Lebanon: Ever at war
By Dr. James E. Sulton Jr.
JA International Correspondent
Once characterized as the “Paris of the Middle East,” Lebanon in 2026 continues to contend with a dangerous deficit of national capabilities. As a sovereign state, Lebanon is unable to exercise a monopoly on force or to formulate an independent foreign policy.
Since it gained independence in 1943, the country has experienced recurrent civil conflicts, foreign occupations, financial collapse, and proxy warfare. Today’s government under President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam, both installed in January 2025 on a platform of restoring sovereignty, now operates within a troublesome field of domestic and external constraints, all of which exert competing pressures on its existence.
Lebanon’s political paralysis is rooted in its confessional system, which allocates political offices, parliamentary seats, and public-sector positions according to religious affiliation. Intended to balance a diverse society, the arrangement instead entrenches sectarian elites whose authority is contingent on preserving their own hold on power. Analysts observe that escaping confessionalism would require dismantling the system that every political figure within it depends on for their own survival. Thus, reform incentives are structurally compromised. Because governance requires consensus across sectarian boundaries, decisive fiscal measures – particularly those tied to international financing – are frequently delayed or diluted.
The most consequential internal force is the armed capacity of Hezbollah, the Iran-aligned organization whose weapons transcend the state’s declared neutrality. Following the resumption of war with Israel in March 2026, the Lebanese government issued a resolution condemning military action launched from its territory and affirming that decisions of war and peace must rest exclusively with the state. In late June, a United States–brokered trilateral framework conditioned any Israeli withdrawal on the verified disarmament of Hezbollah throughout Lebanese territory. While President Aoun characterized the agreement as an initial step toward restoring sovereignty, Hezbollah rejected it, and several observers warned that the framework carried the risk of renewed internal conflict.
Seven years after the 2019 financial collapse that rendered its banking sector insolvent and eroded depositor savings, Lebanon’s economy remains structurally impaired. A modest recovery – estimated at approximately 4 to 5 percent growth in 2025, the strongest since 2011 – was reversed by the 2026 war, which displaced more than 20 percent of the population and reduced public revenues by roughly 40 percent within a single month. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) projects that gross domestic product (GDP) will contract in 2026 as tourism and agriculture decline. Although the government has advanced banking-sector restructuring and a proposed “Gap Law” governing the allocation of financial losses, a comprehensive IMF program remains contingent upon reforms the confessional elite has been reluctant to implement.
Lebanon must simultaneously reckon with multiple external actors whose interests intersect on its territory. Iran has sought to link Lebanon’s fate to its broader negotiations with Washington, prompting Aoun to assert a “sovereign decision” to separate Lebanon’s trajectory from the Iranian/American track. Saudi Arabia, responding to Hezbollah’s diminished position, lifted a five-year import ban in June as a conditional endorsement of institutional reform. However, because the measure was conveyed informally and without published conditions, it functions as revocable leverage rather than a durable commitment. Post-Assad Syria has pursued a cautious normalization, establishing a joint committee on border management and trade while resisting United States pressure to assume responsibility for Hezbollah’s disarmament. Concurrently, France and Italy have proposed a multinational coalition to succeed the UNIFIL (United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon) peacekeeping mission, whose mandate expires at the end of 2026, with the stated objective of averting a security vacuum.
The central problem confronting contemporary Lebanon is the disconnection between the state’s assertion of sovereignty – reflected in Aoun’s declaration that “no one negotiates on our behalf” and the reality that decisions bearing on its security and economic future are substantially shaped in external capitals. Constrained by an armed non-state actor (Hezbollah) aligned with a foreign patron (Iran), an economy dependent on external financing, and a security order underwritten by foreign forces, the Lebanese leadership faces the difficult task of reconstituting effective statehood amid the competing influence of considerably stronger powers. Whether the current reform effort can translate this fragile moment into durable sovereignty, or whether entrenched sectarian and geopolitical dynamics will reassert themselves, remains the defining question of Lebanon’s near-term future.
The current phase of war erupted when Hezbollah launched attacks on northern Israel in early March 2026. This happened in retaliation for the American/Israeli killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader and ongoing border violations. The current fighting continues decades of unresolved hostilities, tracing back to the Lebanese civil war (1975–1990) and historical Israeli occupations of southern Lebanon. The conflict includes extensive international involvement, including American mediated cease-fire negotiations intended to de-escalate tensions and secure Israeli troop withdrawals.
