'Against it 100 per cent': Children of Israel-backed militia members oppose reoccupation of Lebanon

Offspring of former members of the now-defunct South Lebanon Army are against both Israeli and Hezbollah presence in the border area

Smoke rises from the Lebanese village of Khiam during Israeli bombardment. AFP

Children of former commanders of a now-defunct Lebanese militia who supported Israel's long occupation of southern Lebanon have told The National they are opposed to another Israeli takeover.

They said local opposition to Iran-backed Hezbollah is already significant but a new Israeli occupation would be bitterly opposed, rallying support behind the group. They emphasised the need to implement UN resolutions instead to put an end to decades of violence.

Jonathan El Khoury, whose father served in the South Lebanon Army (SLA), a Christian-majority militia founded two years after civil war broke out in 1975, said he was “100 per cent” against Israel staying in south Lebanon as part of its current ground operations against Hezbollah, a Shiite movement that emerged as the country's most powerful force after the civil war ended in 1990.

“Lebanon is a sovereign country and the territory of south of Lebanon is part of Lebanon,” Mr El Khoury said. “One of the reasons that Hezbollah got stronger is because Israel stayed too long in Lebanon.”

Israel sent its troops across the border three weeks ago amid an escalation in air strikes that has displaced more than one million people and destroyed and damaged vast numbers of buildings.

The SLA fought alongside Israeli forces against the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and later Hezbollah during the 18-year occupation of south Lebanon, which became isolated from the rest of the country. It collapsed after Israel’s chaotic withdrawal in 2000, with thousands of SLA members fleeing across the border into Israel. Some later travelled on to Europe and the US.

To some Lebanese, the SLA protected Lebanon from Hezbollah and the PLO, which set up bases in the south after it was ejected from Jordan in 1970. To others, its members are traitors who were responsible for terrorism and torture.

Mr El Khoury’s family settled in Israel and later became citizens. The 32 year old now considers himself Lebanese and Israeli.

Like other children of former SLA commanders interviewed by The National, he said antipathy towards Hezbollah among some residents of south Lebanon was a key reason for his opposition to Israel taking control of the area. He accused the militant group of dragging Lebanon into a war the country did not want.

Lebanon has been caught in an economic and political crisis since 2019. Reforms needed to unlock international financial assistance are in limbo because of the country's political paralysis – it has not had a president for two years and its current government serves only in a caretaker capacity.

“I think one of the reasons that I'm against Israel staying in south of Lebanon or basically destroying all of south of Lebanon so it couldn't be inhabited again, is because, at the end of the day, there are many villages in south of Lebanon that kept Hezbollah away,” Mr El Khoury said.

Amer Fakhoury worked with Israel as part of the SLA and made headlines in 2019 when he was detained after returning to Lebanon on a family holiday from his home in the US after a 20-year absence. He was held for seven months as what his family described as a "US hostage." He suffered torture and other forms of mistreatment, his family said, after Hezbollah-aligned parts of the Lebanese authorities charged him with kidnapping, imprisoning and torturing inmates at Khiam, a detention centre run by the SLA and Israel.

He was released seven months later following pressure from Washington and a Lebanese court ruled that he should be freed because the 10-year statute of limitations for his alleged offences had passed. He returned to the US, but died five months afterwards from late-stage Epstein-Barr virus-related lymphoma, which his family says was contracted during his detention.

His daughters Guila Fakhoury, 37, and Zoya Fakhoury, 27, told The National via Zoom from the US state of New Hampshire that they opposed an Israeli occupation of south Lebanon and also control of the area by Hezbollah, which receives weapons and backing from Iran.

“I think I stand with every Lebanese when we say we don't want Israeli occupation and we don't want Iranian occupation,” said Zoya, a development engineer. “Obviously, we're against the ground invasion that Israel is committing right now in Lebanon because a lot of innocent people are dying because of it. But I think what we believe is the root cause of this is Hezbollah should have never dragged our country into war.”

Their father was not pro-Israel and joined the SLA because it was what young men in the area did at the time, accoriding to the family. "He loved Lebanon so much," Zoya said.

Maryam Younnes, 29, was five years old when her family fled to Israel from Lebanon. They expected the evacuation to be temporary, and Ms Younnes, a university communications worker, still hopes to return to Lebanon one day.

“I don't expect from people, and even from myself, to be like, 'in order to kill Hezbollah or to eliminate Hezbollah, I'm OK with people being killed'. I am not,” she said. “I know that every civilian and every person is paying the price; it's just heartbreaking.”

She describes herself as a Lebanese-Israeli and speaks Lebanese Arabic and Hebrew. While the SLA fought the PLO, she recognises Palestinians today are also “sick of wars”.

“They deserve a dignified life. They deserve to live in peace.”

Two UN resolutions – No 1559 adopted in 2004, and 1701, from 2006 – could have prevented the current violence. They call for all militias in the country, including Hezbollah, to give up their weapons, the extension of the government control over all Lebanese territory and for the withdrawal of Hezbollah and other armed groups from areas south of the Litani river, 10km from the border with Israel.

But implementing them has proved difficult. Hezbollah has been able to build up large weapons supplies in south Lebanon that Israel says it is now intent on destroying. Lebanese politicians previously told The National that Israeli air strikes appear to be sparing the country’s infrastructure and army but they fear Israel aims not only to weaken Hezbollah but to completely eradicate the Iran-backed group.

This week Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his country would “continue to strike Hezbollah without mercy everywhere in Lebanon – including Beirut”.

A fringe of Israel’s settler movement, which advocates the seizure of Palestinian territories, is also calling for Israel to take control of southern Lebanon. The Israeli government has not suggested it will reoccupy the south but is intent on destroying Hezbollah’s weapons stockpiles. It has hit locations across the country it says are linked to Hezbollah, although Lebanese on the ground say some of the targeted sites had no links to the group.

For the children of former SLA commanders, the implementation of the UN resolutions is the way out of the current conflict. They recognise that doing so will be tough but fear the consequences of maintaining the current status quo.

“We call on someone in the Lebanese government to stand and say 'we need to implement these resolutions',” said Guila Fakhoury, a research scientist. “Or else, honestly, Lebanon is going to be destroyed, all of it, not just the Shiite, or the south.”