Lebanese Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Mitri said Friday the government will not "back down" from implementing the Trilateral Framework for disarming Hezbollah — and will avoid any decision requiring force against the group. [1] The Institute for the Study of War calls that formula what it is: Hezbollah will not surrender its arsenal voluntarily, so enforcement without force is designed to fail. [1]

The timeline explains the skepticism. The army's five-phase disarmament plan advanced on paper to its second stage, between the Litani and Awali rivers, while commander Rodolph Haykal cited Israeli violations and thin capability as brakes — the same army now expected to carry the implementation burden alone. [2] The US-brokered framework signed in Washington on June 26 drew immediate Israeli pledges to stay in southern Lebanon, and its unresolved fights over cabinet approval remain exactly where they started. [3] Now Washington's lever has hardened: the Treasury re-designated Hezbollah as an entity operating for Iran's Quds Force and sanctioned ten individuals in its money-laundering network — legal fusion with Tehran timed to the widening siege. [1][4]

The regional echo is instructive. In Iraq, Asaib Ahl al-Haq handed the disarmament committee fewer than ten unarmed drones — scrap compliance as precedent. [1]

Beirut's formula has a calendar and no mechanism. The framework advances on schedule; the arsenal it targets does not move at all.

-- YOSEF STERN, Jerusalem