BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon’s army chief on Monday briefed the government for the first time on its plan to disarm the militant group Hezbollah, while Israel carried out airstrikes in southern and northeastern Lebanon that killed two people.
Army commander Gen. Rudolph Haikal’s report came a month after the Cabinet discussed the military’s plan to put all weapons under state control.
No details of his briefing were immediately shared. Information Minister Paul Morcos told reporters that the Cabinet decided to keep the plan and all discussions about it “secret.”
Hezbollah has rejected the plan, saying it won’t discuss disarmament as long as Israel continues to occupy several hills along the border and carries out almost daily strikes. The group was badly weakened during its latest war with Israel that ended with a ceasefire in November.
The Lebanese government first aimed to disarm Hezbollah by the end of the year, but officials later said resources are too limited to meet the deadline. The current aim is to fully clear a stretch along the Lebanon-Israel border, defined as south of the Litani river, by the end of November before moving into further phases.
Lebanon’s army has suffered from the repercussions of the country’s economic meltdown six years ago. Western and Arab countries have offered support. Last week, the Trump administration approved $230 million to Lebanon’s army and police forces.
Ed Gabriel, president of the American Task Force on Lebanon, a nonprofit that aims to build stronger U.S.-Lebanon ties, told journalists on Monday that the $190 million for the armed forces and $40 million for Internal Security Forces will be mainly in training and equipment.
Gabriel, who met several top officials in recent days including Haikal and President Joseph Aoun, said the president is “determined to get things (disarmament) done.”
He added that the Lebanese government has to make it clear that it is not backing down from full disarmament of Hezbollah, and said a weakness in the plan is that “they don’t have a specific timetable.”
He added that the international community wants Hezbollah’s “strategic weapons” such as precision-guided missiles and drones to be removed.
A deadly Israeli drone strike
Around noon Monday, an Israeli drone strike near the southern city of Nabatiyeh killed a Hezbollah member, who was blinded last year in Israel’s exploding pagers attack, along with his wife in their car.
Shortly afterward, Israeli airstrikes struck Lebanon’s northeastern region of Hermel.
Israeli military said the Hezbollah member killed, Hassan Atwi, was a key official in the group’s Aerial Defense Unit. The military said the airstrikes on northeast Lebanon struck training centers for Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Forces.
The most recent Israel-Hezbollah war killed more than 4,000 people in Lebanon, including hundreds of civilians, and caused an estimated $11 billion worth of destruction, according to the World Bank. In Israel, 127 people died, including 80 soldiers.
The war started when Hezbollah began firing rockets across the border on Oct. 8, 2023, a day after a deadly Hamas-led incursion into southern Israel sparked the war in Gaza. Israel responded with shelling and airstrikes in Lebanon, and the two sides became locked in an escalating conflict that became a full-blown war in September 2024.
By BASSEM MROUE
Associated Press
