UN peacekeeping chief says major questions hang over southern Lebanon as UNIFIL exit nears

The head of UN peacekeeping, Jean-Pierre Lacroix, said Wednesday that major unresolved questions hang over southern Lebanon as the mandate of UNIFIL — the UN force created in 1978 to oversee Israel's withdrawal after its first invasion — expires at the end of the year, ending nearly five decades of presence.

"No decision has been made so far about what kind of UN presence, if anything, after UNIFIL," Lacroix told the Associated Press during a visit to Beirut, adding that negotiations should begin at the Security Council soon. Lebanese authorities, he said, "were unanimous in telling us they want to keep a UN presence" to monitor violations and defuse tensions between Israeli and Lebanese troops.

The Security Council voted in August 2025 to terminate the mandate at the end of 2026, responding to demands from the United States and Israel, which accused UNIFIL of failing to halt Hezbollah's military buildup in the south. Since that vote, the security situation has worsened substantially: a new Israel-Hezbollah war broke out in March, a shaky ceasefire now holds, Israel occupies a large swath of southern territory, and it continues demolitions and strikes that have destroyed thousands of homes and in some cases wiped out entire villages. Hezbollah has refused to disarm.

UNIFIL's record over 48 years is difficult to summarize as either success or failure because it was neither. The force was expanded after the 2006 war to monitor Resolution 1701 — which it monitored while Hezbollah's arsenal grew beneath the reporting line. It escorts aid convoys and civilians through the Israeli-occupied zone, and Lacroix warned that no one has been identified to take over even those functions. The European Union has announced a training mission for the Lebanese army that pointedly excludes patrolling or monitoring violations.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, who met Lacroix on Wednesday, said a withdrawal "would create a vacuum with negative repercussions for the security situation in the region and leave the area without any international oversight of unfolding events." A small unarmed observer force, UNTSO, will remain — though Lacroix questioned whether it can operate without the protecting environment of a UN military presence.

The force that was sent to supervise an Israeli withdrawal in 1978 will depart while Israeli troops are still on the ground it was created to watch them leave.