The Lebanese-Israeli Accord is War on The Resistance

CrossFireArabia
Opinion
June 28, 2026

Dr. Nassib Hateit

The announcement of the Lebanese-Israeli agreement, sponsored by the United States, constitutes a dangerous turning point in the war against the Lebanese resistance and its people. It is intended to compensate for the occupation army’s field failures in achieving its objectives of disarming and eliminating the resistance, after suffering significant moral and military losses and realizing its inability to achieve these illegitimate goals on its own.

The enemy’s impotence has driven it to resort to using the Lebanese government, whose legitimacy and constitutionality are still guaranteed by the resistance forces (in the dual alliance). This provides the government with a constitutional—albeit immoral—cover for cooperating with the enemy and legitimizing a comprehensive war against the resistance. It also involves assembling a US-led military coalition that includes Arab and international (multinational) parties, mirroring the “Desert Storm” coalition led by the United States against Iraq.

The aim is to support a beleaguered Israel and eliminate the resistance in all its cultural, economic, social, and health-related aspects, not just its military ones. This agreement confirms the beginning of a new phase of confrontation following the end of the “Hundred Days’ War,” in which Israel failed to achieve its objectives, despite the resistance suffering approximately 20,000 martyrs and wounded, the destruction of tens of thousands of homes, and the destruction and occupation of more than 50 villages and towns.

This shifts the war from a confrontation between Israel and the Lebanese resistance to a war between the resistance and an international coalition led by Washington, with the participation of Israel and the Lebanese government and opens the door for the involvement of Arab and foreign armies, most notably the new Syrian regime army, which US President Trump announced he would task with eliminating the resistance.

This will be facilitated by the Lebanese government’s initiative to formally request the support of Ahmed al-Sharaa’s government for the Lebanese army and will force the resistance to fight on three fronts:

Against the Israeli enemy in the south

Against the US military, multinational forces, and the Lebanese army within Lebanon

Against the Syrian army and takfiri groups in the Bekaa Valley. The US has effectively nullified the first clause of the Memorandum of Understanding with Iran through the Lebanese-Israeli negotiations in Washington, placing the memorandum in a precarious position that threatens its collapse. According to its terms, violating the first clause invalidates the remaining clauses. This precariousness is further evidenced by the timing of the agreement’s announcement, coinciding with the US airstrikes in the Strait of Hormuz. It reinforces concerns that the 60-day period the US needs to reassess its position might be shortened or canceled, or that it could be exploited to forcibly separate the Lebanese and Iranian tracks through the Lebanese government. The aim would be to break the military and political alliance between the resistance and Tehran, and to further fragment the axis, isolating its members and preventing them from uniting their forces to compensate for the imbalance of power.

This agreement grants the Israeli enemy a clean bill of health by the Lebanese government, implicitly acknowledging that the invasion was a response to threats from the resistance. It also includes a pledge not to file any complaints or seek compensation before international institutions and courts—a clever preemptive move by the enemy to shield its military and political officials from accountability and represents a complete surrender by the Lebanese government, which has become something akin to the “12th Division” of the occupation army.

The initial response to this surrender document should be as follows:

Restraining this government and ceasing the sin of granting it legitimacy and constitutionality. It must abandon its hesitation, ambiguity, and incompetence in ministerial representation, the latest glaring example of which is passing the agreement’s presentation to the cabinet without objection from the resistance ministers, who merely issued a statement that condemns them more than it exonerates them.

The Islamic Republic of Iran should take the initiative to freeze the implementation of the MoU with the United States, given that Washington is responsible for this agreement, which contradicts the memorandum’s first clause. The Resistance Axis (Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, and Yemen) has declared its complete readiness to engage in the new round of war, united and collectively, without delay, and to move from a state of “finger on trigger” to one of “fire.” Otherwise, the Axis’s fronts will fall one by one, as Israel and America plan.

The coming phase is the most dangerous since the outbreak of war in 2023 due to the expansion of the fronts and the multiplicity of parties participating against the Resistance. It comes after a war of attrition and exhaustion that has plagued the Resistance and its support base for three years, necessitating the formulation of a new defensive strategy. The Lebanese government must be considered an “unfriendly” entity, having made the Resistance a common enemy for itself and Israel. Participation in a government that collaborates with the enemy against the Resistance is unjustifiable, as experience has proven its futility.

We are not weak… the proof is the global mobilization against us, which cannot be countered with motorcycles and statements!

Manage the power you possess wisely! Take advantage of the enemy’s motto against you (kill first) and kill the government “politically” and bring it down to prevent it from carrying out its plans!

Dr Hateit is a Lebanese writer. An architect by training from Nabatieh in south of Lebanon he teaches at the Institute of Fine Arts in the Lebanese University and is a political columnist contributing to different Lebanese newspapers. This article is published in the Arabic Al Rai Al Youm website and reprinted in crossfirearabia.com.

CrossFireArabia

Dr. Marwan Asmar holds a PhD from Leeds University and is a freelance writer specializing on the Middle East. He has worked as a journalist since the early 1990s in Jordan and the Gulf countries, and been widely published, including at Albawaba, Gulf News, Al Ghad, World Press Review and others.

Opinion

Who is Afraid of Palestinian Revolutionary Art?

CrossFireArabia
September 4, 2026

By Ramzi Baroud

The death of Palestinian artist Sliman Anis Mansour stirred powerful memories.

He passed away at Al Makassed Hospital in occupied East Jerusalem on August 24, at the age of 79, bringing to a close a legacy that cannot truly be described, but only experienced.

His life almost exactly spanned the age of the Palestinian Nakba. He was born mere months before the mass expulsion of the Palestinian people from their homeland. Yet his death in an occupied city tells us that the story of Mansour, his art and the Palestinian struggle for freedom is far from over.

Oddly, for years, I knew Mansour through a single painting: Jamal al-Mahamel (The Camel Carrier of Hardships).

The title itself requires a pause. The phrase is rooted in Palestinian and Levantine popular culture. It describes one who shoulders the collective struggles, pain and responsibilities of others.

In Mansour’s post-Nakba world, that person is an elderly Palestinian porter, a barefoot worker carrying the burden of an entire homeland on his back. That homeland is represented by Jerusalem, with the Dome of the Rock, one of Islam’s holiest sites, rising above it.

Mansour, however, was not a Muslim. He belonged to the once-thriving, though sadly shrinking, Palestinian Christian community and came from the town of Birzeit, near Ramallah in the West Bank.

Let that sink in. One of the most iconic Palestinian paintings of the modern era, celebrating the centrality of Jerusalem and one of its most recognizable historic Islamic sites, was painted by a Christian man.

In the age of Israeli extremists like national security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and his “religious wars,” this may appear unusual. For Palestinians, it is anything but. Though deeply spiritual, Palestinians have historically transcended religious divides in their long struggle for freedom.

A mosque is never just a mosque, and a church is never just a church. They are powerful symbols of history, culture, roots, spirituality and continuity. Mansour entrusted the Camel of Hardships with carrying all of that alone, as the world watched an old man bent beneath an unbearable weight, yet fierce and unbroken in his resolve.

Though the painting was created in 1973, it exploded in popularity during the First Intifada, the popular uprising that unified Palestinians everywhere. It took on a renewed meaning: we Palestinians may be standing alone, exhausted by time and the betrayal of others, but we remain as steadfast as ever.

The last time I saw that painting hanging in the living room of my old house in the Nuseirat refugee camp in Gaza was also the last time I saw my father, most of my brothers and many of my childhood friends.

My father died years later. The house was bombed. The painting no longer hangs where it once did, at the heart of our old refugee home.

Ironically, it was only after I left Palestine that I discovered that Sliman Mansour was far more than the creator of a single painting. He belonged to an artistic movement that taught visual sumud, steadfastness, to an entire generation.

My lack of knowledge was not a fault of my own. Artists such as Mansour, Ismail Shammout, Fathi Ghaben, Vera Tamari, Tayseer Barakat and Nabil Anani, among others, were simply forbidden by Israeli military ordinances.

Israel is afraid of Palestinian art, particularly art that preserves memory, asserts steadfastness and speaks of revolution. During the Intifada, the Israeli army would storm Palestinian refugee camps almost daily, particularly before dawn, to ensure that artistic expressions on the walls were painted over.

The soldiers did not paint over the walls themselves, of course. They dragged weary refugees from their sleep and forced them to erase every piece of graffiti, every image and every word. The soldiers may have thought they were carrying out a military duty, somehow protecting Israel’s national security. In reality, they were trying to erase evidence of a people whose roots in the land ran far deeper than the occupation itself.

But the evidence was never erased. It could not simply be painted over, even when the artist himself disappeared, because true art is more than an arrangement of colors on canvas. It is one of the deepest forms of documenting one’s own existence.

Fathi Ghaben, who became a close friend of my family, had, like most Gazans, more than his share of suffering. He was a refugee from a once-serene village called Hirbiya, north of Gaza. His family sought refuge in Gaza during the Nakba.

Ghaben had no memories of the village he lost as a child, yet its colors filled his paintings. For him, Palestine was a beautiful woman, powerful in her determination yet gentle in her gaze. Her eyes, always sharply defined, embodied the beauty of a homeland that never abandoned him. She was the worker, the farmer, the student, the protester, the fighter.

Ghaben was repeatedly imprisoned by Israel for emphasizing the colors of the Palestinian flag in his art, accused of “incitement through his paintings.” The occupation army killed his young nephew in 1982, and many of his relatives were killed in the genocide.

Ghaben himself died during the genocide, in February 2024, after being displaced from his home.

For me, and dare I say for many of my generation, it is difficult to process art that does not carry this kind of weight — art that goes beyond mere “expression” and becomes an experience of blood, sweat, tears and the burden of memories that can only be put to rest when justice in Palestine finally prevails.

I think back to the Camel of Hardships, and I am convinced that Mansour’s figure represented more than Palestine and the Palestinian. Perhaps unknowingly, he was also painting the Palestinian artist himself.

They, too, carried an immense responsibility on their shoulders. Without them, several generations might never have truly appreciated the colors of Palestine, smelled the powder of revolution, or understood the true meaning of losing a homeland.

Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of eight books. His latest book, “Before the Flood” was published by Seven Stories Press. His other books include “Our Vision for Liberation”, “My Father was a Freedom Fighter” and “The Last Earth”. Baroud is a non-resident senior research fellow at the Centre for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net. The article appeared in The Jordan Times

Opinion

Netanyahu and The Settlers: Cart and Horse in Action

CrossFireArabia
August 30, 2026

By Mohammad Abu Rumman

Perhaps the most surprising aspect of the latest events in the West Bank was not what the settlers did — that is hardly new or unexpected — but what Benjamin Netanyahu himself said. The Israeli prime minister denounced the “criminal acts of violence” committed by settlers in the villages of Qusra and Jalud, describing those responsible as a “handful of rioters” whose actions harm law-abiding settlers, interfere with the army’s work, and damage Israel’s standing in the world. This is precisely where the paradox lies: What exactly is Netanyahu condemning? Do the settlers’ actions really contradict his government’s policies, or do they ultimately serve the same project, albeit through different means and methods?

What is happening in the West Bank did not begin over the past few days, nor with the latest attacks. It has been developing for years along a clear trajectory, one that has accelerated dramatically under the current government and since the Gaza war. The United Nations has documented unprecedented levels of settler violence, with more than 1,430 attacks this year affecting some 260 Palestinian communities. Nearly 3,800 Palestinians have been displaced in 2026 as a result of settler violence, demolitions and evictions. These figures cannot simply be viewed as a collection of isolated security incidents; they point to a much deeper transformation taking place on the ground.

Settler violence, in fact, is only one part of a much larger picture. Nearly a thousand checkpoints, barriers, gates, and roadblocks now fragment the West Bank, turning everyday Palestinian life into a continuous struggle with geography, time, permits, and restrictions. In the northern West Bank, the situation has become even more severe, with tens of thousands displaced from the Jenin, Tulkarm and Nur Shams refugee camps, alongside extensive demolitions, bulldozing, and the physical reshaping of these areas.

The E1 settlement project takes the issue to another, more strategic level. Moving forward with E1 would effectively sever geographical continuity between the northern and southern West Bank and further isolate East Jerusalem, making the prospect of a contiguous and viable Palestinian state increasingly detached from realities on the ground. Add to this the transfer of significant powers within the Civil Administration to the authority of Bezalel Smotrich, who has made no secret of his objective of preventing the establishment of a Palestinian state; the empowerment of Itamar Ben-Gvir; repeated incursions into Al Aqsa Mosque and attempts to alter the long-standing status quo; settlement expansion; and a broader set of legislative and administrative measures moving in the same direction. What emerges is not a series of disconnected policies, but an integrated effort to determine the future of the West Bank on the ground before any political settlement can take place.

Against this backdrop, Netanyahu’s reference to a “handful of rioters” becomes difficult to take seriously. It suggests that the settlers operate in a political vacuum or somehow act against the direction set by the government and the state. Yet, however chaotic and violent their actions may appear, the outcome converges with a clearly defined political project: Pushing Palestinians away from their land, expanding settler control, fragmenting Palestinian geography and effectively closing the door on the possibility of a Palestinian state.

The real explanation for Netanyahu’s condemnation may therefore lie in his own words: these attacks, he said, “damage Israel’s standing in the world”. That sentence reveals the essence of the problem from his perspective. The concern appears to be less about the direction of these actions than about their method and image; less about their political consequences than about their transformation into openly violent scenes captured by international media — as happened when an NBC News crew itself came under attack by settlers — at a moment when Israel’s international image has become increasingly associated with the Gaza war, settlement expansion, and settler violence.

Netanyahu’s condemnation can therefore be understood as carrying a dual message. To the outside world, it says that the Israeli government neither endorses nor approves of such violence, even as its policies on the ground move in broadly the same direction. To the domestic audience, the message may be that what is required is not necessarily a change of course, but a more disciplined and calculated management of that course — one that does not further inflame the mounting crisis surrounding Israel’s international image and standing.

This is why Netanyahu’s condemnation is itself worthy of condemnation. The problem in the West Bank has long ceased to be simply a group of extremist settlers acting beyond the state’s control. It is part of a political project in which government policy, settlement expansion, security measures, legislation, and the Civil Administration increasingly converge to reshape the territory and demography of the West Bank and create realities that will be exceedingly difficult to reverse.

When Netanyahu finds himself condemning the natural consequences of a project that his own government has done so much to accelerate, the paradox becomes impossible to miss: He is not merely condemning the settlers. In effect, Netanyahu is condemning himself.

By Mohammad Abu Rumman is a columnist in The Jordan Times.