Lebanon Divided After Hezbollah Explosives Seizure

Beirut, Lebanon – On October 5, a minivan was stopped at a checkpoint in Dahr el-Baydar, an area between the Bekaa Valley and the Mount Lebanon region. Lebanese security forces found the vehicle carrying hundreds of kilograms of explosive materials, including TNT and C-4, according to Lebanese officials.

On Thursday, Hezbollah MP Hassan Fadlallah issued a statement asserting that the explosives belonged to Hezbollah and that the group had demanded their return, along with the release of two people detained in the vehicle.

"As soon as the vehicle was seized, the relevant bodies within [Hezbollah] immediately contacted the security and judicial authorities, informing them that the vehicle and its cargo belonged to the resistance," Fadlallah said. "They demanded the immediate release of those detained and the return of the vehicle and everything inside it, because this is the capability the resistance uses to confront the Israeli occupation in southern [Lebanon]."

According to Fadlallah, the explosives were intended for use against Israel – which still occupies large areas of southern Lebanon – and not for internal use against the Lebanese government or other factions, as some political figures and analysts have suggested.

"We therefore warn [the Lebanese authorities] about the consequences of continuing to escalate measures," he said. "[Hezbollah] will protect the interests of its people and the capabilities used to confront the Israeli enemy, and will not tolerate any targeting by any party carrying out American demands against our resistance."

However, many of Hezbollah's political opponents – who have long accused the Iran-backed group of targeting political rivals in assassinations – fear the smuggled explosives will be turned against Hezbollah's critics.

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam pointed out that C-4 has been used in past assassinations, although investigators have not determined that the seized shipment was intended for such an attack.

Hezbollah has never admitted carrying out assassinations, despite repeated accusations, including the 2005 killing of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Regional implications

On March 2, when Hezbollah first responded to Israel's prolonged attacks over more than a year, in retaliation for the killing of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Salam and his government banned the group's military activities. Salam's coalition government includes two Hezbollah ministers who opposed the decision, and the group has repeatedly defied the government's declaration by continuing to fight Israel.

The fighting largely subsided from June, when Beirut and Tel Aviv signed a US-mediated trilateral framework. Under the agreement, pilot zones would be established in a phased process under which Israel would eventually withdraw and the Lebanese Army would move in to disarm Hezbollah. But the program ran into trouble from the start, as Israel had never been present in some areas included in the pilot zones, according to local residents, and Israeli demolitions continued in occupied areas.

In recent weeks, Lebanese security forces have uncovered a series of smuggling operations involving explosive materials. Lebanese officials condemned the operations, and Salam pledged an investigation, particularly into the Dahr el-Baydar case.

"We will not be lenient in pursuing and expanding the investigation to identify all those involved in this criminal operation as well as those behind it," Salam wrote on social media. "We will deal with weapons outside the framework of the law with the necessary firmness."

But the issue also reveals growing disagreements between the Lebanese government and Hezbollah's leadership over the role of the armed resistance.

Concerns about the explosives

Since Lebanon's civil war ended in 1990, Hezbollah has been the main Lebanese force to maintain weapons. This was ostensibly part of the national security formula of "army, people and resistance" to confront the Israeli occupation – which lasted until 2000 before resuming in 2024 – and to counter aggression, in a context where the country was also under Syrian influence.

That changed last year when President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Salam took office. Hezbollah's ally, the al-Assad regime in Damascus, had just collapsed, cutting a key land route for transporting weapons and financing from Tehran. The regional balance of power appeared to shift toward reduced Iranian influence and greater US and Israeli influence, prompting Lebanon's leadership to declare that all non-state weapons would fall under state control.

Despite Hezbollah's opposition to the new leadership's decrees, the Lebanese Army has proceeded to disarm the group's weapons sites in southern Lebanon. Some of Hezbollah's opponents claim the group has been weakened and defeated, though analysts say it still retains some fighting strength and that Lebanon's regional alignments may largely be determined by regional developments.

Still, the group's domestic influence has at times been challenged by Lebanon's new leadership, including in the Dahr el-Baydar case.

Marcel Baloukji, a former brigadier general who headed the Lebanese Army's border committee with Syria, told Al Jazeera that the recent seizures, especially the Dahr el-Baydar case, are tied to the broader regional security situation, particularly the US-Israeli campaign against Iran and the recent escalation of violence between Houthi forces in Yemen and Saudi Arabia.

He suggested Hezbollah may be seeking to emulate other Iran-aligned forces in the region and intensify attacks on its opponents. But he also said Hezbollah may need explosives for drones to attack Israeli forces occupying southern Lebanon.

The government's difficulties

Despite Lebanese officials' pledges to investigate, analysts say concerns remain about how effective the investigations will be.

Issam Kayssi, an analyst at the Beirut-based Carnegie Middle East Center, questioned the relationship between Salam and Lebanon's security apparatus. Lebanon has multiple security agencies, some of which have competing loyalties to different political figures or parties.

"It has been more than a year since the Raouche incident," he said, referring to a 2025 Hezbollah event on Beirut's seafront to commemorate the late leaders Hassan Nasrallah and Hashem Safieddine. Hezbollah projected images of the two slain leaders onto Pigeon Rock in Beirut's Raouche seafront area, even though the projection was banned by the authorities, prompting Salam to call for the arrest of those responsible. Security personnel at the scene did not act to stop the projection, and observers fear that some components of the security agencies may not fully cooperate with Salam in the explosives investigations he has ordered.

Baloukji described the relationship between Salam and the security agencies as "somewhat tense." He added that this may be the latest file in a series of difficulties facing the Lebanese government, as Israel's occupation and the destruction of southern infrastructure continue.

"Our situation remains in a protracted state of ambiguity, with no solution in sight," Baloukji said. "The framework agreement is stalled and there is no solution to calm the situation in the south."