Lebanon has been commemorating “Liberation Day” every May 25 since 2000, which is actually the anniversary of the Israeli withdrawal.
This historical period straddles that of the civil war that took place between 1975 to 1990 in which Israel was directly involved from 1978.
On May 25, 2000, the last Israeli soldier left the occupied areas of Lebanon, with the notable exception of the Shebaa Farms and other areas south of the Blue Line. It should be remembered that this blue line is a demarcation line between Lebanon and Israel in accordance with the armistice agreements of 1949 and not the internationally recognized border which is constituted by the Paulet-Newcombe line of 1923. The Hebrew state recognizes moreover in the text of the armistice of 1949 that the line of the border is constituted not by the blue line but by the Paulet Newcombe line.
7 Lebanese villages are thus south of the Blue Line. These are the localities of Malkiya, Kadas, Nabi Yusha, Hunin, Saliha, Tarbikha and Abeil el-Qamh whose inhabitants hold Lebanese nationality.
In addition, part of the Lebanese maritime economic zone is now claimed by Israel. The disputed area between the 2 countries is estimated at more than 800 square kilometers. The Hoff line, named after the American proposal that Beirut already rejected, grants 560 square kilometers to Lebanon and the balance to Tel Aviv. This block would be rich in oil and gas resources.
The origins of the conflict: the Israeli-Palestinian conflict
In 1948, during the Israeli-Palestinian war following the birth of the State of Israel, approximately 140,000 Palestinians took refuge in Lebanon. This presence will distort the community balance of the Pays Des Cèdres.
From January 1, 1965, a first action by Fatah against the Hebrew state will be organized from southern Lebanon. Other operations will cause a rise in tensions with Israel on the one hand, and its operation against Beirut International Airport on December 28, 1968 (they will destroy most of the Lebanese civilian air fleet), and on the other side, with the Palestinians that the Lebanese Army will try to control all the same. Driven out following the Black September from Jordan but also from Syria, the Palestinian forces will regroup in South Lebanon. The latter will gradually transform the various Palestinian camps into fortresses whose access will be made difficult for the Lebanese security forces and will de facto become lawless areas that escape the authority of the State.
Israeli military operations increased against Lebanon between 1968 and 1974. Israel demands that the Land of the Cedars ensure peace on the border by controlling Palestinian activity in its territory, which the Lebanese authorities are unable to do due to a weak state of its security and security services. a political paralysis, the Palestinian militias enjoying the support of the Arab countries which threaten Lebanon with reprisals and of a part of the local political class primarily Sunni.
Social problems are thus appearing to the fore with the notable emergence of Imam Moussa Sadr, who will incite the Shiite community to demonstrate since 1970 in reaction to the Palestinian operations in South Lebanon and to the Israeli reprisals of which the Shiite villages are the main collateral victims. On January 20 of the same year, the Amal militia will be created to defend Shiite interests in South Lebanon.
Following pressure from the Arab countries, the Lebanese authorities will abdicate and allow Palestinian militias to operate freely following the famous Cairo agreements of November 3, 1969. This agreement enshrines the right of the fedayeen to carry out, from Lebanese territory, military operations and attacks as part of their armed national struggle and while respecting, adds the text, the sovereignty of the Lebanese State. This agreement allows the Palestinians to organize themselves militarily in Lebanon and to create a true state within the state, the Palestinian camps enjoying extraterritorial status.
A burst of pride on the part of the Lebanese Army, following the kidnapping of 3 of its soldiers, will be on May 1, 1973, with the bombardment by the air force of the positions held by the PLO in the camps of Bourj Brajné. The inaction of the Lebanese political authorities and in particular the government authorities lacking their solidarity with the Military Institution, will paralyze the Lebanese Security Forces which will henceforth be kept away from the conflict in order to avoid any internal dissension, leaving room for the Palestinian militias. and to their allies on the one hand, particularly in South Lebanon, and to the self-defense militias on the other.
On April 13, 1975, the Lebanese Civil War officially began.
Read
In 1976, the Army of South Lebanon (SLA) was founded by members of the Lebanese army. It will be mainly based in the city of Marjayoun and made up mainly of Christians, but also of Lebanese Shiites and Druze wishing to protect the Lebanese civilian population against the PLO operating freely in South Lebanon. It will quickly ally itself with the Hebrew state due to the inability of the Lebanese authorities to be able to come to the aid of these populations.
During the civil war, the Lebanese side, with the Amal movement, the PCL which will ally with the PLO and various Palestinian currents against the Hebrew state. Some of its members will lead joint actions with the Palestinian movements, including infiltration operations in the middle of Israeli territory. Alongside him, the Baath Party and the Syrian Social-National Party, rivals who have become allies, will do the same.
1978, the beginning of the Israeli occupation with Operation Litani
3 days after the massacre of 37 Israelis in a Tel Aviv bus by PLO members infiltrated from Lebanon, the Israeli Army launched Operation Litani from 14 to . It invades part of southern Lebanon and pushes the PLO beyond the Litani River, thus beginning the occupation of part of Lebanese territory.
United Nations Security Council resolution 425 will be adopted on March 19, 1978. In particular, it will found UNIFIL, whose mission is to ensure the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon, to allow border security and to help the Lebanese government to restore its effective authority in the south of its territory.
On the Israeli side, we deplore 8 killed and 113 injured in his forces, on the Palestinian side, we deplore 300 to 500 dead among the combatants. The heaviest toll will however be that of the Lebanese population:
1,186 Lebanese civilians were killed, 285,000 refugees were counted and 82 villages were damaged, 6 of which were completely destroyed.
At the end of this episode, the Israeli forces will partially withdraw from southern Lebanon, leaving room for the SLA which they will equip and support financially and logistically by providing it with weapons.
Read
Peace in Galilee or the end of the PLO’s military action in Lebanon
The day after an attack carried out on June 3, 1982 by the Palestinian organization Abu Nidal against the Israeli ambassador to London Shlomo Argov, the Israeli forces bombed the positions of the PLO – yet an opponent of the Abu Nidal group – in Lebanon. The PLO led by Yasser Arafat will respond to these bombings.
On June 6, 1982, the Israeli Army will mobilize 76,000 men and launch Operation Peace in Galilee, officially to establish a 40km security zone. 2 inside Lebanese borders despite the presence of UNIFIL present since 1978. Faced with it, 15,000 PLO militiamen and 22,000 Syrian soldiers will try to contain its advance.
But it is as far as Beirut, under the leadership of Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon, that the IDF will advance to join forces with the Lebanese Forces of Bashir Gemayel. The Syrian Forces present since 1976 will suffer heavy losses after fighting with the Israeli army. As for the Palestinian forces, they will undergo the siege of West Beirut which will begin a week after the start of the offensive.
The siege of the capital will last from June 14 to
Sabra and Chatila and the start of the Israeli withdrawal
During the Israeli Peace in Galilee intervention, Bachir Gemayel, considered an ally of Israel, was elected President of the Lebanese Republic. He will be assassinated three weeks later on by a Christian member of the PSNS (Syrian Nationalist Social Party), before being able to take the oath.
See also:
- 35th commemoration of the assassination of Bachir Gemayel
- The death of Bachir Gémayel and the survival of his assassin
Left unprotected, several hundred Palestinian refugees will be massacred in the Sabra and Chatila camps in 3 waves as Israeli forces control the perimeter of the camps.
The first wave was formed by the Israeli military targeting specific Palestinian people, intellectuals, engineers and doctors. A second wave will act in the same way. A third wave will be formed by members of the Phalangists and the Army of South Lebanon. Their mission will be to clean the camps and thus cover the traces of the first 2 waves according to the Lebanese commission of inquiry. On the Israeli side, an official investigation made public in February 1983 by an Israeli commission headed by Itzhak Kahane, the head of the Supreme Court, concluded that the phalangists were responsible and Ariel Sharon was indirectly responsible.
At the end of 2 days of massacres, 700 to 3,500 including many children and women will be killed.
Read
Following this massacre, the Israeli Forces will begin their withdrawal from the Lebanese capital. and will continue their withdrawals from the Lebanese Mountain, leading Lebanon into what is called the Mountain War and the massacres by the Druze militias of Walid Joumblatt of thousands of people mainly from the Christian community and the exile of the Chouf.
According to some reports, the Israeli Army lost 670 soldiers during this phase of the conflict.
17,825 civilians (Lebanese and Arabs) died during this war, of which at least 10,000 were soldiers of the Syrian army or Palestinian militias.
The South Lebanon Security Zone
The Hebrew state will establish a security zone in 1985 south of the Litani with its ally of the SLA now led by Antoine Lahd until 2000, date of the Israeli withdrawal from the area. This militia will be in charge of the civil administration and will be equipped with weapons, uniforms and equipment by the Israeli Army. With up to 5,000 men at its peak in the 1980s, the SLA also instituted compulsory one-year military service, forcing many young people to go into exile in order not to serve.
In Khiam, the SLA will open a detention center where torture is common.
A gradual weakening in the face of Hezbollah
Unprecedented fact, since 1982 the Israeli forces have been facing a new enemy, Hezbollah, resulting from a split from the Amal movement and whose existence will be made public in 1985 after the publication of its founding manifesto in the Lebanese daily as- Safir. This document calls for the destruction of the State of Israel and is a fundamental dogma of Hezbollah ideology. Hussein Moussavi and Ibrahim el Amine will thus create Amal Islamique which will become the military branch of Hezbollah.
First led by Subhi al-Toufeili then by Abbas Moussaoui in 1991 who will be assassinated by Israel in 1992, the group will be led from that date by Hassan Nasrallah. Faced with Israeli abuses and those of their allies, particularly because of Khiam, Hezbollah will enjoy broad support among the southerners.
Under his command, actions targeting the Israeli forces and their SLA auxiliaries will multiply on the part of Hezbollah but also the intelligence services of the Lebanese Army which will succeed in infiltrating the SLA. Its numbers will drop to 1,500 combatants, which was insufficient to control the area. Hezbollah will respond to any Israeli attack with Katouicha rockets striking a balance of terror.
Thus following the assassination by an Israeli missile of 2 men in Yater, 20 rockets will be fired on Israeli territory. Tsahal retaliated by triggering on April 11, 1996, Operation Grapes of Wrath which ultimately resulted in the bombing of a UN camp where many civilians had taken refuge. 102 will die during this bombardment in Cana, following which a ceasefire will be imposed.
Faced with this failure and following the assassination of number 2 of the SLA, Colonel Akel Hachem, designated successor of Antoine Lahd by Hezbollah, the Israeli authorities of Ehud Barak’s government will decide to withdraw unilateral without even having informed its allies on May 25, 2000.
Caught off guard, the SLA collapsed and a number of its members attempted to cross into Israel. Others will be tried by the Lebanese state for collaboration with Israel and finally some will be protected because having collaborated with the Intelligence Services of the Lebanese Army or with Hezbollah.
Hezbollah takes control of Israeli and SLA positions in southern Lebanon.
However, even if the Israeli withdrawal is obtained that day, the area remains the object of bitter battles, especially during the conflict of 2006.
Read
