After decades as Lebanon’s dominant armed group, Hezbollah now faces an unprecedented challenge: the Lebanese government’s decision to disarm the militia and restrict all weapons to state security forces by the end of 2025. What choices does Hezbollah actually have?
00:00Lebanon government has decided to task the army with setting a plan to disarm Hezbollah.
00:07A thorny issue decades after the last time, the country had made factions give up their weapons.
00:13Here is a look at how the government's decision may be implemented
00:17and whether the Iran-backed militant group can still block it.
00:22The announcement made on 5 August 2025 was the first time a Lebanese government has announced it would disarm Hezbollah,
00:36the only armed faction that kept its weapons in the aftermath of the 1975-1990 civil war.
00:43Hezbollah has kept its arms in the name of resistance against Israel, which occupied Lebanon's south until 2000.
00:51The decision effectively strips Hezbollah's weapons arsenal of political legitimacy,
00:57breaking with past government statements that recognised the resistance alongside the Lebanese army.
01:04The balance of power in Lebanon has shifted after a recent war between Israel and Hezbollah.
01:10The group has been left badly weakened after the fall of close ally Bashar al-Assad in neighbouring Syria.
01:18Unprecedented Israeli strikes on Hezbollah-backer Iran in June have further weakened its stance.
01:25Previous moves to limit or do away with Hezbollah's weapons and logistical network have led to major political and security crisis.
01:34In May 2008, when the Lebanese government decided to shut down the group's wired communication network,
01:41clashes erupted with Hezbollah using its weapons against political opponents in Beirut and beyond.
01:48The violence killed at least 65 people.
01:52The group's arsenal has remained a divisive issue in Lebanon, with opponents demanding that the state control all territories and the government having the sole power to declare war and peace.
02:05Hezbollah on 6 August 2025 rejected the government's decision, calling it a grave sin and saying that it will treat it as if it did not exist.
02:20But the armed group has few choices, which all appear to come at a great cost.
02:25Hezbollah could escalate politically by having the four ministers affiliated with it and its allies resign.
02:32It could also disrupt the work of parliament or incite chaos by mobilizing its armed supporters to the streets.
02:41Any domestic unrest blamed on Hezbollah would likely have major repercussions for the group's image among Lebanese.
02:49David Wood, a senior Lebanon analyst at the International Crisis Group, said,
02:54Hezbollah as much as possible would want to reduce the chance of itself entering a confrontation with the army because it knows that the entire country would be against it except for its supporters.
03:07He added that it would be an absolute disaster for its image.
03:11Hezbollah lawmaker Ali Ammar dismissed the possibility of any confrontation with the army, saying that the two forces understand each other.
03:19Hezbollah could also relaunch attacks against Israel, but this option could easily prove devastating with the country still reeling from last year's war.
03:31Military analyst Riyadh Khawadji said,
03:33Going into war right now, again, will be very devastating to Hezbollah because it does not have a supply line.
03:40It lost a lot with the collapse of the Syrian regime.
03:44He added that its intelligence capabilities, its logistical capabilities have all been severely affected.
03:51The war with Israel saw much of Hezbollah's senior leadership killed and a large part of its military arsenal destroyed, as did swaths of Beirut, Lebanon's south and other areas.
04:04Receiving weapons shipments from Iran via Syria has become more difficult as Lebanese and Syrian authorities have tightened border controls and funding has come under stricter oversight.
04:17Hezbollah could agree to disarm, but a media outlet quoting Lebanese source said that it would not do so without something in return.
04:27Tehran's position may also affect any decision.
04:30According to Atlantic Council researcher Nicholas Blanford, the Lebanese group may play for time.
04:37He said,
04:38Lebanon is under intense Arab and Western pressure to disarm non-state actors.
04:53A key demand to secure international support as it emerges from years of political and economic crisis.
05:00President Joseph Aoun last week said that we must choose either collapse or stability.
05:07Should Hezbollah insist on keeping its arsenal, Beirut will find itself in a very difficult position.
05:14Researcher Blanford said,
05:15If they can't do it politically, the government would not send the Lebanese army against Hezbollah.
05:21Blanford said,
05:22So it has to be a question of a compromise and some kind of an agreement, which is not going to be easy.
05:29Meanwhile, Israel has already signaled that it would not hesitate to launch destructive military operations if Lebanon fails to disarm Hezbollah,
05:38as is stipulated in the ceasefire agreement that ended the latest war.
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