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Lebanon’s Surrender Agreement: Hezbollah Expert Amal Saad on Beirut’s “Framework” With Israel
00:59:25
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- [00:05]
A
I'm Jeremy Scahill from DropSiteNews. DropSiteNews.com it's been a little over 120 days since the US and Israel launched a war against Iran. It kicked off with the assassination of the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, as well as members of his family. Also, in the opening salvos launched by Israel and the United States, they bombed a girls school, the Manob Girls School, killing more than 160 people, the vast majority of them young girls. Since then, we saw the United States and Israel massively bombing Iran in a war that both Trump and Netanyahu predicted would be the beginning of the end or bring the downfall of the Iranian state as we've known it since 1979. And that, of course, did not happen. Iran clearly stunned both the United States and Israel in how it responded to this war. And it made made clear, including before the war began, which, by the way, it was launched in the middle of negotiations. But Iran had made clear that it wasn't going to engage in any backdoor choreographing of its strikes. It wasn't going to say, well, we're going to hit this military base at this time, so make sure you clear your soldiers out. Instead, Iran had in advance, anticipating this war, delegated command authority much further down the chain of the Iranian military and security infrastructure. And as a result, the Iranians were able to launch retaliatory strikes all across the Persia Gulf, causing an unprecedented evacuation of US Military bases, an unprecedented amount of destruction and damage of US Military infrastructure in the region. And most importantly, the Iranians used asymmetric warfare tactics to assert total domination of the Strait of Hormuz, one of the most geostrategically important chokepoints in the world for the flow of oil and other goods. And so Iran was able to fight off an attack by not one, but two nuclear powers. And the agreement that ultimately was signed a few weeks ago, this memorandum of understanding came about as a result of the United States agitating for it, the United States requesting it. And as part of that agreement, the Iranians secured what they felt was very clear language stipulating that there had to be respect for Lebanon's sovereignty and that the war had to end on all fronts. The Iranians very much viewed Hezbollah, which entered the war officially just days after the United States and Israel began attacking. They did so in early March, and more than 4,000 Lebanese people have been killed by Israel since. But on the Lebanese front, similar to Iran, the Israelis seemed quite stunned by the resistance that was put forward by Hezbollah, including through the use of relatively cheap fiber optic controlled drones that have proved very, very devastating to Israeli forces. While it did so, Trump was heading in the direction of honoring this agreement with the Iranians, who very clearly said that Lebanese sovereignty means that all Israeli forces need to withdraw. Of course, Netanyahu said that they weren't going to do that. It seemed for a moment like Trump understood that this was a serious red line. The Iranians had in fact launched attacks against Israel because Israel bombed Beirut. And they said in advance, that's a red line for us and if they do it, then we're going to attack. And the Iranians did just that. But what's happened in the meantime is that the United States and Israel have attempted to completely sever the Lebanese government away from anything having to do with this Iranian memorandum of understanding with the United States. And they've created an alternative framework. And I think it's just factual to say that the core element of it on a military level is to try to co opt or enlist the Lebanese army and as essentially a quote, unquote, counterterrorism force operating at the behest of the United States and Israel to take the lead in trying to dismantle Hezbollah. And of course, Hezbollah has been very critical of this. A lot of commentators, analysts, particularly among the Shia community, but not exclusively among the Shia community, have also been attacking Lebanon's meeting with Israel and ultimately embracing this framework. Now, we're very fortunate right now to have one of the leading experts on Hezbollah and in fact the broader axis of resistance in the world with us right now. I'm talking about Amal Saad. She's lecturer on international relations and politics at Cardiff University in the uk. She's currently writing a book on Hezbollah and the axis of resistance. And Amal joins us now from Beirut, the Lebanese capital. Amal, thank you so much for being with us.
- [04:51]
B
Thanks for having me, Jeremy.
- [04:52]
A
So I laid out some of the historical, recent, historical context here, but this, what Joseph Aoun, the president of Lebanon, is saying is not an agreement but a framework. I just want to mention a few of the items in it. And I've been closely monitoring prominent Lebanese analysts as they've been talking about this. But from my reading, this document effectively means that Lebanon recognizes Israel. Some analysts suggest that the terms and the way it's phrased open a clear path to normalizing relations with Israel. It explicitly calls for disarming Hezbollah as a condition for Israeli withdrawal with these so called pilot zones where Lebanese army would move into areas, and then presumably, or theoretically, the Israelis would then move out of them because the Lebanese army is ensuring that Hezbollah is no longer there or no longer a threat. But ultimately it places the responsibility for disarming or dismantling Hezbollah on the Lebanese government. And the framework also portrays Hezbollah as illegal and illegitimate and appears to suggest that Israeli war crimes are going to go unpunished. In short, I mean, it seems like this is authorizing the Israeli government to do precisely what Netanyahu said he wanted to do, remain entrenched in Lebanon, deep into the south of Lebanon, and to put the onus of responsibility on the Lebanese government for dismantling Hezbollah, or the Israelis just will have to just stay. So give us your broad overview of this quote, unquote framework, as President Aoun calls it, and its implications.
- [06:26]
B
Right. So I think it's not an exaggeration to say that this framework or agreement is something quite historically unprecedented, you know, in, in contemporary history, honestly, in the sense that it transcends anything like even the Abraham Accords or any or, you know, of peace agreement. And it resembles much more closely an alliance treaty. And I think maybe alliance is too big a word because what the president, Joseph Han and the Salam government represent isn't really the Lebanese state, but really this, you know, authority, a segment of the state. So it's not even a state as a whole. It's a small faction within the state. And so it's not a proper alliance. And Lebanon is obviously a very junior partner in this. So it is an alliance that excludes exclusively, actually serves Israel and the authorities, not the Lebanese state. And how does it serve them in that it de centers Israel as the source of the problem, the source of instability and war and so on, and centers the response to the occupation, the resistance to the occupation, as the central challenge to be confronted. And so what the Lebanese authorities are doing here is calling on Israel, the enemy state, according to Lebanese law. It is that an enemy state has been so for decades to come and help them expunge the resistance from Lebanon, it's to disinherit the whole legacy of resistance, not just Hezbollah, by the way, but all resistance. What has happened before Hezbollah's emergence and what could potentially arise in the future because it ensures through this agreement that no resistance of any kind will ever arise again. And so what we're really looking at here is, I would call it like an attempt at first of all, depicting Hezbollah's resistance as an insurgency against the state, which obviously is like, legally very problematic and inaccurate. But the attempt through the government's decisions since August 2025 to criminalize Hezbollah's resistance activity. And I think in future they will even try and criminalize Hezbollah politically as a party representing, you know, virtually the entirety of the Shia community In Lebanon, maybe 95% or so of that community, which is a third of the Lebanese population. And so we're seeing, first of all, criminalization of Hezbollah of resistance, the attempt to depict it as an insurgency, as being a movement that kind of is anti state, although it's not. Hezbollah is an inherent part of the state, not just in terms of its parliamentary representation or governmental representation, but in many other ways as well. It has historically, for decades now coordinated and cooperated with the Lebanese armed forces. So there is an attempt to pit the Lebanese armed forces as well against this, you know, proclaimed criminal group now and to depict it as an insurgency, as I said. So it's, it's kind of like a counterinsurgency that avails itself to the US And Israel. And so I think in a nutshell, that is how we should view this current agreement as an attempt to forge an alliance and a treaty. And the reason that it's been called a framework by Aon is because, and the Americans is because that is their way of trying to circumvent the need for parliamentary approval, which any treaty by law requires. It has to go through parliament and get a two thirds majority vote and it also has to go through the Council of Ministers in the cabinet. So by calling it a framework, the idea is that they can overstep that, which I don't think is going to be, they're going to succeed in doing,
- [10:13]
A
you know, one of the clear intents of Israeli policy over the years or aims of it has been to try to restart a civil war in, in Lebanon or to foment civil war in Lebanon. And in fact, we see the Israelis, that's, that's their open strategy in Iran. Short of being able to do, you know, actual regime change, let's try to get Iranians to fight each other, let's shatter the state. And it does seem as this was quite a coup for Netanyahu and, you know, Trump world to get the Lebanese government to go along with this. But if, if the Lebanese government does attempt to say, okay, the Lebanese army is going to go in and they're going to now start taking over these positions. How are, how are, it's not just about Hezbollah. How will she, how will the Shia population in those areas respond to this? Because it is diverse armed forces. This is not, you know, I mean, Lebanon is a, is a diverse state, as you, as you point out. But if they go into these areas where Hezbollah was viewed as the people's force, where Hezbollah was not just a fighting force, but also a social institution, a governing body in cases where state institutions weren't addressing the needs of the people, and that cuts deeply to the heart of the identity of Lebanese people in the south. Is, is civil war on the books then if the, if the Lebanese army tries to serve essentially as the enforcement arm of this U.S. israeli policy?
- [11:42]
B
Well, it certainly seems to be that's what the Lebanese authorities are offering Israel because effectively they have no leverage. They have nothing to offer in exchange for whatever token gestures Israel has, you know, promised to make. Like with, you know, the whole idea of the pilot zones, you know, areas which Israel doesn't even occupy. What the Lebanese authorities have actually offered is a civil war. They have basically said we, what we will give you is we can guarantee civil strife. And in, you know, in so doing, in so doing, their, their idea or their plan rather is to force the Lebanese, you know, armed forces. The commander of those forces, and again here we know that the commander of the, the laf, Rudolf Heel, has refused to confront Hezbollah's resistance. There is a lot of talk and chatter about replacing him. And that's certainly what the Americans want. And what Marco Rubio alluded to previously, if you recall, when he said they would train their own kind of, you know, battalion which would res. Closely resemble the South Lebanon collaborationist force from the 1980s. So there was this idea, I think, that they could use the Lebanese army or a section of the Lebanese army to forcibly disarm Hezbollah. And, and obviously I think realistically no one believes that can actually happen. And so in this agreement, what we see is that Lebanon has, or the Lebanese government has actually called upon Arab countries like we, we know that means Syria, that's shorthand for Syria has basically called upon Arab countries like Syria to come in and help them disarm Hezbollah. And again, here I do think there is, there must be an awareness that this is close to impossible given has been unable to disarm Hezbollah for what, over 40 years now. So it's essentially a kind of quid pro quo whereby Israel gets to maintain its occupation, potentially annex south Lebanon, which it seems very clearly that this government has no problem handing over to Israel. It's a form of self colonization really. It's effectively handing over South Lebanon for Israel to colonize, handing over the people of the south for Israel to genocide and ethnically cleanse. And in exchange, this government will offer civil strife, knowing that even with the civil strife, they probably will still not succeed in disarming Hezbollah. But what they can do is get Hezbollah mired in a civil war. That is their thinking, that they will drag it into a civil war, which will distract it from its resistance activity. And I think that's the ultimate goal here. And so what we really have to look at is will Hezbollah allow itself to get dragged into this? And that's the big question. And so we can talk about, like, what Hezbollah's strategy in the coming phase will be.
- [14:25]
A
Yeah, I mean, I'd be very curious. I just want to point out one thing, since you mentioned this idea of Syria coming in to be the force that's going to fight Hezbollah. Trump said this openly. And, in fact, he went further than that. You know, at first it was sort of sounded like a suggestion Trump was making. And then Trump, as he's prone to do, starts, like, spilling out other things that, you know, who knows to what level it was discussed in the White House or between the US and the government of Ahmed Al Sharra. But Trump is, if we boil it down to its sort of basic fact, Trump is saying, let's get this former Al Qaeda commander to now work with us and go in and he's going to take care of Hezbollah. And of course, there's a long history involving Syria's civil war and Hezbollah's involvement and Ahmed Al Shara's forces involvement. I mean, and that's, you know, that is a minefield discussion when you talk in the region about what happened in Syria, of course, Iran as well. But relevant to this discussion, though, Amal, is the fact that then Ahmed Al Shararra responds to this by then doing an interview with Lebanese journalists by coming out and saying, we don't want anything to do with this. And the fact is that when Bashar al Assad was brought down and left the country, what did the Israelis do immediately? They bombed the entire conventional military infrastructure of Syria to ensure that no one who comes to power there is going to be able to defend the country's sovereignty against Israel. They weren't bombing offensive weapons systems. They were trying to make it so they don't have a state, a functioning state military defense system. So I just wanted to put that on the table for people to understand the context of what you're talking about there. But I do, I think it would be great to hear your assessment of how you assess that Hezbollah is navigating this period right now, because it's a, it is a extremely consequential moment for Hezbollah as a movement, as a fighting force, as a political entity.
- [16:26]
B
Yeah, I think it's very important to sort of preface that by saying like this. So this agreement had been in the works for months, actually. And according to reports like from Al Akbar, the agreement was actually completely kind of fleshed out already right before March 2, when Hezbollah first kind of entered the fray and resumed its resistance or responded to Israeli aggression that had been going on since November 2024, when the ceasefire with Lebanon was meant to, you know, take place. And so that agreement had already been in the making. And so when Hezbollah, you know, stepped in, I think there was this, this very misguided belief or miss a huge miscalculation on the part of the us, Israel and these Lebanese authorities that Hezbollah would be weakened considerably by a huge strike on Iran. And the idea was that they, they genuinely believed that Iran would fall, that the system, the political system in Iran would collapse once the, the leader, supreme leader Khamenei, was assassinated and so on. And that didn't happen. And Hezbollah kind of also, not only was Iran extremely resilient, but even Hezbollah sort of came back with a vengeance, so to speak, and sort of proved that all these months it had been sort of reconsolidating, reconfiguring, resupplying weapons, etc. And so there was, I think this maybe perhaps surprise in that result, because this agreement is kind of incongruous with this whole geostrategic context of a very powerful Iran. I mean, Iran is very clearly now arising, I don't want to say a regional hegemon, but it is by, you know, by far now the strongest regional power, I would say. And Hezbollah has also proven that it is much more powerful and definitely not finished as many had predicted it had been since November 2024. So this agreement does not reflect the political reality on the ground. And so what Hezbollah is going to do now is, first of all keep an eye out for what Iran will do next in terms of its the MOU with the US in the sense that Iran has very clearly wedded itself to Lebanon, to Hezbollah, or at least to the occupation of Israel's occupation of South Lebanon, and has made this entire agreement contingent on that clause being fulfilled. And so Hezbollah will likely await to see what Iran is going to do next, now that it's very clear that the US and I don't know whether this is sort of Trump initiating this or if it's a Marco Rubio Lindsey Graham kind of side side gig. You know, it's very difficult to tell, you know, is this, are these factions within the government? I mean, Trump has okayed it. Obviously he's not. And from what I saw today, like JD Vance seems okay with this as well. And so they have kind of subverted their own MOU with Iran and tried to retroactively translate the, the first paragraph of the MoU regarding Lebanon as being. Oh, we actually meant that Hezbollah should be disarmed when that clearly was not the language in the MoU. So you have this kind of parallel track which completely subverts the mou. And so we need to wait to see what Iran is going to do next. I think that's what Hezbollah is sort of banking on, that Iran will not tolerate this for much longer. Perhaps, you know, in terms of maybe even responding with kinetic strikes against Israel. Like that remains to be seen, or what other kind of leverage Iran will have. Secondly, on the domestic level, what, what is Hezbollah likely to do? I think it's very, and this doesn't require my own analysis, Hezbollah has actually said, not only through its close ally Nabih B, the speaker of Lebanon's parliament, but also through its own MPs and interviews, that it is going to refuse to be dragged into civil strife. Now, what that means is the idea of mass popular protests that attempt to bring down this government is not going to happen. And that is because it will look very much like. It won't just look. It will in fact be a case of the Shia community which is overwhelmingly supportive of Hezbollah. And so the pro Hezbollah rallies will likely be confronted with or faced with people who support, for instance, right wing Christian groups. And so it will look very much like perhaps a Shia kind of uprising against the government versus Christians. And so that will very much, you know, sectarianize the current fault lines, which are in fact, I wouldn't say they're actually sectarian because a very large segment of maybe, you know, I don't want to get throw numbers here, but I would say at least half of the Sunni community is against this agreement, you know, according to different polls, and perhaps around a third of the Christians and I don't know really in terms of other sects like the Druze, but I would say, you know, Lebanon is split maybe equally 50, 50, more or less here. And so it's not entirely a case of it's the Shia versus the rest, but on the street that's what it will look like. And it could very easily lend itself into sectarian Strife. And let's not Forget that, yes, 40% of the displaced Shia have, you know, returned to south Lebanon, but you have 60% that are still displaced. And even the 40% that have returned haven't returned to their homes because their homes are rubble. Now. They're also displaced within south Lebanon. So they're kind of like the Achilles heel, Hezbollah's Achilles heel, because they are in a very vulnerable position, and they are now residing, you know, in host communities from other sects. And so any kind of civil strife will affect them first and foremost. So that is why it is very unlikely. And Hezbollah officials have said this, again, it's not my own analysis, only that they will not be resorting to, you know, popular protests right now or anytime soon. The other issue is what can Hezbollah do inside the government? So Hezbollah has its own ministers as well as the, you know, other Shia ministers allied with Hezbollah belonging to the Amal movement. Now, what Hezbollah did in the past, after the July war leading up to the 2008 clashes between Hezbollah and the authorities back then over Hezbollah's weapons, what it did back then was it withdrew from the Cabinet thinking that it could render the. The government unconstitutional. And what the government did then was actually to just go ahead without any Shia representation. And it actually used that as an opportunity to issue decisions which aimed at disarming Hezbollah. And so Hezbollah doesn't want to make that mistake again, because while it could, in theory, render this government unconstitutional, if all the Shia ministers were to, for example, resign from their positions, yes, it would lack, you know, any kind of constitutionality. But knowing this government very well and knowing Joseph on Now and Noah Salam, they would likely go ahead without the Shia and issue similar decisions or way, way worse, I would say, than in 2008. So that that can't be, you know, a strategy that Hezbollah uses in this specific, you know, juncture wherein it can't resign from government, the Shia can't resign, and it can't resort to popular protests. So what it will likely do is try and fight this from within the state. And also, I think it's a very important point. And Hezbollah officials have actually been talking a lot about this in their discourse, which is Hezbollah is not outside the state. So what the government or the authorities are trying to do is to portray themselves as being the state, as conflating the. The government with the state. And so Hezbollah has been very keen to point out that actually, we are the state, too. We are part of the state. You know, and so if Hezbollah were to resign, that would Kind of feed into that whole narrative that it's the state versus Hezbollah or, you know, so the idea is Hezbollah will remain in the state and, and consolidate its position in the state and try and confront this historic, you know, it really is a historic surrender agreement or alliance with Israel from within the state. And so that's how they're most likely to play it, I think.
- [24:46]
A
Yeah, I wanna. And of course, Joseph Aoun said on, on Wednesday, you know, that people need to stop characterizing it that way and it preserves these, these core things, which of course, you know, you're, you're giving the counter view to. But I want to ask you about why you think Aun and his allies are, are doing this. I mean, you had this strange series of events where when the Iranians made clear that they meant business with Lebanon being included in the, in the memorandum of understanding, Aoun then releases this statement, or maybe it was that he said it in an interview where he was, he basically said, we don't need Iran. Iran doesn't speak for us. And this, we're not a party to this, you know, which is extraordinary. You have a major power in the region that just fought off two nuclear armed states, one of which is waging a war of annihilation in the south of your country. And you have this state that clearly had a lot of leverage at that moment over the United States and had the beginnings of something that looked like a fissure between Trump and Netanyahu for Trump, for his own reasons. I never believe these Barack ravid stories about, oh my God, they're having a big fight. But there was a tactical moment of opportunity there and he says, no, we don't want that. Then some weeks go by, he sees that the Iranians mean business. He has a call with Foreign Minister Arachi, the Iranian foreign minister. He doesn't thank Iran, he doesn't say, oh, we're going to be a party to this. But he also issues a statement that could be read as kind of a shift in tone where he's saying, oh, we're thankful to everybody who's trying to end the war against Lebanon. And then you had the Israelis again on the eve of the signing of the MOU bomb, Beirut. And I was told by a senior Iranian official that day we are less than three hours away from striking Israel. And it was very clear to me that that was going to happen. And then I was preparing to report that, and then I got a text saying, hold off a second, there's a huge meeting. And my understanding was that all These regional mediators and messages passed from the White House were essentially begging the Iranians don't do it. And the Iranians claim they got some 11th hour concessions out of the Americans at that time. You know, the Iranians are keeping meticulous documents. I think someday we'll, we'll actually see the proof of who was telling the truth or not. But in general, the Iranians have been pretty straight shooters when they say what's going on in these discussions. But then you have Netanyahu and Trump who were being portrayed in Axios and elsewhere, sort of at war against each other and Trump interfering in the elections and saying I put Bibi there, etc, then this whole other track gets intensified with Lebanon and, and it results in what you're saying is like now viewed by many as a kind of surrender agreement. Why, what, what are the factors that led to, to the Awun government doing this? Because clearly they understand everything you're saying about the prospect of civil war. They know their own history. Whether they agree with your portrayal of it or not, there's an established set of facts on how Israel is operating here. Why did they do this?
- [27:51]
B
You know, it's really difficult. I think I, I often try and think about this, you know, like what is their agenda? And we know that like, you know, Michelle, sorry, Joseph on was the army commander and I, by the way, I taught the Lebanese armed forces for six years and it was a really, I think, interesting experience for me to understand kind of the, the military ethos of this army. And you only know that when you kind of sort of sit down and have intellectual discussions, not just with the top brass but sort of mid ranking officers. And so over the years I got to really see in this transcend sect whether they were Sunni or Christian and the majority were actually Christian or Shia in terms of the, the higher ranks, they view, they don't even use the word Israel by the way. They call it the, the enemy and they call it the Zionist entity or Zionist enemy or the Israeli enemy. They do. They never say just Israel.
- [28:44]
A
You're talking about the official Lebanese armed forces. Just for, to clarify for people, you were, you were a lecturer, instructor, academically teaching soldiers.
- [28:52]
B
The Lebanese. So sorry, the Lebanese University where I used to teach for six years, I was involved in a joint program between the Lebanese university and the Lebanese armed forces have their own research center and they had a master's program in strategic studies and I taught there for six years. And over the six years I got to really, you know, get a more kind of granular understanding of the sort of ideology that the Lebanese army has. And I would say this, like, obviously it's very hard to tell what sort of political background each official sort of, each officer has. But it was very clear from our discussions, just from the language they use, they do not use the word Israel very much like Hezbollah. And so I'm really hard pressed to sort of imagine how a man who was in that position, was a commander of the army, is the same person now who is completely violating Lebanese law. Lebanon's constitution. Our entire history, you know, the very, I would never say Lebanon in terms, has a sort of a shared identity. And Lebanon has always struggled, I think, to kind of identify a joint enemy. And at times, you know, Syria was an ally, other times it was an enemy. Same with Saudi Arabia, same with the US but when it came to Israel, I think, you know, after the tariff accord in 1989, when the system, you know, was no longer dominated by the Maronite community, where you no longer had, you know, in the past, like in the 1980s, you did have, for example, the May 17 agreement. But this, this agreement is far worse. It actually way worse. And I think everyone has come to that realization now. And so what I'm saying is we now are in a completely different phase whereby, or we have been for decades now that Lebanon has an enemy called Israel. You know, there's no doubt about that. And, and so this is a huge taboo that has been broken, you know, in this country. It's a taboo. You can't, for example, if a journalist was in Israel and then comes to Lebanon, he can't, he or she can't use that. The Israeli can't have an Israeli stamp on their passport. They can't enter. And so we've had really strict anti normalization laws. And so for, for this government to come out and wholeheartedly embrace Israel and to, you know, like, if you look at the sort of the wording of this agreement, it's really shocking to I. And, and the previous also, if you recall from last month, I think it was when there was another not agreement but there these, all these memos. Yeah.
- [31:23]
A
The US would publish these things on the State Department website and say, here's the ending of these trilateral meetings. Yeah, they were strange, nebulous what they actually were documented.
- [31:33]
B
One of them, for example, said Iran is kind of identified Iran as the enemy. And so it very clearly became like, why do I call it an alliance? Because an alliance is always between two states is bound by a common threat. And so the common Threat here appeared to be Iran and Hezbollah, not. And, and Israel is the ally. Like both Lebanon and Israel are aligned in terms of who the common threat is, which is Iran and Hezbollah. And so for this army General, sorry, I know I'm sort of rambling a bit here, but like, to go back to the original question, the original question is, you know, what was, what was his thinking? I, I really don't know how someone from the military tradition, even if they, if he had fundamental political differences with Hezbollah, would actually identify Israel as a friend, you know, and in the midst of a genocide, no less. Like, we're not talking here about a lab, talking here about a far right Israeli government which is, you know, basically a pariah state. Now Israel is a pariah state. And, and not only do we have, you know, Joseph, in terms of, I said the army commander, we also have the head of the government, the Prime Minister, Noah Salam, who was himself the, the ICJ judge who ruled, you know, that Israel was committing a genocide. And now these same individuals have authored this agreement that absolves Israel preemptively of any war crimes in Lebanon. The other issue, like, you know, is it opportunism? It's really difficult to tell, but I do think they actually believe, I, I think there's a genuine conviction here that the US Is invincible. And they really think despite this war and despite like what we have seen in terms of Iran's military performance and even Bala's military performance in Lebanon, which is quite formidable as well, vis a vis Israel, like Israel hasn't been able to really hold on to any territory. And yes, it has these, you know, villages, I think around 60 now in the yellow, you know, behind the yellow line and so on. But, but ultimately, with time, Hezbollah would very clearly, I think be able to inflict huge losses that would force an Israeli withdrawal. So this through, you know, a medium to long term, maybe war of attrition, those areas would also be liberated, obviously. So there's, you know, Lebanon is not being occupied as a state. We have a portion of it that is occupied. But, you know, Hezbollah still has a lot of room still, which, which obviously this government is trying to prevent them from having any room for maneuver to liberate these areas. So the question here is, I think there is a sense of that the US is invincible, so is Israel. We're just going to have to put up with this and just surrender. Like, I'm, I, I honestly don't know to what extent they are that delusional to think that Iran and Hezbollah have lost, because they clearly haven't. And they're clearly really struggling like Israel itself is struggling. Otherwise it wouldn't need this incredibly weak, illegitimate government to sign this agreement. Why would Israel even need this government, Right, if it wasn't itself able to finish the job? They're clearly trying now to subcontract this to the Lebanese armed forces, knowing that the only other way of weakening Hezbollah is through civil war. So it's very difficult to try and understand the psychology of, you know, on and Salam. But I do think they must believe that the US is still in a position to weaken Iran and Hezbollah and that they will emerge victorious from this. And I think they really do think that they can. I mean, and I, I am very confident that they are more than happy to allow Israel to annex South Lebanon. And if anything, I, I think they do see the Shia as a burden on Lebanon. They do see people of the south as a burden on Lebanon, because these people will always want to resist, with or without Hezbollah. The people in the south, by this, this transcends the Shia as well. It's not just the Shia. People of the south have historically always resisted Israel, and they will continue to do so, even if it's with, you know, very basic weapons. And so they would be more than happy for Israel just to kind of relieve them of this burden called the resistant people of South Lebanon. And in exchange, they, they are actually delusional enough to believe that they could then live in their neoliberal bubble in Beirut, in Mount Lebanon, and that Israel will leave them alone. And, and they're completely oblivious to what, for example, Israel did with Syria, how it tried to demilitarize and succeeded actually in demilitarizing Syria. Here. They don't seem to think or have this awareness perhaps that that would be Israel's next step, that they would not let them live in peace if they just surrendered South Lebanon, for example. So I think that is kind of their thinking. And the people that support them, and they're not an insignificant minority. I would say maybe a large segment of the Lebanese population, maybe half of it, thinks that maybe this is one way that Israel will stop attacking Lebanon. They just want to live in peace. Ultimately, it's not out of any love for Israel. A lot of these people, by the way, actually oppose Israel's actions in Gaza. Many of the people who have some hope in this agreement actually ending the war, they believe the agreement could end the war. And so it's, it's a lot of, you know, I think a lack of awareness and understanding of what this agreement entails. I'm talking about people here, the public. Yeah, I understand government itself, obviously. Yeah.
- [37:10]
A
You know, I mean, you, you, you mentioned in, in passing the May 17th agreement of, of 1983. And I just want to emphasize for people what's significant, given that you're a historian on these matters, that it's significant what you're saying, because when the May 17, 1983 agreement was a US orchestrated plan, that officially the intent of it was, this is going to end the war. And just to remind people, or to mention for people that may not know this history, at that point in time the Israelis had invaded Lebanon. The Israelis also had their own proxy forces and forces that they were, you know, both overtly and covertly backing and really trying to destroy Lebanon and make it, you know, a full blown civil war that ensured that it wasn't going to be anything resembling a state. But the, one of the most relevant factors to that agreement or that framework that the US Pushed through was that the Israelis were occupying Beirut and the Lebanese negotiators who had to deal with this or the quote, unquote, officials that had to deal with, they had no leverage whatsoever. They had an occupying army in their capital city. And in this case, and this is why I brought up the thing about Aun saying publicly, oh no, we don't need Iran's help, is that Lebanon probably hasn't had this kind of leverage almost ever since 1983. To be, I mean, maybe I'm wrong, I'm not a historian on these matters, but like, I can't imagine that Lebanon had a greater leverage than this particular Iran after having fought the United States and Israel in this particular war, saying we won't make a nuclear deal with the United States or move forward with one unless this stops. And what, and our definition of stops is total withdrawal of the Israeli occupation forces. Like, it's mind blowing if you even have a rudimentary understanding of the history of what you're referencing. Amal, when you talk about May 17,
- [39:02]
B
1980, 1983, as you're saying, Jeremy, like in back then, Lebanon was under occupation. And that's why I often say, like, what this government is doing. The sort of, it transcends collaboration. A lot of people say, you know, the Mahmoud Abas ification of this government, actually Mahmoud Abbas is, you know, lives under occupation. And yes, he is a collaborator, but it is a state of occupation. He's under. Like, you know, Palestine is under, whereas this country isn't. And in, in 1983, all of Lebanon was under occupation, but what we're seeing is we have the so called security belt under occupation and that is going to be a transient phenomenon obviously. And so the rest of Lebanon is not under occupation. And beyond that, Lebanon now enjoys a security umbrella provided by Iran which secured an unprecedented, I would say agreement. It even put, it said that Hezbollah was a party to the agreement, as was Israel. So it was an agreement not just between Iran and the U.S. but Iran said between Iran and Hezbollah on one side and Israel and the US on the other. So it elevated Lebanon to, you know, a stature that is, has been, you know, never, we've never seen before. It's security umbrella that it's very rare to find historically, honestly, especially one that is this cohesive and tight knit, not just strategically but ideologically as well. And so it, I don't think anyone has any doubt that Iran is not going to throw Hezbollah under the bus because it hasn't in all these months. And it's against Iran's security interest to do so anyway. And so what the Lebanese authorities did was actually do everything they can to subvert this agreement, to overturn it and to say, hold on a minute, this looks like they're going to secure an Israeli withdrawal. Let's ensure Israel stays, let's help Israel remain. And what they did was the really, really. I keep using the word unprecedented but I can't find another word. You know, this, this, this agreement whereby Israel gets to stay indefinitely ad infinitive as long as the, the Hezbollah is not disarmed. And the government obviously very clearly knows Hezbollah will not be disarmed. And in so doing have basically handed over south Lebanon to Israel in the context of this historic agreement between Iran and Hezbollah on the one hand and the US and Israel on the other. So they actually went out of their way to ensure that Lebanon is occupied and annexed. And so, you know, it's very interesting because I think one way of looking at this is in terms of sovereignty. Like what is this government's agenda? You asked me earlier, I believe this government's agenda is to de sovereignties Lebanon is to actually expunge Lebanon of any sovereignty that it currently enjoys. And so this, you know, they keep talking about this idea of monopoly on violence and the decision of war and peace being in the government's hand. And that's how they interpret sovereignty in what we call in political science the Weberian way, this Weberian understanding. Max Weber, who defines sovereignty as a government's monopoly over the use of force. And in so doing they have actually completely overturned what we, we call Westphalian sovereignty, which is no, no foreign intervention in another state. That's the, the other understanding or the other facet of sovereignty. When a state is not occupied by another state, it enjoys external sovereignty, meaning other states can't invade, attack it or interfere. The Lebanese government doesn't seem to care about that aspect. They just want in what they call internal sovereignty, which mind you, they don't enjoy because they don't actually have a monopoly on violence in Lebanon because Israel is occupying Lebanon. So they don't actually have that kind of authority over all of Lebanon even if they wanted to. It's not just Hezbollah supposedly, which is the obstacle to that. And so what they're trying to do is to really undo whatever sovereignty, whatever self determination that Lebanon enjoys. This is an actual proactive agenda. It's not simply that they are this sort of, you know, in, in being so close to the U.S. and subservient to the U.S. they have violated Lebanon's sovereignty or been dismiss is dismissive of it. No, they are actually out to undo sovereignty. And I think that is really rare even among collaborationist governments which kind of find themselves in a position of having to work with occupation forces, for example. So this is, this is quite unique, I would say.
- [43:32]
A
We don't have much time left and there's a couple of things I want to make sure to get your, your perspective on. You know, one of them. In the, in the bigger picture, we've talked a bit about the way Iran has conducted itself since the US and Israel launched this war. But in the bigger picture, what's your assessment of how Iran approached this situation? You know, beginning even before the June, so called 12 day war, you know, last year, June of 2025 and 12 days there, the Iranians still coordinated backdoor the way they were going to respond to it, as has happened a number of times since October 7, where the Iranians tried to calibrate the way they responded to Israel or the United States in such a way that it wouldn't risk a broader war, the 12 Day War. The Iranians, although it was more intense and prolonged in nature, did engage in some form of coordination. And it was the US and Israel that asked for the ceasefire in the June 2025 war.
- [44:32]
B
War.
- [44:33]
A
But Iran then spent the next year preparing because they knew that this was going to happen again and they suspected that it was going to happen during negotiations again. And that's precisely what happened. And then they militarily fought off the US and Israel in a way that clearly stunned a lot of people, including the governments of Israel and the United States. And then in the negotiations also, Iran has seemed to effectively utilize its leverage. But now we're in a situation where it seems like the Trump administration is trying to shift the dynamics. And you know, Vice President J.D. vance implied this week that, you know, we really only got into this MoU to get the oil flowing again. But the other stuff, we're going to see how it goes. You know, people in Trump's orbit are suggesting that he's contemplating resuming a larger scale war, maybe after the midterms. Who knows what Netanyahu is going to do. Maybe Netanyahu is going to escalate his murderous assault against the Palestinians of Gaza, expand the violent murderous operations and expansionist operations in the occupied West Bank. But I, I'm asking you about your big picture sense of how Iran has emerged and conducted itself here.
- [45:43]
B
So sorry, just ask you, do you mean like from March 2nd?
- [45:47]
A
No, I just mean in, you know, you can say from March 2nd. But I, I'm, I guess I'm, I'm asking you to speak in a bigger picture about the way that Iran, honestly post October 7th, I'm looking at the way that Iran now has emerged in this and how they got the path that put Iran in the position it's in now and to kind of assess the bigger picture of what you think is important to understand about what's happened with Iran during this period.
- [46:14]
B
Yeah. So I think Iran has obviously been, or before this last war practiced what, what is called strategic patience. The, the doctrine of strategic patience. Right. And the idea since October 7th was this whole unity of fronts which Iran led indirectly through political and military support and financial, you know, financial, military and political support to resistance movements, you know, Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis on Sadullah in Yemen and the PMU in Iraq. And there was indeed as we saw, a multi front war. It was, you know, something rather new in the sense that, or novel because it was the first time we saw a coalition of non state actors. You know, and Iran wasn't, this is actually a non state because Iran wasn't one of them come to the assistance of another non state actor. And it was a wartime coalition. And so this, this idea of unity of battlefronts was very new. And Iran was 100% behind this in the sense of, you know, arming these groups and helping them coordinate and so on. And obviously they are not proxies, they are all allies of Iran. They have their own interests, strategic interests which align with and intersect with Iran's. And so Iran was very much a pivotal or the linchpin of that whole unity of fronts or axis of resistance alliance. And so because of its, you know, many people I recall would criticize, there are many supporters of, of the, you know, the Palestinian cause and resistance would criticize Iran back then and say, you know, why isn't Iran militarily intervening? And obviously Iran, you know, for a state, any state, not just a state like Iran, but any state to enter a war, the cost will be, as we've seen, is much, much greater than it is for I would say a non state actor like say Hezbollah in Lebanon. The state, you know, obviously there are different costs involved here, but we're talking here about an entire state, its entire economy. And Iran has indeed paid a huge price since then, since 2025 and especially after March, sorry, after February 28, it has paid a huge price for this war. And so I, I do think that is something we have not really witnessed historically for any state to come to the defense of much more junior allies, come to the defense of oppressed people in this manner. And, and this has a lot to do. I know there are many people who are cynical about this and say, oh, it has its own interests and agenda. Let's say it does. Let's say that is, that is the only reason. But that is still quite formidable because it has, its strategic interests have been defined in such a way as to overlap with resistance movements. And that's not a small thing. Right. And obviously you do have ideological and cult, cultural and religious considerations as well, and motives, especially regarding Hezbollah and the people of the south. Right. But I'm talking here more generally about the Palestinian cause. So what Iran has done, and I think it's very clear for people to, to see this, if Iran had just maybe, you know, for several decades now, Iran has been sanctioned, economically strangulated, perpetually threatened with, with, with, you know, even nuclear bombs at one point. Right. Historically, Iran has been really born the brunt and paid a huge price for its support for the Palestinian cause and for resistance movements. It has been economically strangulated, threatened. I'm talking here, you know, even before Obama, before the jcpoa, I'm talking about decades ahead and the condition was always that for the US to back off and Israel, any regime change that Iran had to give up its support for Palestine and Hezbollah, you know, it was the Israel, the question of Israel that has been the sole concern of the US Historically. All Iran had to do was not even like become One of these, you know, so called moderate Arab regimes like the UAE or Saudi Arabia or whatever. All Iran had to do was adopt, you know, something like a neutral sort of Malaysia profile or even like, like Turkey. A country like Turkey and the US would have backed off, not only the nuclear issue, it would have backed off regime change aspirations. They would have let Iran be. And so Iran has historically paid that price and continues to do so today. And I have no doubt in my mind that Iran would not have been attacked to begin with had it not supported Hamas, Islamic Jihad in, in Palestine and Hezbollah in Lebanon. There is absolutely, you know, this is, this is, these are facts. And so what Iran is doing today is kind of taking, yes, it's true that the US attacked Iran and so it has to defend itself and this is in its self interest. But why did the US and Israel attack Iran? Why? The US does not have a problem with Iran having an Islamic form of government because allies like Saudi Arabia have Islamic forms of government. Right. Historically the US is willing to have even alliances with countries that have Islamic or other forms of government. That is not the problem. It's what type of Islamic government is this? Is it an Islamic government that is anti imperialist, anti Zionist, that, that's where the fault lines lie. And it doesn't have to be Islamic, it can be socialist or any other type of government. And if it has an anti imperialist identity and if it believes in regional sovereignty, then it will be attacked. And that is exactly what Iran represents today, is a model for sovereign, for regional sovereignty and not just anti imperialism. And it has demonstrated this through its own economic self sufficiency, its own military self sufficiency, its own form of, as we're seeing now, like what Iran has done in the region is really quite formidable because it has actually forced Arab states that were aligned with the US to now kind of rally behind it and try and find ways to deal with Iran separately without it. So there is really, I would say that we are seeing major regional changes.
- [52:29]
A
You know, finally, I just, I want to ask you about where you see all of this going. You know, Netanyahu certainly is at the apex of his career and his project. He not only got that complete carte blanche from Joe Biden and the Democrats, and you know, Biden of course was one of the most dedicated Zionists in the history of American politics. But then under Donald Trump, he got full blown permission slip backed by weapons and rhetorical support and also this kind of religious fanatical framing that the US Ambassador does, endorsing The Greater Israel Project finally gets the United States to engage in an open, overt military war against Iran. And yet in Gaza, Hamas and Islamic Jihad have never raised the white flag. They didn't surrender. They're fighting off their own attempt by this fraudulent board of peace to try to win through edicts from the board of peace what Israel couldn't achieve on the battlefield. And that's an ongoing war. And Israel is threatening. And Israel, by the way, on a daily basis, murders Palestinians in Gaza. In fact, they've killed more than a thousand Palestinians in Gaza since last October when the so called ceasefire was signed. That's more people than Israeli civilians that died on October 7th. That's not even counting the 80,000 plus confirmed deaths of Palestinians throughout the course of the two and a half years of this genocide. That's just since this so called ceasefire. Hezbollah, we were told after the pager bomb attacks, after the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah and other senior leaders of Hezbollah and its armed forces, that basically Hezbollah was put in the corner. We were told that the Iranian state was gonna get brought down from within and that Trump was just paving the way by doing this bombing and that Iranians were gonna rise up and take control. None of those things have happened. And yet we're witnessing now attempt to win victories through diplomatic trickery and refusing to abide by the terms of agreements. And we're in this period. And when you talk to certain Iranian officials or you talk to people from within the resistance in Palestine, and I'm sure the same is true within Hezbollah, though I haven't spoken to anyone that directly made this point there. In the case of Palestine and Iran, I have have they believe another war with Israel is coming. And one of the things the Iranians I know are talking about, and they said they've had these discussions with Hezbollah, is trying to decouple the United States and Israel. You know, the, the part of the Israeli and American program is to try to decouple these other resistance movements from Iran, particularly Hezbollah. And the Iranians and Hezbollah are aware of this and they're looking at it the same way. But my final question for you, Amal, is where do you see this going? And I'm sure you're hearing the same thing from people too, that no one believes this is over. And I hear a lot of people, including influential people within resistance circles, saying we know another war is coming and it's definitely going to be with Israel. And the question is, is it going to also be with the United States?
- [55:43]
B
Again, yes, I think there's a general sentiment, and I see this, like, from Iranian commentators and media particularly, that, that this war, this, this war hasn't ended and that this, the mou, is kind of like a pause or hiatus. And, and many, I think, believe this could go on, drag on for many months. And so what Israel and the US Are trying to do is extract, extract as many, I wouldn't even say concessions, because they can't extract any concessions, but, like, try and change things on the ground. They certainly have been doing that in Lebanon. But, like, you know, ultimately we, we don't know. And I very much doubt not any of this will be implemented. Like, there's no way this agreement will be implemented in Lebanon. But you know that I say that with or without a resumption of war with Israel, but there is very clearly this, I would say, belief among everyone that the war, round two, is going to be resumed. And whether that just means it's Israel and IRAN without the U.S. or with the U.S. it's certainly going to also take place here in Lebanon as well. And that is why I think this, this idea of the security agreement or alliance with Israel is so important for this government, because I think they too know that war is inevitable, like the resumption of war is inevitable as well. And, and this could also perhaps explain why Hezbollah is kind of just letting this, letting them, they're calling this income paper and saying this is illegitimate. None of this matters. This agreement doesn't matter anyway. And I think part of that might be because they're aware that the war is not over anyway. You know, I think it would be, we'd be thinking, you know, a lot more clearly now in Lebanon here if the, the war had actually technically ended and very clearly ended with Iran. And then there would be then this attention to what are we going to do with this government. That would be a real plan, I think, for Hezbollah and people who oppose this agreement to start working against. But there seems to be the sense of, well, the war is going to resume anyway, and so all of this is going to be superfluous, regardless if that makes sense.
- [57:48]
A
Yeah, I mean, I, unfortunately, I think that's, I, I think that's right and it's, you know, if history is any indicator, and it almost always is, then it's not over. You know, the wild card here also is because Iran, you know, established deterrence, I think, in a really clear way on some core issues, because Iran seems to be holding red lines very firm in a way that I think even some supporters of Iran were surprised to witness. There's always that wild card there. You know, Iran shows up at negotiations with an armada of PhDs, and the United States shows up with a couple guys holding last week's golf scores. And so, you know, anything can happen. But I do think history shows us that certainly in the case of Israel, this is not going to be the last war we're going to witness between the Axis of Resistance and Israel. But Amal Saad, as always, I want to thank you so much for your scholarship, for your analysis, and also for taking time out of your schedule to be with me today.
- [58:53]
B
Thanks very much for having me, Jamie, it was a pleasure.
- [58:55]
A
Amal Saad is lecturer on international relations and politics at Cardiff University in the UK currently writing a book on Hezbollah and the Axis of Resistance. I'm going to keep pressuring her to finish that book. We desperately, desperately need that kind of scholarship at this moment. Thank you everyone for joining us. And thank you to everyone who supports our work at Dropsite News. You can see everything at dropsitenews.
- [59:16]
B
Com.
- [59:16]
A
I'm Jeremy Scahill. Thanks so much.