Israel-Lebanon maritime agreement and its wider implications

Ensuring Socio-economic Justice

Crescent International

Rabi' al-Awwal 23, 1444 2022-10-19

Daily News Analysis

by Crescent International

As news of the maritime border agreement between Lebanon and the zionist occupying regime in Palestine was announced, several media outlets and policy analysts started to offer differing perspectives.

On the official Lebanese side, it was primarily considered as economic progress since Lebanon will now have access to potential energy resources.

The hope is it will be able to generate much needed income for its economy.

On the US side the agreement was projected as success of Washington’s diplomacy and ability to be a political intermediary.

The deeply-divided Israeli ruling caste gave their own divergent evaluations based on their political interests.

One zionist spectrum presented it as an economic step forward and as a successful step in avoiding regional escalation.

The other spectrum presented the agreement as a political retreat in the face of Hizbullah’s declared political red lines.

There is some truth in all these versions except the US spin.

Washington had little choice but to work out an agreement acceptable to all sides.

Hizbullah had made it absolutely clear that if Lebanon’s sovereignty and economic interests were not taken into consideration, it will create a security challenge for apartheid Israel.

The ongoing war in Ukraine appears to have forced America’s hand.

If war between Lebanon and Israel does break out, many experts agree that it will not be on a limited scale.

Washington would find it difficult to simultaneously handle two major conflicts in highly sensitive geopolitical locations.

The US would not be able to supply massive amounts of weapons to Israel and Ukraine at the same time.

It has already exhausted its stocks by supplying Ukraine and is now forced to draw down on weapons system in current use by the US military.

Thus, the White House cowboys went for an option that would cause the least headaches.

Since 2014, Hizbullah has made it very clear that if Israel attacks Lebanese territory, the Islamic resistance would take the war inside occupied Palestine.

This is a possibility which even zionist military officials do not doubt.

The latest maritime agreement is likely to be viewed in the broader context by Islamic Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Russia, Yemen and the Palestinian people.

It signals that Washington wants to avoid escalation in the region where it has spent decades destabilizing and imposing its illegitimate demands on others.

Thus, as the war in Ukraine drags on, other theatres of conflict in West Asia might see greater pushback against the US-imposed regional order.

Washington is getting exhausted by the proxy war in Ukraine and there is no reason to believe that others will not use this to assert their own rights and interests.

It cannot be ruled out that as NATO regimes continue to undermine Russia, Moscow will at some point activate its geopolitical leverages against the US in West Asia.

To what extent this will take place is yet to be seen.

What is clear is that Hizbullah has once again shown that only it has the capability to deter zionist Israel, both at the political and military levels.

After years of destabilizing Lebanon, it has become clear that the political, military, and economic capabilities of the resistance not only remain intact but have enhanced.

Thus, Israel’s biggest regional headache is here to stay and there is nothing it can do about it.

The latest maritime agreement is another indication that the only deterrence against multifaceted zionist aggression is indigenous regional resistance.