While Israel seeks, through its intensive strikes on southern Lebanon and evacuation orders for residents of villages and towns in the south, a broader project aimed at dismantling Hezbollah’s incubating environment, the party is adopting a social, material, and mobilization plan to prevent the success of this Israeli path.
The escalation of the current Israeli operations in Lebanon reflects a remarkable transformation, as the Israeli army moved from an attempt to dismantle Hezbollah to a strategy of dismantling its incubating environment, by annexing lands, turning them into places uninhabitable for life, and displacing the residents of the south in what resembles a “diaspora” strategy.
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It seems that the myth of the diaspora that the Israelis recently promoted to link themselves to the Babylonian captivity was imprinted in their policies, and it appeared against the Palestinians after the Nakba in 1948, then after the setback in 1967, and until the war of extermination on Gaza in 2023, and they are currently seeking to apply it in southern Lebanon.
With this southern Lebanese diaspora, Israel aims to go beyond occupying the south, by changing Lebanese demographics and creating sectarian tensions and imbalances in the demographic structure in the long term, which may explode within Lebanon, as political and military analysts reported to Al Jazeera Net.
Diaspora strategy
The former Lebanese government coordinator to UNIFIL, Brigadier General Mounir Shehadeh, deconstructs the “diaspora” strategy, saying that since the 2023-2026 war, Israel has adopted a policy of making large areas of southern Lebanon unlivable through raids, repeated targeting, and urban genocide, which led to the forced displacement of a large number of people from Hezbollah’s incubating environment, estimated at about one million and 200 thousand.
Since last March 2, the Israeli aggression against Lebanon has left 3,324 people dead and 10,027 wounded, including hundreds of children and women, in addition to deepening its ground incursion into Lebanon, in a deliberate Israeli strategy that military and strategic expert Hassan Jouni and political analysts Ali Matar and Amin Qamouria describe as scorched earth.
The scorched earth, as Brigadier General Johnny says, starts from the south of the Litani to the south of Zahrani and recently north of Zahrani, and there is also a choice of important villages and cities that constitute a weight such as Nabatieh and Tyre, so that the whole of the south is daily distributed on the evacuation map, in addition to revenge for history in Tyre and Israel’s attempt to abolish one of the most important historical cities, as confirmed by political affairs expert Tawfiq Shoman.
For his part, political analyst Hadi Qubaisi, director of the Al-Ittihad Center for Research and Development, believes that the Israeli plan related to the buffer zone began in stages after the 2024 war and is developing according to field conditions, and that the evacuation is also a multi-faceted process, not only related to completely removing the people, but rather putting pressure on them, and not only related to the south of the Litani, but reached the suburb, and to areas in the Bekaa, the north of the Litani, the north of the Awali River, and the western Bekaa as well.
The Israeli army issued warnings to evacuate hundreds of towns and villages, amounting to 2,000 square kilometers, which is approximately one-fifth of the area of Lebanon. It also designated a buffer zone extending over about 600 square kilometers.
As for the Israeli goals of the current operations, they are multiple, including reducing Hezbollah’s ability to approach the border, reducing the presence of civilians in a way that eases political and media restrictions on military operations, and taking revenge on the environment incubating resistance to incite public opinion within it, says Shehadeh.
While Qamouria says, and Brigadier General Johnny agrees with him, that the goal is to expel the population so that they do not form any incubating and protecting environment for any resistance that may arise, but the resistance, as the writer and political researcher Ali Matar confirms, has so far succeeded in thwarting it with the steadfastness of its land-owning community.
Shehadeh adds that there are practical indications of Israel’s desire to reoccupy large areas in the south, including the entire southern Litani area, to create a buffer zone, which is likely to become, over time, an integral part of this entity. This is what Ali Matar supports, saying that the permanent occupation of large areas in southern Lebanon remains the most important goal for Israel, so evacuating the population may be a means to facilitate military operations and political and security pressure to arrange what it wants from a buffer zone.
Israel is adopting a strategy of buffer zones to keep its opponents out and protect its settlers, such as creating “buffer zones” on its borders with Gaza, Syria, and now Lebanon, while the fears of many residents are rising that they may never be able to return to their homes, in a permanent diaspora of the land’s owners.
Demographic change in Lebanon
But there are no fears of demographic change in Lebanon. In practice, the current destruction does not mean the actual and final displacement of the population, as Qubaisi confirms, pointing out that there are about 80 buildings in the southern suburb that were destroyed, each building containing about 20 housing units. As for the destruction of thousands of buildings in the suburb, it is very limited, unlike some of the front villages that were completely destroyed.
However, he confirms that we are facing a project of displacement, uprooting, and permanent occupation in southern Lebanon, pointing out that a group of Hebrew studies issued after last April 16 speak clearly about what can be called the doctrine of rubble, paying the price for the population, and subjugating them through destruction.
Brigadier General Shehadeh approaches him, who believes that the demographic threat is likely as a result of the war. If Israel succeeds in eliminating the resistance and reconstruction is not allowed, the displaced will remain in shelter centers for a long time, which Qubaisi denies, stressing that the resistance will not stop.
Regarding fears of changing the demographic composition, Brigadier General Shehadeh differentiates between the existence of real political fears and the claim that there is a confirmed project to change the demographic composition.
But Brigadier General Johnny believes that Israel seeks to create a demographic vacuum and empty spaces that will help it target any human movement in those areas and thus restrict the movement of Hezbollah fighters and members.
Shehadeh explains that fear exists in Lebanese political discourse, even if it is not always announced directly, and not only because of the security dimension, but also the sensitivity of Lebanese balances, as any displacement of a large number creates pressure on infrastructure, economic competition, political tensions, and discussions related to sectarian balances.
Matar agrees with him, who says that this obsession appeared among former Minister Walid Jumblatt and many others, as does Qamouria, who believes that there is a fear of attacking the suburb, harming stability, and changing the sectarian structure in Lebanon, which is still stronger than nationalism, pointing out the lack of a serious national project to confront these dangers and national political forces capable of drawing national solutions and rational policies.
He also believes, in agreement with Brigadier General Johnny, that Israel seeks to cause internal fighting among the Lebanese again, by bringing about a change in the societal structure, pitting the components against each other, and transforming the party’s environment into a besieged and angry environment, which increases the sectarian and sectarian division in Lebanon, which has a fragile structure.
Hezbollah and the diaspora
This fragile structure resulting from the new Israeli strategy – the diaspora – is likely, over time, to affect the incubating environment of Hezbollah, without a doubt, and the party politically and socially, but it may not have a significant impact on the party’s strength organizationally and militarily, as Shehadeh believes.
While Qammouriyeh believes that this process will inevitably have profound effects on the party organisationally, politically and security-wise, and will cause it great confusion and new unexpected problems. The Israelis today seek, by expelling the population and forcibly forcing them to leave, to dismantle the party community and make it lose its ability to organize, mobilize and remain a cohesive force that is difficult to penetrate, but it does not necessarily lead to the collapse of the party’s power, as Matar says, given what the party has built over the decades with his community in the south.
Brigadier General Shehadeh believes that the diaspora strategy creates difficulties, including psychological and social pressure on the population, economic burdens on the party environment, and disruption of part of normal life in the southern villages.
However, on the military side, displacement alone does not lead to the collapse of armed organizations. Rather, some of these organizations were able to continue despite harsher conditions, which is supported by Matar and Qamouria. These are methods that have been relied upon throughout history towards revolutionary movements, but they have failed.
Regarding the extent of popular support for Hezbollah in the south, Shehadeh says that the recent municipal elections showed that the majority of the southern vote is with Hezbollah, which still has a large popular base within the southern Shiite environment despite the losses and pressures. As for the opponents, they are individual cases, which is what Qamouria and Matar agree with.
Matar refers to a study by Information International, a Lebanese opinion polling company founded in 1995, which showed that there is an unparalleled Shiite rally around the resistance, and that Hezbollah, along with the Amal Movement, won all the southern seats. It also showed that there is a general Shiite refusal to disarm, amid ineffective opposition, which is what Qubaisi supports, as the southerners have realized that they are in an existential battle that means permanent occupation and displacement.
But the effects of displacement, exodus, loss of homes, and economic deprivation have begun to weigh heavily on the southerners and their positions. However, the cry so far is still suppressed and may not appear soon, especially since what is rumored is that the war is a direct targeting of the Shiite component in Lebanon and the region, as Qammouriyeh confirms and Brigadier General Johnny supports.
Qamouria adds that Hezbollah has succeeded over the past 40 years in transforming the villages of the south and the suburbs into closed communities that are easy to organize, mobilize, and control securityally, politically, and socially, and transforming them into strongholds of power that are difficult to penetrate.
Regarding Hezbollah’s strategy to confront the deliberate Israeli “diaspora” policy, Brigadier General Shehadeh and Ali Matar said that the party adopted several social, material, and mobilizational axes:
First: Maintaining social cohesion through support, relief and compensation networks, and social institutions.
Second: Preventing displacement from turning into a permanent rupture with the land by encouraging return, reconstruction, and clinging to border villages.
Third: Transforming civil steadfastness into an element of political power, as the party presents the survival or return of residents as a form of civil resistance.
Qamouria believes that the party relies on two things:
The first: his steadfastness by inflicting losses on Israeli soldiers, which will force their leaders to change the government’s policy and look for ways out, which is what Qubaisi supports. The strategy of resistance is to expel the occupation by force, stressing that the continuation of the war and Israeli stubbornness in preventing the return of the population will lead to turning this battle into a regional war, as the Turks specifically say.
The second thing, as Qammourieh says, is to bet on the Iranian position that links any agreement with America to ending the war in Lebanon, while Shoman believes that the Lebanese resistance is working on a set of combat pillars:
- First: Preventing the occupation forces from establishing themselves in the occupied Lebanese territories.
- The second: waging a guerrilla war.
- Third: making the settlements less secure.
- Fourth: introducing a new combat factor, which is drones using fiber optic technology.
Who succeeds?
However, in the short term, Israel has achieved some of the goals of its new policy, such as weakening normal life in border areas, creating great economic and social burdens, and imposing a new security reality in parts of the south, as Brigadier General Shehadeh says, and Matar agrees with him.
In the long term, it may achieve a strategic gain if it succeeds in transforming temporary displacement into permanent migration and social disintegration, Shehadeh adds.
But the Lebanese experience from 1982 until today indicates that the decisive factor is not military force alone, but rather the ability of society to adapt. If the population returns and the villages gradually regain their lives and the social environment maintains its cohesion, the policy of population pressure will have achieved only limited results, as Shehadeh confirms. But Matar points out that the Israeli project will fail, as historical experiences confirm.
As for political analyst Qamouria, he believes that it is not easy now to reach a picture of the final scene, neither in Lebanon nor in the region, as we are in the midst of a major war that extends beyond Lebanon and the region to the global system.
What political and military analysts conclude, in their statements to Al Jazeera Net, is that Israel is betting that continued military, economic and social pressure will lead to the diaspora and weaken the incubating environment for Hezbollah, which in turn is betting on the steadfastness of southern society and its adherence to the land to thwart the Israeli bet.
They also agree that Israel has so far, after years of confrontation, succeeded in causing enormous damage to the south and its social environment, but it has not yet succeeded in breaking the basic cohesion of the popular incubator of the Lebanese resistance, which is the factor that may determine the outcome of this conflict in the long term.
