English LCCC Newsbulletin For Lebanese, Lebanese Related, Global News & Editorials
For  December 14/2025
Compiled & Prepared by: Elias Bejjani
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Bible Quotations For today
Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Matthew 01/18-25: “Now the birth of Jesus the Messiah took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been engaged to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. Her husband Joseph, being a righteous man and unwilling to expose her to public disgrace, planned to dismiss her quietly. But just when he had resolved to do this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, ‘Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.’ All this took place to fulfil what had been spoken by the Lord through the prophet: ‘Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel’, which means, ‘God is with us.’ When Joseph awoke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him; he took her as his wife, but had no marital relations with her until she had borne a son; and he named him Jesus.”

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on December 13-14/2025
The Necessity of Severing Diplomatic Relations Between Lebanon and the Islamic Republic of Iran and Expelling the Iranian Ambassador/Elias Bejjani/December 13/2024
Link to a video interview with writer and director Youssef Y. El Khoury from Fadi Shahwan’s YouTube channel
23 Lebanese prisoners, 42 missing: How will Lebanon respond to the latest detainees’ list?
Ambassador Tom Barrack to Israel... and Preventing Escalation in Lebanon
A Busy Week from Paris to Naqoura: International Urgency for "Arms Monopolization"
Qassem: It is a US-Israeli demand... defense strategy must benefit from the "Resistance."
Tel Aviv: Threatens to target a house despite being searched by the Army.
Aoun says did not offer pledges to Hezbollah, rejects Barrack's remarks
Israel army ‘temporarily suspends’ strike on south Lebanon
Israel issues evacuation warning for village in southern Lebanon ahead of strike
How Lebanon’s ancient olive trees became casualties of Israel-Hezbollah war
If Hikel and Karam Carry This Proposal... Does It Avert the War Scenario?/Lara Yazbek/Al-Markaziya/December 13, 2025
From Syria to Lebanon and Gaza: Far-right groups push stretches across regional borders
Hezbollah’s Qassem urges state to defend sovereignty, rejects disarmament pressure
Financial Gap Threatens Depositors Amid Government Inaction/Nadia al-Hallak for Houna Loubnan/This Is Beirut/December 13/2025
Yassine Jaber: Your Own Words Confirm the Crisis Is Systemic!
Finance Committee Allocates $90M to Amal-Linked Council
Lebanese MP Ghassan Skaff Dies After Battle With Cancer
Voluntary Servitude, Civil Disobedience, and Lebanese Liberation Movements: A Philosophical-Political Analysis in Light of La Boétie and Thoreau/Edmond El-chidiac/December 13/2025

Titles For The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on December 13-14/2025
Mossad Vault/Video-Link/How Mossad Hid a Spy in a Pilgrimage Group to Track an Iranian General
Mossad Vault/Video Link/How Mossad Used Wedding Photographers to Mark a Hamas Target in Gaza
Police searching Brown University after shooter kills 2 and wounds 8 on campus
Israel Says Killed Top Hamas Weapons Figure in Gaza
US forges ahead with plans for Gaza international force, Indonesia to send 20,000 troops
2 US service members and one American civilian killed in ambush in Syria, US Central Command says
Jordan condemns Palmyra attack, expresses solidarity with Syria and US
IMF approves reviews, unlocks $240m in funding for Jordan
US to host conference on stabilization force plans
US forces raids ship headed to Iran as Iran seizes oil tanker
UN chief visits Iraq to mark end of assistance mission set up after 2003 invasion
Iran detains 18 crew members of foreign tanker seized in Gulf of Oman
Erdogan warns Black Sea should not be 'area of confrontation' after strikes
Germany to send soldiers to fortify Poland border
Ukraine says it received 114 prisoners from Belarus
US envoy to meet Zelensky, Europe leaders in Berlin this weekend
Ukraine says Russian drone hit Turkish cargo vessel in Black Sea

Titles For The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on December 13-14/2025
President Trump's Farsighted Policy on Venezuela, Iran's 'Second Home' in the Americas/Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Gatestone Institute./December 13/2025
The Middle East is no longer collapsing. It is sorting/Yassin K. Fawaz/The Arab Weekly/December 13/2025
UNRWA is beyond repair, so it's time to move on/David Weinberg/Jerusalem Post/December 13/2025
Israel’s healing begins with Tamar-like leadership/Zehavit Gross/Jerusalem Post/December 13/2025
Selected Face Book & X tweets for /December 13, 2025

The Latest English LCCC Lebanese & Lebanese Related News & Editorials published on December 13-14/2025
The Necessity of Severing Diplomatic Relations Between Lebanon and the Islamic Republic of Iran and Expelling the Iranian Ambassador
Elias Bejjani/December 13/2024
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2025/12/150192/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6eKHFG0jauY&t=4s
What is known as the “Islamic Republic of Iran” is not the name of a normal state seeking balanced relations with its surroundings, but rather a mullah-led, expansionist, sectarian, and terrorist regime that, since its establishment in 1979, has been built on exporting Shiism, chaos, violence, sectarianism, and fanaticism under the slogan of “exporting the revolution.” This regime has never recognized the borders or sovereignty of states, but instead has treated the countries of the region as open arenas of influence. Lebanon has been—and continues to be—one of its most prominent victims.
Thus, Lebanon does not suffer from Iran’s criminality and terrorism as a geographically distant regime, but rather suffers from it as a regime effectively residing within its territory, imposing its decisions, paralyzing the state, confiscating the future, security, and coexistence of its people, and assassinating sovereignists and free individuals through its military, sectarian, terrorist arm, falsely and deceitfully called Hezbollah.
It is necessary to recall that Lebanon and the Lebanese people—particularly the Shiite community—did not choose the Iranian regime, nor were they behind the emergence of the Iranian terrorist proxy, Hezbollah. Iranian hegemony over Lebanon never came with the consent of the Lebanese people, nor even with the consent of the Shiite community itself, which has been abducted, confiscated, and turned into a hostage in the hands of Hezbollah, along with the Lebanese state and the Lebanese people.
Hezbollah was born under the Syrian occupation of Lebanon, with the direct sponsorship of the Hafez al-Assad regime, which facilitated and sponsored the violation of Lebanese land, institutions, and security agencies by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. At that stage, Hezbollah was not merely a resistance organization, but a closed ideological project whose goal was first to fully control the Shiite community, then to use that control to dominate the Lebanese state and transform Lebanon into an arena and base for Iran’s expansionist wars.
Under the false slogan of “resistance,” pluralism within the Shiite community was abolished, the community was politically, militarily, and financially subjugated, and turned into a human reservoir for an Iranian project that has nothing to do with its people, Lebanon, or Lebanese interests.
In 2005, the Syrian occupation army was forced to withdraw from Lebanon under the pressure of the Independence Intifada and international resolutions. However, the Lebanese did not regain their sovereignty, because the occupation did not end—it merely changed its form and tools. Instead of the state returning to its people, guardianship was transferred from Damascus to Tehran.
At that pivotal moment, Hezbollah replaced the Syrian army—not merely as a military force, but as a direct instrument of Iranian occupation. It gradually transformed from an armed militia into a state within the state, then a state above the state, and finally the state itself.
Since then, Hezbollah—composed of Lebanese mercenaries—has decided war and peace, paralyzed the parliamentary system in all its forms, imposed or toppled governments, dominated security and military decision-making, paralyzed the judiciary, and used state institutions as a superficial façade for its external project. Thus, Lebanon is no longer a partially hijacked state, but a fully confiscated one.
More dangerous than the occupation itself is the arrogance of Iranian rhetoric. Senior Iranian officials, led by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, have never attempted to conceal their interference in Lebanese affairs. On the contrary, they have openly boasted that Lebanon is part of their “axis,” that its decision is not independent, and that Hezbollah’s weapons are a red line decided in Tehran, not Beirut. These are not verbal slips, but a systematic official policy reflecting a condescending view of Lebanon, its people, constitution, and institutions, as if the Lebanese are incapable of governing their own country and in need of a “Supreme Jurist” to rule them from abroad.
Today, after Hezbollah’s military and political defeat, and after the issuance of clear international resolutions aimed at ending the state of illegal weapons and restoring Lebanese sovereignty, Iran insists on rejecting the new reality. Iran is not defending Lebanon, nor the Shiite community, but rather its last foothold on the Mediterranean coast. Therefore, it refuses to hand over Hezbollah’s weapons—which are, in reality, its own—refuses to return decision-making to the state, refuses to abide by international resolutions, and insists on keeping Lebanon, through Hezbollah, hostage to its regional project, even at the cost of what remains of the country.
Accordingly, there is no meaning or legitimacy for any diplomatic relations between Lebanon and a state that occupies its political decision, possesses an armed militia on its territory, openly interferes in its internal affairs, and treats its institutions with contempt.
Since diplomatic relations between states are based on parity and mutual respect—not on a relationship between a sovereign state, a regional master, and an affiliated militia—severing Lebanese–Iranian relations and immediately expelling the Iranian ambassador becomes an obvious sovereign step, not provocation or hostility, but a national rescue duty. There can be no liberation of the state while the embassy of an occupying power remains, and no sovereignty with a militia obeying foreign orders.
Lebanon will not be a state as long as Hezbollah is the state. It will not be independent as long as decisions of war and peace are made in Tehran. It will not rise as long as it remains occupied by weapons, terrorism, and Iran’s sectarian ideology. Therefore, cutting relations with Iran is not the end of the problem, but its correct beginning.
What is required, clearly and without hesitation, is: to prosecute Hezbollah’s leaders as war criminals and traitors, to completely disarm this Iranian terrorist proxy, to dismantle all its security, social, cultural, intelligence, and financial institutions, to officially designate it as a terrorist organization, as it is classified in dozens of countries around the world, and most importantly to prevent any ideologically indoctrinated Hezbollah member from entering state institutions, especially security and military ones.
Without this, Lebanon remains merely a name on a map, not a truly sovereign, free, and independent state.

Link to a video interview with writer and director Youssef Y. El Khoury from Fadi Shahwan’s YouTube channel
“I fear the separation of the South; the displaced will return soon; and for the annulment of the history of 25 May.”
https://eliasbejjaninews.com/2025/12/150180/
13 December 2025

23 Lebanese prisoners, 42 missing: How will Lebanon respond to the latest detainees’ list?
LBCI/December 13/2025
A list of 23 Lebanese detainees held in Israeli prisons was handed to President Joseph Aoun by an association representing Lebanese captives and released individuals. A copy obtained by LBCI shows that three of the detainees were captured before the most recent war, dating back to 1978, 1981, and 2005. During the war and Israeli incursions, the list shows 11 Lebanese were captured, most in October 2024 in Aita al-Shaab, including Waddah Younes in Blida and Imad Amhaz, who was taken in an Israeli naval commando operation in Batroun. After the ceasefire agreement in November of last year, the list notes nine additional detainees abducted from various southern Lebanese villages, with operations continuing until after the Israeli withdrawal on February 18, 2025. The document submitted to the president notes that the number of missing individuals whose fate remains unknown, including missing martyrs whose bodies have not been accounted for, is 42. Observers of the file say these cases raise the possibility that additional detainees or remains may be held by Israel. The submission of the list to the president, which was already kept at the presidential palace, was accompanied by a request to pursue the matter through international legal and humanitarian channels, in addition to diplomatic efforts. During the meeting, President Aoun emphasized that he had asked former Ambassador Simon Karam to prioritize the detainees’ file in the ceasefire monitoring mechanism's meetings. Israel recently released five citizens in Ras Naqoura who had been detained after the ceasefire while attempting to return to their villages. The step represents an effort to advance the issue, one of Lebanon’s official demands, while the Lebanese authorities continue negotiations within the civil framework of the ceasefire committee, despite Israeli obstruction on multiple fronts.

Ambassador Tom Barrack to Israel... and Preventing Escalation in Lebanon
On the Table Al-Modon/December 13, 2025 (Translated from Arabic)
Israeli media revealed an anticipated visit by US envoy Tom Barrack to Israel next Monday, to discuss preventing escalation in Lebanon and Syria with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Israeli Channel 12 reported that Barrack will meet with Netanyahu "with the aim of preventing escalation with Lebanon, and in order to reach understandings with Syria." The channel also mentioned that "Netanyahu requested the cancellation of his trial session next Monday due to his meeting with Barrack." The Hebrew website "Walla" indicated that "the US Ambassador to Turkey and Trump's envoy for Syrian affairs, Tom Barrack, is visiting Israel on Monday. His arrival comes amid a noticeable acceleration in political and security talks in preparation for moving to the second phase of Trump's 20-point plan to end the war in Gaza." Regarding what happened today in the southern town of Yanouh, after the Israeli Army "temporarily froze its raid" on the threatened house in the town, the Israeli newspaper "Yedioth Ahronoth" indicated that "in the last moments and under American pressure, the Israeli political echelon ordered the Israeli Army not to bomb the town of Yanouh in southern Lebanon, even though the planes had already taken off."

A Busy Week from Paris to Naqoura: International Urgency for "Arms Monopolization"
Qassem: It is a US-Israeli demand... defense strategy must benefit from the "Resistance."
Tel Aviv: Threatens to target a house despite being searched by the Army.
Geagea: Berri is flouting the Constitution.
Al-Markazia / December 13, 2025 (Translated from Arabic)
The Lebanese scene is engulfed in a state of heavy anticipation for what the next few days will bring militarily and securely, amidst a series of significant events that will help determine the path between Lebanon and Israel. Israel continues to raise its threats of a military operation it is preparing for if Hezbollah is not disarmed before the end of this year. This comes as Hezbollah today renewed its commitment to its weapons, circumventing the Lebanese government's demands by declaring its readiness to discuss a "defense strategy"—a strategy it has pre-shackled with its own conditions and vision, labeling the monopolization of arms as a "US-Israeli demand."
Key Milestones
Next Thursday, Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly is scheduled to arrive in Beirut. His visit aims to continue Cairo's efforts to avoid Israeli escalation against Lebanon, initiated by Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and Intelligence Director Hassan Rashad. Simultaneously, eyes are on a US-French-Saudi meeting in Paris on December 18, attended by Army Commander General Rudolf Heikal, where the plan for the monopolization of arms will be central to the discussions. The following day, December 19, the "Mechanism Committee" will meet in Naqoura with the Lebanese delegation led by Ambassador Safeer Karam, the Israeli side, and UN, French, and American sponsors. This meeting holds special importance as it will delve for the first time into the core objectives of the negotiations.
The Plan
In this atmosphere, informed political sources told "Al-Markazia" that world capitals monitoring local developments have stressed the need for Lebanon to accelerate the arms monopolization process, regardless of the negotiation track, as it is mandatory to curb Tel Aviv's escalation plans. Sources indicate that at the upcoming Paris meeting, the Army Commander will be asked to set a clear, reasonable, and logical timeframe to complete the monopolization of arms across all Lebanese territories. It is hoped this step will contribute to restraining Netanyahu on the eve of his visit to the White House to meet President Donald Trump at the end of the month.
Search then Warning
On the ground, while US and Israeli sides demand that Lebanon search properties in the south, a Lebanese Army patrol accompanied by UNIFIL forces entered a house in the southern town of Yanouh today for inspection at the request of the Mechanism Committee. Journalistic reports indicated that some private properties in Yanouh were searched with the residents' consent, while other videos showed confrontations between the Army/UNIFIL and residents who objected. After reports surfaced that no weapons were found, the Israeli army issued an urgent warning to Yanouh residents to evacuate because "Hezbollah military infrastructure" would be attacked. It was reported that the threatened house is the same one inspected by the Army earlier that morning.
A US-Israeli Demand
This threat was issued as Hezbollah Secretary-General Sheikh Naim Qassem delivered a speech asserting that "Lebanon entered a new phase since the ceasefire agreement on November 27, 2024, which differs from what preceded it and requires a different performance at various levels." He emphasized that the State is now responsible for establishing Lebanon's sovereignty and independence, while the Resistance has done its part regarding implementing the agreement. He stressed that the Resistance's primary mission is liberation, based on faith and readiness for sacrifice, clarifying that preventing aggression is the responsibility of the State and the Army, while the Resistance's role is limited to supporting them and intervening when they fail to perform their duties.
Sheikh Qassem confirmed readiness for the highest levels of cooperation with the Lebanese Army and agreement on a defense strategy that utilizes Lebanon’s strength and its Resistance, while rejecting any framework that constitutes a "surrender" to the US and Israel. He also asserted that the State’s crisis is not the monopolization of arms, calling such a proposal a "US-Israeli demand" that weakens Lebanon, pointing instead to sanctions and corruption as the real crises. He concluded that surrender means the disappearance of Lebanon under Israeli administration.
Hezbollah is Not Cooperating
On the other hand, former Deputy Prime Minister MP Ghassan Hasbani confirmed that "Hezbollah refuses to cooperate in handing over its weapons even voluntarily, and its officials issue statements declaring the rebuilding of its military structure." In a televised interview, he stressed that "Israeli attacks on Lebanon are handled by the State, not the Party," adding that when the State holds the sole decision on war and peace and possesses the monopoly on arms, it can act through all necessary means, including diplomacy and international law, to deter Israel. He noted that the Party "failed to defend itself and hid in trenches and tunnels, leaving the people above ground vulnerable."
Blatant Violation
Electorally, the clash over the current law continues amidst fears that failing to amend it—specifically Article 112—might jeopardize the upcoming elections, given the government's inability to implement the "16th District" issue. Today, Lebanese Forces leader Samir Geagea stated that Speaker Nabih Berri’s handling of the urgent bill sent by the government to amend the parliamentary election law constitutes "a clear and blatant violation and a disregard for constitutional deadlines." During a ceremony in Maarab, Geagea explained that the government submitted the bill as "urgent" because it is tied to deadlines such as the end of the current parliament's term. He accused Berri of attempting to "empty the democratic process in Lebanon of its substance," warning that this path threatens the elections themselves and consecrates a "logic of no-state."

Aoun says did not offer pledges to Hezbollah, rejects Barrack's remarks
Naharnet/December 13/2025President Joseph Aoun has said that the latest remarks attributed to U.S. envoy Tom Barrack are "rejected by all Lebanese." Asked about statements by Hezbollah MPs that he had pledged prior to his election that a defense strategy would be approved without including the removal of Hezbollah's arms and allegations about the presence of a paper signed by him, Aoun said: "Let them publish it now if it exists. I'm responsible for my word and there is neither an agreement nor a signed paper.""How could I have committed to that and an hour later I deliver a inaugural speech in which I pledged that there would be an arms monopolization?" Aoun wondered.

Israel army ‘temporarily suspends’ strike on south Lebanon
AFP/December 14, 2025
JERUSALEM: The Israeli military said it would “temporarily” suspend a strike planned for Saturday that was intended to target what it described as Hezbollah military infrastructure in southern Lebanon. A November 2024 ceasefire sought to end over a year of fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah militant group, which broke out after the start of the Gaza war in October 2023. But Israel has repeatedly bombed Lebanon despite the truce, usually saying it is targeting Hezbollah members and infrastructure to stop the group from rearming. The Israeli military issued a warning earlier on Saturday announcing an imminent strike and warning people in the Yanuh area of south Lebanon to evacuate immediately. But later Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee said “the strike was temporarily suspended,” adding that the military “continues to monitor the target.”The suspension came after the Lebanese army “requested access again to the specified site... and to address the breach of the agreement,” he said on X.Adraee added that the military would “not allow” Hezbollah to “redeploy or rearm.”The year-old ceasefire monitoring mechanism includes the United Nations, the United States and France. A Lebanese security source said the army had previously tried to search the building that the Israeli military wanted to target but could not because of objections from residents. But the source told AFP that the Lebanese army was able to enter and search the building after returning a second time, because residents “felt threatened,” adding that they were evacuated over fears of a strike.

Israel issues evacuation warning for village in southern Lebanon ahead of strike
Reuters/December 13, 2025
CAIRO: Israel issued an evacuation warning for a village in southern Lebanon on Saturday ahead of what it said was a planned strike against infrastructure of the Hezbollah militant group. A military spokesperson said the Israeli military would attack the site in the village of Yanouh in southern Lebanon. It would be the second such attack within days, after Israel hit what it described as Hezbollah infrastructure in several areas in southern Lebanon on Tuesday. Israel and Lebanon have both sent civilian envoys to a military committee monitoring their ceasefire, a step toward meeting a months-old US demand that they broaden talks in line with President Donald Trump’s Middle East peace agenda. Israel and Lebanon agreed to a US-brokered ceasefire in 2024, ending more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah that had culminated in Israeli strikes that severely weakened the Iran-backed militant group. Since then, the sides have traded accusations over violations.

How Lebanon’s ancient olive trees became casualties of Israel-Hezbollah war
NAJIA HOUSSARI/Arab News/December 13, 2025
BEIRUT: Farmers in southern Lebanon have long held a fierce pride in their ancient olive groves. Many boast that their trees, which stretch along the border with Israel, contain specimens “dating back to the time of the pharaohs.”However, since the most recent war between Israel and Hezbollah, which ran from October 2023 to November 2024, these trees — the stoic, living witnesses of history — have become casualties of the destruction. The bombardment was not confined to military positions. It struck at the heart of agricultural life in the south, destroying a heritage that provides the economic lifeline for tens of thousands of families. Olives from the south account for 38 percent of the total olives grown in Lebanon, making their fate critical to the nation’s food security and identity. The extent of the damage is starkly clear in the official assessments. Agricultural engineer Hussein Al-Saqa, the head of the Agriculture Department in the Nabatieh Governorate at the Ministry of Agriculture, confirmed the deep wounds inflicted on the region’s primary crop. “There has been structural damage to olive crops, in terms of the destruction that targeted olive groves through burning, bulldozing and uprooting, estimated at around 40 percent in border villages and reaching 3 percent in villages north of the Litani River,” he said. The immediate economic impact is even more severe. “There is also damage to olive oil production, with losses in the south reaching 90 percent,” Al-Saqa added. According to a report by the Ministry of Agriculture, the region lost around 47,000 trees as a result of flares, phosphorus bombs, and shelling. The destruction of these trees, some of which “date back to the time of the Phoenicians,” around 1500 B.C. to 300 B.C., as one farmer lamented, has been nothing short of a disaster for agricultural production. The physical destruction is compounded by a bureaucratic siege that has made accessing and salvaging the remaining harvest almost impossible. (Supplied). The war has reduced 24 border villages rich in olive trees to scorched earth.
Following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel that triggered the Gaza war, Hezbollah initiated limited operations against Israel’s north in solidarity with the Palestinian militant groups responsible for the assault. Israel retaliated against Hezbollah’s attacks with escalating strikes, which included the use of incendiary weapons like white phosphorus. Besides the significant degradation of Hezbollah, the primary consequence of the grinding conflict, which ended with a fragile ceasefire in November 2024, was the mass displacement of farming communities and the devastation of civilian infrastructure across southern Lebanon.
Neither party has yet fulfilled its obligations under the US- and French-brokered ceasefire deal, with Hezbollah failing to disarm and fully withdraw its fighters north of the Litani River and Israeli troops continuing to occupy five strategic hilltops on Lebanese territory. The devastation wrought by the conflict is deeply personal for farmers like Mahmoud Sarhan, 65, from the border town of Kafr Kila. For him, the loss of the trees is an attack on his very existence. “I have 10 dunams of land planted with olive trees, and the Israelis uprooted half of them,” said Sarhan. He recounted returning to his field after the war to prune the trees and cultivate the land, only to inhale white phosphorus residue, causing severe lung damage. Sarhan now relies on oxygen tanks to breathe and is unable to walk. He moved his family to the town of Tuleh, north of the Litani River, but his commitment to his trees remains absolute. “I used to pamper them like my own children,” he said. The physical destruction is compounded by a bureaucratic siege that has made accessing and salvaging the remaining harvest almost impossible. Farmer Tariq Mazraani from the town of Hula, a shareholder in the local agricultural cooperative, said farmers had lost “a third season this year.” While farmers managed a desperate harvest in October 2023 despite the initial attacks, it became impossible to reach the groves the following year due to the intense bombing and mass displacement. This year, the process required to safely access the fields is layered and restrictive. Farmers must submit a request to the Lebanese Army Command, specifying their tasks and destination. This request is then forwarded to the UN Interim Force in Lebanon, which in turn sends it to the Israeli side for approval. The core difficulty, according to Mazraani, “lies in the permits.
“They limit us to two hours to do what we need to do, but it takes a whole day or more. The process involves picking the olives and removing the sheets placed under the trees.”Mazraani detailed the impossibility of the time constraint, particularly given the state of the infrastructure and labor shortage.
“Most of the olive trees are located in rugged areas that take time to reach, and we have to pack the olives and transport them to the trucks. “This cannot be done in two hours, especially since the workers we used to employ were Syrians, and most of them have left the area, and transport vehicles cannot reach the area due to the destruction of the roads.”
Even the act of seeking permission carries risk for farmers like Sarhan, who, despite his injuries, does not want his only son going to town for fear of Israeli attacks. Sarhan said those submitting requests “must provide detailed information and personal details, all of which reach the Israelis, and I do not want that. I am a farmer and have nothing in this world but God’s mercy.”The economic impact reverberates across Lebanon. Olive cultivation is the source of livelihood for more than 100,000 southern families and provides seasonal employment for thousands of workers. The difficulties encountered in harvesting olives, coupled with the destruction of olive presses in the border area and a steep drop in supply, have pushed up the price of olive oil. The price of 20 liters of olive oil now ranges between $180 and $200, compared to just $100 in 2023.
Lebanon typically produces about 20,000 tonnes of olive oil annually, and the commodity is considered an essential ingredient in Lebanese cuisine. Furthermore, the trees that survived the immediate shelling now face a slow decline from neglect. Engineer Al-Saqa described a scene “reminiscent of Hiroshima,” noting that “the situation in the front-line villages is much worse than we thought. “There is destruction and devastation, and the trees that survived the war are neglected, infested with insects and disease, affected by humidity, and surrounded by weeds, which weakens the trees and sets them back years,” he said. The consequence is a grim outlook for future production, even for the surviving groves. Al-Saqa warned that “although the trees remain alive, they will not produce olives in the near future.”
The violence also claimed the lives of those dedicated to their craft. Mazraani noted that “many skilled farmers and craftsmen were killed during the war because they refused to evacuate their homes and leave their farms.”And the losses are not limited to olives. Vast forest areas, estimated at 18 million square meters in the south, have been destroyed, affecting oak and other perennial trees. Yet, farmers remain defiantly attached to their land. Abu Ali, from the village of Blida near the Israeli border, said he was unable to harvest this year due to the damage to his field. He will nevertheless persevere.
“Poor farmers are attached to their land and insist on living in their semi-destroyed homes despite the daily fear of death,” he said. “They cultivate their land and harvest their crops despite all the risks.”The olive trees, which have stood the test of time, are among the few things that can withstand the conditions of war, and farmers are gradually returning. In an attempt to mitigate the losses, the Ministry of Agriculture has announced the allocation of 50,000 free olive seedlings in the frontline areas. Minister of Agriculture Nizar Hani, accompanied by UN coordinator Imran Riza, visited the border area to assess the damage firsthand. Hani affirmed that “the state is steadfast in its support for the south, given its fundamental role in national agricultural production.”He pledged that the ministry “will adopt a gradual and comprehensive approach in supporting farmers affected by Israeli attacks, leading to the rehabilitation of fields and orchards and the restoration of the entire production cycle, in close cooperation with the UN. “Farmers in the south are the first line of defense for Lebanon’s food security. It is our duty to stand by them.”

If Hikel and Karam Carry This Proposal... Does It Avert the War Scenario?
Lara Yazbek/Al-Markaziya/December 13, 2025 (Translated from Arabic)
Al-Markaziya - The Israeli Broadcasting Corporation reported on Friday that the Israeli Army is preparing to carry out a large-scale attack against Hezbollah targets in Lebanon if the efforts of the Lebanese government and the Lebanese Army fail to disarm Hezbollah before the end of the year. It added that "the Israeli Army has prepared a comprehensive plan to strike Hezbollah sites over the past few weeks." On Thursday, "Yedioth Ahronoth," citing Israeli officials, reported that "Hezbollah is restoring its capabilities on all fronts amid a renewed flow of Iranian money," noting that "Tel Aviv will not wait indefinitely." It added, "Lebanon has dismantled 80 percent of Hezbollah's weapons south of the Litani, but it is unable to complete the disarmament before the end of the year," pointing out that "Washington informed the Lebanese side that it may not be able to prevent any potential Israeli military operation if the Lebanese government does not initiate concrete and rapid steps to disarm Hezbollah." The newspaper said that "the anticipated Netanyahu-Trump meeting will be decisive in determining whether Israel will obtain American approval for a major escalation in Lebanon."
After the experience of the past two years, everyone knows that Tel Aviv does not just exaggerate or threaten; it warns, and when its warnings are not taken seriously, it executes and strikes. It is, so far, insisting on the demand to disarm Hezbollah, and clearly announces that what is not disarmed by the Lebanese state before the end of 2025, it will undertake this mission itself. Based on this, monitoring political sources tell "Al-Markaziya" that eyes are focused on two destinations. The first is directed from Beirut towards Baabda and the Serail, to monitor what the state will decide to do in order to avoid war. The matter of assigning Ambassador Simon Karam to head the Lebanese team to the Mechanism was not enough to avert this scenario, which will remain present as long as the weapons have not been disarmed. Therefore, it may be a useful and worthwhile step for Army Commander Rudolph Hikel to carry a clear timetable with him to the Saudi-French-American meeting in Paris on the 18th of this month, specifying the date for the end of the plan to confine weapons across all Lebanese territories, and for Karam to do the same at the Mechanism meeting on the 19th of this month, provided that Lebanon adheres to the deadline it presents and that the deadline is logical, ending in the first months of the new year. Will Lebanon head in this direction? The second destination is Washington, where a meeting will be held on the 29th of this month between US President Donald Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. During this meeting, Netanyahu may convince his host that Lebanon is procrastinating and the opportunity given to it has ended, and therefore Israel must use force to strike Hezbollah. Or perhaps Trump will ask his guest to delay, to give diplomatic pressure an additional chance... The scene is thus hazy and tense, and what is certain is that there is no escape from taking serious steps to collect the illegitimate weapons, otherwise, things may head towards undesirable consequences, the sources conclude.

From Syria to Lebanon and Gaza: Far-right groups push stretches across regional borders
LBCI/December 13/2025
From Syria to Lebanon and Gaza, borders have become wide open to far-right groups and settlers, who have united from the far south to the far north around a single goal: establishing settlements within Syrian, Lebanese, and Gazan territories.
Using slogans such as “our historical right to this land” and “victory is achieved only through control of the land,” these groups have, since the beginning of the month, seen dozens of their members cross the Syrian border multiple times in full view of Israeli soldiers. They advanced well beyond the frontier and began ceremonies to lay a cornerstone for a settlement there.A similar attempt was repeated on Thursday, when the groups sought to carry out comparable actions in southern Syria and on Mount Hermon. The same groups are also seeking to replicate these moves in Lebanon, aiming to seize land in the south and establish settlements there, claiming the territory is an inseparable part of Israel and that controlling it would ensure security in the north. The organizations draw support from political, security, and military figures who cite the need to prevent a repeat of October 7 to justify the creation of buffer zones on multiple fronts and potential border changes. In Gaza, the push has gone beyond border crossings. Backed by far-right ministers in the government and members of the Likud party, the groups are calling for the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah to be marked inside the enclave and for the Israeli flag to be raised over the ruins of the former Nisanit settlement, from which Israel withdrew in 2005. The proposal is expected to be discussed by Defense Minister Israel Katz in a special meeting early next week, as the region awaits the upcoming missions of U.S. envoys Morgan Ortagus and Tom Barrack and the extent to which they may succeed in curbing escalation.

Hezbollah’s Qassem urges state to defend sovereignty, rejects disarmament pressure
LBCI/December 13/2025
Hezbollah’s chief Sheikh Naim Qassem said that limiting weapons under what he described as a U.S.-Israeli approach would amount to stripping Lebanon of its strength, arguing that the state’s core problem lies in corruption rather than arms exclusivity, and warning that surrender would lead to Lebanon’s demise.
Speaking on Saturday, Qassem urged the Lebanese state to stop making concessions. He cited remarks by the U.S. ambassador, saying negotiations are one matter while continued aggression is another. Addressing the United States, Qassem said Hezbollah would continue to defend itself regardless of pressure, stressing that its weapons would not be relinquished to meet what he described as Israel’s objectives, even if Lebanon were subjected to war. He added that the current phase requires a different approach, noting that the state now bears responsibility for safeguarding sovereignty, protecting Lebanon, ending occupation, and deploying the army.

Financial Gap Threatens Depositors Amid Government Inaction
Nadia al-Hallak for Houna Loubnan/This Is Beirut/December 13/2025
The most notable aspect of the ninth draft of the plan is that the state itself is completely exempted from bearing any of the costs. This is especially significant given that it is the primary party responsible—from reckless spending, to squandering $45 billion on electricity, to illegal hiring, through the failure of the “Cedre” conference, to subsidizing imported goods that drained $14 billion from reserves, and ultimately defaulting on the Eurobond in 2020. Amid ongoing government debates over the draft law addressing the financial shortfall and the fate of deposits, concern is growing within economic and banking circles over the plan’s potential direction. Each new draft leak highlights a deep disagreement—over how losses should be allocated and the extent of the burden the state must shoulder relative to the banking sector and depositors—while the economy remains trapped in one of its worst crises since the Republic’s founding.
As banks grapple with a severely fragile financial reality that threatens their survival, banking sources disclose serious concerns that assigning them the bulk of the losses could trigger a systemic collapse of the sector. These concerns align with a deeper analysis by economist Nassib Ghobril, who argues that the circulating ninth draft of the law remains incomplete and that the state—the primary party responsible for the accumulation of losses—entirely fails to assume its role in any proposed solution. Amid bank warnings and expert assessments, the country faces a draft law that could redefine the financial sector for years to come, while decisive answers remain absent regarding the fate of deposits and trust in the financial system.In this context, the economist notes that the country “has entered a prolonged period of waiting since the government began work on the draft law to determine the fate of deposits, also referred to as addressing the financial gap.” He explains that the ninth draft of the project, which was made public—whether intentionally or not—appears to have been released to gauge reactions from depositors, banks, and other relevant stakeholders. Meanwhile, according to leaked information, the government is currently working on a more advanced version, numbered 16.
According to Ghobril, the circulating draft “does not include all the details, but its core appears likely to remain the same: the first $100,000 for each depositor would be paid in cash over four years, while amounts above this threshold would be converted into long-term bonds backed by the Lebanese Central Bank (BDL) assets. These would be structured in tiers—$100,000 to $1 million, $1 million to $5 million, and above $5 million—with maturities varying by deposit size.”
Sources of the Liquidity
Ghobril explains that the cash component related to paying the first $100,000 would require liquidity sources estimated at a minimum of $20–22 billion, though these figures are not yet official. He adds: “This portion will be paid from BDL’s foreign currency reserves, totaling around $12 billion, of which $11.2 billion is a mandatory reserve originally belonging to depositors, in addition to the liquidity held by banks and their potential contributions.”
He emphasizes that “the banks’ role in this regard is inherent, as they are using their own funds and liquidity, but the fundamental question remains: what is the state’s contribution?” He notes that the bonds to be issued to depositors “will be backed by BDL’s assets, not by treasury funds.”
Ghobril points out that “the Currency and Credit Law, particularly Article 113, explicitly compels the treasury to cover BDL’s losses, yet the proposed draft entirely disregards this obligation.”
He also raises several questions regarding the types of assets that will back the bonds: “Are we talking about the gold reserve of 17.7 million ounces, currently valued at $38.4 billion? Does it include Middle East Airlines? Does it include real estate? Nothing is clear in the draft.” He stresses that the absence of these details “fundamentally undermines the credibility of the proposal.”
Ghobril illustrates with figures that the burden of cash payments will effectively fall entirely on the banks: “Banks currently hold around $6 billion in liquidity, of which more than $2 billion is unusable because it is reserved to cover fresh deposits. This means that the actual available liquidity does not exceed $4 billion, while the central bank holds $11.2 billion in mandatory reserves, which fundamentally belong to depositors. The total of these amounts falls short of the minimum required for cash payments.”He further explains that “even selling all bank assets, including real estate and Eurobonds, would yield no more than an additional $8.5 billion,” leaving the cash gap “deep and impossible to bridge without state involvement.”
The economist further warns that “placing the entire responsibility for repayment on the banks alone could trigger serious repercussions: the lack of clarity in the draft may lead some bank boards to consider exiting the market and handing over control to BDL. Should any bank declare bankruptcy, depositors would need many years to recover even a small portion of their rights, which is precisely what banks have sought to avoid since the start of the crisis.”In this context, Ghobril points out that “BDL’s governor had previously assured that the restructuring would be organized so that depositors would not lose their deposits, but this becomes difficult if banks are unable to provide the required liquidity for the $100,000 tier.” He further notes that “the purpose of the bonds to be issued by BDL is to cover the remaining deposits after excluding suspicious-source deposits, writing off accrued interest, and reconverting into Lebanese pounds the deposits that were converted into dollars by depositors after the onset of the crisis—equivalent to roughly $35 billion. Yet neither the state, BDL, nor the banks hold this amount in cash.” He emphasizes that these bonds “will not be inflationary, as they represent tradable financial assets rather than direct liquidity.”
According to Ghobril, the most striking aspect of the ninth draft of the plan is that the state itself is completely exempted from bearing any of the costs. This is particularly striking given that it is the primary party responsible—from reckless spending to squandering $45 billion on electricity, to illegal hiring, through the failure of the “Cedar” conference, to subsidizing imported goods that drained $14 billion from reserves, and ultimately defaulting on the Eurobond in 2020.
Ghobril further notes that “the government behaves as if it were an external observer of the crisis, rather than the political authority that created it through the misuse of power and mismanagement of the public sector.”In sum, in the absence of government involvement, trust is eroded for years, and Ghobril emphasizes that any plan in which the government does not assume part of the cost “will not restore confidence—in the banking sector, the economy, or the government itself.” He concludes that “confidence in banks cannot be rebuilt before confidence in public institutions and the political authority. If the government does not take responsibility, there will be no possibility of restoring trust, today or in the years ahead.”

Yassine Jaber: Your Own Words Confirm the Crisis Is Systemic!
This Is Beirut/December 13/2025
Finance Minister Yassine Jaber’s recent statements stand out for his comparison of the Lebanese financial crisis with those in countries such as Greece, Cyprus, and Portugal. In this comparison, he is once again off the mark.
In fact, Cyprus experienced only a conventional banking crisis, while Greece and Portugal faced financial crises centered on public debt. Consequently, none of these crises were systemic, whereas Lebanon is hit squarely by a systemic crisis, as Jaber himself has acknowledged. Such a crisis requires exceptional laws and measures, since the entities at the heart of the problem are none other than the state and the Banque du Liban (BDL). This situation subsequently affected the banks, triggering their liquidity crisis—not the other way around.
All proposals put forward today require postponing the adoption of the law, allowing for transparent and constructive negotiations. These discussions must hold the state and the Banque du Liban (BDL) accountable and require them to make a genuine financial contribution to restore deposits while avoiding any measures that would undermine the banking sector or jeopardize Lebanon’s economic recovery.
Any solution to the financial crisis must involve accountability on the part of the state. Lebanon’s systemic collapse is the result of decades of mismanagement, flawed financial policies, and the misuse of public resources, which have weakened the banking sector and eroded citizens’ trust.
The state therefore bears both legal and moral responsibility to recapitalize the BDL. Article 113 of the Code of Currency and Credit is clear on this point, providing for compensation of losses resulting from financial and monetary policies. Failing to implement this provision would only prolong the crisis, exacerbate inequalities, and further undermine the legitimacy of institutions.
Public assets represent an opportunity to restore depositors’ rights. The state and the BDL have a real ability to use their public and quasi-sovereign assets to meet obligations to depositors, in accordance with legal frameworks and principles of equity, in order to restore financial stability. Shifting the entire burden of costs onto the banking sector would effectively wipe out its capital and result, de facto, in the loss of deposits. Yet a healthy banking sector is essential for Lebanon’s economic recovery. A viable banking sector with genuine financial strength is necessary to restart the economic cycle, create jobs, and restore confidence.

Finance Committee Allocates $90M to Amal-Linked Council
This Is Beirut/December 13/2025
Lebanon’s parliamentary finance committee on Thursday approved the transfer of roughly $90 million USD in reserve funding for the Council of the South as part of the 2026 budget process to support reconstruction in areas damaged by Israeli bombardment in last year’s Israel-Hezbollah war.
According to parliamentary sources present at the Finance and Budget Committee meeting, MPs affiliated with Amal and Hezbollah stressed that the state must transfer a significant share of its reserve to reconstruction to signal to residents of the south that they have not been abandoned by the state.
In August 2025, the Ministry of Finance transferred $16.7 million USD to the Council allocated to reconstruction efforts in southern Lebanon, according to Finance Minister Yassine Jaber. Then, in September 2025, another $25 million was proposed to the Council in the draft budget, of which $4.7 million was earmarked for infrastructure works. Taken together, the most recent allocation brings the total funding directed to the Council of the South to approximately $132 million.
MP and Minister Defend Funding
Supporters, including MP Ibrahim Kanaan, have previously argued that significant financial allocations are essential to restore public trust in the south and to support those affected by “Israeli aggression”. In response to the most recent move, Jaber stated, “We sent a message from Parliament to the citizens, especially the residents of the South, West Bekaa, Beirut’s southern suburbs, Baalbek-Hermel, and Zahle, as well as all those affected by the Israeli aggression, the state must assume its responsibilities.”
Reconstruction Needs & Hezbollah’s War
The World Bank estimates that approximately $14 billion is needed to reconstruct southern Lebanon after the 2024 Israel-Hezbollah war.
Hezbollah has publicly framed reconstruction as part of both recovery and resistance to Israeli aggression, portraying these efforts as integral to fulfilling commitments made during the war. Despite Hezbollah’s insistence that reconstruction is essential, the militant group has yet to make any meaningful contributions to this effort. Supporters that the group claims to protect are losing faith in Hezbollah’s ability to deliver on assisting with their basic needs. Following the 2006 Israel-Lebanon war, Hezbollah spearheaded reconstruction initiatives in the south, largely financed by Arab Gulf states, notably Qatar. Meanwhile, Iran continued to fund Hezbollah without facing significant international scrutiny, allowing the group to maintain dominance over social networks and infrastructure.
This contrasts starkly with today’s situation. Naim Kassem is insisting that the Lebanese state bear financial responsibility for reconstruction, indicating the group’s crippling financial obstacles. Iran’s financial support for Hezbollah is facing tightened international monitoring via sanctions and funding channels through Syria are more limited after the fall of President Bashar al-Assad.
Transparency and Oversight Concerns
The Council of the South remains a central patronage arm of the Amal movement, controlling construction funds and strategic local influence. Amal’s close ties to Hezbollah heighten concerns over the large, discretionary public funding allocation that may lack proper oversight and transparency. Critics have long pointed to Lebanon’s political patronage system, a core grievance behind the 2019 movement that slammed the government for corruption and patronage networks. Channeling large allocations outside standard ministerial frameworks weakens centralized oversight and reinforces parallel governance structures, an issue that has already contributed to Lebanon’s prolonged economic crisis. The move consolidates political influence among the “Shiite duo” rather than empowering transparent and centralized budgeting.

Lebanese MP Ghassan Skaff Dies After Battle With Cancer
This Is Beirut/December 13/2025
Lebanese lawmaker Ghassan Skaff died after a battle with cancer, his office said on Saturday. Skaff was elected to parliament in the 2022 legislative elections, representing the Western Bekaa–Rashaya district. Alongside his political career, Skaff was a prominent neurosurgeon and academic. He had served as professor and head of the Department of Neurosurgery at the American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC) since January 2007, and as director of its Spine Program since 2002. He previously held several senior positions at AUBMC, including associate professor and acting head of the Department of Neurosurgery between 2006 and 2007, and assistant professor from 1998 to 2006.
Skaff also served as Director of Education for the Middle East Council of the AO Spine organization, an international body, and chaired the Scientific Committee of the Lebanese Medical Association from 2010 to 2016. He was chairman of the board of trustees of the Medical Committee at the University of Balamand. His medical training included residencies in neurosurgery at the University of Toronto in Canada and at the University of California, Los Angeles. He obtained the Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons (FRCS) in 1998, a neurosurgery fellowship from the University of Toronto the same year, and the American Board of Neurosurgery in 1997. Skaff held a Master of Business Administration degree as well as a Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery from Saint Joseph University in Beirut. He is survived by his wife, Maysam Younes, and their three sons, Philip, Patrick and Ralph.

Voluntary Servitude, Civil Disobedience, and Lebanese Liberation Movements: A Philosophical-Political Analysis in Light of La Boétie and Thoreau
Edmond El-chidiac/December 13/2025
Ever since Étienne de La Boétie formulated the concept of “voluntary servitude” in his celebrated Discourse of 1574, the idea has remained a cornerstone for understanding the relationship between ruler and ruled—not as a purely coercive bond, but as a form of voluntary complicity in the perpetuation of tyrannical systems. In the mid-nineteenth century, Henry David Thoreau transformed this insight into praxis by developing the doctrine of “civil disobedience” as a conscious strategy of non-compliance against unjust authority. Between these two poles—La Boétie’s philosophical foundation and Thoreau’s practical application—stands the Lebanese experience as an exemplary case of the permanent struggle between voluntary submission to a composite despotic order and repeated attempts at liberation through recurring movements of civil disobedience.
Voluntary Servitude: Theory and Lebanese Reality
La Boétie insists in his Discourse that tyranny can endure only through the acquiescence of the subjected. The tyrant possesses no intrinsic power sufficient to subjugate an entire people unless the people themselves voluntarily surrender the keys to their own domination. In the Lebanese context, this concept finds vivid expression in the confessional system, which has evolved into a regime of collective voluntary servitude. Although the Lebanese citizen routinely laments confessionalism, he or she frequently continues to reproduce it through politico-sectarian loyalties and deference to the sectarian leader as the primary frame of reference—even when such allegiance comes at the expense of his or her interests as a citizen of the state.
The Lebanese system is not merely a confessional quota arrangement imposed by force; it is a regime to which a substantial portion of the Lebanese population has consented, thereby constituting a paradigm of “voluntary servitude” that renders the individual hostage to his or her sect—not through military coercion, but through the very culture of dependency itself [1].
Thoreau and Civil Disobedience: Non-Compliance as an Act of Liberation
In his seminal 1849 essay “Civil Disobedience,” Thoreau urged individuals to practice deliberate disobedience whenever state laws conflict with moral justice. For Thoreau, law is not sacred in itself; it derives legitimacy solely from its justice. When law becomes an instrument for perpetuating injustice, disobedience becomes an ethical imperative.
In the Lebanese case, this principle has found its clearest manifestations in diverse forms of civil disobedience across historical junctures: from the existential rebellion launched by Sheikh Bashir Gemayel in the 1970s, through the boycott of sham elections, to the major popular uprisings that shattered the walls of sectarian and political fear [2].
From Bashir Gemayel to 17 October: Lebanese Disobedience against Subordination and Sectarian Servitude
If La Boétie’s philosophy of voluntary servitude centres on the people’s will to withhold obedience, the Lebanese experience at the end of the twentieth and beginning of the twenty-first centuries has witnessed landmark episodes that embodied this refusal through major acts of sovereign rebellion. Bashir Gemayel (1976–1982) remains one of the most prominent symbols of Lebanese disobedience against external subordination and against the sectarian enslavement system imposed on Lebanon by domestic and foreign alliances that produced a reality of surrender akin to the “voluntary servitude” described by La Boétie [3].
Bashir Gemayel: An Individual Revolution against Subordination
Within the context of the Lebanese war, Bashir Gemayel’s 1982 candidacy for the presidency was not a transient political act but an open revolt against the logic of Syrian–regional hegemony, which had imposed its tutelage over Lebanese decision-making under the pretext of “sectarian balance” and “civil peace.” In his political discourse, Gemayel confronted the culture of submission head-on, raising the slogan “Lebanon First” as a sovereign rebellion against the logic of dependency and as an attempt to restore the idea of an independent, sovereign Lebanese state [4].
His candidacy constituted in itself an act of political civil disobedience: Gemayel did not emerge from the traditional confessional establishment that accepted quota-sharing and foreign tutelage; rather, he challenged it from within, using the presidential platform to overturn the rules of the game. He exhorted the Lebanese to “stop waiting for the outside world” and to “cease holding others responsible for their destiny,” thereby practically enacting La Boétie’s central thesis: the tyrant falls the moment people cease to serve him [5]. In confronting Syrian domination and domestic political subservience, Gemayel practised a form of collective civil disobedience whose essence was the rejection of the existing subordinating order.
Despite his assassination shortly after election, his legacy endures as an exemplar of individual revolution against the voluntary servitude accepted by segments of the Lebanese political class—a legacy that turned his experience into a symbol of individual and collective sovereignty in the face of forces of oppression [6].
The Cedar Revolution of 2005: Toppling Tutelage through Popular Disobedience
Following the assassination of Prime Minister Rafic Hariri on 14 February 2005, the Lebanese street erupted in one of the largest peaceful popular uprisings in the country’s history, known as the Cedar Revolution. This mass movement constituted a concrete embodiment of civil disobedience against the Syrian regime’s tutelage—not only through demonstrations, but also through the boycott of sham elections, peaceful sit-ins, and legal–international mobilisation to restore sovereignty [7].
In the Cedar Revolution, the Lebanese practised disobedience by refusing to participate in the discourse of submission, by rejecting cultural and political servility, cand by demanding the withdrawal of Syrian forces. Their weapon was not violence but the withdrawal of popular legitimacy from unjust authority—in exact accordance with La Boétie’s logic that the tyrant collapses of his own accord once people stop serving him [8].
The Cedar Revolution thus represented a continuation of Bashir Gemayel’s spirit of rebellion, yet elevated it to the level of cross-sectarian, non-violent mass mobilisation that relied on collective civil disobedience as the instrument for ending external subordination.
The 17 October 2019 Uprising: Revolution against Sectarian and Economic Servitude
Voluntary servitude in Lebanon reached its apogee with the disintegration of state institutions under the hegemony of Hezbollah, which had become the Iranian arm gripping the levers of Lebanese decision-making. Virtually all political parties abdicated their sovereign role, accepting instead the position of follower or accomplice—either out of fear or to preserve their private interests within the spoils system. Through this complicity, Hezbollah was allowed gradually to capture the state, tightening its security and political grip until the Lebanese Republic descended into near-total collapse. The Lebanese citizen, amid this landscape, lives a dual subjugation: external subjugation to Iran via Hezbollah and internal subjugation to a complicit and impotent partisan system.
Faced with this reality, oppression was no longer merely external; it was exercised through partisan functionaries and local leaders who enslaved citizens via clientelist networks and corruption, foreclosing any horizon of genuine resistance. Parties that were supposed to defend state sovereignty either colluded with Hezbollah or submitted to it under the banner of “political realism,” thereby rendering the Lebanese citizens hostages to a system of internal and external enslavement simultaneously.
The uprising of 17 October 2019 emerged against a backdrop of total economic and social collapse, yet it was not merely a revolt over living conditions; it was a revolution against the sectarian obedience system and the enslavement mentality that treats the sectarian leader as inescapable fate [9].
In the 17 October movement, civil disobedience became the primary weapon: general strikes, road blockades, boycott of state institutions, popular tribunals against regime symbols in public squares, and the shattering of partisan media hegemony through independent digital platforms. All of these forms expressed civil disobedience in the precise sense intended by Thoreau: a moral and political withdrawal of support from a corrupt and unjust system [10].
Most significantly—despite its eventual internal erosion and failure to achieve the liberation of Lebanon and the Lebanese—the uprising shattered one of the most entrenched forms of voluntary servitude in Lebanon: sectarian loyalty. Protesters transcended their traditional divisions and refused to defend their historic leaders, marking the beginning of emancipation from the sectarian servitude regime that had been consolidated for decades.
Conclusion
From Bashir Gemayel to the Cedar Revolution and the 17 October uprising, the concept of voluntary servitude is manifest in the deep structure of the Lebanese system, just as civil disobedience appears as an ethical and political act of liberation. Every Lebanese mobilisation against tutelage, sectarianism, or corruption has taken the form of breaking blind obedience and rebelling against a reality of subordination that part of society had accepted.
If La Boétie called upon people to cease serving tyrants, and Thoreau put that call into practice through individual disobedience, the Lebanese, at pivotal historical moments, have enacted this refusal in practice—affirming that freedom is not merely a right but a responsibility that begins with the individual’s decision to say “no.”
Yet the question remains: can the Lebanese rise once more through civil disobedience and break the chains of their voluntary servitude in a genuine, effective, and transformative revolution capable of liberating Lebanon?
National emancipation will not be achieved by awaiting external salvation or by appeasing domestic structures of oppression. It begins with a conscious individual decision to withhold service from tyrants and to reject blind obedience to any authority that practises despotism in the name of sect, security, or economy. At the forefront of these structures stands Hezbollah as an Iranian instrument strangling the Lebanese state, seizing control of its legitimate institutions, and transforming the state into a subordinate entity bereft of sovereignty and national will.
Civil disobedience is no longer a theoretical option; it has become an existential necessity for Lebanon as a state and for the Lebanese as free human beings. Every Lebanese citizen is called today to dismantle the system of voluntary servitude by withdrawing from the game of dependency and forging a conscious collective act whose slogan is: no obedience to those who enslave us in the name of sect, money, or arms. The restoration of sovereignty is possible only through comprehensive revolutionary civil disobedience that liberates the will of the Lebanese from the yoke of Hezbollah and from a state subservient to its Iranian project.
This is not a call for chaos, but for the moral revolution through non-compliance—as La Boétie and Thoreau envisioned it, and as the responsibility to preserve a free, sovereign, and independent homeland demands.
Notes
[1] Étienne de La Boétie, Discours de la servitude volontaire, 1574.
[2] Henry David Thoreau, “Civil Disobedience,” 1849.
[3] Antoine Sfeir, Liban, la guerre de trente ans, 2005.
[4] Farid el-Khazen, The Breakdown of the State in Lebanon, Harvard University Press, 2000.
[5] La Boétie, op. cit.
[6] Sfeir, op. cit.
[7] Ussama Makdisi, The Culture of Sectarianism, University of California Press, 2000.
[8] Hannah Arendt, On Violence, Harcourt, 1970.
[9] Mohja Zreik, “Civil Resistance in Lebanon’s 2019 Uprising,” Journal of Middle Eastern Politics, 2020.
[10] Thoreau, op. cit.
References
Arendt, Hannah. On Violence. New York: Harcourt, 1970.
Foucault, Michel. Discipline and Punish. New York: Pantheon Books, 1975.
La Boétie, Étienne de. Discours de la servitude volontaire, 1574.
Makdisi, Ussama. The Culture of Sectarianism. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.
Sfeir, Antoine. Liban, la guerre de trente ans, 2005.
Thoreau, Henry David. “Civil Disobedience,” 1849.
Zreik, Mohja. “Civil Resistance in Lebanon’s 2019 Uprising.” Journal of Middle Eastern Politics, 2020.
el-Khazen, Farid. The Breakdown of the State in Lebanon. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000.

The Latest English LCCC Miscellaneous Reports And News published on December 13-14/2025
Mossad Vault/Video-Link/How Mossad Hid a Spy in a Pilgrimage Group to Track an Iranian General
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UP1fQ0Levd4
December 12, 2025
A man in pilgrim's clothing kneels among thousands at Karbala's holiest shrine. His prayers are flawless. His devotion appears genuine. But the Quran in his hands conceals a satellite transmitter, and the Iranian general praying nearby has no idea he's being tracked.For three weeks in 2011, an Israeli operative infiltrated Iranian pilgrimage groups to document an Revolutionary Guard commander coordinating weapons networks across the Middle East. He lived as Ali Rezaei—a Turkish convert seeking spiritual guidance—performing rituals he didn't believe in, befriending people he was deceiving, maintaining a false identity so completely that even daily life became operational theater. We reconstruct the operation: months mastering Farsi and Shia practice, forged documents surviving Iranian immigration, the cover story explaining any errors, and the discipline required to maintain deception while surrounded by genuine believers whose trust enabled his access. But this operation weaponized religious pilgrimage and exploited sacred ritual for surveillance. We examine the calculus: does mapping Iranian militia networks justify deceiving worshippers who believed they were helping a sincere convert? Where are the boundaries intelligence services should respect? We explore what the operation revealed: command structures connecting Tehran to proxy forces, logistics networks moving weapons through routes satellites couldn't detect, and vulnerabilities in Iranian security when religious obligation forced even cautious officials into public spaces. It's about whether any context should remain off-limits to intelligence exploitation. It's about the cost of living as someone else so completely that your actual identity becomes the disguise. And it's about invisible war fought in crowds and prayer gatherings—where the greatest weapon is becoming whoever your target will trust. If this examination of deep cover operations made you question intelligence boundaries, hit Subscribe—we're revealing operations between necessity and transgression. Comment your perspective: is infiltrating religious pilgrimage justified by security threats, or does it violate something more important?

Mossad Vault/Video Link/How Mossad Used Wedding Photographers to Mark a Hamas Target in Gaza
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nxu_DpIupqM
December 12, 2025
A photographer moves through a Gaza wedding, camera clicking, capturing celebrations. Three days later, an airstrike levels a safe house with surgical precision. The target: a Hamas weapons coordinator who thought he was just another guest at his nephew's wedding. This is the story of how Israeli intelligence turned a family celebration into a targeting operation—using a recruited Palestinian photographer to mark a commander Israel had hunted for years. We reconstruct the operation: the coerced collaboration, the modified camera equipment transmitting images in real-time, and the violent extraction that followed the strike. We examine how intelligence services exploit civilian roles to penetrate hostile territories where traditional operatives would be instantly identified. But this operation raises profound questions: are targeted killings legitimate military operations or extrajudicial executions? What happens when wedding photographers become intelligence operatives? And what about the collaborator—victim or willing participant? It's about the invisible war fought through ordinary civilian roles, how modern intelligence blurs every boundary between combatant and civilian, and whether precision assassination is more acceptable—or more disturbing. If this investigation made you question the methods states employ in modern conflict, hit Like and Subscribe. Drop your thoughts: was using a wedding photographer justified—or a dangerous violation of fundamental principles?

Police searching Brown University after shooter kills 2 and wounds 8 on campus
PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP)/December b14/2025 — A shooter dressed in black killed at least two people and wounded eight others at Brown University on Saturday during final exams on the Ivy League campus, authorities said, as police searched for the suspect.Officers were hunting through campus buildings and sifting through trash cans more than three hours after the shooting erupted. The suspect was a male in dark clothing who was last seen leaving an engineering building where the attack happened, said Timothy O’Hara, Deputy Chief of Police.
Mayor Brett Smiley said a shelter-in-place was in effect for the area and encouraged people living near the campus to stay inside and not to return home until it is lifted.
“We have all available resources” to find the suspect, Smiley said. The site of the shooting sits on the edge of campus alongside a neighborhood filled with stately brick homes. Emma Ferraro, a chemical engineering student, was in the engineering building’s lobby working on a final project when she heard loud pops coming from the east side. Once she realized they were gunshots, she darted for the door and ran to a nearby building where she was waited for a couple o fhours. Eight people with gunshot wounds were taken to Rhode Island Hospital, where six were in critical but stable condition, according to Kelly Brennan, a spokesperson for the hospital. Another was in critical condition and one was stable, she said. University officials initially told students and staff that a suspect was in custody, before later saying that was not the case and that police were still searching for a suspect or suspects, according to alerts issued through Brown’s emergency notification system. The mayor said a person preliminarily thought to be involved was detained but was later determined to have no involvement. “We’re still getting information about what’s going on, but we’re just telling people to lock their doors and to stay vigilant,” said Providence Councilmember John Goncalves, whose ward includes the Brown campus. “As a Brown alum, someone who loves the Brown community and represents this area, I’m heartbroken. My heart goes out to all the family members and the folks who’ve been impacted.”
The shooting occurred in the Barus & Holley building, a seven-story complex that houses the School of Engineering and physics department. According to the university’s website, the building includes more than 100 laboratories, dozens of classrooms and offices. Engineering design exams were underway there when the shooting occurred. Brown senior biochemistry student Alex Bruce was working on a final research project in his dorm directly across the street from the building when he heard sirens outside and received a text about an active shooter shortly after 4 p.m.
“I’m just in here shaking,” he said, watching through the window as a half-dozen armed officers in tactical gear surrounded his dorm. He said he feared for a friend who he thought was inside the engineering building at the time. Students in a nearby lab hid under desks and turned off the lights after receiving an alert about the shooting, said Chiangheng Chien, a doctoral student in engineering who was about a block away from the scene. Mari Camara, 20, a junior from New York City, was coming out of the library and rushed inside a taqueria to seek shelter. She spent more than three hours there, texting friends while police searched the campus.“Everyone is the same as me, shocked and terrified that something like this happened,” she said. President Donald Trump told reporters that he had been briefed on the shooting and “all we can do right now is pray for the victims.”“It’s a shame,” he said in brief remarks at the White House. The FBI said it was assisting in the response. Brown, one of the nation's most prestigious colleges, has roughly 7,300 undergraduates and more than 3,000 graduate students. ***Durkin Richer reported from Washington. Associated Press journalists Mike Balsamo and Seung Min Kim in Washington; Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City; Jack Dura in Bismarck, North Dakota; and John Seewer in Toledo, Ohio, contributed.

Israel Says Killed Top Hamas Weapons Figure in Gaza
Arab News/December 13/2025
Israel said it killed the head of weapons production in Hamas's military wing in a strike in the Gaza Strip on Saturday. The civil defense agency and medical sources in the Hamas-run Palestinian territory told AFP an Israeli strike killed five people in the Tel al-Hawa district, southwest of Gaza City. When contacted by AFP earlier on Saturday, the army did not say whether the strike reported in Tel al-Hawa was the same as the one mentioned in an army statement before the announcement that it had killed Hamas's Raed Saad. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a joint statement that "in response to the detonation of a Hamas explosive device that wounded our forces today in the Yellow Area of the Gaza Strip... (they) instructed the elimination of the terrorist Raed Saad". Under the US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, Israeli troops have withdrawn to positions behind the so-called Yellow Line, though they are still in control of more than half the territory. Netanyahu and Katz described Saad as "one of the architects" of the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war in Gaza. The Israeli army said Saad was the head of the weapons production headquarters of Hamas's military wing who led the group's "force build-up". Family sources confirmed his death to AFP and said the funeral would be held on Sunday. Israel's military earlier on Saturday said two reserve soldiers were lightly injured "as a result of an explosive device that detonated during an operation to clear the area of terrorist infrastructure in southern Gaza". The ceasefire that came into effect on October 10 has halted the fighting between Israel and Hamas, but it remains fragile with each side accusing the other of violating its terms.
Burnt-out car
Mahmud Bassal, a spokesman for Gaza civil defense which operates as a rescue force under Hamas authority, said five people were killed after "a civilian jeep-type vehicle was targeted near the Nabulsi roundabout in Tel al-Hawa". Bassal said the "charred" bodies were taken to Al-Shifa hospital after "Israeli warplanes targeted the civilian vehicle with three missiles, causing it to burn and its destruction".  The hospital's emergency department confirmed to AFP the arrival of the five bodies and said more than 25 people were injured in the strike. AFP footage showed a mangled car with vehicle parts scattered around next to other debris. "Warplanes fired several missiles at the vehicle, setting it ablaze. Residents rushed to extinguish the fire, and charred body parts were scattered on the ground," a witness, who did not wish to give his name for security reasons, said in the Tel al-Hawa area.  Another witness, a 34-year-old man living in a tent in the Tel al-Hawa area, said he "saw several Hamas members arrive at the site of the attack", without providing further details. Civil defense agency spokesman Bassal also said a 17-year-old boy and an 18-year-old boy were killed by Israeli fire in two separate incidents in Gaza.

US forges ahead with plans for Gaza international force, Indonesia to send 20,000 troops
The Arab Weekly/December 13/2025
US officials are currently working out the size of the ISF, composition, housing, training and rules of engagement.
International troops could be deployed in the Gaza Strip as early as next month to form a UN-authorised stabilisation force, said Reuters quoting US officials. But it remains unclear if and how Palestinian militant group Hamas will be disarmed.
The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the International Stabilisation Force (ISF) would not fight Hamas. They said many countries had expressed interest in contributing and US officials are currently working out the size of the ISF, composition, housing, training and rules of engagement. The US Central Command will host a conference in Doha on December 16 with partner nations to plan for the ISF, the officials said. More than 25 countries are expected to send representatives to the conference, which will include sessions on the command structure and other issues related to the Gaza force, they said.
An American two-star general is being considered to lead the ISF but no decisions have been made, the officials said. Deployment of the force is a key part of the next phase of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan. Under the first phase, a fragile ceasefire in the two-year-old war began on October 10 and Hamas has released hostages and Israel has freed detained Palestinians. “There is a lot of quiet planning that’s going on behind the scenes right now for phase two of the peace deal,” White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Thursday. “We want to ensure an enduring and lasting peace.”Indonesia has said it is prepared to deploy up to 20,000 troops to take on health and construction-related tasks in Gaza. “It is still in the planning and preparation stages,” said Rico Sirait, spokesperson of Indonesian Defence Ministry. “We are now preparing the organisational structure of the forces to be deployed.”Israel still controls 53% of Gaza, while nearly all the 2 million people in the enclave live in the remaining Hamas-held area. The plan – which needs to be finalised by the so-called Board of Peace, chaired by US Presidnet Donald Trump, is for the ISF to deploy in the area held by Israel, the officials said. Then, according to the Trump peace plan, as the ISF establishes control and stability, Israeli troops will gradually withdraw “based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarisation.” A UN Security Council resolution adopted on November 17 authorised a Board of Peace and countries working with it to establish the ISF. Trump said on Wednesday that an announcement on which world leaders will serve on the Board of Peace will be made early next year. The Security Council authorised the ISF to work alongside newly trained and vetted Palestinian police to stabilise security “by ensuring the process of demilitarising the Gaza Strip, including the destruction and prevention of rebuilding of the military, terror, and offensive infrastructure, as well as the permanent decommissioning of weapons from non-state armed groups.”However, it remains unclear exactly how that would work. US Ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz noted on Thursday that the ISF was authorised by the Security Council to “demilitarise” Gaza by all means necessary – which means use of force. “Obviously that’ll be a conversation with each country,” he told Israel’s Channel 12, adding that discussions on rules of engagement were under way. Hamas has said the issue of disarmament has not been discussed with them formally by the mediators – the US, Egypt and Qatar – and the group’s stance remains that it will not disarm until a Palestinian state is established. Israel’s Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said in a speech on Sunday that the second phase would move toward demilitarisation and disarmament. “Now that raises a question: Our friends in America want to try and establish a multinational task force to do the job,” he said. “I told them I welcome it. Are volunteers here? Be my guest,” Netanyahu said. “We know there are certain tasks that this force can perform … but some things are beyond their abilities, and perhaps the main thing is beyond their abilities, but we will see about that,” he said.

2 US service members and one American civilian killed in ambush in Syria, US Central Command says
AP/December 13, 2025
DAMASCUS, Syria: Two US service members and one American civilian have been killed and three other people wounded in an ambush on Saturday by the Daesh group in central Syria, the US Central Command said. The attack is the first to inflict casualties since the fall of Syrian President Bashar Assad a year ago. Central Command said in a post on X that as a matter of respect for the families and in accordance with Department of War policy, the identities of the service members will be withheld until 24 hours after their next of kin have been notified. Shots were fired at Syrian and US forces on Saturday during a visit by American troops to a historic central town, leaving several wounded, Syria’s state media and a war monitor said. The shooting took place near Palmyra, according to the state-run SANA news agency, which said two members of Syria’s security force and several US service members were wounded. The injured were taken by helicopters to the Al-Tanf garrison near the border with Iraq and Jordan. SANA said the attacker was killed, without providing further details. A US defense official told The Associated Press that they are aware of the reports and did not have any information to provide immediately. The official spoke on condition of anonymity for not being authorized to speak to the media. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least three Syrian security members were wounded as well as several Americans. It added that the attacker was a member of the Syrian security force. The US has hundreds of troops deployed in eastern Syria as part of a coalition fighting the Daesh group. Last month, Syria joined the international coalition fighting against Daesh as Damascus improves its relations with Western countries following last year’s fall of President Bashar Assad when insurgents captured his seat of power in Damascus. The US had no diplomatic relations with Syria under Assad, but ties have warmed since the fall of the five-decade Assad family rule. The interim president, Ahmad Al-Sharaa, made a historic visit to Washington last month where he held talks with President Donald Trump. Daesh was defeated in Syria in 2019 but the group’s sleeper cells still carry out deadly attacks in the country. The United Nations says the group still has between 5,000 and 7,000 fighters in Syria and Iraq. US troops, which have maintained a presence in different parts of Syria — including Al-Tanf garrison in the central province of Homs — to train other forces as part of a broad campaign against Daesh, have been targeted in the past. One of the deadliest attacks occurred in 2019 in the northern town of Manbij when a blast killed two US service members and two American civilians as well as others from Syria while conducting a patrol.

Jordan condemns Palmyra attack, expresses solidarity with Syria and US
Arab News/December 14, 2025
AMMAN: Jordan’s Ministry of Foreign and Expatriate Affairs on Saturday strongly condemned a terrorist attack targeting Syrian security forces and US personnel near the city of Palmyra, which resulted in a number of casualties and injuries. Ministry spokesperson Fouad Al-Majali said Jordan rejects all forms of violence and terrorism that seek to undermine security and stability, expressing the Kingdom’s full solidarity with both Syria and the US, the Jordan News Agency reported. Al-Majali reaffirmed Jordan’s support for Syria’s reconstruction efforts on foundations that preserve the country’s territorial integrity, sovereignty, security and stability, while continuing efforts to combat terrorism and protect the rights of all Syrians. He also conveyed Jordan’s sincere condolences to the governments and peoples of Syria and the United States, as well as to the families of the victims, and wished a speedy recovery to those injured.

IMF approves reviews, unlocks $240m in funding for Jordan
Arab News/December 13, 2025
AMMAN: The International Monetary Fund’s executive board has completed the fourth review of Jordan’s Extended Fund Facility and the first review under the Resilience and Sustainability Facility, unlocking immediate access to about $240 million to support the kingdom’s economic program. The decision allows Jordan to draw about $130 million under the EFF and about $110 million under the RSF, bringing total disbursements under the IMF arrangement to about $733 million. In a statement issued on Saturday, the IMF said Jordan’s economy “remains resilient,” supported by sound macroeconomic policies and strong international backing. Growth accelerated to 2.7 percent in the first half of 2025 and is expected to reach about 3 percent in the coming years, driven by major investment projects, deeper regional integration and continued structural reforms. Inflation remains anchored at about 2 percent, while the current account deficit is projected to narrow to below 5 percent of GDP over the medium term. The IMF also noted that Jordan’s banking sector is stable and international reserves remain strong. Fiscal performance continues to align with program targets, underpinned by robust revenue collection and disciplined current spending. The authorities remain committed to reducing public debt to 80 percent of GDP by 2028 through gradual fiscal consolidation, while protecting social and development spending and reducing losses at public utilities. The IMF said progress under the RSF is ongoing, with reforms addressing vulnerabilities in the water and electricity sectors and strengthening health emergency preparedness. All reform measures scheduled for the current review have been completed. Commenting after the board discussion, IMF Deputy Managing Director Kenji Okamura said Jordan’s continued macroeconomic stability amid persistent external headwinds reflects the authorities’ commitment to sound policies, supported by strong international assistance. He said growth continues to recover, inflation remains low and reserve buffers are strong, stressing the importance of maintaining prudent fiscal and monetary policies amid regional tensions and global uncertainty. Okamura added that accelerated structural reforms are essential to foster job-rich growth, improve the business environment, enhance labour market flexibility, tackle youth unemployment and low female labour force participation, and attract private investment. He also underlined the importance of sustained donor support to help Jordan manage external challenges and the economic cost of hosting large numbers of refugees, while noting that progress under the RSF would help address long-term vulnerabilities and strengthen balance-of-payments stability.

US to host conference on stabilization force plans
Reuters/December 13, 2025
WASHINGTON: The US Central Command will host a conference in Doha on Dec.16 with partner nations to plan the International Stabilization Force for Gaza, two US officials said. More than 25 countries are expected to send representatives to the conference, which will include sessions on the command structure and other issues related to the Gaza force, the officials said. International troops could be deployed in the Gaza Strip as early as next month to form the stabilization force, the officials said.
They said many countries had expressed interest in contributing, and US officials are currently determining the size of the ISF, its composition, housing, training, and rules of engagement.
BACKGROUND
Indonesia has said it is prepared to deploy up to 20,000 troops to take on health and constructionrelated tasks in Gaza. “There is a lot of quiet planning that’s going on behind the scenes right now for phase two of the peace deal,” said White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt. “We want to ensure an enduring and lasting peace.”Indonesia has said it is prepared to deploy up to 20,000 troops to take on health and construction-related tasks in Gaza. “It is still in the planning and preparation stages,” said Rico Sirait, spokesperson of the Indonesian Defense Ministry. “We are now preparing the organizational structure of the forces to be deployed.”Israel still controls 53 percent of Gaza, while nearly all the 2 million people in the enclave live in the remaining Hamas-held area. The plan — which needs to be finalized by the so-called Board of Peace — is for the ISF to deploy in the area held by Israel, the US officials said. Then, according to the Trump peace plan, as the ISF establishes control and stability, Israeli troops will gradually withdraw “based on standards, milestones, and timeframes linked to demilitarization.”

US forces raids ship headed to Iran as Iran seizes oil tanker
Agencies/December 13, 2025
WASHINGTON: A US special operations team in the Indian Ocean raided a ship headed to Iran from China last month and seized military-related articles, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday, citing US officials. The cargo consisted of components potentially useful for Iran’s conventional weapons, one official said, adding the shipment had been destroyed. US forces boarded the ship several hundred miles off the coast of Sri Lanka, according to the newspaper, which added the vessel was later allowed to proceed.
Iran seizes ship
Iran has seized an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, Iranian media said overnight Friday to Saturday, adding that 18 crew members from India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh were on board. “An oil tanker carrying six million liters of contraband diesel fuel has been boarded off the coast of the Sea of Oman,” the Fars news agency said, quoting an official from the southern province of Hormozgan. “The vessel had disabled all its navigation systems.”Iranian forces regularly announce the interception of ships it says are illegally transporting fuel in the Gulf. Retail fuel prices in Iran are among the lowest in the world, making smuggling it to other countries particularly profitable. Iran seized an oil tanker in Gulf waters last month “for carrying an unauthorized cargo,” dismissing suggestions it was a retaliatory measure against another country. The latest interception came two days after the United States seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela. According to Washington, the ship’s captain was transporting oil from Venezuela and Iran. The US Treasury sanctioned Venezuela in 2022 for alleged ties to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Hezbollah.

UN chief visits Iraq to mark end of assistance mission set up after 2003 invasion
AP/December 13, 2025
BAGHDAD: United National Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was in Baghdad on Saturday to mark the end of the political mission set up in 2003 following the US-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam Hussein.
The UN Security Council, at Iraq’s request, voted last year to wind down the mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI), by the end of 2025. The mission was set up to coordinate post-conflict humanitarian and reconstruction efforts and help restore a representative government in the country. Iraqi caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani said his country “highly values” the mission’s work in a region “that has suffered for decades from dictatorship, wars, and terrorism.” He said its conclusion showed Iraq had reached a stage of “full self-reliance.”“Iraq emerged victorious thanks to the sacrifices and courage of its people,” he said in a joint statement with Guterres. The ending of UNAMI’s mandate “does not signify the end of the partnership between Iraq and the UN,” Sudani said, adding that it represents the beginning of a new chapter of cooperation focused on development and inclusive economic growth. The prime minister said a street in Baghdad would be named “United Nations Street” in honor of the UN’s work and in recognition of 22 UN staff who were killed in an Aug. 19, 2003, truck bomb attack on the Canal Hotel in Baghdad, which housed the UN headquarters. Guterres praised “the courage, fortitude and determination of the Iraqi people” and the country’s efforts to restore security and order after years of sectarian violence and the rise of extremist groups, including the Daesh group, in the years after the 2003 invasion. “Iraqis have worked to overcome decades of violence, oppression, war, terrorism, sectarianism and foreign interference,” the secretary-general said. “And today’s Iraq is unrecognizable from those times.”Iraq “is now a normal country, and relations between the UN and Iraq will become normal relations with the end of UNAMI,” Guterres added. He also expressed appreciation for Iraq’s commitment to returning its citizens from the Al-Hol camp, a sprawling tent camp in northeastern Syria housing thousands of people — mostly women and children — with alleged ties to the IS. Guterres recently recommended former Iraqi President Barham Salih to become the next head of the UN refugee agency, the first nomination from the Middle East in half a century.Salih’s presidential term, from 2018 to 2022, came in the immediate aftermath of the Daesh group’s rampage across Iraq and the battle to take back the territory seized by the extremist group, including the key northern city of Mosul. At least 2.2 million Iraqis were displaced as they fled the IS offensive. Many, particularly members of the Yazidi minority from the northern Sinjar district, remain in displacement camps today.

Iran detains 18 crew members of foreign tanker seized in Gulf of Oman
Reuters/December 13/2025
Iranian authorities detained 18 crew members of a foreign tanker seized in the Gulf of Oman on Friday that they said was carrying 6 million liters of smuggled fuel, Iranian media reported on Saturday, citing the Hormozgan province judiciary.
It said those detained under the ongoing investigation include the captain of the tanker. The semi-official news agency Fars said the crew were from India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. The authorities said the tanker had committed multiple violations, including “ignoring stop orders, attempting to flee, (and) lacking navigation and cargo documentation” Iran, which has some of the world’s lowest fuel prices due to heavy subsidies and the plunge in the value of its national currency, has been fighting rampant fuel smuggling by land to neighboring countries and by sea to Gulf Arab states.

Erdogan warns Black Sea should not be 'area of confrontation' after strikes
Agence France Presse/December 13/2025
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday warned that the Black Sea should not turn into an "area of confrontation" between Russia and Ukraine, after several strikes in recent weeks. "The Black Sea should not be seen as an area of confrontation. This would not benefit Russia or Ukraine. Everyone needs safe navigation in the Black Sea," he was quoted as telling reporters aboard his plane, according to the official Anadolu news agency. A Russian air strike damaged a Turkish-owned vessel in a port in Ukraine's Black Sea region of Odesa, Kyiv and the operator said on Friday. The attack came hours after Erdogan had raised the issue personally with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of a summit in Turkmenistan. Erdogan had called for a "limited ceasefire" concerning attacks on ports and energy facilities in the Russia-Ukraine war, during the face-to-face talks with Putin, according to his office. On the plane, Erdogan said he mainly discussed the war and peace efforts with Putin, Anadolu reported. "Like all other actors, Mr Putin knows very well where Turkey stands on this issue," he said. "After this meeting we held with Putin, we hope to have the opportunity to also discuss the peace plan with U.S. President (Donald) Trump," he added. "Peace is not far away, we can see it."Turkey, which has sought to maintain relations with Moscow and Kyiv throughout the war, controls the Bosphorus Strait, a key passage for transporting Ukrainian grain and Russian oil towards the Mediterranean.
Over the past weeks, several attacks also targeted Russia-linked tankers in the Black Sea, some of which were drone attacks claimed by Kyiv. The attacks sparked harsh criticism from Ankara, which summoned envoys from both Russia and Ukraine.

Germany to send soldiers to fortify Poland border
Agence France Presse/December 13/2025
Germany has said it will send a group of soldiers to Poland to help with a project to fortify the country's eastern border as worries mount about the threat from Russia. Poland, a strong supporter of Ukraine in its fight against Moscow, announced plans in May last year to bolster a long stretch of its border that includes Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. The main task of the German soldiers in Poland will be "engineering activities," a spokesman for the defense ministry in Berlin said late Friday. This could include "constructing fortifications, digging trenches, laying barbed wire, or erecting tank barriers," he said. "The support provided by German soldiers as part of (the operation) is limited to these engineering activities."The spokesman did not specify the exact number of troops involved, saying only it would be a "mid-range two-digit number".They are expected to participate in the project from the second quarter of 2026 until the end of 2027. The spokesman stressed that parliamentary approval was not needed for the deployment as "there is no immediate danger to the soldiers from military conflicts".Except for certain exceptional cases, the German parliament has to approve the deployment of the country's armed forces overseas. Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Warsaw has staunchly backed Kyiv and been a transit route for arms being supplied by Ukraine's Western allies. Warsaw has also modernised its army and hiked defense spending. Germany is Ukraine's second-biggest supplier of military aid after the United States and has sent Kyiv a huge quantity of equipment ranging from air defense systems to armoured vehicles.

Ukraine says it received 114 prisoners from Belarus
AFP/December 13/2025
Ukraine received 114 prisoners released by Belarus on Saturday, Kyiv’s POW coordination center said, including Ukrainian citizens accused of working for Ukrainian intelligence and Belarusian political prisoners. The center’s statement said that the released captives would receive medical attention, and those Belarusian citizens who so wished would subsequently be transported to Poland or Lithuania. The center posted photos appearing to show the released captives boarding a bus, with some of them smiling and embracing.

US envoy to meet Zelensky, Europe leaders in Berlin this weekend
Agence France Presse/December 13/2025
U.S. President Donald Trump's special envoy will meet with Volodymyr Zelensky and other European leaders in Berlin this weekend, the White House said, as Washington presses for a plan to end Russia's war with Ukraine. Trump has been stepping up pressure on Kyiv to reach an agreement since revealing a peace plan last month that has been accused of echoing Moscow's key demands, including Ukraine ceding crucial territory. The 28-point proposal has triggered a flurry of diplomacy between the United States and Ukraine's European allies, with Kyiv officials recently saying they had sent Washington an updated plan. A White House official confirmed to AFP on Friday the accuracy of a Wall Street Journal report that Trump's envoy Steve Witkoff will meet with Zelensky and European leaders over the weekend to discuss the status of peace negotiations. Germany's government has said Berlin will host the leaders, including the heads of the European Union and NATO, next Monday in the hours after Zelensky attends a German-Ukrainian business forum with Chancellor Friedrich Merz. The idea of a speedy accession by Ukraine into the European Union -- a move opposed by Moscow -- is included in the latest version of a U.S.-led plan to end the war.uropeans and Ukrainians are also asking the United States to provide them with "security guarantees" before Ukraine negotiates any territorial concessions, the French presidency said on Friday. Concrete security guarantees for Ukraine are a "prerequisite" for any peace agreement and must be set out in a legally binding document, Ukraine's ambassador to NATO, Alyona Getmanchuk, told AFP on Thursday.
EU membership
Under the latest U.S. plan, Ukraine would join the EU as early as January 2027, a senior official familiar with the matter told AFP on Friday on condition of anonymity. The complicated EU accession process usually takes years and requires a unanimous vote from all 27 members of the bloc, and some countries, most notably Hungary, have consistently voiced opposition to Ukraine joining. Trump can use "various levers of influence" to convince leaders opposed to Ukraine's membership to change their stance, Zelensky told journalists, including AFP, on Thursday. Kyiv has long striven for EU membership but has struggled to eradicate endemic corruption -- a core prerequisite for joining the bloc. Full details of the plan have not been released. Zelensky will discuss "the status of peace negotiations" with "numerous European heads of state and government, as well as the leaders of the EU and NATO", Berlin said.
A long road
Moscow indicated Friday it was suspicious about the efforts to amend the U.S. plan, for which it has signalled support. "We have an impression that this version... will be worsened," Kremlin foreign policy aide Yuri Ushakov told the Kommersant business daily. "It'll be a long process," he added, saying that Moscow had not seen an updated version since discussions between Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. envoys Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Moscow last week. Zelensky said Thursday that Washington wants only Ukraine, not Russia, to withdraw its troops from parts of the eastern Donetsk region, where a demilitarised "free economic zone" would be installed as a buffer between the two armies. On Friday evening, an adviser to French President Emmanuel Macron said Kyiv was "not considering" a deal on the territories or a demilitarised zone. Russia, which has the numerical advantage in manpower and weapons, has been grinding forward on the battlefield for months, notching up its quickest advance for a year in November.

Ukraine says Russian drone hit Turkish cargo vessel in Black Sea
Reuters/13 December/2025
Ukraine’s navy accused Russia of deliberately attacking a civilian Turkish vessel carrying sunflower oil to Egypt with a drone on Saturday, a day after Moscow hit two Ukrainian ports. In a statement on Telegram, the navy said the vessel was called the Viva and had 11 Turkish citizens on board. It added that nobody was hurt and the vessel was continuing its journey to Egypt. “The strike was carried out in the open sea in Ukraine’s exclusive economic zone, outside the range of Ukrainian air defence systems,” the statement said, accusing Russia of breaching maritime laws.
The navy said it was in contact with the ship’s captain. On Friday, Russia attacked two Ukrainian ports, damaging three Turkish-owned vessels, according to Ukraine’s navy. A large fire broke out on one of those ships. The attacks come after Moscow threatened to “cut Ukraine off from the sea” after Kyiv’s attacks damaged three “shadow fleet” tankers heading to Russia to export its oil.

The Latest English LCCC analysis & editorials from miscellaneous sources published on December 13-14/2025
President Trump's Farsighted Policy on Venezuela, Iran's 'Second Home' in the Americas
Dr. Majid Rafizadeh/Gatestone Institute./December 13/2025
Venezuela functions both as a forward operating base and as an insurance policy for the regime, safeguarding its operatives and extending its reach.
Allowing Iran to entrench itself in the Western Hemisphere would only create a hostile foothold from which it could coordinate operations, support proxy groups, and control regional dynamics with near impunity.
President Donald J. Trump's policy on Venezuela is not only strategically sound but necessary to finally put a stop to Iran's explicit plans for the U.S.
The partnership between Iran and Venezuela is not symbolic — it is deeply functional, encompassing military cooperation, intelligence sharing, support for proxy groups, and opportunities for illicit trade, all of which bolster Iran's global reach while challenging U.S. interests. Pictured: Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro meets with Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on October 22, 2016, in Tehran. (Image source: khamenei.ir)
Iran has recently come out publicly, voicing strong support for Venezuela against the United States. Its statement reflects a deep strategic and military relationship that serves multiple interests for Tehran. The Iranian regime openly views its partnership with Venezuela as a rare foothold in the Western Hemisphere, a staging ground for influence, and a safe haven for key figures and networks. The relationship encompasses military cooperation, intelligence sharing, support for proxy groups, and opportunities for illicit trade, all of which bolster Iran's global reach while challenging U.S. interests.
Venezuela can, in effect, be viewed as a prized extension of Iranian power — a "second home" where Iran can operate relatively freely, project influence close to the United States, and maintain strategic depth far beyond its borders.
The Iranian regime's fondness for Venezuela is rooted in several ideological and strategic advantages. Militarily, Venezuela allows Iran to experiment with logistics, training and potentially the deployment of drone and missile capabilities in the Americas. Intelligence-sharing between the two countries, far from Iran's territory, facilitates coordination with allied groups such as Hezbollah and other proxies.
Politically, Venezuela serves as an additional approach into Israel's backyard. Just as Tehran openly backs Hamas and Hezbollah near Israel, it now enjoys a safe platform near the United States where it can extend asymmetric pressure. In addition, Venezuela's weakened state institutions, opaque financial systems, and corrupt governance make it fertile ground for illicit operations, including narcotics trafficking and criminal networks, which Iran can leverage to sustain its wider geopolitical ambitions. This combination of intelligence, military and financial utility makes Venezuela a critical hub for the regime's global strategy.The role of Venezuela as a sanctuary for Iranian elites only accentuates its strategic value. During moments of internal crisis in Iran, particularly during its so-called "12-day war" with Israel, reports surfaced that high-ranking Iranian officials were actively exploring safe havens abroad, with Venezuela emerging as a viable destination. The prospect of having Iranian operatives and mullahs so close to the United States should create justifiable concerns: it allows Tehran to maintain influence and operations from a location that is geographically advantageous, politically aligned, and relatively insulated from Western oversight. Venezuela functions both as a forward operating base and as an insurance policy for the regime, safeguarding its operatives and extending its reach.
The partnership between Iran and Venezuela is not symbolic — it is deeply functional, encompassing military, intelligence and criminal domains. Isaias Medina III, who served as legal adviser for Venezuela's Permanent Mission to the United Nations until he resigned in 2017 over Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's human rights abuses, recently told Fox News:
"Iran's partnership with the rogue Venezuelan narco-dictatorship is far from a principled stand for 'sovereign rights' under the U.N. Charter. It is a calculated strategy serving mutual interests in criminal enterprise and asymmetric warfare, posing a direct and evolving threat to U.S. national security.... This is a partnership for power, not principles. Iran's engagement centers on deepening military, criminal, and intelligence cooperation that blatantly disregards international norms."
From a U.S. strategic perspective, the partnership between Venezuela and Iran highlights the importance of applying consistent pressure on both regimes. The Trump administration's policy of applying maximum pressure on the Maduro regime addresses directly with the danger posed by Venezuela serving as a strategic base for Iranian operations. Allowing Iran to entrench itself in the Western Hemisphere would only create a hostile foothold from which it could coordinate operations, support proxy groups, and control regional dynamics with near impunity. Pressure on Venezuela is therefore inseparable from pressure on Iran. The two regimes contribute to one another's survival and reinforce each other's strategic objectives.
By continuing to hold Maduro's regime accountable and maintaining strong sanctions and diplomatic pressure, the United States is constructively addressing a threat that extends well beyond Venezuela and directly confronts Iran's ambitions in America's backyard. Venezuela represents a multifaceted asset for the Iranian regime: a sanctuary for its elites, a hub for intelligence and military cooperation, and a platform for illicit networks that undermine regional and global security. Iran's deepening engagement with Venezuela is designed to expand its reach, further its interests, and challenge U.S. influence.
President Donald J. Trump's policy on Venezuela is not only strategically sound but necessary to finally put a stop to Iran's explicit plans for the U.S.
https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/22111/trump-policy-venezuela-iran
**Dr. Majid Rafizadeh, is a political scientist, Harvard-educated analyst, and board member of Harvard International Review. He has authored several books on the US foreign policy. He can be reached at dr.rafizadeh@post.harvard.edu
**Follow Majid Rafizadeh on X (formerly Twitter)
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The Middle East is no longer collapsing. It is sorting
Yassin K. Fawaz/The Arab Weekly/December 13/2025
What the Middle East is experiencing now is something colder, quieter and more decisive: selection. For more than a decade, the Middle East has been described as a region in permanent collapse. Revolutions failed. States hollowed out. Wars multiplied. Institutions eroded. The vocabulary was familiar: fragility, transition, reform. Western diplomats spoke of road maps and benchmarks, while local elites promised one last rescue plan after another. But collapse is no longer the right word. What the Middle East is experiencing now is something colder, quieter and more decisive: selection. The region is not reforming itself. It is sorting, separating systems that can still function from those that cannot; elites that remain useful from those that have become liabilities; borders that still impose order from those that merely exist on paper. This is not a negotiated process. It is not driven by consensus or vision. It is imposed by exhaustion.
The era of collapse was noisy. The era of sorting is clinical. The idea that crisis produces reform has been a comforting illusion. In theory, economic collapse should force accountability; war should strengthen institutions; popular anger should generate new leadership. In practice, the opposite has occurred. Crisis has become a filtering mechanism. States are no longer judged by legitimacy, ideology, or even sovereignty. They are judged by usefulness, to their own populations, to regional power brokers and to external actors who no longer pretend to believe in transformation.
In this environment, three broad categories are emerging. First are hard states: countries with clear command structures, enforceable decisions and an ability to absorb shocks. Israel belongs here, regardless of how polarising its politics may be. Iran does as well, despite sanctions and economic pressure. These states may be embattled, but they remain coherent. Second are transactional states, primarily in the Gulf. Their power is not ideological nor military but managerial. They trade access, stability and capital for influence. They do not seek to reshape the region; they seek to insulate themselves from it. Their success lies precisely in their refusal to moralise. Third are hollow states: Lebanon, Iraq, Yemen, Libya, countries where institutions exist but authority does not. These systems have not collapsed entirely; they linger. But they no longer make decisions. They absorb pressure until something outside them decides their fate. The sorting process does not eliminate hollow states. It marginalises them. End of reform illusion The language of reform has not disappeared, but it has been downgraded. It now serves as diplomatic décor rather than policy ambition. International actors still speak of governance, transparency and capacity-building, but they no longer organise their strategies around them. Instead, the operative question has become simpler: can this system deliver outcomes at an acceptable cost? If the answer is no, the response is not rescue, it is containment. Lebanon offers the clearest illustration. For years, its collapse was framed as temporary dysfunction. Another IMF programme. Another political settlement. Another national dialogue. Today, no serious actor believes the system will be fixed. The question is not how to save the state, but how to prevent its paralysis from spreading instability outward. This shift is not unique to Lebanon. Iraq’s repeated crises have not produced institutional consolidation; they have produced power sorting among militias, parties and external patrons. Yemen’s war has not clarified sovereignty; it has clarified which actors can sustain themselves indefinitely at low cost.
The Middle East has learned to live without solutions.
One of the clearest signs that sorting is under way is the changing role of militias and non-state actors. For years, militias were portrayed as ascendant, flexible, ideological and embedded. They filled vacuums that states abandoned. That phase is ending. Not because militias have lost power, but because they have become expensive.Maintaining armed networks, parallel economies and permanent mobilisation requires resources, legitimacy and external tolerance. As patron states face fiscal and strategic constraints, militias are being forced to justify their cost. Some adapt by institutionalising themselves. Others calcify. A few will be quietly discarded. This does not mean disarmament. It means prioritisation. Iran’s regional posture increasingly reflects this logic. So does the Gulf’s disengagement from ideological battles. Even Israel’s military doctrine now emphasises limited, controlled force rather than open-ended confrontation. The region is not demilitarising. It is rationing disorder.
Nothing illustrates the sorting dynamic more starkly than the war in Gaza.
The scale of destruction was immense. The emotional shock was real. Yet the strategic . response across the Arab world was notably restrained. There were statements, summits and symbolic gestures, but no regional rupture. No escalation cascade. No fundamental realignment. The lesson was uncomfortable: the Palestinian cause no longer organises the region. This is not a moral judgement. It is a structural one. Arab states have recalibrated their priorities toward regime survival, economic insulation and controlled diplomacy. Public outrage is managed; strategic exposure is minimised. Gaza did not reorder the Middle East. It revealed who still mattered enough to shape outcomes, and who could be absorbed, however tragically, into the background noise of regional instability.
That, too, is sorting.
What emerges from this process is not peace, nor prosperity, nor justice. It is something less aspirational but more durable: ugly stability. Borders hold, but without coherence. Governments endure, but without legitimacy. Conflicts simmer at a controlled temperature. Authoritarianism no longer apologises for itself. Human rights language survives mostly as rhetorical residue. This stability is not imposed by hegemonic power. It is the by-product of fatigue. After a decade of uprisings, wars,and failed transitions, the region has discovered that endless crisis. is more dangerous than managed stagnation.
The Middle East is not becoming freer. It is becoming calmer, on harsher terms.
New Regional Logic
For outside powers, this shift requires intellectual adjustment. The old play book assumed linear progress: crisis leads to reform; reform leads to stability. That model no longer describes reality.Today’s Middle East rewards systems that can:
make decisions quickly,
enforce limits on escalation,
and remain useful to others.
It punishes those that confuse symbolism for power and legitimacy for leverage.
The region’s future will not be decided by grand bargains nor comprehensive peace plans. It will be shaped by incremental exclusion, by which actors are ignored, bypassed or quietly written off. Sorting is not dramatic. It does not announce itself. But it is relentless. Collapse implies an endpoint. Sorting does not. Some states will harden. Others will adapt transactionally. A few will remain suspended in institutional limbo, neither alive nor dead. Borders may shift at the margins, but the deeper change will be invisible: a redefinition of what counts as a functioning political system.
The Middle East’s next phase will not be negotiated. It will be endured.Reform was the language of the last era. Survival is the grammar of this one. And in the Middle East today, survival is no longer a right. It is a test
**Yassin K Fawaz is an American business executive, publisher and security and terrorism expert.

UNRWA is beyond repair, so it's time to move on - opinion
David Weinberg/Jerusalem Post/December 13/2025
Evidence mounts of UNRWA’s terror ties; the agency must be closed. It is the first step to rebuilding Palestinian society. We long have known that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East is a biased, inefficient, and radicalizing actor, and that it cannot be fixed simply by “better oversight.” It is time to finish off UNRWA now. UNRWA institutions in Gaza – schools, clinics, hospitals, and more – harbored Hamas killers and weapons, with Hamas terror attack tunnels built right underneath them. And dozens of UNRWA personnel were complicit or active participants in the October 7 assault on Israel. It turns out that more than 2,000 agency employees were also terrorists in either Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ). A fifth of UNRWA school administrators were Hamas terrorists, and 10% of the senior positions (school principals and their deputies, directors, and deputy directors of training centers) were also members of Hamas or PIJ. More than 200 agency staff were Hamas killers with unmistakable terrorist records, and hundreds more openly celebrated the October 7 rapes and murders. Beyond Gaza, UNRWA is rotten to its core. Its schools in Judea and Samaria, Jordan, Lebanon, and elsewhere validate the so-called Palestinian “right of return,” the “right” to demographically overwhelm Israel, thus perpetuating the Palestinian war against Israel instead of helping to solve the conflict.
Watchdog organizations have tirelessly documented the hate taught in UNRWA classrooms. Palestinian children learn that Jews are liars and fraudsters, and that Jews spread corruption, which will lead to their annihilation.
Lessons that incite violence
Terrorists are glorified as role models. Lessons that incite violence are taught across all grades and subjects, including in math and science classes. Inevitably, the systematic teaching of hatred and violence within the UNRWA school system results in Palestinian terror against Israel. And of course, the agency does nothing to resettle Palestinian refugees. In fact, the number of UNRWA-registered “refugees” continues to grow exponentially. The aid agency refuses to remove from its registry millions of people who hold foreign citizenship and residency, and who, by any other “refugee” concept, would no longer be considered refugees.In short, while UNRWA professes to be a humanitarian organization, its true goal is to perpetuate the hope that Palestinians will one day flood and destroy Israel. UNRWA is plainly an enormous obstacle to peace.
Despite this, last Friday, the UN renewed UNRWA’s mandate for another three years, on the mistaken assertion that the organization is an indispensable humanitarian tool. Fortunately, real changes on the ground in Gaza and in eastern Jerusalem are proving just how wrong this is and how things can be done so much better without the newly renewed agency.
In Gaza, UNRWA has been blessedly replaced by over a dozen other aid organizations. As Enia Krivine of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies has shown, relief organizations are delivering aid and services just fine without UNRWA’s radicalizing agenda.
The UN Development Program (UNDP) is managing waste management. Fuel distribution is managed by the UN Office for Project Services (UNOPS). The World Central Kitchen has been effective at delivering food alongside the World Food Program (WFP). The UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has taken a larger role in children-related humanitarian responses. The World Health Organization (WHO) is providing medical aid to field clinics and hospitals. UNRWA’s decades-long monopoly on aid and services – which came part and parcel with annihilationist messaging about Israel – has finally been broken. The Trump administration (through its Civil-Military Coordination Center in Kiryat Gat) gets partial credit for this. Now the administration is considering hitting UNRWA with terrorism-related sanctions, something that would appropriately cripple the organization. For its part, new Israeli laws that came into effect this year outlaw coordination with UNRWA, making it difficult for the agency (which had used Israel as its base of operations for decades) to continue delivering its services. Not surprisingly, UNRWA’s well-paid lobbyists and advocates warned that Israel’s move would have catastrophic consequences. It has not.
For example, UNRWA schools in Jerusalem have been closed down. A thousand or so eastern Jerusalemite Arab students have moved to other institutions, including schools that teach the Israeli curriculum. This is an exceptionally good thing. (Why the heck was UNRWA ever allowed to open schools in Jerusalem?!)Under the new laws, all UNRWA facilities in Jerusalem are also supposed to be shuttered, especially the agency’s vast, main compound in Maalot Dafna (Sheikh Jarrah). Israeli police finally raided the compound this week, seizing equipment and replacing the UN flag with an Israeli one – an act that was of course condemned by the UN secretary-general.
(The compound is scheduled to become a residential neighborhood with 1,400 apartments. Haredi/ultra-Orthodox community activists are already bickering over control of the project, which abuts other mostly haredi neighborhoods.)
Next is financial action against UNRWA. The Bank of Israel is supposed to force Israeli banks to close its accounts, and the Labor and Social Welfare Ministry is supposed to stop processing benefit payments to its employees. The Finance Ministry has already cancelled the agency’s substantial tax exemptions on imported cars, fuel, and equipment. But UNRWA still owes Jerusalem years of unpaid property taxes, worth millions of shekels. Slowly, slowly (too slowly), the ministries of Defense and Foreign Affairs are stopping the issuance of work/residence permits to UNRWA employees, too. Moving from axing UNRWA to a constructive post-Gaza-war framework, the “international community” must focus on rebuilding Palestinian society – free from rank corruption, destructive indoctrination, coddling of terrorism, and the overall moral rot that for too long has contaminated international politics relating to Palestinians.
First and foremost, this means elimination of refugee status for all Palestinians living in Gaza, Judea, and Samaria. “Refugee camps” must be transformed into regular neighborhoods or towns, and their residents redefined as, well, local residents – not refugees. Second is that meaningful curriculum overhauls should be undertaken in Palestinian educational institutions from kindergarten through university, eliminating antisemitic and anti-Israel materials, and the adoption of population-wide deradicalization initiatives.
Third is that action toward total demilitarization of Palestinian areas should be taken (excepting lightly armed police forces), as envisioned and promised in the Oslo Accords 30 years ago – but never pursued seriously.
Alas, Israel has little confidence in the ability of anybody to swiftly rebuild Palestinian society or “reform” Palestinian government, unless the Palestinians themselves wish to do so. Throwing more aid money at the Palestinians certainly won’t help, just as it has not done the trick over the past thirty years since the Oslo Accords were signed.
Despite tens of billions of dollars and euros invested in the Palestinian Authority by the “international community,” there is no democracy, no rule of law, no transparency, no sustainability, no investment in economic stability, and no peace education in the PA. Not a single refugee has been resettled. Not one hospital has been built in the West Bank: only one sewage treatment plant.
But there is plenty of nepotism and corruption, “pay-for-slay” handouts (meaning the incentivizing and rewarding of terrorism against Israel), violent propagandizing against Israel (including support for Hamas’s October 7 invasion and massacres), and diplomatic assault on Israel in every possible international forum.
As for Western “security assistance” to the PA, this has produced mixed results, at best. The authority does not effectively control key terrorist nodes in the West Bank, and its security personnel have repeatedly participated in or facilitated terror attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers. PA security personnel account for 12% of all Palestinian terrorists held by Israel. In short, the overall return on Western investment in Palestinian maturity and independence is abysmal. Real reform of Palestinian government and society is going to be a long, arduous process and must involve penalty and penance, not just reward and recognition. Which is why it is asinine of France, Britain, Canada, and others to resurrect illusions of imminent Palestinian statehood. Regrettably, their gambit is a recipe for devastating disappointment and protracted conflict.
The writer is managing senior fellow at the Jerusalem-based Misgav Institute for National Security & Zionist Strategy. The views expressed here are his own. His diplomatic, defense, political, and Jewish world columns over the past 30 years are at davidmweinberg.com.

Israel’s healing begins with Tamar-like leadership - opinion
Zehavit Gross/Jerusalem Post/December 13/2025
https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-880031
As Israel seeks healing after October 7, Tamar’s fearless leadership shows how truth and accountability can heal the nation's wounds.
In the biblical landscape, few figures are as misunderstood – and as urgently needed in our time – as Tamar. She is neither submissive nor ornamental, neither passive nor convenient. Tamar is a woman who refuses to accept the collapse of justice as an inevitable fate. She is a bold, creative, morally unyielding disruptor who challenges the sacred truths of her social order – not out of rebellion for its own sake, but out of a fierce commitment to repair a world gone wrong. Tamar steps into the story at a moment of deep moral breakdown. Judah, destined for leadership, is spiraling. The biblical text emphasizes his descent twice – “vayered Yehuda”, “Judah descended” – signaling an ethical and spiritual deterioration.
When he turns aside to a woman he thinks is a prostitute, the Torah adds another verb of deviation – “vayet,” “he veered off course.” Judah is lost. Someone needs to restore him. And that “someone” is Tamar.
Tamar studies the system around her – the hierarchical, patriarchal mechanism capable of swallowing her whole – and asks a radical question: How does a system break, and what will it take to fix it? She stages a scenario that exposes the hypocrisy of the very structure designed to bury her. She forces Judah, the future leader, to confront himself not through punishment but through revelation.
Her confrontation produces the most stunning moral statement in Genesis: “tzadkah mimeni” – “she is more righteous than I.”
It is the moment Judah becomes worthy of leadership. It is the beginning of his transformation from the man who sold Joseph into slavery to the man who stands before Joseph years later – no longer self-serving, but fully accountable, ready to sacrifice himself to save Benjamin.
The path to Vayigash, to moral courage, begins with Tamar.
A model of leadership: Creativity, precision, and accountability
Tamar’s leadership is defined by:
1. Courageous nonconformity:
She does not accept inherited norms when they betray justice. She refuses to be erased.
2. Creative, out-of-the-box problem solving:
She designs a meticulous plan: incontrovertible evidence, clear foresight, ethical purpose.
3. Commitment to relationship:
According to Carol Gilligan and Nancy Chodorow, women build identity through connection. Tamar insists on relational responsibility – even when Judah seeks separation. Her insistence on connection creates repair.
4. Moral agency born from despair:
Her despair does not paralyze; it catalyzes. She transforms hopelessness into a new frequency of action, turning chaos into meaning.
From her courage come twins – Peretz and Zerah – the ancestors of King David. Without Tamar’s moral disruption, the line of Israel’s monarchy would not exist. Tamar is not merely part of the story of redemption; she initiates it.
What Tamar teaches Israel after October 7
In the aftermath of October 7, Israel faces a profound rupture – moral, political, social, and psychological. We are a society struggling with shattered trust, wounded leadership, and a deep need for repair.
Tamar offers us a national metaphor.
1. We need leaders who will dare to break the script:
Leaders who are not paralyzed by “what will people say,” who refuse to serve power, who do not bend to the comfort of the familiar.
2. We need women’s moral leadership at the center:
Tamar represents a leadership of courage, creativity, and ethical clarity – precisely the qualities missing from many corridors of power today.
Just as Judah could not return to his path without Tamar’s intervention, so too our national restoration may require women who can force a moment of collective “tzadkah mimeni.”
A moment of recognition.
A moment of accountability.
A moment of truth.
Without recognition, there can be no healing.
3. We must move from denial to moral admission:
Judah is transformed only when he names the truth – when he sees the evidence Tamar presents and admits, “I was wrong.”Israeli society, wounded and fractured, cannot begin its journey toward a healthier, more just future without such a reckoning.
Accountability is not weakness; it is the gateway to strength. Only through recognition of failures, blind spots, and moral ruptures can we rebuild a society worthy of the values it claims to cherish.
4. From hopelessness to agency:
Like Tamar, we must resist paralysis.
Despair is not the end of the story – it can be the catalyst for creating a new one.
Call for Tamar-like leadership
Tamar’s story is not a marginal biblical episode; it is a blueprint for national recovery.
Israel today needs leadership that is: courageous rather than compliant, creative rather than rigid, accountable rather than defensive, relational rather than alienating, driven by truth rather than by image. We need leaders – especially women leaders – who, like Tamar, are willing to confront the darkest corners of our social reality and call us back to moral clarity. Only then can we move toward the metaphorical “Kingdom of David”: a healthier, more ethical, more repaired Israel. Tamar reminds us that redemption begins when someone dares to say: This path is broken – and I will not rest until it is healed.
**The writer is head of the Sal Van Gelder Center for Holocaust Instruction & Research, Faculty of Education, at Bar-Ilan University.

Selected Face Book & X tweets for /December 13, 2025
Dr.Habib Zoghbi
It is with immense sorrow that I learned this morning the passing away of Member of Parliament and surgeon Dr Ghassan Skaf . Lebanon has lost a truly patriotic figure who genuinely gave to his country without asking anything in return . He served as an example of ethical conduct professionalism and altruism , a real statesman who defended with vigor sovereignty and independence. My deepest condolences to his wife Attorney Mayssa and his family.