Overview
- Residents began re-entering Zawtar al‑Gharbiyeh on Friday after Israeli troops withdrew and Lebanese Armed Forces units moved into the town under the pilot-zone arrangement.
- Local officials say more than half the town is destroyed and army teams are sweeping for mines and unexploded ordnance while ambulances have removed bodies of fighters, leaving returns tentative and unclear for overnight stays.
- The U.S.-brokered framework requires the Lebanese army to seize weapons from Hezbollah in designated zones as a condition for phased Israeli pullbacks, but full verification procedures are not yet agreed and technical talks are pending.
- Hezbollah dismissed the army deployment as largely symbolic and Israel continues to hold and conduct operations in a roughly 10-kilometre security zone, making the handover fragile and limited in scope.
- U.S. military teams and upcoming diplomatic and technical sessions will shape whether this pilot can be sustained or scaled, with tens of thousands of displaced people still unable to return until security and reconstruction are secured.