US President Donald Trump, Tuesday, issued a rare rebuke of Israel, rejecting the destruction of entire residential buildings in Lebanon in the search for a single Hezbollah member. He noted that many of the residents of those buildings are not affiliated with the group.
This came in remarks he made to reporters after meeting with Emir of Qatar Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad on the sidelines of the G7 summit in France. It comes two days after the announcement of a US-Iranian agreement.
In response to a reporter’s question, Trump said: “I’m not happy with the way Israel has dealt with Lebanon and with Hezbollah. They should have been able to get the job done much faster.”
He added: “You don’t have to destroy an entire apartment building every time looking for one Hezbollah member; there are many people living in those buildings, and not all of them are Hezbollah members.”
Trump said he had suggested to Israel that Syria be left to deal with the Lebanese Hezbollah group.
He pointed out: “The person running Syria (Ahmed al-Sharaa) is someone that I, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and other figures supported, and we helped him come to power. He has done an exceptional job in restructuring the country.” He continued: “I suggested to Israel that Syria take care of Hezbollah, because frankly I think they would do a better job.”
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He added: “If Israel can’t get the job done against Hezbollah without killing everyone, then (Syria) will take over. Syria will do the job.”
Trump also criticized the Israeli attack on Beirut just before the signing of the US-Iran agreement, saying: “I didn’t think it was right for Israel to attack Lebanon and Beirut hours before the agreement was signed. I didn’t like it at all, and I told him (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu) that very clearly.”
Trump said that without the United States, “Israel wouldn’t exist and would have been destroyed,” calling on Netanyahu to act more responsibly toward Lebanon.
On Sunday, the Israeli army launched an airstrike targeting an apartment building in Beirut’s southern suburbs, claiming to be targeting “Hezbollah targets,” while the world awaited the imminent signing of a memorandum of understanding between Washington and Tehran to end the war.
The airstrike killed three people, including two women, and wounded 16 others, including four women. Iran vowed an “imminent response” to the Israeli attack in Beirut’s southern suburbs.
On Sunday evening, Washington and Tehran announced an agreement, brokered by Pakistan, to end military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon, reopen the Strait of Hormuz, and lift the naval blockade on Iran. The agreement is scheduled to be signed in Switzerland next Friday.
Since 2 March, 2026, Israel escalated its aggression against Lebanon as part of the ongoing conflict it has waged, alongside the United States, against Iran.
These attacks have resulted in the deaths of 3,826 people and injuries to 11,851 others in Lebanon, according to the latest figures released by the Lebanese Ministry of Health.
Israel continues to occupy areas in southern Lebanon, some for decades, and others since the previous war between 2023 and 2024, while during the current aggression it has expanded the scope of its incursion to a distance of more than 10 kilometers inside Lebanese territory according to Anadolu.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demonstrated his ability to effectively redraw the maps and borders of the Middle East when he backed down from striking Beirut’s southern suburb to completely destroying it. He succumbed to the threats and pressure from US President Donald Trump. In this respect here, Iran can be considered to have become a regional superpower not only in the Middle East, the West and Central Asia, but globally.
Trump, who previously threatened to wipe Iran off the map and unleash hell upon it, destroying all its energy and electricity infrastructure, scurried like a frightened rabbit to the phone to call Netanyahu in a “call of insults,” ordering him to immediately halt all plans to bomb Beirut’s southern suburb and withdraw his troops and warplanes en route to the area, just hours before the bombings and destructions where to begin.
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In a Washington Post interview, Trump completely changed his threatening tone and began pleading for peace with Iran, after extending the unilateral ceasefire by 60 days. More importantly, he expressed his desire for a summit with Ayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei as soon as an agreement is reached, and confirmed that Mojtaba, whom he had previously claimed was no longer alive, is now involved in the decision-making process regarding war and peace in the current conflict.
The new and effective ‘password’ in the Middle East, reflecting Iran’s “power shift,” is embodied in its thunderous response to the Israeli threat to destroy the southern suburb of Beirut, western Bekaa Valley, and Nabatieh. Iran launched hundreds of missiles and drones to strike deep into occupied Israel, sending a clear message: “Greater Tel Aviv in exchange for the southern suburb.”
The Iranian leadership, backed by a solid popular base, a highly advanced missile and drone industry, a naval fleet, and over 460 kilograms of uranium enriched above 60%—enriched to produce 10 nuclear bombs in a few days—says what it means and acts accordingly. It will not tolerate injustice and is prepared for all eventualities.
There is ample evidence to support this assertion, as demonstrated early Wednesday morning when Iranian missiles and drones struck US military bases in Kuwait and Bahrain in retaliation for attacks on an Iranian oil tanker in the Strait of Hormuz and a communications tower on Qeshm Island, both launched from these bases.
The American-Israeli alliance has, since the October War of 1973, grown accustomed to a deeply ingrained official Arab subservience, a failure to respond to any Israeli aggression, and a refusal to reject any American dictates. Most Arab leaders turn the other cheek to Israeli and American slaps, becoming indifferent to the situation. But now, someone has emerged to uproot this system of surrender and usher in a new, truly Islamic era—an era of resistance, where the response is not merely in kind, but in a stronger and more significant way.
Mohsen Rezaei, advisor to Iran’s Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei, summarized this new military, political, and moral upheaval in a statement saying, “America and its president, Trump, should expect a barrage of missiles (hypersonic and cluster warheads) and drones should they renew their aggression against Iran.”
Netanyahu, who craved the limelight and the humiliation of Arabs, and who rubbed his hands with glee at the long line of Arab leaders queuing before his office seeking normalization and the signing of the Abraham Accords, has fallen silent and disappeared from the public eye. He no longer dares to threaten to destroy Iran alone, without America’s participation in the aggression.
The dictates Trump issued just days ago, the shifting balance of power on the ground, and Iran’s threat of retaliation for any aggression against Lebanon have evaporated. The American president, as a New York Times editorial acknowledged, has failed miserably in all his wars since arriving at the White House a year and a half ago—in Iran, Ukraine, and the Gaza Strip—and has not achieved his objectives and has become a laughingstock.
As for the Gulf states – those that normalized relations and/or those that were eager to join the “Abraham Accords” to avoid angering Trump and rejecting his demands – they reached a firm conviction that America is incapable of protecting itself, its bases, and its ships.
The most prominent evidence of this is the destruction of American military bases in their countries, including the US Navy base in Bahrain, and the closure of these bases and Saudi airspace to planes and drones, whilst preventing them from launching attacks on Iran from their territory. They saved the Hajj season, just as they saved themselves and their people from the consequences of the mirage of American power.
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In conclusion, we sympathize with our Kuwaiti brothers who were injured as a result of an Iranian missile attack on the passenger terminal at Kuwait Airport, whether by mistake or deliberately. However, the blame lies entirely with those who allowed America to use Kuwaiti territory as a launching pad for aggression against Islamic Iran. America possesses three aircraft carriers and more than 300 warships in the Arabian Sea, so why didn’t it use them in this aggression? And why does it insist on using its bases in the Gulf states, thereby endangering millions of their citizens?
Abdul Bari Atwan is the Chief Editor of the Arabic Al Rai Al Youm and his piece has appeared in the English crossfirearabia.com English website.
As hostilities escalate in Lebanon despite a recent ceasefire extension, the United Nations continues to push for peace and support displaced civilians by providing food, protection and other assistance.
Thousands of people fled the southern suburbs of the capital, Beirut, on Monday after Israeli announced that it will carry out renewed strikes targeting Hezbollah militants sheltered there.
“Families are leaving by car, motorcycle, and on foot, carrying essentials,” the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, tweeted. Many others are returning to shelters and “fear and uncertainty are mounting.”
The UN reiterated that civilians and civilian infrastructures must not be targeted.
“We urge all actors to respect the cessation of hostilities and avoid further escalation. We condemn all the loss of civilian lives,” UN Spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric told journalists in New York.
He underscored the need for a diplomatic solution to end the cycle of violence.
High stakes, heavy cost
The development unfolded as the UN Security Council in New York prepared to hold an emergency session on Monday afternoon to discuss the escalating conflict.
Humanitarians reported that many people escaped from Beirut and the southern cities of Tyre and Saida following the threat of strikes and renewed displacement orders.
UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon Jeanine-Hennis Plasschaert continues her engagement to de-escalate tensions, reinforce commitments agreed to under the ceasefire, and advance confidence‑building measures.
In a tweet, she noted that southern Lebanon was “in flames” while roads in Beirut were “choked with people fleeing their homes.”
The senior official said that suffering was compounding “as both sides hold out for victory.”
She added, however, that “escalation has its own logic” and “attempting to contain or manage it is a high-stakes gamble, with costs borne by people who have already lost too much.”
Thousands killed since March
The crisis in Lebanon is part of unrest across the wider region. It erupted on 2 March, just days after the United States and Israel began bombing Iran, prompting Hezbollah militants in Lebanon to fire on Israel.
Since then, 3,412 people have been killed and more than 10,000 injured, the UN aid coordination office OCHAsaid on Monday, citing the Lebanese health authorities. At least 88 people reportedly were killed over the past weekend.
Healthcare has also been affected by attacks. The World Health Organization (WHO) said five attacks were recorded in the past three days, resulting in one health worker reportedly killed and 19 others injured.
A US-brokered ceasefire between Lebanon and Israel took effect on 17 April but was never fully observed by either side. It was nominally extended twice, most recently on 16 May for a 45-day period.
UN agencies are on the ground such as UNHCR, which has been supporting the government-led emergency response. Alongside partners, it has reached hundreds of thousands with protection services, emergency cash assistance, shelter support, and other relief.
‘Deepening humanitarian emergency’
However, “nearly three months into the conflict, Lebanon faces a deepening humanitarian emergency with a critical combination of displacement and increased food insecurity,” the UN World Food Programme (WFP) warned on Monday.
More than a million civilians have been uprooted, and food security experts report that 1.24 million people nationwide – nearly a quarter of the population – are not getting enough to eat.
WFP stressed the critical need for sustained humanitarian access, stable supply flows and predictable funding.
“The ongoing conflict characterised by daily bombardments and displacement orders is challenging humanitarian access and resulting in continued displacement,” the agency said, noting that “these conditions are hampering the delivery of critical assistance, particularly in hard-to-reach areas.”
Rising food costs
While food remains available in many areas in Lebanon, costs have risen alongside the escalating fighting. For example, vegetable prices are now 20 per cent higher, while bread costs roughly 15 per cent more.
Furthermore, although markets in Beirut and other areas “remain operational but under growing strain”, most markets in southern Lebanon and Nabatieh – more than 80 per cent – are no longer functioning.
Recently, a shipment of 250 metric tonnes of wheat flour entered Lebanon through Jordan, which is now supporting roughly 10,000 vulnerable households.
Hot meals, food parcels and emergency cash
WFP has ramped up its response efforts, reaching more than 700,000 people to date with hot meals, ready-to-eat rations, and food parcels for families sheltering in displacement sites.
Teams have distributed nearly five million hot meals, in addition to supporting more than 215,000 displaced people across over 500 shelters nationwide, alongside approximately 85,500 people in host communities and hard-to-reach areas.
The UN agency has also provided emergency cash support for close to half a million Lebanese through national systems, and cash support for more than 100,000 Syrian refugees.
Since the conflict began, 24 humanitarian convoys have been deployed to communities in Lebanon facing access restraints, but more than half of those requested have been delayed or cancelled due to movement and access risks.
Humanitarians will launch a renewed flash appeal this Friday to scale up assistance in Lebanon over the next three months. – UN News
BEIRUT—On March 28, George Saeed, 62, and his 24-year-old son Elie were driving back to their home in Debel, a village in southern Lebanon close to the border with Israel. It was a route Saeed knew well. He ran a small laundromat beneath his house, where he washed uniforms for a Polish unit in the United Nations peacekeeping force stationed in the nearby village of Tiri. The trip from Tiri used to take a few minutes, but after the main road was bombed by the invading Israeli military he had begun taking a longer route through the neighboring village of Rmeich.
That afternoon, villagers saw George’s car pass through Rmeich and enter Debel, disappearing along the village’s steep, winding roads. When they were roughly 60 meters from their house, the crackle of gunfire rang out, followed by the blare of a stuck car horn.
Elie Louqa, Saeed’s nephew and the former mayor of Debel, was in Beirut when he got a call from his brother describing what had happened. He began contacting UN peacekeepers (UNIFIL), the Lebanese Army, and the Red Cross, asking them to reach the car. Both the Red Cross unit in Rmeich and the nearby UNIFIL contingent told Louqa they could not secure permission from their superiors to move.
After about 90 minutes, a group of young men from the village decided to go themselves. Carrying white blankets and mattresses to signal they were civilians, they reached the site of the attack and found the father and son dead inside their bullet-ridden car. They pulled the bodies out and carried them to the village cemetery for burial.“You won’t find a man with cleaner hands. He was generous to a fault,” Louqa told Drop Site News. “Go and ask the people of our villages who George Saeed was.
”The killings were just one in a series of attacks on residents of several villages along the southern border who have chosen to remain in their homes despite repeated sweeping displacement orders by the Israeli military covering all of southern Lebanon.
Earlier this week, the Lebanese army announced its forces had withdrawn from southern border villages, leaving residents without even the semblance of protection. At least six Lebanese soldiers have been killed by Israel over the past month. The army said its troops had to “reposition” as they were being encircled and cut off from their supply lines but claimed it continued to “stand by residents” by “maintaining a group of military personnel” in the villages. What this meant in practice, according to residents, was that soldiers from the area could stay in their homes provided they did not wear army uniforms or carry arms.
“We don’t know why the army made this decision,” said Boutros al-Rai, a local farmer and civilian administrator. “For us, its presence made us feel protected.”Drop Site News is reader-supported. Consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
Lebanon is being ravaged as Israel’s escalated assault enters its second month. More than 1,300 people have been killed, including over 120 children, and over 4,000 injured in a relentless onslaught. Israel has issued displacement orders covering around 15% of Lebanese territory and more than 1.1 million people—about a fifth of the country’s population—have been forced from their homes. Emergency workers have also been increasingly targeted, with over 50 killed over the past four weeks.
Despite a ceasefire agreement in November 2024, Israel continued to carry out near daily attacks and occupied five hilltop positions on Lebanese territory. When Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel on March 2 in solidarity with Iran after the U.S. and Israel launched a war on Tehran, Israel launched a full scale aerial assault and ground invasion on Lebanon.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced on Tuesday that the Israeli military plans to occupy the entire area south of the Litani River and will not allow hundreds of thousands of residents to return to their homes, making a reference to areas in Gaza that have been completely razed in the genocide. “The return of over 600,000 residents of the area south of the Litani River will be completely prohibited until the safety and security of residents of the north is ensured, similar to the model of Rafah and Beit Hanoun in the Gaza Strip,” Katz said.
The Israeli military also appears to be engaged in a campaign to ethnically cleanse southern Lebanon of its Shia residents. Around three weeks ago, Israeli military officials called the heads of a cluster of majority Christian villages in southeastern Lebanon and ordered them to force out any “displaced people” that had taken refuge there, according to a municipal official in one of the villages, who spoke to Drop Site on condition of anonymity. “Displaced people” was a thinly-veiled reference to Shia residents who had been forced to flee nearby towns like Khiam.
U.S. Ambassador to Lebanon Michel Issa used explicitly sectarian language two weeks ago in referencing Israel’s military campaign in the south. “We asked the Israelis to leave the Christian villages in southern Lebanon and requested that the army keep a unit stationed there,” Issa said in a meeting with Maronite Patriarch Cardinal Mar Bechara Boutros Rah.
Over the past week, the Israeli military made a new round of phone calls to leaders in majority Sunni villages Chebaa and Kfarchouba, warning them to not accept any non-locals into their village. Mohammad Hammoud, a spokesperson for the town of Chebaa, confirmed the authenticity of a video circulating online showing a call received on Tuesday by local leader Ibrahim Nabaa. Over the phone, an Israeli soldier warned that the village would be targeted if officials failed to keep resistance fighters out. Hammoud said that the municipality had organized a small police force to conduct patrols at night and make sure no outsiders entered—measures that, he hoped, would spare residents their homes and land.
As part of its invasion of southern Lebanon, the Israeli military is in the midst of a scorched earth campaign, systematically destroying homes and civilian infrastructure in border villages. Louqa, the former mayor of Debel, said he fielded frantic calls on Wednesday from village residents who told him that occupation forces had begun to blow up homes on the village periphery. The homes were empty, he explained, because in times of war, residents often move closer to the village center for safety.
“These homes are in Debel—not on the outskirts, not kilometers away,” Boutros al-Rai, a local official told Drop Site, adding that at least 10 houses had been demolished on Wednesday alone. “They’re blowing them up one by one. We don’t know why or how.”Around 1,700 people remain in Debel, according to al-Rai, down from 2,500 before the war. Once the escalation began on March 2, residents started making trips to the nearby village of Rmeich to buy essential goods. But after the killing of George and Elie Saeed last week, and without any support from UNIFIL or the withdrawn Lebanese army, that route was no longer considered safe.
“People have supplies for a week or two,” al-Rai said. “They rely on each other. But it’s not enough for much longer.”
Access to medical care is also severely limited. In Rmeich, where about 6,000 people remain, there is no hospital. Residents depend on coordinated evacuations, typically requiring approval from the Lebanese Army as well as UNIFIL, which then communicates with Israeli occupation forces.
Elie Shoufani, a local official and Red Cross volunteer, said the process is inconsistent. “Sometimes we get permission quickly, sometimes we don’t.”Earlier this week, a 48-year-old man, Paul Mu’awwad, went into cardiac arrest and died before he could get treatment. “We didn’t get permission to take him for emergency care,” Shoufani said, adding that Mu’awwad had left behind a wife and six children. “If we had been able to reach a hospital, he might have lived.
”Over the past month, residents in Debel, Rmeich, and nearby Ein Ebl have relied largely on aid convoys from the International Committee of the Red Cross, which in the past have been accompanied by the Lebanese army.
“Now that the army has left, we don’t know what will happen,” Shoufani said.UNIFIL troops have also limited their movement after Israeli airstrikes killed three Indonesian peacekeepers in southern Lebanon over a 24 hour period last week. Residents say this has further reduced their options.
“All we ask is for a way to move the injured or reach medical care,” Louqa said. “A mechanism to respond when we call. God will take care of the rest.”Al-Rai described the difficulty and humiliation of displacement in a state with overburdened shelters and skyrocketing rents. More than anything, he worried that if he abandoned his home, it would be destroyed by Israeli occupation forces. He, like the others in his village, was determined to stay put.
“These are our homes, our livelihoods, our villages, the homes of our parents and grandparents,” he said. “These are not places that can be left behind.” Drop Site
Since last Wednesday, the Israeli army has continued targeting the network of roads and bridges that link Lebanon to its south. In addition to pressuring the Lebanese government to make concessions in Lebanon and possibly beyond, the Israeli army claimed that targeting the Qasmiyeh bridge and other bridges is intended to prevent the transfer of military supplies to southern Lebanon. However, military experts questioned this justification, noting that Israeli aircraft maintain intense air dominance over the routes leading to the south, which undermines the credibility of this claim. Sources believe that targeting infrastructure, especially bridges and roads, aims to isolate the southern region in preparation for occupying it and turning it into a “buffer zone”.
After the 1982 invasion, Israel maintained a buffer zone in southern Lebanon for 15 years. It was meant to prevent attacks but instead created local resistance and required constant military presence, ending with a unilateral Israeli withdrawal in 2000.
Buffer zones as a military solution in the region were tested between 1985 and 2000. In the 2006 Lebanon War, Israel avoided re-occupying Lebanon, relying instead on air power and UN peacekeepers (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon). Now, in 2026, Israel is returning to buffer zone thinking. Current discussions of a 10-15 km buffer zone show that Israel is returning to a doctrine it once abandoned as distancing itself from its enemy is more important than before.
Meanwhile, air raids continue to target the Lebanese capital, Beirut, and its southern suburbs. Residential areas and neighborhoods near Beirut and in the coastal city of Sidon are also being targeted under the pretext of assassinating figures and cadres linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
On the southern front, the Israeli army has been facing major difficulties in advancing and consolidating its positions since March 2. Hezbollah in Lebanon targeted Israeli troops at dozens of locations.
Ground combat tactics against the Israeli ground maneuver
Hezbollah carried out strikes against concentrations of soldiers and vehicles in different border villages. These attacks were carried out using rockets and artillery shells.
Operations extended beyond the border line, where Hezbollah support units targeted military positions and fixed barracks, as well as newly established sites in Jabal al-Bat and Nimer al-Jamal. Strikes also repeatedly hit the Avivim barracks, as well as Ramot Naftali, Branit, Hounin, Nahal Gershom base, and the Meron Air Surveillance Base.
Both Hezbollah and the Israeli army also carried out psychological and media operations associated with the ground maneuver, including threats, intimidation, low-altitude aircraft flights, and air raids conducted at night or at dawn. Settlers were also used in messaging to suggest that failure to negotiate would expose Lebanon to destruction similar to Gaza, or to incite Lebanese public opinion against a particular sectarian group and the environment that supports confrontation with Israel.
Overall assessment
In summary, the ongoing confrontation since March 2 reveals a gap between Israeli rhetoric and action. Despite statements about deploying three full military divisions, these forces rely heavily on air strikes to flush out Hezbollah fighters positioned inside villages and in the surrounding wooded terrain.
Hezbollah initially responded by targeting troop concentrations with rockets from outside the area south of the Litani River in the early days, and also struck D-9 bulldozers from areas far from the front line, while its special units advanced and seized forward positions. There was also discussion of advances along the Khiam-Marjayoun axis, with the understanding that the advance aimed to encircle the city of Nabatieh in the south and push through the Sahmar axis toward an unspecified town to reach Lake Qaraoun, similar to what Israel did on the Syrian front when it took control of the Yarmouk basin.
A notable development was the use of explosive drones similar to tactics used in Ukraine. On Friday, armed drones were used to strike a rear-area position on the Israeli side. This was considered the second major tactical surprise to enter the battlefield after the previous confrontation in 2024 during the “66-day battle.”
Israeli attacks on Iran and the entry of Iranian missiles targeting Israeli troop concentrations and fortifications around the town of Khiam suggest that the linkage of fronts — from southern Lebanon to Iraq and Iran — indicates that the Khatam al-Anbiya headquarters in Iran is directing a confrontation against Israeli destabilization and US military presence across a theater stretching from the eastern Mediterranean to the Gulf.
The author is the director of the Institute for Strategic and Communication Studies in Lebanon (Isticharia-ISCS).Anadolu
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