24 June 2026
Talks between Israel and Lebanon (click here) include discussion of a US-backed proposal for Israeli forces to hand over some of the territory they have invaded during the war with Hezbollah to the Lebanese military, according to Israeli and Lebanese officials.
The Israeli officials said the Lebanese troops involved would undergo US training and vetting to ensure they are not linked to Iran-backed Hezbollah, while Israel would maintain a military presence in a buffer zone along the border.
The proposed "pilot" project is being discussed in the latest round of talks between Lebanese and Israeli officials, which got underway in Washington on Tuesday.
Rejected by Hezbollah, this diplomatic track has been overshadowed as Tehran has made Lebanon a focal point of its negotiations with the US....
A joint peace initiative with anticipations of handing control back to the Lebanon military is the best way forward and a remarkable accomplishment. Unfortunately, these dynamics are all backwards and upside down. Negotiations with Hezbollah has been necessary because they asserted power over the Lebanese government including a political party that adversely effects the outcomes of Lebanon.
The Iran-backed Shiite militia (click here) was considered the most powerful...
...non-state armed group...
...in the Middle East. A 2024 Israeli military campaign against Hezbollah considerably weakened the group, though it is now involved in the war brewing between the United States and Israel against Iran....
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights or OHCHR has not adopted a clear definition of terrorist or terrorist organizations. That is most likely a mistake and actually beings about instability and with instability an invitation to military leaders like that under the Trump regime to decide it is best to control other countries than put up with terrorist networks within them.
...In reality, (click here) national definitions of terrorism remain largely left to the discretion of States, leading to varying interpretations in domestic counter-terrorism legislation. Ambiguous definitions of terrorism in some States have led to policies and practices that violate the fundamental freedoms of individuals and populations, and discriminate against particular groups. National definitions must always comply with international principles of legality and legal certainty....
June 24, 2026
The Israeli military (click here) says thousands of its troops have surrounded an underground Hezbollah fortress beneath the hills of southern Lebanon, trapping dozens of militants inside.
The standoff is at the heart of intense clashes that have erupted in the area in recent days between U.S.-allied Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.
The clashes have already threatened to upend delicate progress toward a framework peace agreement between Tehran and Washington. Should the confrontation end in a blood bath, it could disrupt those negotiations again.
Despite an Israel-Hezbollah cease-fire and even after a halt to out-and-out combat over the weekend, fighting has persisted in the hills this week, particularly on a strategic ridge called Ali al-Taher, just north of the town of Kfar Tebnit....
The only negotiations for peace should be between Lebanon and Israel with a clear understanding Lebanon does not sanction the violence carried out by Hezbollah. There is a lot wrong with a non-state group armed and experienced in terrorism. The Iranian government cannot expect sovereign countries such as Lebanon to tolerate terrorists within it's borders. Iran is wrong in asserting it's sovereign authority within the borders of countries like Lebanon.
The Shi'ites and their religious freedom should be welcomed in all countries, but, it cannot be in coordination with terrorists networks. Hezbollah removes the legitimate sovereignty of Iran in that it operates with a clear understanding the violence is sanctioned by Iran. Iran cannot expect other countries to look the other way.
Terrorist organizations should never have political importance. It is ridiculous to consider such paradigms as answers going forward. We have witnessed sincere disruption in lives when a terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah or Hamas obtains recognition as a part of a political dynamic. The purpose to any country needs to be the peaceful lives of it's people within it's borders. Tolerating terrorist organizations within sovereign borders can only lead to instability within government and business.
That is exactly what it going on with Hezbollah. There is definitely a false leadership agenda within the Trump White House for the Middle East. That is possible because of the violence not controlled by sovereign countries. Such violence is an opportunity to instill a faux agenda of control through war and aggression. Such war and aggression allows invasion and occupation with little to no respect for the people that rightfully live on the land, in this case the Lebanese. That cannot be tolerated as hate will override dignity and peace and the occupied lands become unlivable by the people that rightfully belong there. An agenda of occupation is a human rights abuse. But. That human rights issue disappears when other more powerful countries decide it will not tolerate the violence existing because of legitimized terrorist organizations, ie: Hezbollah and Hamas.
Hezbollah had become powerful within sovereign countries less stable and more authoritarian. If a terrorist organization sets up housekeeping in a country such as Venezuela it is because they bring stability to a regime that operates outside the acceptance of the people. Between the former Maduro regime and Hezbollah the Venezuelan people had little or no authority over their own lives. We are still witnessing the oppression of the Venezuelan people in the lack of acceptance of a freely elected president. However, the alternative being Trump's ideology of turning the Western Hemisphere into Trumpland is as much a nightmare as the alliance between Hezbollah and Maduro. The killing and exploitation of natural resources would result in worse conditions for the people who inevitably would be enslaved for the sake of employment. The result of Trumpland is not benevolence. The agenda and goal to Trumpland is greed to a fewer and fewer of the global wealthy, primarily living in the USA at this point. Basically, his oligarchs.
Trump has a faux agenda of prosperity. It is not prosperity of the people of any country, it is his own prosperity justified by being a living god that brings happiness and quality of life for his genius. That quality of life will be trashed in an instance for control when the people decide they are unable to live under the oppression of his regime. His international friends, like Bolsonaro, are not interested in the people. They are interested in themselves and the control of the people for the benefits of profit. They are authoritarians not interested in democracy or freedom. They consider democracy and freedom an enemy of the people.
So, as to Hezbollah. It is a terrorist organization willing to exist on profits by assaulting humanity. In Venezuela, Hezbollah was interested in violence to satisfy Maduro to maintain control, but, it's primary interest was the drug cartels and the empowering money received in human carnage of the drugs. Hezbollah is not a benevolent organization regardless of it's belief in the principles of the Muslim faith. Better said, Hezbollah is more a violent Islamic organization no different than al Qaeda. They cannot be allowed to flourish under any regime. The fact remains that organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas fuel the need for control and justifies military actions through political paradigms resulting in the deaths of many innocent people.
Those deaths are wrong. They simply are. We are less a people ourselves to believe permitting such war will protect us. We know better. Trump is not a good and decent man with good intentions. Trump is propaganda to that ideology. He will kill at will to serve his own goals justified by a Bible he wrote himself.
The Middle East needs to solve it's own problems without the power of the USA military. There are paths forward and every one of them should be pursued. You mean to tell me the leaders of the Middle East cannot see the future of their children? They cannot see anything but violent conflict? I don't believe that. Not for a second.
The old world strategies need to be abandoned and new alliances and commitment to the lives of all the ethnics in the region with patience with difference. The economy of religious tourism is real in the Middle East. It cannot be tainted by violence and false ideology.
To every leader in the Middle East their joy will be to witness the happiness and quality of life of their people as shared with those of neighboring countries. Terrorist organizations that seek to harness jihad as an ideology to serve god are toxic and violent and cannot be allowed to exist.
The example of Lebanon and Israel coming together to benefit both their national interests and national security is the way forward. There is no right or wrong religion or the right to annihilate one faith for another. Peace and prosperity void of hate and jealousy will bring about a Middle East that can garner the best of the future for it's children.
June 24, 2026
David M. Halbfinger, Christina Goldbaum, Euan Ward and Samuel Granados
The Israeli military (click here) says thousands of its troops have surrounded an underground Hezbollah fortress beneath the hills of southern Lebanon, trapping dozens of militants inside.
The standoff is at the heart of intense clashes that have erupted in the area in recent days between U.S.-allied Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah.
The clashes have already threatened to upend delicate progress toward a framework peace agreement between Tehran and Washington. Should the confrontation end in a blood bath, it could disrupt those negotiations again.
Despite an Israel-Hezbollah cease-fire and even after a halt to out-and-out combat over the weekend, fighting has persisted in the hills this week, particularly on a strategic ridge called Ali al-Taher, just north of the town of Kfar Tebnit....
The Arab Peace Initiative needs to be reconvened with Israel in attendance. Diplomatic relations between the Middle East countries has fallen into disrepair. No citizen of any country in the Middle East wants to entertain terrorists within their borders. To that end there is no reason why the Shi'ite diaspora cannot be moved from countries such as Lebanon to either justice proceedings, jail, and/or deportation to Iran.
The region needs peace and prosperity. Neither peace or prosperity are possible when terrorist organizations are normalized into a political spectrum.
There is much work to be done.
In March 2002 heads of Arab states (click here) gathered for an annual summit in Beirut adopted a resolution, proposed by Saudi Arabia, that offered to recognize the right of Israel to exist in return for withdrawal from occupied territory on the West Bank and Gaza and for division of Jerusalem into Israeli and Palestinian quarters. The resolution became known as the Arab Initiative. It was largely ignored by both Israel and the United States. Five years later, in 2007, Arab heads of state reaffirmed their acceptance of the so-called two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. In 2008 some Israeli politicians took a second look at the Arab Initiative and suggested that it could form the basis for negotiations to end the half-century old war which had gradually been subsumed by the growing conflict between Shiite Iran and the Sunni states of the Arabian peninsula....
