefire but is not a formal signatory. It insists the disarmament as mentioned in the text only applies only to the south of Lebanon.
On Sept. 5, the cabinet adopted a more detailed five-phase plan for imposing the state monopoly on arms – starting in the south and gradually moving north and east, the security sources and the second Lebanese official said.
The army said it would clear the south by December, without committing to a timeline for the rest of the country. The government has said the plan is contingent on Israel halting air strikes that have continued despite the ceasefire. All the sources said the army would have to navigate treacherous political terrain to achieve full disarmament.
Ed Gabriel, who heads Washington-based non-profit the American Task Force Lebanon and met with Lebanon’s military and political leaders in October, said the army‘s cautious approach reflected the possibility of civilian strife if it moved too fast outside of the south.
“It’s a Lebanese answer to disarmament,” he said.
Hezbollah has not opposed the seizures of unmanned weapons caches in the south and has not fired on Israel since the November truce. However, it has publicly refused to relinquish its weapons elsewhere, hinting conflict was possible if the state moved against the Islamist group.
Moving north and east without a political consensus risks confrontation with Hezbollah fighters or street protests by Lebanon’s Shi’ite community, among whom Hezbollah remains popular, the two security sources and the second Lebanese official said.
In a written statement to Reuters, Hezbollah‘s media office said the ceasefire meant Lebanon’s army was fully responsible for the zone south of the Litani River, referring to the water body that crosses southern Lebanon near Israel.
But any disarmament efforts north of the river would require political consensus, it said.
“The rest – that depends on a political settlement, which we don’t yet have. The army is betting on time,” said a Lebanese official close to the group.
The army still fears a stand-off with Hezbollah‘s constituency could again fracture the army, which split during Lebanon’s 15-year civil war, one Lebanese official told Reuters.
In a speech on Sunday, Hezbollah secretary general Naim Qassem described the army‘s approach as good and balanced but also issued a warning, saying he hoped the army was not considering clashing with the Shi’ite community.
The media offices of the Lebanese army, cabinet, and presidency did not respond to questions from Reuters for this story. The Israeli military did not respond to requests for comment.
MULTIPLE WEAPONS CACHES FOUND AND DESTROYED
The army does not possess its own information on where Hezbollah‘s stockpiles are located, two security sources told Reuters. It has relied on intelligence supplied by Israel to “the Mechanism,” the sources said, referring to a committee established by the truce deal, chaired by the US and including France, Israel, Lebanon, and UN peacekeepers.
In late May, the army was receiving so many reports from the Mechanism that it could not keep pace with the requests for inspections, the two sources said.
If troops found a depot, they kept any ammunition or new equipment compatible with their own arms and destroyed rockets, launchers, and other material, the two sources said.
Operations in the south by the UN peacekeeping force UNIFIL yielded tunnels dozens of meters long and unexploded ordnance, according to UNIFIL statements.
The army depleted its explosives stocks by June. In August, six army troops were killed trying to dismantle an arms depot. Reuters could not determine additional details of the circumstances of the accident.
The US is keen to help: in September, it announced $14 million in demolition charges and other aid to help Lebanese troops “degrade Hezbollah” and approved $192 million aid to the army the day before the US government shutdown.
The US also approved $192 million aid to the Lebanese army the day before the US government shutdown.
US Senator Jeanne Shaheen advocated for the aid after a visit to south Lebanon in August left her impressed with the army‘s efforts and convinced it needed more support, an aide in her office told Reuters.
It could still take months for the detonation charges to be delivered Lebanon, a source familiar with the process said.
WILL THEY, WON’T THEY
In recent months, Hezbollah‘s position about the future of its weapons has appeared fluid. In public statements, the group warned the state against trying to seize its arsenal – but also said it would be willing to discuss the fate of its arms if Israel commits to a real ceasefire.
In private, some representatives of the group have floated the possibility that progress could be made elsewhere if reconstruction allowed Shi’ite constituents to return to villages and towns destroyed in the war, the Lebanese official close to the group said. Others have flatly rejected decommissioning its weapons under any circumstances.
The group is still conducting internal discussions on the future of its arsenal and is also playing for time, the Lebanese official close to Hezbollah and a Lebanese political source said.
In its written statement, Hezbollah said the status of its weapons depended on an end to the Israeli aggression, its withdrawal from the occupied Lebanese territories, the return of prisoners, and ensuring reconstruction.
NEXT STEPS POSE CHALLENGE
The security sources say that a lack of information makes it difficult for the army to estimate what exactly Hezbollah has stored, and where, including in the eastern Bekaa – a vast plain where Hezbollah is thought to store the bulk of its long-range missiles and other strategic arms.
Israel provided some reports of weapons in areas north of the Litani but the army deemed them too sensitive to act on without a consensus on whether and how to disarm Hezbollah there, one of the security sources and one of the diplomats based in Lebanon said
Despite providing intelligence on weapons locations, Israel is proving another obstacle in the south, the officials briefed on the cabinet meeting said.
Several soldiers have been wounded by Israeli fire while on inspection missions, the two security sources said. Israeli drones have dropped grenades near soldiers and UN peacekeepers in the south, UNIFIL has said.
The army has also warned that Israel’s occupation of five hilltops within Lebanon near the border with Israel could delay a full sweep of the area, the two security sources said.
And when Lebanese troops tried to erect a rudimentary watch-tower to monitor the border, Israel objected, the two security sources said. The tower remains unmanned.
The Israeli military did not respond to questions about the wounded Lebanese troops and the abandoned watchtower.
Washington is keen to see Lebanon expedite disarmament in the rest of the country after meeting the year-end deadline for the south, the congressional aide said. US envoy Tom Barrack has warned of possible Israeli action if that deadline is not met.
“The US sees that Lebanon needs to do more, and faster,” Gabriel said.
The United States fully supports Lebanon’s “courageous and historic decision to disarm Hezbollah,” a US State Department spokesperson said in response to Reuters questions.
“The region and the world are watching carefully,” the spokesperson said.
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The Israel news we don’t hear – and the forces that silence us
I spent part of Shabbat reading about the stunning performance of the Israeli stock market — which is up dramatically since Oct. 7, outpacing the gains of the S&P by a significant margin.
The 35 Israeli stocks with the largest market capitalizations are up a whopping 90 percent since Oct. 7. Meanwhile, the S&P 500 was up 60 percent during that same time period.
I wondered why I had not read more about this, and was struck by what Eugene Kandel, the chairman of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, told Investors Business Daily.
“Israel was, and still is, under a PR attack from ideological actors, who finance huge campaigns against us,” Kandel said. “But even during these two years, the collaboration with so many organizations, companies, governments and investors did not stop despite threats and protests.”
Why aren’t we hearing about those collaborations?
Then the news of the Bondi Beach Hanukkah shooting broke. Instantly, all the peace of Shabbat dissipated, along with all the thoughts of collaborations — and who is covering what and why, and in which language.
Instead, I thought again of how terrorists worldwide seem to own a well-thumbed Jewish calendar. The date and timing of this massacre — on yet another Jewish holiday — was no accident, and Jews around the world know this.
We are living through a sustained campaign to make Jews afraid to be Jews. Attacks on Jewish holidays are an effort to erase Jewish joy, Jewish observance, and in the case of Hanukkah, Jewish history.
And perhaps we are also under a sustained campaign to minimize Jewish achievement.
Some politicians take notice
Some politicians are making efforts to look at the often-exhausting layers of what is happening and find ways to name them.
I appreciate the effort to find language for all of this. Representative Brian Mast, the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a Florida Republican, commented that he discerns a “very specific network that is in place that works together to sow antisemitism that is now, in many cases, working on the left and right across the media, to go out there and put this wedge in this relationship.”
He was referring to the U.S.-Israel connection.
Speaking at a Hudson Institute conference on antisemitism, he called this network a “very, very serious global threat across multinational organizations, media across the globe and adversaries and terrorist organizations.”
When he said “media,” I thought of the minimal coverage of the Israeli stock exchange and the strength of Israeli stocks.
The relief of acknowledgment
I felt a strange sigh of relief as I read Mast’s comments. It was the relief of actual acknowledgment. It was the relief of hearing someone trying to name things, even though I’m not sure if “network” is the best possible word.
Because something must be said.
What I noticed the day after the Bondi Beach massacre was the deep silence. The silence came from so many people that maybe “network” was the right word for it.
I went to a non-denominational holiday party this week, and no one mentioned what had happened in Australia. I wondered what the conversation would have been like if the shooting had happened at a Christmas tree lighting, or a drag story hour that turned into carnage. What would the conversation have been if any other group, but the Jewish community, had been targeted?
It’s unlikely that there would be total silence. Total non-acknowledgment. No words in a room of people who work with words.
The threat we face is not just the threat Representative Mast detailed, or the PR threat Kandel described. It’s also the silence, a silence so loud that it is visible as candlelight in the darkness.
How to respond to silence
I don’t know how to answer silence, but maybe some wiser people out there do.
Late last night, I saw a reel of a very long line of cars with menorahs on their roofs driving along the New York State Thruway, not far from the Palisades Mall, just a short drive from where I grew up.
The line of cars went on and on. The silent message was Do not be afraid. And I saw it as a response to Bondi Beach.
I hope there are more Hanukkah menorahs lit tonight, not less. And I also hope that we can consider bringing layers of truth into the light. Sometimes, layers represent both a dose of reality and an antidote against despair.
Yes, a father and son attacked the Jewish community on a holiday. But it is deeply important and also true that an unarmed Muslim father and fruit seller named Ahmed al Ahmed jumped on one of the gunmen and undoubtedly saved many lives.
The video of that heroic act should be watched by all.
It is a reminder that perhaps there is another “network” out there, a network of those who object to hatred. And it is a reminder that generalizations can only take us so far; as my mentor James Alan McPherson taught me, a story is about an individual at an individual moment in time.
Ahmed al Ahmed showed us all the power of an individual. And the power of a single layer in any truth, and in any story.
As for all those under-discussed Israeli companies holding on in wartime, through boycotts, pushing up the index by 90 percent since the worst day in Israeli history, continuing to collaborate with partners around the globe despite a PR onslaught to isolate them — even in this darkness, and in this silence, we see you.
The post The Israel news we don’t hear – and the forces that silence us appeared first on The Forward.
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Zohran Mamdani visits the Rebbe’s Ohel, increasingly a pilgrimage site for politicians
(New York Jewish Week) — Zohran Mamdani visited the gravesite of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement’s late leader on Monday, one day after the shooting that killed 15 people at an Australian Hanukkah event hosted by Chabad.
Yaacov Behrman, a Crown Heights activist who works as a PR liaison for Chabad, said Mamdani reached out about visiting the gravesite, known as the Ohel.
“Following the terrorist attack in Sydney, Australia, the mayor-elect asked to visit the Ohel to pay his respects and came last night,” said Behrman, who was present during Mamdani’s visit.
The New York City mayor-elect did not publicly share anything about his visit to the Ohel on Monday, but a photo obtained and posted by Forward journalist Jacob Kornbluh showed Mamdani wearing a black velvet kippah standing at the gravesite.
Mamdani had shared a lengthy statement on Sunday morning calling the Bondi Beach attack a “vile act of antisemitic terror.”
“I mourn those who were murdered and will be keeping their families, the Jewish community, and the Chabad movement in my prayers,” Mamdani wrote.
Mamdani specifically mentioned Rabbi Eli Schlanger, who was killed in the attack, and his “deep ties to Crown Heights,” the Brooklyn neighborhood that is home to the headquarters of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement.
“What happened at Bondi is what many Jewish people fear will happen in their communities too,” Mamdani wrote.
Monday marked Mamdani’s first known visit to the Ohel, which is in the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Queens, and is a site with particular significance for adherents and admirers of the Chabad movement. It is the resting place of the movement’s two most recent leaders: Menachem Mendel Schneerson, known as the Lubavitcher Rebbe, and his father-in-law, Yosef Yitzchak Schneerson.
In recent years, it has become an oft-visited site by Jewish and non-Jewish politicians and public figures.
The Ohel draws 1 million visitors per year, according to Chabad’s website, who are “religious and not, laypeople and leaders, Jews and non-Jews, each one coming to pray, seek inspiration and find solace.”
Mamdani’s predecessor, Mayor Eric Adams, has visited the Ohel at least seven times, and has said that he finds himself there during “the most difficult days” of his life. President Donald Trump visited the Ohel to mark the first anniversary of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
Other visitors to the site in the last five years include Ivanka Trump; New York Gov. Kathy Hochul; then-Long Island congressman Lee Zeldin, who is Jewish and now heads Trump’s EPA; Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. during his presidential candidacy; Rep. Mike Lawler; Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand; and New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker. Argentinian president Javier Millei and Sara Netanyahu, the wife of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, have both visited from abroad.
“There’s nothing opulent about it,” Rabbi Motti Seligson, a Chabad spokesperson, told the Free Press during a tour of the Ohel in early 2025.
Visitors have found deep meaning in their time in the open-roofed mausoleum. Booker, who prays at the Ohel on the eve of his elections, told the Free Press that he finds “something universally spiritual about that sacred space” even though he is not Jewish.
“I find my visits are both grounding and expanding,” Booker said.
Mamdani’s visit to the Ohel comes as Chabad officials and Jewish leaders are doubling down on their efforts to celebrate Hanukkah with public menorah lightings around New York City. Those events have surged in attendance in the wake of the Bondi Beach attack.
The visit is Mamdani’s most recent appearance in a primarily Orthodox Jewish space as he seeks to overcome skepticism among many Jewish voters who were turned off by Mamdani’s opposition to Israel. Voters in Crown Heights, where the Chabad-Lubavitch community is headquartered, turned out heavily for Andrew Cuomo in November’s general election.
The mayor-elect attended a celebration by the Satmar Hasidic sect last week, which is anti-Zionist for religious reasons. He was endorsed by a Satmar rabbi, Moishe Indig, and was welcomed to a sukkah by Indig in the fall.
During the Democratic primary, he made an appearance at a breakfast organized by the Council of Jewish Organizations of Flatbush, where there was a large Orthodox Jewish population.
The photo of Mamdani at the Ohel circulated in Jewish WhatsApp groups, and has been shared by some local Chabad chapters’ social media pages.
“His decision to go was surprising,” Chabad Virginia Beach wrote in an Instagram post. “But we all know that when light and darkness meet, light has the power to transform. And this place is a place of light.”
The post Zohran Mamdani visits the Rebbe’s Ohel, increasingly a pilgrimage site for politicians appeared first on The Forward.
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Iran Opposes Grossi’s UN Secretary-General Candidacy, Accuses Him of Failing to Uphold International Law
UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi holds a press conference on the opening day of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) quarterly Board of Governors meeting in Vienna, Austria, Sept. 8, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Elisabeth Mandl
Iran has publicly opposed International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director-General Rafael Grossi’s potential appointment as UN Secretary-General next year, accusing him of failing to uphold international law by not condemning US and Israeli strikes on Iranian nuclear sites during the 12-day war between Iran and Israel in June.
During a UN Security Council meeting on Monday, Iran’s Ambassador to the UN, Amir Saeid Iravani, sharply criticized Grossi, calling him unfit” to serve as UN Secretary-General next year, Iranian media reported.
“A candidate who has deliberately failed to uphold the UN Charter — or to condemn unlawful military attacks against safeguarded, peaceful nuclear facilities … undermines confidence in his ability to serve as a faithful guardian of the charter and to discharge his duties independently, impartially, and without political bias or fear of powerful states,” the Iranian diplomat said.
With UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres’ term ending in December next year, member states have already begun nominating candidates to take over the role ahead of the expected 2026 election.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, Israel’s relationship with Guterres has spiraled downward, reaching a low point last year when then-Foreign Minister Israel Katz labeled the UN “antisemitic and anti-Israeli” and declared Guterres persona non grata after the top UN official failed to condemn Tehran for its ballistic missile attack against the Jewish state.
Last week, Argentina officially nominated Grossi to succeed Guterres as the next UN Secretary-General.
To be elected, a nominee must first secure the support of at least nine members of the UN Security Council and avoid a veto from any of its five permanent members — the United States, China, Russia, the United Kingdom, and France.
Afterward, the UN General Assembly votes, with a simple majority needed to confirm the organization’s next leader.
As head of the UN’s nuclear watchdog since 2019, Grossi has consistently urged Iran to provide transparency on its nuclear program and cooperate with the agency, efforts the Islamist regime has repeatedly rejected and obstructed.
Despite Iran’s claims that its nuclear program is solely for civilian purposes rather than weapons development, Western powers have said there is no “credible civilian justification” for the country’s nuclear activity, arguing it “gives Iran the capability to rapidly produce sufficient fissile material for multiple nuclear weapons.”
With prospects for renewed negotiations or nuclear cooperation dwindling, Iran has been intensifying efforts to rebuild its air and defense capabilities decimated during the 12-day war with Israel.
On Monday, Mohammad Eslami, head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI), declared that the IAEA has no authority to inspect sites targeted during the June war, following Grossi’s renewed calls for Tehran to allow inspections of its nuclear sites and expand cooperation with the agency.
Iran has also announced plans to expand its nuclear cooperation with Russia and advance the construction of new nuclear power plants, as both countries continue to deepen their bilateral relations.
According to AEOI spokesperson Behrouz Kamalvandi, one nuclear power plant is currently operational, while other two are under construction, with new contracts signed during a recent high-level meeting in Moscow.
Kamalvandi also said Iran plans to build four nuclear power plants in the country’s southern region as part of its long-term partnership with Russia.
During a joint press conference in Moscow on Tuesday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi reiterated Iran’s commitment to defending the country’s “legal nuclear rights” under the now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal, noting that Tehran’s nuclear policies have remained within the international legal framework.
Iran’s growing ties with Russia, particularly in nuclear cooperation, have deepened in recent years as both countries face mounting Western sanctions and seek to expand their influence in opposition to Western powers.
Russia has not only helped Iran build its nuclear program but also consistently defended the country’s “nuclear rights” on the global stage, while opposing the imposition of renewed economic sanctions.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has described the reinstatement of UN sanctions against Iran as a “disgrace to diplomacy.”
In an interview with the Islamic Republic of Iran News Network (IRINN), Lavrov accused European powers of attempting to blame Tehran for the collapse of the 2015 nuclear deal, despite what he described as Iran’s compliance with the agreement.
Prior to the 12-day war, the IAEA flagged a series of Iranian violations of the deal.