The cease-fire in Lebanon finally forestalls the prospect of a region-wide war.
Israel and Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group in Lebanon, agreed to a cease-fire. The arrangement is a win for outgoing President Joe Biden, who has followed a hapless policy course through a calamitous year for the Middle East.
Ever since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, the Biden administration’s goal in the Middle East has been to contain the conflict. That policy didn’t exactly succeed: The fighting spread to Lebanon and even led to exchanges of fire between Israel and Iran. In the meantime, Washington gave Israel virtual carte blanche in Gaza, particularly in the first few months of the war; in doing so, it implicated itself in a war that has exacted a heavy toll not just on Hamas but on the people of Gaza. Israel’s onslaught has killed more than 44,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, and displaced nearly the entire population of 2.2 million, many of them multiple times. An estimated 66 percent of structures that once stood in the Strip have been damaged or destroyed. And at every step, Israel dictated the scope and nature of the conflict, not just to its adversaries but also to Washington, escalating to the brink of all-out war with Iran.
Now Washington has helped broker a cease-fire, not in Gaza, but in Lebanon and northern Israel.
