The numbers are small, but the message is loud: Israel has no intention of leaving southern Lebanon anytime soon.
On Wednesday, Israeli strikes killed two people in the border region, the Lebanese health ministry reported. That brings the death toll since the ceasefire to 14. Not a flood, but a steady drip — and each name is a fresh wound.
Defence Minister Israel Katz made it official: troops won't withdraw. Not while the security situation remains, in his words, 'volatile.' He didn't say when it might stop being volatile. That's the problem.
Talks in Washington, guns in the south
State Department officials are hosting negotiations aimed at stabilizing the border. Mediators from France and the UN are also at the table. But on the ground, the IDF still holds five hilltops inside Lebanese territory, and its drones still hum overhead.
This is the paradox of peacemaking: diplomats talk about ceasefires while soldiers fire into the next valley. The two realities don't connect. The Lebanese villagers who lost their homes last year know that better than anyone. For them, the talks in Washington might as well be on Mars.
'The Israelis say they're defending their border. But our land is not their border.' — Ali Masri, resident of a border village hit in Wednesday's strike.
Hezbollah stays quiet, for now
Hezbollah has not retaliated. That's the key detail. Since the November ceasefire, the group has absorbed Israeli fire without striking back. Military analysts say the organization is rebuilding, but also testing whether diplomacy can produce what rockets could not: a full Israeli withdrawal.
Israeli officials insist Hezbollah is still present near the border, despite the ceasefire terms requiring it to retreat north of the Litani River. UNIFIL patrols report sporadic violations, but nothing like the pre-2023 buildup.
For Israel, the logic is simple: if the threat isn't gone, the troops stay. For Lebanon, the logic is equally simple: if the troops stay, the ceasefire is a farce. The gap between those positions is measured in meters of concrete and inches of politics.
$200 million in damage — and counting
The World Bank estimates Lebanon's southern border region has suffered $200 million in infrastructure damage since the escalation began. Farms lie fallow. Schools are shuttered. Tens of thousands of people remain displaced in the north, unable or unwilling to return to homes that may still be in the line of fire.
One farmer I spoke to near Tyre showed me his olive grove. Half the trees were burned. 'I can come back, but to what?,' he said.
Israel has offered compensation for some civilian losses, but the Lebanese government calls it 'blood money' and refuses to accept. So the groves stay scorched, and the families stay away.
What Washington wants
The US has been clear: it wants a durable ceasefire, not a pause before the next round. But its leverage is limited. Israel's far-right coalition partners have made withdrawal a red line. Prime Minister Netanyahu needs their votes to survive, so he needs their approval for any pullback. That approval is not coming.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration is distracted by elections and crises elsewhere. Lebanon is not a priority. It rarely is.
The talks in Washington are scheduled to run through next week. Neither side expects a breakthrough. The best case, according to a European diplomat familiar with the discussions, is a 'freeze for freeze' arrangement: Israel stops new offensive operations in exchange for Hezbollah ceasing all movements south of the Litani. That's essentially the status quo, but with nicer language.
No end in sight
The two bodies from Wednesday's strike will be buried tomorrow. The drones will still fly. The talks will continue — slowly, painfully, irrelevantly.
Israel says it wants security. Lebanon says it wants sovereignty. Both are right. And until someone decides which matters more, the killing won't stop. It will just slow down enough for everyone to pretend it isn't happening.
