A Ceasefire Is Not a Strategy: What It Will Take to Turn the Israel–Lebanon Truce into a Turning Point

The direct talks and ceasefire announced last week between Israel and Lebanon present a historic opportunity for welcome de-escalation and a dramatically improved relationship between the two countries; however, as long as Hezbollah retains its weapons, along with the power to decide when war begins and ends, no agreement between the two governments will hold.

A truce that leaves that reality untouched is not a solution. It is a pause.

Importantly, the terms of the current arrangement reflect that reality. The ceasefire does not require Israel to withdraw from Lebanese territory, effectively allowing it to maintain a buffer zone along the border. It also reiterates Israel’s inherent right to self-defense. In the days since the ceasefire was announced, Israel has already conducted self-defense strikes in Lebanon against Hezbollah operatives following the deaths of two IDF soldiers killed in explosive attacks. Hezbollah also reportedly killed a French UNIFIL peacekeeper and wounded several others.

This reflects the usual pattern: Previous arrangements between Israel and Lebanon, mediated through third parties, reduced violence in the short term while leaving the primary driver of the conflict — Hezbollah (funded and armed by the Iranian regime) — in place. The central question now is whether this moment can break that pattern.

For decades, Hezbollah has operated as both a powerful military force and a dominant political actor inside Lebanon. It has positioned itself as Lebanon’s defender against Israel. That narrative has been central to its legitimacy, but it is also the source of Lebanon’s instability.

There is a potential path — narrow, but real — in which Israel can weaken Hezbollah not only through military pressure, but by bypassing it politically. By engaging, directly or indirectly, with the Lebanese state, Israel helps reestablish a distinction that Hezbollah has long sought to erase: the difference between Lebanon and the terror group that claims to act in its name. If that distinction begins to take hold, it has strategic implications.

A ceasefire that allows Israel to maintain a buffer zone while reducing active hostilities creates a more controlled security environment along the border. If that space is used to enable a more active role for the Lebanese Armed Forces in southern Lebanon, supported by international partners, it could begin to shift the balance, however gradually, toward state sovereignty.

A diplomatic pathway with real teeth that addresses border security, enforcement mechanisms, and accountability for Hezbollah violations would reinforce that shift.

Over time, these steps could do something that military force alone cannot: reduce Hezbollah’s relevance within Lebanon itself.

That is the theory of success, but it comes with significant constraints.

First, military pressure on Hezbollah cannot disappear prematurely. It is precisely that pressure that has helped create the current diplomatic opening. The fact that Israel retains both a physical presence in key areas and an explicitly recognized right to act in self-defense reflects a continued need for deterrence. If that posture weakens too quickly, Hezbollah will have both the time and the narrative space to regroup and reassert itself.

Second, diplomacy must lead somewhere tangible. A ceasefire that simply pauses hostilities without establishing mechanisms to prevent rearmament, cross-border attacks, or escalation will not hold. The details here really matter, and the absence of follow-on arrangements has been a defining weakness of past efforts.

Third, and most difficult, the issue of Hezbollah’s Iranian-backed military capability cannot be indefinitely deferred. Whether through formal disarmament, military defeat by Israel, or a gradual reassertion of state control by the Lebanese Armed Forces, this issue will ultimately determine whether stability is temporary or sustainable.

Hezbollah’s strategic alignment with Iran means that developments in Lebanon are closely tied to a wider regional dynamic. Iran’s model has long relied on projecting influence through armed non-state actors embedded within fragile states. To the extent that Lebanon moves — even incrementally — toward stronger state control and direct engagement with Israel, that model comes under pressure.

A successful diplomatic track between Israel and Lebanon would carry implications beyond the immediate conflict and would represent not just a stabilization of the border, but a significant strategic setback for Iran’s broader architecture of regional instability. However, that outcome is far from guaranteed.

Israel must maintain a difficult balance: continue to degrade Hezbollah’s military capabilities while avoiding the destruction of the Lebanese state, and — at the same time — opening space for that state to reassert itself, independent of Hezbollah and Iran. Each of these objectives is complex on its own. Pursued simultaneously, they create tensions that will be difficult to manage.

If this moment leads to a sustained reduction in violence, it could mark the culmination of a trajectory in which Hezbollah is weakened not only on the battlefield, but within the political system it has long dominated.

Alternately, if Hezbollah emerges from this ceasefire intact, with its arsenal replenished, the region will simply be resetting the clock.

A ceasefire can stop a war, but by itself it cannot end one. That requires a strategy, and the willingness to follow through while the window for action is still open.

Anne Dreazen is Vice President, Center for a New Middle East at American Jewish Committee.