President Joseph Aoun receiving Admiral Edward Ahlgren in Baabda on March 24, 2026. (Credit: Photo released by the Lebanese Presidency on X)
BEIRUT — President Joseph Aoun said Tuesday the renewed Israel-Hezbollah war since March 2 "could have been avoided if Israel had responded to calls to withdraw from the territories it occupies and respected the 2024 truce agreement."
The head of state expressed this position during a meeting with Admiral Edward Ahlgren, the United Kingdom's strategic defense adviser for the Middle East and North Africa.
This statement also marks a shift in tone from his previous interventions, in which he accused the Shiite militia of having drawn the country into the war.
Aoun nevertheless assured that "there will be no going back on the government’s decisions concerning the monopoly on arms and the decision for war or peace, as they are consistent with the Constitution, the Taif Agreement [which ended the 1975–1990 civil war], my inaugural address as president and the ministerial statement" from Nawaf Salam’s Cabinet.
"Lebanon cannot wage the wars of others on its territory, and this was recalled by Cabinet a few weeks ago," the president further insisted.
These statements indirectly respond to threats made Monday by former Hezbollah security chief Wafic Safa against the Lebanese government, in which he declared Hezbollah "will force it, after the war and no matter the means, to reverse its decision" banning the party's military activities.
Aoun also condemned Israel’s bombing of bridges crossing the Litani, considering that it "seeks to isolate villages and towns south of the Litani from the rest of the Lebanese regions, with all the negative consequences that this act entails."
Earlier in the day, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz confirmed that Israel planned to seize an area in southern Lebanon, stretching from the border to the Litani river, about 30 kilometers further north, for its own security. Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Monday that Israel "should move its border with Lebanon up to the Litani river."
As soon as the war resumed, following the one triggered by Israel and the United States against Iran, the government held a meeting to declare Hezbollah’s military and security activities illegal and reaffirm its disarmament order against the group.
Over 1,000 people have been killed in Lebanon since March 2, including many children, while over a million people have been forced to flee southern Lebanon, the Bekaa and the southern suburbs of Beirut, which are bombed by the Israeli state almost daily.
