Above photo: Israeli soldiers along the Lebanese border near Misgav Am, June 12, 2023. Ayal Margolin/JINI via Xinhua.
Turning ‘buffer zones’ into permanent borders.
Israel has stated it does not plan to leave Lebanon even if the current ‘war’ ends. If the Gaza model is any guide, Israel appears to be moving toward expanding its border into Lebanon.
While the US-Israeli war on Iran and its economic repercussions on the global economy continues to be at the center of global media attention, Israel is in the process of re-drawing the map of the Middle East, particularly in Lebanon. If successful, Israel’s plans could have regional and global repercussions. And yet, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon has barely made a blip on the Western media’s radar.
Last week, Israel’s defense minister, Israel Katz, said that Israeli forces will not leave the south of Lebanon after the end of the current war. Katz’s statements are in line with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who said last weekend that he had instructed the Israeli army to expand its control in the south of Lebanon up to 10 kilometers, to create a “security buffer zone.” These statements come as the Israeli army has deployed four divisions to the Lebanese border, and continues to push into Lebanese territory.
Everything in the current Israeli invasion of Lebanon is repeated from previous invasions; Israeli orders to civilians to leave their villages in the south, the near 1 million Lebanese displaced, the bombing of infrastructure, especially bridges over the Litani river, and the fighting inside and around Lebanese villages. But there is something different this time; Israel’s destruction of infrastructure is not a mere war strategy. It is yet another announcement of Israel’s renewed doctrine: occupying new areas, often depopulating them by force, and permanently controlling them, basically expanding Israel’s de facto borders with “buffer zones.”
Although Israel has implemented elements of this strategy in the past, this time it is significantly different. First, because Israel is explicitly stating that it wants to permanently occupy new Arab territory, against the backdrop of official statements about ‘Greater Israel’ ambitions. Second, because it is happening without any significant international reaction. And lastly, because this new model that Israel is trying to replicate on a second front could have implications for the future of war and border drawing worldwide.
This reality raises two critical questions: how did this model become an Israeli official policy? And what will this Israeli vision mean for the Middle East and the world, if realized?
Applying Gaza’s ‘Yellow Zone’ logic in Lebanon
In the latest round of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, Israeli forces have conducted large-scale detonations and demolitions of Lebanese villages and infrastructure in the south. The tactics resemble the same tactics Israel used in Gaza during the height of the genocide.In Gaza, Israel had an explicit goal of pushing Palestinians permanently out of entire areas, like the northern Gaza Strip cities of Beit Hanoun and Beit Lahia, and the southern city of Rafah.
Now, as Israel escalates its war on Lebanon, Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz has made Israel’s plans clear: implement the Gaza model of total destruction and ethnic cleansing. He said on Tuesday that “the model of Rafah and Beit Hanoun” will be implemented in Lebanon.
This means that Netanyahu’s orders to the Israeli army to create a buffer zone 10 kilometers deep into Lebanon is more than a military strategy. It is a statement of reshaping an area of approximately 10,000 square kilometers, making it uninhabitable for its Lebanese residents, and putting it under Israeli military control. In Syria, Israel hasn’t conducted the same kind of destruction, but it has announced that it will remain in the new territories it occupied after the fall of the al-Assad regime in December 2024. Together, in Lebanon and Syria, Israel seeks to maintain permanent control of some 14,000 square kilometers, all to create a so-called “buffer zone.”
The model that Katz evokes in Gaza resulted in the creation of the ‘yellow zone’, making up 53% of the Gaza Strip, where Israeli forces have destroyed all civilian infrastructure, pushing the Palestinian population to the crowded tent encampments of Al-Mawasi and Deir al-Balah. The Israeli army was supposed to evacuate the area behind the ‘yellow line’ as part of the ceasefire, but last December, the Israeli army chief of staff announced the ‘yellow line’ in the Gaza Strip as Israel’s new border.
If Israel’s genocide in Gaza is any indication of its state policy, Israel’s current actions in Lebanon suggest it plans to apply the same logic of the ‘yellow line’ to southern Lebanon – creating a temporary ‘buffer zone’ before entrenching it as a permanent border.
The way this logic developed introduces a new and dangerous approach to building and implementing strategic plans. First, creating facts on the ground, militarily, with no political opposition. Then, consecrating these facts in pro-longed and one-sided ceasefire deals with U.S. support. If this goes through in Lebanon, it can easily be repeated elsewhere, such as in Syria or parts of the West Bank. Even more concerning, nothing can guarantee that other countries with sufficient power would do the same in other conflicts in other parts of the world.
The new Israeli territorial doctrine goes beyond redrawing the map of the Middle East. It is part of the ongoing process of reshaping the international order, doing away with international law, even as a formality, and shaping the world through military force.
Israel has announced that even if the U.S. ended its war on Iran, it will continue its own war on Lebanon. In light of the new reality on the ground, with Hezbollah revealing that its force hasn’t been destroyed to the point expected by Israel, and that it will very likely remain present in the country, Israel’s new goal might be a territorial one, through a long, and destructive war, which would lead to something resembling the Gaza model, establishing new de facto borders in the Lebanese south, without a political agreement to give it any legitimacy.
Beyond the impact on Lebanon itself, it is the whole way the world will be run, and the borders will be drawn in the future, that is at stake.
