All Policy Analysis by David Schenker

Recent Lebanese media engagement with Israelis is a welcome sign, but U.S. mediators should let this organic trend gain momentum for the time being rather than pressuring Beirut to make immediate legislative changes.

The potential upsides of implementing the Trump administration’s poorly conceived idea are negligible at best, while the downsides would be legion, including further damage to Middle East stability and American interests.

U.S. and Israeli experts discuss the potential obstacles to progress in upcoming rounds of negotiations, and explain why keeping the Lebanon track separate from the Iran talks would be wise.

Tehran seems just as enthusiastic about the new prime minister as Washington—a telling sign that the militia-dominated status quo in Baghdad will be difficult and slow to change, if it changes at all.

Cairo’s economic mismanagement has increased the country’s reliance on Gulf largesse, but that spigot may soon run dry for diplomatic and financial reasons.

Given Hezbollah coup threats, Beirut may seek to proceed incrementally toward establishing a state monopoly on weapons, but Washington and Israel will expect quicker results this time.

The economic, political, and diplomatic fallout of the Iran crisis is bending the kingdom in multiple directions, but Washington can do much to ease the domestic stress, avoid bilateral friction, and address Amman’s growing rift with Israel.

Although U.S. officials should keep pushing Baghdad to move against these groups, the Iran war has demonstrated the need to seek other avenues of pressure and recalibrate the bilateral relationship.

Through their continued unwillingness to take on the militia and break Iran’s hold over Lebanon, Beirut and the LAF have effectively chosen the more calamitous path of war with Israel.

For the first time, the region is on the path to sidelining militias and reaping the potential stabilization benefits, though significant obstacles remain.

The international community has held nearly a dozen donor conferences to support Lebanon’s insolvent military and economy, but they all failed, largely because the country has not made the hard decisions necessary to help itself.

Without electoral law modifications, sanctions against pro-Hezbollah elites, prosecutions for long-delayed cases like the port explosion, and other urgent measures, the group and its allies could wind up regaining their grip in Lebanon during the next round of nationwide voting.

Israel may believe the tense status quo is sustainable, but Washington is frustrated about the potential implications for Arab normalization, Turkish military friction, and near-term economic plans.

Israel’s approval of the delayed export agreement is a welcome development, but U.S. officials should view it as the start, not the end, of efforts to ease tensions between two key peace partners.

Although Washington should keep pressing the Lebanese government to seize weapons and prosecute political assassins, the chances of Beirut actually confronting the militia appear increasingly slim.

Sudani did very well at the ballot box, but the peculiarities of Iraq’s long government formation process and the final distribution of parliamentary seats may leave the main Iran-backed coalition in the driver’s seat.

There will be no peace, sovereignty, or reconstruction for postwar Lebanon until more of the group’s weapons are confiscated, but Beirut appears increasingly unwilling to tackle that task outside the southern frontier zone.

Amman and Jerusalem need to worry about maintaining peace, not new arrangements in the West Bank.

Although regional peace agreements have survived the Gaza war and other recent crises, the increasingly explicit red lines being laid down by Arab capitals need to be taken seriously in Jerusalem and Washington.

The Gulf might be “the New Middle East,” but Washington should not forget that problems in “the Old Middle East” still set much of the regional agenda, raising the need for more consistent American engagement.