Lebanese Politicians, Media Figures: We Want Peace With Israel

In the last few months, Lebanese politicians, journalists and other public figures have increasingly voiced opposition to Hizbullah's military offensive against Israel, which has been ongoing since October 8, 2023, and warning about the high price Lebanon and its people are paying for it.[1] More recently, following threats to declare total war on Israel, some Lebanese figures said that a peace agreement with Israel could benefit Lebanon and the entire region, and called to favor political solutions over war, which only causes the Lebanese to lose their sons.

It should be noted that this is not the first time Lebanese figures have called for diplomatic arrangements and peace with Israel.[2]

This report presents some of the recent statements urging to consider the option of peace with Israel.

Samy Al-Gemayel, Head Of The Kataeb Party, Calls For Peace

In a May 29, 2024 interview, Kataeb Party head Samy Al-Gemayel urged "peace between Israel and the Palestinians, and the entire region, including Lebanon." He stressed that this aspiration is nothing to be ashamed of and hoped that the Lebanese would stop paying the price of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

To view excerpts from the interview, click below:

Shi'ite Lebanese Journalist: A Peace Agreement Between Lebanon and Israel Is The Only Logical Solution

In a May 22, 2024 article, Shi'ite Lebanese journalist Nadim Koteich, director of the Emirati Sky News channel, who is known as an opponent of Hizbullah,  lamented the peace agreement signed by Lebanon and Israel on May 17, 1983, which lasted only ten months due to Syria's objection to it.[3] Koteich argued that, had the agreement been maintained, Lebanon's fate would have been completely different today: it would have benefitted from cooperation with Israel in many domains, and from American aid and foreign investments. But instead, Lebanon paid and is still paying a steep price that is evident in every domain, he said.[4]

Koteich wrote: "The nonsense and the shouts of the politicians have turned the peace agreement between Lebanon and Israel, signed in May 1983, into a kind of taboo [subject]. The important attempt to make peace and normalize the relations between the two countries – in the midst of the Lebanese civil war and the upheavals that characterized the geopolitics of the region [at the time], including the Khomeini revolution, the peace [agreement] between Egypt and Israel and Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982 – lasted less than ten months.

"From that point onward, every genuine discussion of peace between Israel and Lebanon was preempted. The direct cause of this was the prolonged Syrian presence in Lebanon and [Syria's] control of the political culture and discourse in the country, a role that was later inherited by the Hizbullah militia.  The Taif Agreement, which ended the Lebanese civil war, was distorted by means of interpretations that strengthened the resistance, perpetuated the Lebanese hostility towards Israel and turned [this hostility] into an ideology completely divorced from Lebanon's direct and practical interests regarding [Israel's] occupation [of South Lebanon] and regarding [Lebanon's] resources, security and so on.

"The [1983] peace agreement explicitly stated that the governments of the two countries respect [each other's] sovereignty and territorial integrity and each undertakes to prevent hostile activity that crosses the border [to the territory of the other]. Israel agreed to withdraw its forces from Lebanon in stages within 12 weeks, providing that the Syrian forces and the PLO withdrew from the country [as well]. In addition, the agreement called for establishing a security zone in South Lebanon under the security control of the Lebanese armed forces. There were also general clauses about economic and social cooperation and the possibility of diplomatic relations [between the two countries]. Not a single one of these clauses contravenes Lebanon's interests!...  

"The truth is that the May 17 agreement did not collapse because it failed to meet Lebanon's interests, but rather because of Syria's intense objection, its eagerness to maintain its influence in Lebanon and its skillful exploitation of the disagreements among the Lebanese and the generational struggles within the [various] sects… The agreement was also thwarted so it would not prevent Iran's systematic onslaught on Lebanon's Shi'ites, whose leaders were in favor of peace, whereas the Khomeinist regime tried to turn the Shi'ites into a springboard for exporting the [Iranian] revolution.

"[And] this may be the [greatest] irony today: Lebanon – which, according to the estimate of the World Bank is facing the gravest economic crisis of the last 150 years, and is on the brink of total war with Israel after Hizbullah decided to help Hamas in its current war in Gaza – is indirectly negotiating with Israel through Hizbullah's ally, [Parliament] Speaker Nabih Beri, and through the Americans about an agreement that is very similar to the provisions of the May 17 [1983 agreement], at least in terms of the buffer zones, the delineation of the border and the terms for a ceasefire.

"It's true that today there is no talk about diplomatic normalization or about ending the state of hostility [between the two countries], but, in its spirit and many of its clauses, the Lebanon-Israel peace agreement remains the only reasonable horizon for the relations between the two countries.

"The May 17 agreement was an enormous missed opportunity that could have steered the [Lebanese] state towards a completely different fate. Had the agreement lasted, nothing could have prevented [Lebanon] from tightening the economic cooperation with Israel via joint projects in the domains of infrastructure, trade and tourism, [producing] growth and job opportunities. Moreover, Lebanon could have enjoyed permanent and systematic support from the U.S., as a guarantor [of the agreement], enabling it to receive aid and large foreign investments.

"But since this opportunity was missed, Lebanon continued to pay a steep price, [manifest in] political disintegration, economic collapse, ongoing conflict and deadly entanglement in regional conflicts. Peace between Lebanon and Israel, with strong international guarantees, is vital to [achieving] permanent peace and stability. Only this will allow Lebanon to regain its abilities and guarantee its citizens a better future. Sooner or later, the entire region will move towards peace, but meanwhile Lebanon will continue to pay a terrible price until it joins [the peace] it could have attained at a far lower cost."[5] 

Lebanese Columnist: The Price Of Peace, However High, Is Much Lower Than The Price Of War

In a June 25, 2024 article titled "Victory at an Exorbitant Price" in the Lebanese daily Al-Nahar, columnist Mazen Aboud wrote: "Winston Churchill [said] that 'those who can win a war well can rarely make a good peace and those who could make a good peace would never have won the war.' But what is the meaning of victory? Defeating the enemies? Taking over their territory, destroying their economy, society and infrastructure, replacing their regime or breaking the spirit of their resistance? How is [victory] measured?... The Gaza war proves that the price of peace, no matter how high, is lower than the price and war and its consequences. There is a kind of exorbitantly-priced victory that the Greeks called a non-victory, and that is the situation we are facing [today]. 

[Former U.S. president] Jimmy Carter said in his speech accepting the Nobel prize for peace in 2002: 'War may sometimes be a necessary evil. But no matter how necessary, it is always an evil, never a good. We will not learn to live together in peace by killing each other's children.' The Greeks believed that an 'exorbitantly-priced victory' is no victory at all. [The war in] Gaza costs Israel USD41 million a day (according to a 2024 [article by Matthias] Dietrich).[6] The Bank of Israel estimates that, by 2025, the war may cost [Israel] USD53 billion, due to increased defense spending and the drop in tax revenue.^[vii]According to Reuters, the infrastructure damages in Gaza were estimated at USD18.5 billion by January 31, [2024], which is 97% of the combined GDP of the West Bank and Gaza in 2022.[8] And this is without considering the 37,000 Palestinian fatalities and tens of thousands of wounded. According to the Al-Sharq Al-Awsat newspaper, the damages in Lebanon exceeded USD1.5 billion by February [2024],[9] and we must wait until the end of the tourism season to estimate the real cost…

"According to [U.S. envoy Amos] Hochstein, Israel is threatening to launch a total war on Lebanon immediately after it finishes [fighting] in Rafah. These threats evoked counter-threats from Hizbullah to turn the war into a regional one…

"I believe in the power of peace that tries to preempt war and restrain it. I believe that the world is not hell, but a slice of Paradise. We did not choose to be born only to die, and neither did the children of Gaza. We did not choose our religion, our land or our nationality. Killing is not the way to defend Allah and it is not an [acceptable] language for human interaction.  Victory is actually defeat if it leads to the loss of a just and lasting peace. Let's try to find an alternative plan… Let's all sing along with John Lenon: 'You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you'll join us. And the world will live as one.'"[10]

Lebanese Columnist: Political Solutions Take Precedence To War; When Will We Stop Burying Our Dead?

In a June 14, 2024 article titled "Peace Too Is A Weapon" in the Lebanese daily Al-Jumhouriya, columnist Joseph Al-Hashem wrote: "…If Israel's strategy of survival is based on war, peace can be a weapon in the confrontation with it… The goal of the military battles – eliminating Isael – is difficult to attain as long as the close relations between Israel and the U.S. persist. This does not mean we underestimate the importance of [military] resistance, but we must urgently seize the political and diplomatic opportunities in order to stop the massacre of innocent people…

"Since every war, no matter how long, necessarily ends with a peace agreement, regardless of who won and who lost, and given that diplomatic solutions are generally found [only] after military wars, why shouldn't we find them before the war, which always comes at the expense of people's lives?...

"Given that the barbaric massacres in Palestine have been widely condemned by the civilized peoples in the countries and universities of the world, and given that Palestine was accepted as a full UN member in a nearly unanimous  vote [in the General Assembly]– why shouldn’t the diplomatic and political arenas gain benefit from this unprecedented international support for the Palestinian cause and for the establishment of a Palestinian state, which Israel opposes, so that [Palestine] will not remain an imaginary state moving between war and peace and between life and death?

"In peacetime sons bury their fathers, and in wartime fathers bury their sons. Can anyone tell us when these funerals will end in this era?"[11]

Lebanese Media Figure Eli Khoury: What’s Stopping Us From Making Peace With Israel?

Similarly, Lebanese media figure Eli Khoury asked in a June 4, 2024 television interview what was stopping Lebanon from making peace with Israel.

To view excerpts from the interview, click below: