Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a> stated that despite the plans of Washington and Tehran, Israeli forces would remain in Lebanon and continue their campaign against Hezbollah. Netanyahu also said that Israel would not withdraw its troops from Lebanon and does not consider itself bound by provisions mentioned in the U.S.-Iran agreement.<\/p>\n![\"Israel](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/2025-01-27T135152Z_1721612699_RC2CICA2XG0N_RTRMADP_3_ISRAEL-PALESTINIANS-LEBANON-1739794768.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Source: aljazeera<\/p>\n
Seeking to reduce tensions surrounding the issue, U.S. President Donald Trump stated that Israel should stop fighting Hezbollah and leave the matter to Syria, whose new leader, in Trump’s view, would handle it much more effectively.<\/p>\n
Trump said he had spoken with Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa and discussed the possibility of countering Hezbollah in Lebanon. According to Trump, the Lebanese front is a “local war” compared to the conflict surrounding Iran, although Hezbollah remains a constant source of tension in the region.<\/p>\n
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa has declared his readiness to negotiate with Hezbollah in order to stabilize the situation in Lebanon. In an interview with the Emirati television channel Al Mashhad, he said:<\/p>\n
“We want to solve the Hezbollah problem in order to ensure Lebanon’s survival. We are ready to sit at the negotiating table if it benefits everyone.”<\/p>\n
He stressed that the opposing sides in Lebanon “should think of nothing but dialogue.”<\/p>\n
According to the Syrian president, Lebanon must find a “political consensus” because the country cannot withstand further polarization.<\/p>\n
Al-Sharaa explained that Syria’s proposal for resolving the crisis is based on ending the war and adopting a package of economic, political, and social measures aimed at rebuilding Lebanon and restoring its relations with Syria.<\/p>\n
At the same time, he emphasized that such steps must be accompanied by security arrangements that take Syria’s interests into account, as well as Israel’s possible concerns.<\/p>\n
“Creative solutions are needed to stop what is happening,” he added.<\/p>\n
Trump later stated that he had spoken by telephone with Netanyahu and informed him that “Syria will now take care of the Hezbollah issue.”<\/p>\n
Trump emphasized that Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa is doing “more useful work” against the Iranian-backed group.<\/p>\n
Ahmed Zeidan, spokesperson for the Syrian president, confirmed that Syria’s possible future role in Lebanon had been discussed with Washington, but stressed that this does not involve military intervention, rather political and institutional support.<\/p>\n
Ahmed al-Sharaa also rejected the possibility of a military operation.<\/p>\n
Despite these denials, Western media outlets published commentary suggesting that Syria could potentially launch action against Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
Experts believe such statements evoke deep psychological associations among both Lebanese and Syrians.<\/p>\n
The Levant region (Bilad al-Sham), which was a single administrative unit during the Ottoman period, was divided by France after the First World War into two states: Syria and Lebanon. However, many Syrians considered the division artificial and argued that Lebanon historically belonged to Syria.<\/p>\n
In 1976, Syrian President Hafez al-Assad, who promoted the ideology of Bilad al-Sham (“Greater Syria”), took advantage of Lebanon’s civil war and, under the pretext of a peacekeeping mission, occupied Beirut.<\/p>\n
The long Syrian occupation of Lebanon resulted in thousands of casualties and created deep mistrust of Syria among many Lebanese.<\/p>\n
After the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, Lebanon’s Hezbollah became one of the Assad regime’s most important military allies.<\/p>\n
Entering Syrian territory, the Iranian-backed group seized strategic areas, including Homs, the outskirts of Damascus, and Qusayr, forcing large numbers of civilians to flee.<\/p>\n
International organizations reported mass killings of civilians in Aleppo, Hama, and Homs.<\/p>\n
Thus, Syrians have old scores to settle with Hezbollah.<\/p>\n
What may await Lebanese Shiites, according to the author, can be seen in the example of Syrian Alawites, who served as a pillar of Bashar al-Assad’s regime.<\/p>\n
It is also widely believed that Turkish support played a role in bringing Ahmed al-Sharaa to power, which could intensify tensions between T\u00fcrkiye and Iran.<\/p>\n
Furthermore, Israel has little interest in seeing Ankara strengthen its position along Israel’s northern frontier.<\/p>\n
A Syrian move against Hezbollah could ultimately lead to Lebanon’s fragmentation along confessional lines, with Druze and Christian communities seeking protection from Israel, as some Syrian Druze have already done.<\/p>\n
In Lebanon, Trump’s idea has been received with little enthusiasm across virtually all political forces and religious communities.<\/p>\n
Although Trump did not specify whether he envisioned Syrian forces replacing Israeli troops in southern Lebanon or disarming Hezbollah throughout the country, the proposal has generated concern among Lebanon’s leadership.<\/p>\n
It would be a mistake to assume that Trump proposed a Syrian role in Lebanon without carefully evaluating the situation.<\/p>\n
The American president understands his own interests well, and in that sense the idea is quite functional.<\/p>\n
Most likely, it is one means of pressuring Iran to force Hezbollah to halt attacks on Israel.<\/p>\n
According to the author, Israel is often blamed for regional problems regardless of whether it is responding to unprovoked aggression.<\/p>\n
By contrast, conflicts between different branches of Islam tend to be viewed as internal disputes, attracting less outside intervention.<\/p>\n
![\"Hezbollah](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/TXML7LP4C5IOLCNWPZG6XSXC7A.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
Source: TASS<\/p>\n
As a result, far less attention may be paid to casualties among the opposing sides.<\/p>\n
Therefore, the author argues that Trump’s goal may be to remove Israel from direct involvement and instead pit Shiites against Sunnis, along with the states backing each camp.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Washington-based New Lines Institute has presented the concept of the “Four Seas” initiative \u2014 a proposed energy corridor through Syria and T\u00fcrkiye that would bypass the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n
The project reportedly envisions attracting up to $10 billion in investment to transport 4 million barrels of oil and 50 billion cubic meters of gas per day to Europe.<\/p>\n
The route would create overland export corridors from Gulf countries through Iraq and Jordan into Syria and T\u00fcrkiye.<\/p>\n
Additional integration with existing energy networks in the Caspian and Black Sea regions is also proposed.<\/p>\n
According to the authors of the concept, Syria’s stabilization after the change of government has opened a “narrow but historically decisive window” for transforming the Levant from a zone of energy conflict into a continental energy corridor.<\/p>\n
If implemented, the project would attract enormous investment from Gulf states and generate billions of dollars in profits.<\/p>\n
There are many companies and private investors in the United States that would like to participate.<\/p>\n
According to the author, implementation of the project requires stability in Lebanon and the neutralization of Iran \u2014 developments that, in his view, are currently underway.<\/p>\n
(If you possess specialized knowledge and wish to contribute, please reach out to us at opinions@news.az).<\/p>\n
News.Az<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Editor\u2019s note: Moses Becker is a special political commentator for News.Az. He holds a PhD in political science…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174967,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[30],"tags":[53583,53584,53582,93,9654,95],"class_list":["post-174966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-syria","tag-confessions","tag-grounds","tag-lebanese-knot","tag-lebanon","tag-population","tag-syria"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116803533648586895","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174966"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174966\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174967"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}