On April 17, Donald Trump announced that he had brokered a 10-day cease fire in Lebanon. Much has been obscured by the U.S. government and the corporate media about this development, about the fighting in Lebanon and about the relationship of forces in that country, and especially about Lebanon’s resistance, mostly based in the Shia group Hezbollah.
Lie 1: U.S. mediation between the Israeli and Lebanese government brought about a truce.
Truth: It was not Donald Trump, it was Iranian leverage and the strength of the Lebanese resistance that pressured the U.S. to force Israel to temporarily stop its major attacks on Lebanon.
The Lebanese outlet Al Mayadeen quotes a high-ranking Iranian military official who said to the Lebanese media outlet Al Mayadeen that his government came repeatedly close to resuming the fighting, with missile launchers ready to fire, unless Lebanon was included in the truce.
“It was the enemy’s realization of the seriousness and inevitability of Iranian operations, combined with Hezbollah’s resilience and sacrifices on the front lines, that ultimately brought about the ceasefire in Lebanon,” explained Al Mayadeen.
Between 50-70,000 Israeli troops have tried to seize south Lebanon, but they have been held back by Hezbollah’s young guerrilla fighters.
The ceasefire however, is fragile, and has not fully constrained Israel. It does not call for Israel to withdraw from the tiny strip of Lebanese land it occupies, and where it continues to demolish buildings and flatten towns.
Lie 2: The Lebanon-Israel front was not included in the original April 7 ceasefire between the U.S., Israel and Iran.
Truth: Both the Iranian negotiator and the Pakistani negotiator, when they announced the ceasefire on April 7, said it was for all fronts, including Lebanon.
Associated Press reports that the agreement also called for Israel and Hezbollah to stop fighting in Lebanon. The truce was honored by Hezbollah, but violated by Israel the very next day in an attack of extreme brutality meant to sabotage any ceasefire in Lebanon.
On April 8 in an operation it called “Eternal Darkness,” the IDF launched some 160 bombs on Lebanon within 10 minutes. The targets were the civilian population of Lebanon, bombing 100 sites including the south, the southern suburbs of Beirut and central Beirut during rush hour. These few minutes of bombing alone killed more than 300 people.
Lie 3: U.S-brokered talks between the Lebanese and Israeli governments were a step towards peace for the Lebanese people.
Truth: These talks were meant to stop the April 7 cease fire from including the Lebanese front, to move Lebanon towards disarming the resistance and towards surrendering Lebanon’s sovereignty.
Israel was aided in this effort to stop a Lebanon ceasefire by a pro-west Lebanese government. The agreement of the Lebanese Prime Minister to participate in talks with Israel, as if Lebanon was a separate issue, undercut the application of the April 7 ceasefire to Lebanon, and gave Israel more time to bomb, especially its Shia areas.
In February 2025 the U.S. installed a pro-western government in Lebanon with the stated intention of excluding, weakening and disarming Hezbollah. This government, headed by Prime Minister Nawaf Salam and President Joseph Aoun, doesn’t not represent the Lebanese people, but follows Washington’s orders.
The Iran ceasefire talks proceeded through Pakistan, a country it has diplomatic relations with. In contract, the Lebanese government agreed to direct talks with Israel, which Lebanese law prohibits, and which the government has regarded as an enemy since 1948. The Lebanese side did not even demand that Israel stop the bombing of its people before entering the talks.
Thousands of Lebanese reacted by taking to the streets to denounce Lebanon’s participation in the talks as treason.
During the talks the Lebanese government agreed with Washington and Tel Aviv that the main task at hand is to disarm Hezbollah. At the same time, it ordered the Lebanese army to stand down and move out of the areas that Israel was attacking. This left only Hezbollah to fight the Israeli invaders, which it has done very successfully and with much heroism.
Lie 4: Hezbollah is terrorist organization and an Iran proxy, representing foreign interests on Lebanese soil. If it didn’t exist, Israel would not attack Lebanon.
Truth: The group is indigenous and was formed to defend Lebanon against Israel’s constant attacks. If it did not exist, another group would arise to meet this need. Today it is the only group holding the line against Israeli aggression.
Lebanon has been oppressed by imperialism and later by Zionism since that country was carved out of greater Syria in 1916 and made a colony of France. At every stage, there was resistance to imperialist encroachment and Israeli occupation. At different times this resistance has included Lebanese from all religious denominations and the Palestinians who are refugees in Lebanon. There will always be resistance as long as this oppression exists. Hezbollah, which Washington has labeled “terrorist,” is just its latest manifestation.
Israel has been invading and bombing Lebanon long before there was a Hezbollah. This is the seventh Israeli invasion of Lebanon since 1978. Hezbollah, which today is known as “the resistance” in Lebanon, was formed in 1985 in response to the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon which killed some 20,000 people and its 18 year occupation of the south.
It is based in the Shia community, Lebanon’s largest, poorest and most disenfranchised. It seeks to defend all of Lebanon from attack and to raise the living standard of the Shia, who occupy most of the villages in south Lebanon which have been attacked for decades by Israel. It receives support from Iran, the strongest anti-imperialist force in the region, in an anti-colonial alliance which calls itself the Axis of Resistance. If it didn’t exist another group would arise to defend Lebanon as long as that need is there. Hezbollah is not a terrorist, sinister force. It is the people of the south, and its fighters are their sons.
Israel and the U.S. seek to destroy Hezbollah because it thwarts their plans. In 1982 when there was no significant resistance in the south, Israeli tanks rolled across Lebanon to occupy Beirut in a matter of days. Today, tens of thousands of Israeli troops cannot pass Hezbollah lines to occupy even Lebanon’s south.
Lie 5: Israeli only targets Hezbollah strongholds and operatives.
Truth: Israel is waging a genocidal war against the entire population of Lebanon, much like its war on Palestinians in Gaza.
Since February 28 alone, when the U.S.-Israeli military attacks on Iran began and Hezbollah opened a second front against Israel in support of Iran, Israeli fire has been aimed at the civilian population of Lebanon. Lebanon’s total casualties since March 2 now stand at 2,196 killed and 7,185 wounded. Israel destroyed 37,674 Lebanese homes, is bombing world heritage cites and razing whole villages, pounding them into rubble.
Israel has bombed people sitting in their homes, attending funerals, going for walks and shopping. It is targeting ambulances and health workers and reporters in double and triple tap operations. Some 30% of the casualties are women and children.
Israel has ordered the displacement of more than a million Lebanese in the south and south Beirut, and said they cannot return to their homes.
Israel seeks to ethnically cleanse the Shia, the main group in the south and Hezbollah’s base. It also hopes to foment divisions between Lebanon’s religious groups, and even provoke a civil war. To this end it has told Druze and Christian village in the south that if they give refuge to Shia they will be bombed too.
Though under tremendous strain, so far Lebanon’s solidarity remains intact. And the people of the south are celebrating even this shaky cease fire and returning to the homes their families have occupied for centuries and repeatedly defended with their blood.
