TEHRAN – In an attempt to secure legitimacy as an occupying force in Lebanon, Israel is seeking to promote the idea of a withdrawal along three lines to sidestep international demands and withdraw from the Lebanese border.

The Israeli regime’s announcement in early September that it had established “operational control” over Ali al-Taher Hill was only one aspect of a broader picture taking shape in southern Lebanon. The hill, which rises about 600 meters and lies roughly 15 kilometers from the border, overlooks the surrounding area and connects the southern positions to the Iqlim al-Tuffah region.

While the Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) claimed that it had cleared a tunnel network beneath the hill of Hezbollah fighters, the Lebanese resistance has yet to issue any comment. A Lebanese military official says the IOF controls only the southern entrances and monitors the northern ones with drones. The extent of their penetration into the network remains unclear.

At the same time, IOF airstrikes have extended beyond the “ground occupation zone.” The IOF destroyed the Ghundour Hospital in Nabatieh al-Fawqa and struck a Ministry of Finance building, civilian facilities, and homes. This was followed by a massacre in Kfar Rumman with nearly a dozen killed including children and paramedics.

Although the occupying regime claimed that the hospital had been used as a Hezbollah command center, targeting it without providing any evidence grants the IOF the freedom to assault civilian infrastructure simply by making an allegation.

These developments come as the occupation regime, according to security officials cited by Kan 11, explores reducing the area it currently occupies to a strip three to four kilometers deep, following what has been called the “Gray Line,” with new military infrastructure to be built inside it.

The project has not yet received political approval, but it raises a question that goes beyond the scope of the withdrawal: Is the regime retreating from southern Lebanon, or reshaping its occupation?

Southern Lebanon between three lines

Following the recent discussion of the “Gray Line,” the south is now governed by three lines whose status differs radically.

The first is the Blue Line, established by the United Nations in 2000 to verify the IOF’s withdrawal. It is not a final international border, but it serves as the practical UN reference line between Lebanon and the occupying entity.

The “Yellow Line” was declared by the IOF during the current aggression. In April, it published a map showing an occupation zone extending up to 10 kilometers deep, with around 20 new military posts. It forms part of the regime’s new vision, which holds that “Israel’s security borders” extend as far as its soldiers are capable of reaching.

The occupation government has provided a clear illustration of this model in the Gaza Strip, where the occupying line continues to expand and push Palestinian families out, leaving behind barren land as a result of extensive bulldozing.

The third line, the “Gray Line,” is not yet official, but rather a regime project to reduce that depth.

Yet reducing the area of occupation does not necessarily mean reducing the scope of force. Control of high ground, such as Ali al-Taher, combined with fortified positions, drone surveillance, and air superiority, allows the IOF to retain a smaller strip of land while keeping wider “security” zones under surveillance and within range of fire.

A new occupation taking shape

The regime’s current conduct in southern Lebanon evokes the model of its occupation that ended in 2000. That occupation relied on a long-term ground deployment, the “South Lebanon Army” (Lahad militia), and a civilian population living inside the zone. A potential occupation today, by contrast, could rely on fewer troops, more heavily fortified positions, and greater air and firepower control.

In July, Reuters cited IOF soldiers who served in the regime’s previous occupation of Lebanon, expressing fears that the experience could be repeated.

According to Reuters, the current area has become largely emptied of Lebanese civilians after large swaths of villages were destroyed, while more than 340,000 people remained displaced in the south at the beginning of September.

All three lines have no legal basis in Lebanon

At the UN level, there is no such color-coded gradation. Security Council Resolution 2790 maintains the Blue Line and calls on the occupation regime to withdraw its forces north of it and lift the buffer zones inside Lebanon.

UNIFIL, the UN peacekeeping force operating in Lebanon, has likewise deemed the IOF presence and buffer zones a violation of Resolution 1701.

Nevertheless, the UN-established Blue Line has been disputed inside Lebanon and its border.

In any case, moving from the “Yellow Line” to the “Gray Line” would not constitute a “withdrawal” in the legal sense as long as the retreat does not extend to the Blue Line.

The matter becomes more complicated, however, with the U.S.-led track. The so-called “framework agreement” concluded on June 26 linked the Lebanese army’s restoration of state authority and the disarmament of non-state groups to the regime’s gradual redeployment outside Lebanese territory.

At the Rome negotiations in July, the parties agreed on a structure of “Pilot Zones” where the Lebanese army would deploy in parallel with the withdrawal of the IOF. Yet the first test in Western Zawtar revealed the model’s difficulties, including gunfire near the Lebanese army, widespread destruction of villages, disagreements over verifying disarmament, and the absence of a comprehensive timetable for withdrawal.

The confrontation with the Lebanese Army was not confined to the regime’s occupation zone either. On June 3, an IOF drone targeted a Lebanese army vehicle on the Deir al-Zahrani-Nabatieh road, wounding an officer and a soldier.

On June 20, another Lebanese soldier was killed in an IOF strike on the Kfar Rumman–Nabatieh road.

The three lines thus reveal three different boundaries: blue for international legitimacy, yellow for the regime’s occupation as it currently exists, and a potential “gray line” for reorganizing it. Meanwhile, IOF air and firepower extend beyond all three.

A shift to the “Gray Line” could indeed mean a tangible reduction in the territory occupied by the regime. But if it remains inside Lebanese territory, it will test another model: an occupation force less dependent on controlling territory on the ground and more dependent on controlling it from a distance.

The question is no longer how many kilometers the IOF will withdraw, but whether the line is a means of making the regime’s occupation smaller in area so that it can last longer.