The ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah is a relief. After two months of open war, preceded by a year of cross-border shooting, it was time to stop the cycle of destruction. The toll is heavy: nearly 4,000 dead, including many members of Hezbollah on the Lebanese side; nearly 130 deaths, two thirds of which are soldiers, on the Israeli side. Hundreds of thousands of displaced people on both sides of the border will be able to return home.
The truce remains fragile and limited in time: sixty days, a period which runs until the inauguration of Donald Trump for a new term as President of the United States. It can make it possible to achieve a lasting situation of non-belligerence, on the basis of a UN Security Council resolution adopted in 2006 and never applied. The heavy defeat of Hezbollah, whose leadership was decimated, will perhaps open a new page for Lebanon, by loosening the grip in which the pro-Iranian Shiite movement gripped the institutions.
Can the cessation of fighting on this front lead to a broader de-escalation of military actions carried out by Israel since the terrorist attack carried out on its territory by Hamas on October 7, 2023? The subject is very complex, because it intertwines the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which has lasted for eighty years, and the tenacious struggle between Iran and Israel, on a Middle East scale. However, no reasonable vision of relations with the Palestinians emanates from the Netanyahu government, where many voices advocate a partial expulsion of the inhabitants of Gaza to Egypt but also the annexation of the West Bank. When it comes to Iran, a lot will depend on Donald Trump. In the meantime, the Biden administration will focus on freeing hostages still held by Hamas. The truce in Lebanon brings families a fragile fragment of hope.