Can the US push Lebanon to normalise with Israel?
Talk of normalisation between Lebanon and Israel has been non-stop in recent days. The flurry of speculation reached a crescendo late last month, when the US special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, declared that normalisation was “a real possibility”.
Several Lebanese politicians joined the chorus. MP Paula Yacoubian, a self-declared reformist, described normalisation as a “taboo” that needs to be broken. Pro-Saudi MP Walid Baarini, whose constituency in the Akkar region is pro-Palestinian, announced that normalisation may enable Lebanon to wrest back territory that Israel has occupied during the current war and restore stability.
Recycled claims were also peddled about the alleged economic benefits of “peace” with Israel, and Lebanon’s need to catch up with other Arab countries that have crossed that bridge.
Belated assurances by Lebanon’s newly-elected president, Joseph Aoun, and appointed prime minister, Nawaf Salam, that normalisation was not on the table put the brakes on this feverish campaign. Faced with public pressure, Baarini backtracked.
Media campaigns notwithstanding, the chances of normalisation in the form of a full “peace” treaty in the near future are slim, thanks to the presence of widespread opposition among large swaths of the population and anti-Zionist political forces. A popular uprising was able to abrogate the "peace" treaty that Lebanon signed with Israel in 1983 under the barrels of Israeli tanks roaring into Beirut.
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But the danger today of a gradual push towards some form of normalisation - or using it to extract concessions, including the long-term neutralisation of the Lebanese resistance front - has not subsided. This is a sign of the growing tutelage of Washington over Lebanon amid expanding Israeli belligerence.
One sticking point is whether Lebanon will agree to US demands that direct diplomatic talks are held with Israel to resolve border disputes. Salam reportedly suggested indirect shuttle diplomacy as an alternative. This was the approach adopted by former US envoy Amos Hochstein to delineate maritime borders and broker a ceasefire agreement last November.
Normalisation in small doses
The head of Lebanon’s parliamentary foreign affairs committee, Fadi Alameh, has said that Aoun does not support direct talks at the political level. Negotiations over border disputes, he said, could be accomplished by striking joint committees composed of military and technical personnel, similar to those that conducted the delineation of water borders in 2022.
In a televised interview, the US deputy special envoy, Morgan Ortagus, denied that Aoun rejected the idea of creating diplomatic committees when she met him over the weekend. But unlike on her first visit when her statements ignored all diplomatic etiquette and boasted of an Israeli victory, Ortagus said she “didn’t have a single conversation” about normalisation.
Initial euphoria among civil society in the wake of Aoun's election and Salam's appointment has fizzled out
She appeared to give equal weight to disarming Hezbollah and governmental reforms, reserving her vitriolic attack on Hezbollah as a "cancer that needs to be removed" until after her departure.
While in Lebanon, she met the president, the prime minister and the parliamentary speaker, and summoned a handful of ministers - including the ministers of finance and economy - to the US embassy to discuss their plans for reforms.
Raising the red flag of reform is a sign that the Trump administration’s hawkish approach and single-minded focus on disarmament has backfired. It is also an indication that Israel’s ongoing use of brute force, despite its tragic toll and destructive impacts, is not enough to cow resistance forces into full submission.
By reaffirming its stronghold on state and government levers of power, Washington is still betting on non-military warfare, including financial sanctions and a security siege at ports of entry, to augment firepower and extinguish any presence of armed resistance or social support for it. News alleging that Hezbollah is using Beirut's seaport to smuggle weapons may be used as a pretext to increase US oversight even though the minister of public works, who is no friend of Hezbollah, has flatly denied it.
On the financial front, the recent appointment of Karim Souaid as central bank chief is another step in that direction.
Paper-thin claims
Disagreements between Aoun and Salam over Souaid’s appointment created an apparent rift within the anti-resistance camp. Traditionalist forces associated with political parties and established banking capital supported the nomination.
Souaid’s selection for the role, despite Salam’s objections, exposed the persistence of the power of the banking lobby. Initial euphoria among liberal civil society in the wake of Aoun’s election and Salam’s appointment has fizzled out and a media war has broken out.
The appointment of a conservative financier associated with banking power as governor of the central bank also undermined Washington’s paper-thin claims of genuine reform. Of greater significance to Washington is Souaid’s aggressive stance on armed resistance. Last September, he called for the creation of a demilitarised zone in Lebanon as far north as the coastal town of Saida, and advocated for neutrality towards Israel.
Souaid may not be able to enforce his political vision as a central banker, but his monetary authority gives him substantial powers to monitor and manage capital flows and design banking regulations. He has already declared his intention to fight money laundering and terrorism, often a euphemism for enforcing US sanctions on Washington’s opponents, in this case Hezbollah.
One low-hanging fruit may be al-Qard al-Hassan, a financial institution affiliated with Hezbollah. If Souaid decides to go after the organisation and outlaw it, he will have to contend with Lebanon’s finance minister, who is aligned with Hezbollah’s staunchest ally, the Amal Movement.
Hezbollah and Amal are betting on these internal contradictions, including the tensions between Aoun and Salam, to reduce direct political pressure for disarmament. But they might be focusing on the trees while losing sight of the forest.
Appeasing Aoun by not objecting to the vote in favour of Souaid without clear gains will strengthen, rather than thwart, US plans to tighten the financial noose on the Lebanese resistance. The US war on the resistance has never been this all-encompassing. Every front matters.
The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.
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