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Hello, I'm Katya Adler from the BBC World Service. This is The Global Story. A ceasefire brokered this week between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon appears to be holding so far. Over the next 60 days, the Lebanese army and state security forces will deploy and take control of their own territory once again. Israel will gradually withdraw its remaining forces.
But how fragile is it? More than a million Lebanese and tens of thousands of Israelis were displaced because of the violence. Will either side ever feel safe? What does this all mean for Gaza and Iran? How will it respond now that its network of proxy groups in the Middle East, which include Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza, appear to be falling apart?
Questions, questions, questions for our international editor, Jeremy Bowen. Hi, Jeremy. Hello, Ms Adler. Good morning. This ceasefire between Hezbollah and Israel came suddenly this week. But isn't it true that, on paper at least, it's been knocking around for quite a while? Yeah, I mean, the guts of it are basically a...
a retread of Resolution 1701, which ended the 2006 war in Lebanon, which was the previous big one between Israel and Hezbollah. Now, very different circumstances right now, but there was a version of this actually knocking around at the UN General Assembly, which was at the end of September. And at that particular time, I was speaking to some
very senior Western diplomats who were in New York, who were in the meetings, in the room, and they were absolutely convinced that a ceasefire was about to happen. They believed that they had the assent of all parties. And then Prime Minister Netanyahu strode up to the podium in the General Assembly.
gave a very fiery speech which made it absolutely clear that he was not going to go for any kind of a ceasefire. As long as Hezbollah chooses the path of war, Israel has no choice and Israel has every right to remove this threat and return our citizens to their homes safely. And that's exactly what we're doing. And then he doubled down in a big way by going back to his hotel, authorizing then the assassination
of the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, and his high command who were meeting in a bunker in Beirut, which the Israelis blew up. That was quite shocking, I think, wasn't it, for the international community? So what...
pushed the ceasefire through now? Does it have anything to do with the last weeks of Joe Biden in the White House? Because we've seen him sort of really push on behalf of Ukraine, for example, the other wall that is burning and occupying Western diplomats' minds. There have been reports that the Biden administration was putting a lot of pressure on the Israelis when it came to
to Lebanon. But I think that Netanyahu over the last more than a year, and actually historically before that too, has no problem whatsoever in not doing as Joe Biden asks. He has actually humiliated him repeatedly in the last 12 or 14 months in terms of listening to what he says and then doing the opposite.
So it may have been pressure from the US administration. I think more than that, though, it's because Netanyahu needs to concentrate on the war in Gaza and a wider war.
with the Iranians. There was an important thing in Netanyahu's speech about this, the recording he did when he was talking about the timing. Why should we have a ceasefire now? For three main reasons. The first reason is to focus on the Iranian threat. The second reason is to give our forces a breather and replenish stocks. And the third reason for having a ceasefire is to separate the fronts and isolate Hamas.
He said the war in Gaza goes on. We have to win that war, get the hostages back. Though, of course, when a lot of hostage families in Israel hear that, they are absolutely infuriated because they believe that Netanyahu has no interest whatsoever in getting the hostages back because he has, you know, quite consistently worked to make sure that there isn't a ceasefire in Gaza.
We're now demonstrating because we've seen that a ceasefire is possible. There was a ceasefire in the north. It's time for a ceasefire in the south. 101 hostages are waiting for 418 days for Netanyahu to make the right decision. Katya, I think the thing about Lebanon is that for the Israelis, it's a simpler set of constraints and essentially fairly simple military objectives from the perspective of
of the Israel Defense Forces, the Israeli military. They wanted to push Hezbollah back from the border. They wanted to cause it some real serious damage. They've done all of those sorts of things.
What they weren't trying to do is absolutely destroy it, which is what Netanyahu, of course, has said consistently. He wants to do with Hamas. So this is not a peace deal in Lebanon. It's not a full-on Israeli victory. They've caused Hezbollah some real damage, but it's a fragile environment. The deal itself has a lot of moving parts and there is zero trust there.
on either side. So will it last longer than the 60 days that it's meant to take effect in? Will it even keep going through that period without outbursts of killing? Well, we'll have to see. Whether or not this ceasefire holds, a lot of this rests on the shoulders of the Lebanese armed forces.
And one of the many astonishing things about Lebanon, of course, is that Hezbollah forces armed by Iran were always much more powerful than the country's national armed forces. So if you were a betting man, what would you say about the chances of being able to keep the peace now? Well, I'm not a betting man, so I don't want to make unwise wagers.
But what I would say is that it's not really just down to them. It's down to what Hezbollah decides to do, what Iran decides to do. It's about the wider political picture inside Lebanon itself. The Lebanese armed forces, you know, a lot of the guys in the army have to have second jobs.
Because with the collapse of the economy, the hyperinflation that they've had, their salaries are worth very little. But the army as an institution is really important in Lebanon. It bridges the different religious communal groups there. And it's one national institution that actually has some respect from the rest of the population. They put a lot of faith into it, but it's not well armed.
In fact, over the years, I remember years ago, I think maybe even the 90s, there was talk of trying to beef up the Lebanese armed forces. And I think I remember the Israelis at the time objecting to it because they're saying, no, we don't want them to have more sophisticated weapons because Israel has always wanted to have freedom of movement as much as it can and access inside Lebanon, certainly in terms of things like overflights and raids if they need to do it. And one aspect of
of the ceasefire deal is that they have a side letter from the Americans essentially saying that if you see Hezbollah up to no good, then you can go wading in. And if it's an urgent thing, you don't even have to ask us, just do it. So Netanyahu is brandishing this and saying, look, we have freedom of action to go back to war instantly if we want to do that.
How does Hezbollah stand in public opinion between those who say, you decided on all of our behalf to go into this with Israel, to start firing more rockets at Israel, basically allowing Israel to come and invade? 3,000 people have died, including women and children. We don't know how many of those are civilians. More than a million people displaced from their homes. How much resentment is there now towards Hezbollah and how much
sympathy and support because of Israel's actions. I think there's a lot of resentment and exasperation in those communities which are outside their core support base, which is the Shia community and also people in that I've spoken to who are well aware that this is a massive self-inflicted wound.
The day after the Hamas attacks last year, Dasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, decided that he would start essentially a war of attrition with Israel. And so for the best part of a year, they were doing exchanges of fire pretty much on a daily basis across the border.
It was a huge miscalculation by Nasrallah because I think he felt that the old rules of deterrence still held. And I don't think he realized that after 7th of October, there had been a sea change in Israel in terms of what they were prepared to do. And also a sea change in the White House in terms of what they were prepared to allow Israel to do internally.
You know, in the past, when there have been wars in Gaza, but also wars between Israel and Hezbollah, then the Americans, after a certain point, say, right, that's enough. That just does not happen anymore. Also watching all of this closely is Iran. Hezbollah was always seen by Tehran as a buffer in the Middle East.
Iran armed Hezbollah. So now the group has been decimated. How likely is Iran to be trying to rearm them or worrying about whether that's a risk? And then if they don't rearm them, how exposed is Iran feeling? Iran's strategy really in the last 20 odd years has been to build this so-called axis of resistance, which is a system of forward defense where they have allies who
will fight for their interests, allow them to project power while keeping one step away from it themselves. And I think that what the last few months has demonstrated is that that model doesn't work. It was a model of deterrence and it seemed to work for quite a long time because the Israelis were genuinely worried that
that those powerful weapons, very accurate missiles and so on, that Hezbollah particularly had been given by the Iranians, were something that could cause mass casualties inside Israel, a huge amount of damage. So that deterrence held. There was mutual deterrence on that very heavily armed border between Israel and Lebanon. But Iran's deterrence now is in tatters. The debate about...
what Iran does next, there are two extremes. They are what's technically referred to as a threshold nuclear state. They know how to enrich uranium. The calculation is that within a matter of days or weeks, they could actually make a nuclear device. And that, of course, is the ultimate deterrent. But there's the other part of the argument, which is that the Iranians have been putting out signals that they are prepared to talk about things like the nuclear issue.
And, you know, this is now a matter of debate and speculation. But back in 1972, Richard Nixon, then the president of the United States, who was renowned as a massive Cold War hawk, did this sensational visit to Chairman Mao's China.
There's an opera that was written about it. It was such a sort of massive event. And so some people think, well, if Trump in his second term wants a huge event, then maybe a surprise overture to Iran might be the way of getting that. But of course, there's the other extreme on that, which is that
If Iran does decide to try and rush towards getting a nuclear weapon, well, that's something which, you know, could even lead to a much wider war in the region with the Americans very much involved. So, you know, this is a time of it's a bit of a crossroads, but it's also a really dangerous and fragile moment.
So we've looked at the ceasefire in Lebanon. Now I'd like to have a look at what the knock-on effect might be in Gaza and how the conflict and hopes for peace are seen in the Arab world and beyond.
I'm Crassi Twig, and on the documentary we zoom in on the backstory of the Syrian militant group that led a coalition of rebels to take control of Aleppo. Once an offshoot of Al-Qaeda, HDS rebranded itself in its desire to be seen as a credible governing body. To listen to this episode of The Global Jigsaw, where we look at the world through the lens of its media, search for the documentary wherever you get your BBC podcasts.
This is The Global Story. We bring you one big international story in detail, five days a week. Follow or subscribe wherever you listen. With me today is the BBC's international editor, Jeremy Bowen.
What state is Hamas in right now? Netanyahu, Israel's prime minister, says we're now going to concentrate on Gaza. But what is there left to do? Well, as a military machine, Hamas, of course, is totally incapable now of doing what it did on the 7th of October last year when they had a highly organized and meticulously planned attack on Israel that resulted in those appalling scenes that...
scarred Israel and which the world saw as well. So they absolutely could not do that now. And that's why a lot of people say Israel needs to stop doing what it's doing because it's restored its security and its deterrence as far as that is concerned.
But what's going on now is that Hamas have morphed into a much more primitive fighting force, which is essentially there are people there who are conducting an insurgency against Israeli troops. And from time to time, they still kill Israeli soldiers who are operating in the sea of concrete and debris, where there used to be towns and refugee camps and cities in
inside Gaza, and they're popping out of holes or from behind piles of rubble and firing at the Israelis. A lot of them get killed, but sometimes they manage to kill Israelis. So frankly, they'll have no shortage of recruits in a place like that amongst a population that has suffered so much. So I mean, that can go on really indefinitely. From an Israeli perspective, how much of what happens next in Gaza depends less on Hamas and more on Israeli internal politics?
When you look at the war in Gaza and Israel's conduct of it, you can't just simply think of this as a military equation. You can't just think of it as an equation about securing their border against their enemies and a potential force that could, they fear, come in and try and do what happened last year. It's also about Israeli domestic politics because Prime Minister Netanyahu's governing coalition, it's always a coalition in Israel, that's the way their political system works,
depends on the votes and support of very hard right extremist individuals who have said that if he ends the war in a way that they don't like, in other words, that he doesn't keep on going and pushing very, very hard.
then they will bring down his government. And Netanyahu, as well as wanting to stay in power, he's also on trial on really serious charges of corruption, a trial which has been going on for a couple of years and which has been slowed down and virtually halted because of the war. Now, if he was no longer prime minister and if the war was over, then he'd be back in the dock full time facing charges which potentially could land him in jail. So for all sorts of reasons,
He wants to stay in power. So that domestic political angle is really, as I'd say, much more important than the state of the war in a military sense. The civilians of Gaza continue to live under horrendous circumstances. The health ministry in Gaza, run by Hamas, obviously says more than 44,000 people have been killed. The United Nations keeps warning about famine. Israel says that...
restrictions on delivering humanitarian aid is that it can be stolen by the wrong people. Initially, they blamed Hamas, but there is a state of lawlessness inside Gaza now too, isn't there? Yeah, there is. The number two in the World Food Programme, who are one of the lead agencies who are trying to get food to people inside Gaza,
He said in the last, it's really the last three, four weeks that the lawlessness has increased exponentially in terms of organized gangs who are looting their convoys. But if you destroy a government and you don't put anything in its place, then lawlessness happens, particularly when people are in such a desperate situation.
The aid agencies there, the UN, their political side, many, many countries absolutely dismiss Israel's assertions that they're respecting international humanitarian law. In fact, they say that essentially, you name it, they've broken it.
According to the World Food Programme of the United Nations, there are now a million people living in makeshift tents, basically on the beach near Khan Yunus in this area called Mawasi. A million people. And not only do they not have enough to eat...
There are huge problems of sanitation, clean water. And again, the UN here have been saying that it is something almost short of miraculous that there hasn't been a serious epidemic and that it is only a matter of time before that happens. What is happening in Gaza is the most appalling humanitarian catastrophe. And from our point of view as journalists, what is super frustrating
is that Israel, by not letting us get into that place, is actually trying to keep this from the world as much as it can. And yet with social media, of course, the world can see and Palestinians say, you world are watching this happening and you are doing nothing about it. So even though Joe Biden is...
did speak quite strongly for a U.S. president's perspective, the U.S. being Israel's closest ally, warning about the humanitarian situation. He continued supplying those necessary arms for Israel, necessary for them to carry out their military operations. What about Donald Trump, Jeremy? I
But do you think he might take a stronger hand towards Israel when it comes to Gaza? You absolutely don't know with Donald Trump. Everyone I ask says, look, we just don't know because we don't know which way he's going to go. But there are some clues.
First of all, just a brief word about Joe Biden. Biden started off by saying some sensible things to the Israelis, actually, after the Hamas attacks, saying you have an absolute right to defend yourself, which they do under international law, but do it the right way. Do not, he said, be blinded by rage. I caution this while you feel that rage, don't be consumed by it. After 9-11, we were in rage in the United States.
While we sought justice and got justice, we also made mistakes. And that's exactly what Israel has done. It's been blinded by rage.
Netanyahu said that there would be, I'm paraphrasing, a huge revenge, great vengeance would be taken. And that is still, I think, a prime motivator. So Joe Biden's words of warning to Israel and his hand wringing about the humanitarian situation, I think, was rendered entirely hollow by the way that they continued to
to supply Israel with the weapons it was using to destroy Gaza and kill civilians. Even when the Americans were saying, please don't use our weapons to do that. They were then saying, would you like some more weapons? And here they are. America is a full partner in what has happened in Gaza. Now, what about Donald Trump?
Donald Trump is someone who in his previous administration, that's only one of the clues we have, was almost more pro-Israel than Israel itself. The Jewish state has never had a better friend in the White House than your president, Donald J. Trump. That I can tell you. It was offering Netanyahu at the time things that even he didn't necessarily want at the time, which was, for example, why don't you annex parts of the West Bank, the other part of the occupied Palestinian territories that you might want?
There's one school of thought that says what he might try and do is give Israel pretty much free reign with the Palestinians while he tries to make some differences elsewhere in the region. Over our journalistic careers, we have seen the power and the influence of the United States still massive.
but reducing in the Middle East. And other powers have grown. I mean, Iran, as you say, is now a threshold nuclear state, but also Saudi Arabia, big, big player in the Arab world. Where does Saudi Arabia stand right now? Because...
before the 7th of October attacks inside Israel, you know, they'd been for a long time talk about a possible normalizing of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia. Donald Trump and his first administration had wanted to normalize relations between Israel and the Sunni Arab world in order to stand together against Iran, basically. What role could Saudi Arabia play here when it comes to the Palestinians?
One thing that the last 14 months of war in Gaza has done is it's forced the Saudis to absolutely state repeatedly that while they are still open to the idea of normalization with Israel,
The price has to be a Palestinian state. I mean, they deny actually, if you speak to the Saudis, that they were prepared to sell the Palestinians down the river before 7th of October last year. But there were lots of indications that they were certainly weren't going to insist on anything more than token help for them.
But now Prince Mohammed bin Salman has said explicitly in public without a Palestinian state and without irrevocable progress towards one, there will be no normalization with Saudi Arabia. And I don't see him going back on that. And why is that? It's because all the polls in the region
show that there is massive opposition to any kind of rapprochement with Israel because of what goes on in Gaza. Donald Trump is not coming into the same Saudi Arabia and the same Gulf that he was dealing with in his first term. Things have really changed.
Things have changed. You've had a normalizing of relations between former dire enemies, Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia. How much has that changed the dial in the region? If you're looking at the extremes of where Iran might go, whether it decides to finalize a nuclear bomb or whether it decides to do some nuclear deal, could you imagine Iran
and Saudi Arabia working together to try and find a solution in Gaza. I think that's quite a few stages away at this point. Well, I think where they are at, though, is that back in the time of Trump's first term, there was a pretty simple divide that you could see, which was essentially friends of Iran versus friends of America. And it's way more broken up and blurred now.
The Saudis particularly are looking in all kinds of different directions. They don't want to get involved in a war with Iran. That's absolutely clear. They're much closer to Iran than Israel is and way closer, of course, than America is. And under Joe Biden, it has seemed clear that Netanyahu was doing quite a good job in dragging America into risking an all-out war with Iran. And
The Saudis and the Emiratis and other and the smaller Gulf states too, very rich, wealthy countries, are looking at what's going on and thinking, we want no part of that. Where does that leave the Middle East, Jeremy? Because I think perhaps there are those who learnt about the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
and thought, OK, this risk that we've been hearing about since the October 7th attacks inside Israel of all that escalation of conflict across the Middle East and possibly wider, that's now gone away because the close focus is back to Gaza. Are they wrong? No, I don't think it has gone away. Sometimes in the news business particularly and also politicians in the political business,
in a world that's connected 24-7. We expect things to move seamlessly towards the next stage or the next conclusion.
But I think what we're seeing now, you know, it's a long-term realignment. The kaleidoscope has been shaken in a very big and deadly way in the Middle East, and it isn't clear how the particles are going to settle and which way it's going to go. In the 30-plus years I've been reporting from the region, there were some established patterns and things that you could predict
sort of rely on and build your analysis around. But now the earth has moved underneath them and it's far too soon to think that the whole thing is calming down just because there is a ceasefire in Lebanon. Jeremy, thank you so much for your time. It's always a pleasure. Thank you, Katya.
And thanks so much to you for listening. If you want to get in touch, you can email us at theglobalstoryatbbc.com or you can send us a message or voice note on WhatsApp. Our number is plus 44 330 123 9480. You can find all those details in our show notes. Wherever you're listening in the world, this has been The Global Story. Thanks for having us in your headphones. Goodbye.
I'm Crassi Twig, and on the documentary we zoom in on the backstory of the Syrian militant group that led a coalition of rebels to take control of Aleppo. Once an offshoot of Al-Qaeda, HDS rebranded itself in its desire to be seen as a credible governing body. To listen to this episode of The Global Jigsaw, where we look at the world through the lens of its media, search for the documentary wherever you get your BBC podcasts.