No Renewal for UNIFIL, Unless...

The annual mandate of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) stationed in south Lebanon is up for renewal this coming August at the UN Security Council. Since it was first deployed in 1978, when the Palestinian PLO terrorists of Yasser Arafat and Syria were doing what the Hezbollah terrorists of Hassan Nasrallah and Iran are doing today, UNIFIL has been like a bookkeeper who counts the rockets and the dead. UNIFIL, no doubt, has also provided great services to the local villages and towns. But those activities are NOT what the primary objective of a force like UNIFIL should be, which is to usher the parties to a peaceful and permanent resolution of their conflict. In this aspect, UNIFIL has not only utterly failed, but its supposed neutral oversight for 45 years over a simmering and latent war has consecrated the absence of the legitimate armed forces of the country and the unlawful existence of a terrorist militia like Hezbollah.

UNIFIL should first and foremost ensure the return of state sovereignty through the exclusive deployment of the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), the withdrawal of terrorist organizations, and a final delineation of the border between Israel and Lebanon. None of these objectives has been achieved. Today in July 2023, the situation in south Lebanon is exactly what it was in 1978, which raises the question of why so many UNIFIL soldiers have died? What have all the billions spent on UNIFIL accomplished? A peacekeeping force is a “force”; it should have some latitude to enforce the stated objectives. But not UNIFIL. At best, its soldiers count the rockets, and at worst its soldiers die like sitting ducks.

In retrospect, it might be better for the international community to let the conflict reach its ultimate conclusion one way or another, as this would resolve the problem faster, there will be less casualties, and the UN would save lots of money that can be spent on hunger around the world.

One wonders why it has been so difficult to resolve the south Lebanon issue, which is over a piece of real estate that is 1,060 square kilometers or 409 square miles.

Lebanon and Israel had kept a quiet border since the March 1949 Armistice Agreement which re-affirmed that the Lebanese-Israeli border, referred to as the Armistice Line or the “Green Line”, is the same as the original 1923 Mandate Line between French- and British-mandated territory.

Following the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, the Christian Lebanese government was pressured by the Muslim countries of the Arab League to sign the 1969 Cairo Accord, which granted the PLO absolute freedom of action along the Lebanese-Israeli border. By the coerced signing of the Cairo Accord, the Lebanese government ceded its sovereignty to Yasser Arafat and withdrew its Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) from the area.

After the 1978 Israeli invasion of the south in reaction to the killing of Israelis by Palestinian guerillas operating in south Lebanon, the UN Security Council adopted resolution 425 in March 1978, which created and deployed UNIFIL.

Finally, following the final Israeli withdrawal in 2000, the 1949 Green Line was slightly modified to become the Blue Line, which differs in about a half dozen spots from the 1949 line, though never by more than 475 meters in any given spot.

The bottom line is that UNIFIL has done nothing to change the precarious and long-simmering situation in the south. UNIFIL apologists argue that the force is simply a tool to prevent escalation and further hostilities, and that its role is not to find a political solution. But the failure of UNIFIL to contribute to a solution over nearly half a century has cemented the unlawful status quo at enormous cost in human life and money, and has accompanied endless events, incidents, and wars which have complicated the initial problem and made a solution harder to achieve today than in 1978.

Lebanon and Israel have in the recent past agreed on a maritime border. Why haven’t they been as eager to draw a final land border? The cynics might answer that the maritime border allows both parties to make money out of extracting oil and gas, while the land border holds no such potential.

But is money and business more important than the normal life that the Lebanese have been denied since 1978?

Is money and business more important than the sovereignty of a country over its territory? Shouldn’t the UN concern itself more with the sovereignty of one of its founder states and one of its Human Rights Charter authors?

How is it possible that the wellbeing of such a small country with a pathetically simple problem be so recalcitrant to a solution? The country’s two neighbors, Israel and Syria, that have stoked the problem and invaded and occupied the country more than once have themselves adhered to understandings, ceasefires, truces, engagement rules, and agreements. In comparison with the Lebanese-Israeli border, the Syrian-Israeli border on the Golan is much bigger and much more complicated. Yet, there has never been a war between the two parties since 1974 when the war criminal Henry Kissinger made them sign a truce in exchange for giving them license to use Lebanon as their boxing ring. Israel has occupied the Golan and has annexed it, yet Syria does not have a Hezbollah fighting Israel from Syrian soil. The occasional sorties by Israel’s air force inside Syria are not aimed at the Assad regime per se, but only against Iran’s smuggling of weapons to Hezbollah. In other words, both Israel and Syria have agreed to keep the Lebanese-Israeli border as their only line of confrontation. Why? Because of the weakness of the Lebanese government. Therefore, any effort by the international community to reassert the Lebanese state’s sovereignty over its entire borders (including both its border with Israel and its lawless and much longer border with Syria) would be a great first step towards a solution.

It took the UN 45 years to add a clause to the UNIFIL mandate, allowing the peacekeepers to undertake patrols without coordinating with the Lebanese army (which is either controlled by Hezbollah or fearful of it). Is this what the international community calls progress? What is the point of patrolling if you have to announce it beforehand to the target of the patrol? This asinine policy may be behind the murder last December of Private Sean Rooney of UNIFIL’s Irish contingent at the hands of Hezbollah terrorists who have been identified but have yet to be arrested and prosecuted.

The mandate of UNIFIL is up for renewal. But it should be done with the following conditions and terms:

- Syria should be compelled to submit official documentation to the UN claiming or denying its ownership of the disputed bald hill of Shebaa Farms. If Syria claims ownership, then the Shebaa Farms are Syrian and Hezbollah's resistance against Israel should switch to resistance against Syria. Unless Lebanon decides to officially challenge Syria on the issue, it would no longer have any stakes in this issue, and Hezbollah should close shop or find another lie with which to justify its existence; if Syria denies ownership, then the Shebaa Farms are Lebanese, and Israel should be compelled to withdraw. As long as Syria refuses to submit any documentation, the fake occupation issue will go on festering, and Lebanon and UNIFIL will continue to suffer.

- The Lebanese Armed Forces should deploy everywhere (not only in the few cosmetic spots that Hezbollah defines for it) south of the Litani, in a permanent and joint deployment with UNIFIL forces.

- Hezbollah and Palestinian organizations should verifiably evacuate the area where UNIFIL operates. Violations of this provision (as happens frequently when a rocket is launched into Israel without anyone assuming responsibility for it) should lead to a penalty imposed on the Lebanese government (a raise in Lebanon's contribution to fund UNIFIL; the withdrawal of a percentage of UNIFIL's troops; etc.) A repeat violation should lead to an immediate termination of the UNIFIL mandate and its evacuation from Lebanon.

- Just as was done with the maritime border, Lebanon and Israel should be compelled to sit down and draw a final and definitive border that complies with the 1949 Armistice “Green” Line.

- Once this is accomplished, the permanent deployment of the Lebanese Armed Forces along the border with Syria should be executed, and UNIFIL’s mandate should be extended to monitor and delineate the Lebanese-Syrian border.

Absent a return of the legitimate armed forces of Lebanon to the entire territory of the country, UNIFIL will continue to suffer human losses and squander precious funds that could be used elsewhere, and the Lebanese will remain in the permanent state of war their barbaric neighbors, Syria and Israel, impose on it.

As of 14 January 2022, UNIFIL has had 324 fatalities since 1978. They include the following nationalities (How do Ireland, Fiji and France explain to their people the killing of so many of their soldiers?):

Country	Death Total
Bangladesh	1
Belgium	4
Canada	1
China	1
Denmark	1
El Salvador	1
Fiji	35
Finland	11
France	37
Ghana	31
India	5
Indonesia	2
Iran	1
Ireland	48
Italy	7
Lebanon	7
Malaysia	3
Nepal	28
Netherlands	9
Nigeria	10
Norway	21
Philippines	1
Poland	7
Senegal	16
Spain	12
Sri Lanka	1
Sweden	7
Turkey	1
United Kingdom	4