The United States is moving to accelerate deployment of the Lebanese army in two sensitive areas near Bint Jbeil in southern Lebanon, Froun and Ghandouriyeh, possibly within days, according to a Lebanese government source who spoke to the pan-Arab daily Asharq Al-Awsat. The push comes as Washington tries to show that progress on stabilizing the Israel Lebanon border can move forward even as separate, far more fraught talks with Iran prepare to resume in Islamabad.
For Israel, the timing is delicate. The plan calls for Lebanese troops to take up positions in areas that sit close to the border and inside a security zone Israeli forces have held since the war with Hezbollah began in March, when the Iran backed militia fired rockets into Israel in the wake of the killing of Iran's supreme leader in US Israeli strikes. Israeli officials have been clear and consistent on the underlying logic: any Israeli withdrawal must be matched, not preceded, by Hezbollah's actual evacuation and disarmament in the same areas, a position rooted in hard won experience watching previous ceasefire arrangements in Lebanon collapse once Israeli forces stood down before Hezbollah's military infrastructure was genuinely dismantled.
Ministerial sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that Washington is now working to stand up a US chaired trilateral committee, made up of the United States, Lebanon, and Israel, to formally oversee the army's deployment in Froun and Ghandouriyeh in the Bint Jbeil district, along with Zawtar al-Gharbiyeh in the Nabatieh district, treating these as pilot zones for a broader eventual handoff. The same sources said Hezbollah's continued refusal to cooperate is the central complication slowing the plan down, a refusal that underscores exactly the concern Israeli officials have raised from the outset, namely that Hezbollah has shown no genuine willingness to relinquish its military presence in the south regardless of what the Lebanese state or international mediators agree to on paper.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said Monday that continued Israeli presence in parts of the south is itself an obstacle to the army's deployment, a framing that has become a familiar Lebanese talking point but one that elides the more basic problem, Hezbollah's own refusal to vacate or disarm, which is what triggered Israel's continued operations in the security zone in the first place. Israeli officials have maintained that they are prepared to withdraw as Hezbollah's evacuation becomes real and verifiable rather than promised, and the reported push to speed up deployment in these two pilot areas appears to be, at least in part, an attempt to test whether that verification can actually happen on the ground.
The broader context is a ceasefire that has held since Hezbollah and Israel reached their agreement, with more than 640,000 displaced Lebanese having returned home in the months since. But periodic Israeli strikes on Hezbollah linked infrastructure and personnel have continued throughout, a pattern Israeli officials describe as necessary enforcement against a group still rebuilding its capabilities rather than a violation of the truce.
Whether the accelerated timeline reported by Asharq Al-Awsat translates into a genuine, durable handoff in the south, or simply another attempt by Hezbollah to run out the clock while retaining its foothold near the border, is likely to become clear only once Lebanese troops are actually on the ground in Froun and Ghandouriyeh and international monitors can assess whether Hezbollah has truly stepped back.
