Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam made an announcement on August 7 that would have been unthinkable even a year before: Hezbollah — indeed all militias in the country — would be disarmed by the end of 2025.

Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim political organization which has long been considered more powerful than the Lebanese Army itself, has been on its back foot since its November 2024 ceasefire with Israel. Since then, the group has been unable to intervene again, for either Gaza or Iran. Now, in its moment of weakness, there is a push to neuter Hezbollah altogether. But is this a push from within Lebanon, or is it coming from outside its borders?

Though the Lebanese government announced the disarmament plan, the effort is an unashamed American initiative, with the Arab press openly describing it as the “American paper.” President Donald Trump’s envoys to the region, for their parts, are saying the plan can bring prosperity to an economically depressed Lebanon, and domestic advocates for disarmament — predominately supporters of parties that were allied with Israel in the 1980s — tout it as a way to restore Lebanon’s ability to self-govern.

Some of the higher echelons of Lebanon’s power structure, however, see something else in the plan: the U.S. and Israel pushing Lebanon back into a devastating civil war.

Hezbollah has so far adamantly refused to disarm, proclaiming that the group would fight any such effort without a comprehensive plan for the national military to confront Israeli aggression.

American officials have grown fond of saying how the Lebanese people want Hezbollah disarmed, but preliminary data does not support the notion. One poll conducted after the disarmament plan was announced showed 58 percent of the country against disarming the group without a plan to deal with Israel. According to said survey by the Consultative Center for Studies and Documentation, 71 percent of respondents believe the army is incapable of confronting Israel.

The Americans

While the Trump administration has an ambassador to Lebanon, the main figure in charge of America’s foreign policy regarding the country is

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