Israel continues demolitions in southern Lebanon
A June agreement set phased withdrawal as a goal. Continuing occupation and destruction have forced more than one million people from their homes.
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A June agreement set phased withdrawal as a goal. Continuing occupation and destruction have forced more than one million people from their homes.
Israeli forces continue to occupy large parts of southern Lebanon and systematically demolish homes and infrastructure across dozens of villages, Al Jazeera’s 24 October feature said, describing more than one million people forced from their homes by the occupation and destruction. Its 27 October feature on the olive harvest says access restrictions and unexploded weapons are disrupting harvesting even where groves remain intact.
The restrictions follow a June 2026 framework agreement between Israel and the Lebanese government, brokered by the US, that set phased Israeli withdrawal as a goal. Al Jazeera’s earlier account said active fighting had largely stopped after the agreement, but occupation and demolitions continued. Israel and Hezbollah, a Lebanese Shia group, have fought at varying levels of intensity since October 2023; Hezbollah rejected the direct negotiations preceding the agreement.
Khaled Farhat, who tends about 200 olive trees in Majdel Selm, told Al Jazeera he received only two weeks to work his land. He said his access request went through his municipality to the Lebanese Army, which coordinates permits through a mechanism established after the June agreement between the US, Israel and Lebanon.
Farhat said displacement had prevented him from tilling and clearing the grove. Removing the resulting weeds now uses part of his limited harvesting time. Any olives he cannot collect within the permit period will remain unharvested.
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Al Jazeera’s harvest feature described three deaths on southern farmland in October. In early October, a retired soldier was killed by Israeli artillery fire in an olive grove in Yater. An engineer was killed when Israeli ordnance exploded while he harvested olives in Froun. A day later, a police officer tending farmland in Ain Ebel was killed in an explosion.
Hiba Ghandour, the Mines Advisory Group’s Lebanon programme manager, said the organisation had identified 444,000 square metres of confirmed hazardous areas for farmers. That is an ongoing assessment, not a complete measure of affected land; she expected the figure to rise significantly as work continued.
The Mines Advisory Group, or MAG, helps communities affected by mines and other explosive weapons. Ghandour said teams were still clearing small explosive devices scattered by cluster bombs during the 2006 war, many of which failed to explode on impact. Hostilities since October 2023 had added another layer of hazards.
Ghandour said explosives hidden beneath soil or vegetation make agricultural land slower to clear, while repeated bombardment has made some communities harder for teams to reach. MAG’s assessment and clearance work continue as farmers face pressure to earn a living from land that has not yet been made safe.
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