What began as a US-sponsored technical committee to manage ceasefires is quietly transforming southern Lebanon into a testing ground for economic and security control. Under the guise of civilian participation and ‘technical talks,’ the committee is experimenting with tools that could reshape the region’s political and economic landscape, blurring the line between diplomacy and strategic influence.
The Cradle
Karam, dispatched by Beirut as the new head of Lebanon’s delegation to the so-called “Mechanism Committee” – a ceasefire management group co-sponsored by the US and UN –was introduced as a technical adjustment.
Yet few in the region mistake symbolism for coincidence. The quiet inclusion of a civilian with explicit anti-resistance credentials signals a broader political shift, not necessarily an overt act of normalization, but a calculated rehearsal for it.
Walking the tightrope of denial and design
Officially, Lebanese leaders such as President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam deny that Karam’s appointment signals a political shift and maintain that the committee’s mandate remains unchanged, to implement the provisions of the November 2024 ceasefire. Moreover, Foreign Minister Youssef Rajji has insisted that:
“Lebanon is very far from signing a peace agreement with Israel, and Ambassador Simon Karam is tasked only with discussing a cessation of hostilities, the Israeli withdrawal from the points it still occupies, and the release of prisoners – purely military matters.”
Prime Minister Salam has also responded directly to Israeli calls for “economic cooperation” by stressing that such moves constitute normalization, which in turn must follow – rather than precede – peace. Lebanon, he asserted, remains committed to the Arab Peace Initiative, which conditions normalization on a just resolution to the Palestinian question.
But these denials are contradicted by the facts on the ground. Karam is no blank slate. A veteran diplomat and Washington insider, he has publicly framed Hezbollah’s arms as the main obstacle to peace. His inclusion in the talks is deliberate as it satisfies a US-Israeli demand that any long-term border settlement must address, if not outright dismantle, the military presence of the Lebanese resistance.
Karam's inclusion in the Mechanism reorients the committee’s optics from a purely security-focused liaison body to one that now includes civilian actors with political agendas. That shift reflects a quiet consensus within parts of the Lebanese state – namely, its US-aligned political class – that normalization is not a question of if, but when.
Normalization in slow motion: The ‘technical’ ruse
To understand how these steps accumulate, one only needs to recall the neofunctionalist theory of integration. Cooperation often begins in “low politics” – non-controversial areas like logistics, border demarcation, or security coordination. But over time, these mechanisms take on lives of their own, pulling participants into deeper entanglements. Technical committees morph into political tools, and normalization creeps ever nearer.
What began as a purely military channel is now being recast as a civil-military dialogue. The language of US diplomats has shifted to reflect this. The US Embassy in Lebanon, “the nerve center for Lebanon’s political and security realignment,” stated:
“To support a durable peace and shared prosperity of both sides, former Ambassador Simon Karam of Lebanon and National Security Council Senior Director for Foreign Policy Dr. Uri Resnick of Israel joined Counselor Morgan Ortagus at today’s meeting as civilian participants. Their inclusion reflects the Mechanism’s commitment to facilitating political and military discussions with the aim of achieving security, stability, and a durable peace for all communities affected by the conflict.”
Israeli media has gone further, describing the committee as marking “a first attempt to establish a basis for a relationship and economic cooperation” between the two states in many years.
While Lebanese officials may call it a “technical adjustment,” Tel Aviv sees it as the institutional expansion of a political framework. The discrepancy is telling.
More importantly, the committee is already discussing high-stakes political issues in coded language. Security arrangements south of the Litani, timetables for Hezbollah’s disarmament, and plans for the contested border enclaves, all of which are about reshaping Lebanon’s southern frontier.
Washington’s preferred Lebanon: Disarmed and dependent
Karam’s appointment dovetails with long-standing US and Israeli designs to neutralize Hezbollah – not through war, but via negotiation. Washington’s goal is simple: recast the Lebanese state as the sole security actor, gradually strip Hezbollah of its legitimacy, and replace military deterrence with donor-funded incentives.
This mirrors Israel’s post-Oslo approach to the occupied West Bank in pacifying the population through economic incentives, avoiding political concessions, and entrenching structural dependence. This model, often dubbed “economic peace,” has transformed the Palestinian Authority (PA) into a subcontractor of occupation – flush with foreign funds, but powerless to deliver sovereignty.
Now, that same model is being exported to Lebanon.
Economic peace, southern style
Following Karam’s appointment, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly instructed the National Security Council to send Resnick, a civilian emissary, to engage with “economic-governmental bodies” in Lebanon. The aim? To explore small-scale cross-border projects and reconstruction efforts under the committee’s umbrella.
There have been reports of an American-Israeli push towards the establishment of a “Trump Economic Zone” in the south, along the border, aimed at attracting Persian Gulf investments, contributing to reconstruction, while at the same time tying these benefits to clear conditions related to the disarmament of Hezbollah and the removal of military resistance structures near occupied Palestine.
US envoy Morgan Ortagus has pitched these initiatives as “confidence-building measures,” echoing language used in Palestinian industrial zones like Barkan and Ma’ale Adumim – where Palestinians are allowed to work but not to own or govern. In this framework, Lebanon’s south becomes both a buffer zone and a test case. A place to apply economic tools as substitutes for sovereignty. Yet this is another example of creeping annexation.
A dangerous point of no return
Each technical step normalizes a pattern of interaction, a vocabulary of cooperation, and a logic of dependency. Over time, these routines become reference points. A new war, a regional reshuffle, or domestic political collapse could turn this “mechanism” into the default framework for negotiations.
By then, the line between technical and political will have all but disappeared.
President Aoun’s recent remarks to visiting representatives of the UN Security Council that Beirut “has adopted the option of negotiations with Israel” and that “there is no going back” signal a deeper shift in the state’s posture. The taboo against direct dealings with Tel Aviv is gradually eroding through bureaucratic habit.
What is unfolding is a slow, procedural absorption into a new status quo, where diplomatic euphemisms replace red lines and the mechanics of ‘technical dialogue’ wear down the politics of resistance. Lebanon is being maneuvered into a framework of economic and security dependency. The language may be cautious, but the architecture being laid is one in which sovereignty is progressively outsourced – often without any public reckoning.
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