
An image released by the Israeli army on Jan. 16, 2025, shows soldiers from the 11th Brigade operating in south Lebanon. (Credit: AFP)
"The Israelis came back last night and started firing randomly. The flames devoured houses, smoke rose from neighboring villages. They are still there," Yahia Jaber, head of the Bani Hayyan municipality (Marjayoun), told L’Orient-Le Jour on Friday, two days before the 60-day cease-fire between Hezbollah and Israel, agreed on Nov. 27 after more than 13 months of war, was set to expire.
Although the cease-fire agreement, negotiated notably under U.S. and French auspices, called for the "gradual" withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon (Article 12), they remain present in the Marjeyoun district, maneuvering there since mid-December and multiplying military operations over the past two weeks. They are also still deployed in the main villages of the Bint Jbeil district and have only withdrawn from the districts of Sour and Hasbaya, remaining along more than half of the Blue Line.
On Friday, citing a delay in the deployment of the Lebanese army in southern Lebanon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said that "since the cease-fire agreement has not been fully implemented by Lebanon, the phased withdrawal process will continue in agreement with the United States." But what exactly did the Israeli army do during these two months of ceasefire and under what pretext?
'Israel dictated the terms of the agreement'
Almost daily, the Israeli army conducted various maneuvers in the exclusion zone about 10 kilometers wide since the day after the cease-fire. Operations that its Arabic-language spokesperson Avichay Adraee regularly described on his X account: Demolishing infrastructure, houses, places of worship, or playgrounds; temporary abductions of Lebanese (often farmers and shepherds from the Hasbaya district); incessant drone flyovers; sabotage of water infrastructure (notably the "Canal 800 Project," aimed at supplying southern Lebanon with drinking water and irrigation water) or solar; destruction of roads; and assassinations of nearly forty people, according to our count.
"The cease-fire agreement is the result of the balance of forces dictated by the field, resulting in a victory for the Israeli enemy over Hezbollah," said retired General Khaled Hamadeh. "Israel dictated the terms of the agreement, reserving the right to freedom of movement and action, in the name of 'legitimate defense' against any potential danger to its territory, which the Lebanese state could not address itself according to its perspective."
Israel repeatedly justified its actions during this period as necessary to dismantle Hezbollah's infrastructure at its border to defend the northern border of its territory, which was the initial stated objective of its ground operation in southern Lebanon, which began on Sept. 30.
However, according to the agreement, "Hezbollah and other armed groups present on Lebanese territory" are asked to cease "conducting operations against Israel." At the same time, it stipulates that "Israel will not conduct any offensive military operations against Lebanese targets, whether civilian or military."
Hezbollah conducted only one military operation in two months: On January 2, when the party mortared the site of Ruweissat al-Alam in the hills of Kfar Shouba – an uninhabited and contested area between Lebanon, Syria, and Israel – claiming an "initial defensive response as a warning against repeated violations." During these two months, four Israeli soldiers died in "two operational accidents" on Dec. 11 and 13, due to explosives left by another contingent.
Hundreds of buildings destroyed or damaged
During the first month of the cease-fire, the Israeli army reached more than 31 new areas and reportedly carried out at least 88 explosions, according to data from the National Council for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Lebanon published by The Washington Post. Additionally, according to the analysis of satellite images by the American daily, the Israeli army damaged or destroyed more than 800 buildings between Dec. 5 and January 6, or 26 buildings per day.
It continued its demolition campaigns throughout January, mainly in the Marjayoun district, facing the main villages of northern Israel, Kyriat Shmona, and Metulla. Military expert Riad Kahwagi speaks of a logical continuation of what he sees as close to a "Hezbollah surrender agreement" as it gave "the exclusive right to Israel to intervene militarily" in Lebanon for two months, noting that "Israel greatly benefited from the cease-fire."

The Israeli army notably took advantage of the cease-fire to carry out unprecedented movements, according to L'Orient-Le Jour's correspondent in the south: It entered for the first time into certain neighborhoods of Aitaroun on Nov. 30; in the town of Bint Jbeil repeatedly from Maroun al-Ras; and operated from Dec. 20 constant comings and goings between Markaba and Qantara (located in the strategic valley of Wadi Slouqi, about 7 km from the Blue Line), passing through Bani Hayyan and Tallousseh, from which it removed welcome signs on Jan. 20.
Above all, it was able to enter without being troubled into the heart of the towns of Naqoura (Sour) and Khiam (Marjayoun), the subject of violent clashes during the war. The Israeli army entered Naqoura, located less than 4 km from the Blue Line, by clearing the dense forest that separated it from the village, without having to go through the hill of Bayada, which overlooks the locality to the north, as it intended to do during the war according to military experts. On Dec. 18, Naqoura municipal council president Abbas Awada accused the Israeli army of having destroyed more than 35% percent of the village "since the cease-fire went into force." On Jan. 7, after the Israeli army's withdrawal from his village, he claimed to have found Naqoura "almost completely destroyed," in remarks reported by the state-run National Information Agency (NNA).
The most populous village of the Marjayoun district, a symbol of conflicts with Israel, Khiam endured various operations of "infrastructure and building" destruction while the Israeli army operated there from Nov. 28 to Dec. 11.
The timid role of the monitoring committee
The international monitoring committee, responsible for supervising the implementation and monitoring of the cease-fire, met officially three times in Naqoura during those 60 days. Composed of representatives from the United States, France, the Lebanese army, the Israeli army and the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), this committee directed by American Major General Jasper Jeffers never officially spoke out on the hundreds of violations of the agreement committed by the Israeli army, according to a count by the Lebanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which filed a complaint with the U.N. Security Council on Dec. 24.
According to a Western diplomatic source familiar with the issue, "there are many technical criteria for determining what constitutes a violation, making it complicated to provide a number to the public."
According to them, the committee played its role of "channeling tensions and violations": "Despite a two to three-week delay in forming the committee, we could see the concrete effects of the committee in the withdrawal of the Israeli army and the redeployment of the Lebanese army in the towns of Khiam and Naqoura."

However, the Israeli army still holds most of the positions it maneuvered in during these two months. It remains present just south of Khiam, on the hill of Hamames, where it continues to operate, firing medium machine gun bursts towards the neighboring villages of Sarda and Amra until as recently as Jan. 24.
Although it has withdrawn from Naqoura and the villages of the western sector of the border, repositioning itself in Aita al-Shaab, it currently maintains most of its positions in the neighboring Bint Jbeil district, notably in the city of Bint Jbeil and the village of Aitaroun, within which the Lebanese army was nonetheless ready to establish itself as of Jan. 11, according to a Lebanese Army statement published on X that day.
This article was originally published in French in L'Orient-Le Jour.