Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defence Minister Israel Katz conducted a field visit to southern Lebanon on Tuesday and declared that Israeli forces would remain until Hezbollah is disarmed, directly contradicting the spirit of a framework agreement that had been expected to initiate a phased handover. The visit, reported by Israeli Channel 15, took place inside a unilaterally imposed security zone that Lebanese media calculate covers approximately 620 square kilometres, or 6 percent of Lebanese territory. Netanyahu instructed soldiers to “move immediately and act” upon detecting any threat, and stated that the military would not withdraw as long as Hezbollah remains armed and present.

According to Netanyahu’s public remarks during the tour, the Israeli campaign has reduced Hezbollah’s pre-war arsenal of some 150,000 rockets and missiles to roughly 8 percent of its former capacity. He described the Lebanese group as “the most important link in Iran’s axis” and claimed that the Israeli army had struck inside Iran itself to eliminate an existential threat. Israeli officials frame the continued presence in southern Lebanon as a necessary buffer to prevent a re-emergence of cross-border attacks and to allow residents of northern Israel to return, while expressing a conditional willingness to see two sovereign states make peace once Hezbollah departs.

Viewed from Beirut, the Israeli position amounts to an occupation that violates international law, a characterisation shared by both the Lebanese government and Hezbollah. The framework agreement, reached after five rounds of direct talks, is a pilot effort under which Lebanese soldiers would assume control of two areas currently held by Israel. However, the text does not specify when or under what conditions Israel would withdraw from the wider territory it occupies. Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri has stated that he and many representatives will not permit the agreement to be approved, signalling deep domestic resistance to a deal that offers no clear path to full Israeli withdrawal.

In Tehran, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf announced the formation of a committee to oversee the end of the war in Lebanon, a move that Iranian state media link to efforts to include Lebanon in Iran’s broader negotiations with the United States. The announcement suggests that Iran is seeking to manage the diplomatic fallout and preserve its influence over the file, even as Israeli officials claim to have dismantled the military infrastructure of Tehran’s most important regional proxy.

The framework agreement remains a limited pilot with no fixed timeline for a comprehensive Israeli pullout. The Lebanese parliament has yet to schedule a vote, and the declared opposition from its speaker indicates a difficult ratification process. Meanwhile, Israeli forces remain deployed with standing orders to engage any perceived threat immediately, leaving the security situation in the south frozen between an incomplete diplomatic track and an open-ended military presence.