Weekly Commentary: Employ Disarmed Terrorists in North - not South -
Lebanon!
Dr. Aaron Lerner 28 August 2025

It is going to take years to clear southern Lebanon from extensive war
damage. Almost all the buildings have been destroyed so housing is
extremely limited and the agricultural land is strewn with debris and even
some unexploded ordnance so that employment in agriculture is also
irrelevant.

Despite this , Trump envoy Tom Barrack announced plans this week to finance
the deployment of Hezbollah forces, ostensibly sans weapons, on Israel's
border in a jobs program.

And please, don't claim that they will be employed in innocent civilian
construction.

Because if Hezbollah is paid to rebuild South Lebanon it will be child's
play for them to exploit the opportunity to embed military structures within
the ostensibly civilian buildings.

This is a reckless half-baked idea.

Where is Secretary of Sate Marco Rubio's team?

"I want the Department of State to have the best ideas and the best options
available for the President...we want to be at the core of how we formulate
foreign policy, because we're going to have the best ideas of any agency..."
Secretary of State Marco Rubio Remarks to Employees 21 January 2025

Want a jobs program for disarmed terrorists?

Offer it hundreds of kilometers away in Sunni dominated northern Lebanon.

There are Shia communities in this area, which was barely touched by the
war.

And while unemployment now is high in that region, a properly funded jobs
program for disarmed terrorists could have an economic spillover effect to
the benefit of the Sunni majority.

A real jobs program in the north could be implemented quickly.

A jobs program for terrorists on Israel's border would essentially keep this
terrorist force intact to threaten the Jewish state.

Secretary Rubio - why isn't your team pushing an alternative?

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