The Israeli military said on Monday that it will keep forces in five locations in southern Lebanon after a deadline for its full withdrawal lapses on Tuesday. The announcement raised fears of a resurgence in violence in southern Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah.
After more than a year of war, the two sides reached a cease-fire in late November that was contingent on both Israel and Hezbollah ceding control of southern Lebanon to the Lebanese military by the end of January. Hezbollah had long dominated the region, while Israel had captured large parts of it after invading Lebanon in September.
In late January, mediators announced a three-week extension to that agreement, giving Israel more time to complete its withdrawal. The truce has frequently been punctured by bursts of violence — including an Israeli airstrike on Monday that killed a Hamas leader in southern Lebanon — but neither side has reverted to full-scale war.
Now, the specter of renewed conflict looms once more after the Israeli military announced that it will keep some troops in Lebanon beyond the Feb. 18 deadline, potentially preventing some Lebanese civilians from returning home.
“We will leave small amounts of troops deployed temporarily in five strategic points along the border in Lebanon so we can continue to defend our residents and to make sure there’s no immediate threat,” said Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, a military spokesman, in a briefing for reporters on Monday afternoon.
Colonel Shoshani named several locations spread along most of the length of the 75-mile border, including places across the border from Israeli villages that were badly damaged by Hezbollah rocket fire during the war. He said that Hezbollah had not lived up to its own side of the November agreement and still posed a threat to Israeli residents in those areas. He declined to say how long the occupation would last. It is unclear to what extent Hezbollah has a presence in those areas.
Hezbollah’s leader, Naim Qassem, vehemently opposed the idea of Israel keeping troops inside Lebanon during a speech on Sunday. But he stopped short of pledging to resume attacks against Israel.
“Israel must withdraw completely on Feb. 18,” Mr. Qassem said. “This is the agreement.”
“Everyone knows how an occupation is dealt with,” he warned, without giving further details.
The war between Hezbollah and Israel broke out after the Lebanese militia started firing on Israeli military positions in solidarity with its ally Hamas, shortly after Hamas attacked Israel in October 2023.
The conflict remained largely contained to back-and-forth missile and rocket strikes, displacing thousands on either side of the border, until it erupted into a full frontal war and wide-scale Israeli bombardment of Lebanese cities in the second half of 2024.
Israel killed much of Hezbollah’s leadership in an aerial campaign and invaded large swaths of southern Lebanon, in moves that collectively displaced more than a million people in Lebanon.
Israel said its intention was to prevent Hezbollah from posing a threat to residents of northern Israel, some 60,000 of whom were forced to leave their homes because of Hezbollah rocket fire.
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