Hezbollah has found little response from Lebanon's political forces to Secretary-General Naim Qassem's call for dialogue and now appears increasingly isolated. A Lebanese cabinet source told Asharq Al-Awsat that any party genuinely seeking engagement with its political opponents would not simultaneously escalate political attacks against President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam.
According to the source, Hezbollah has found virtually no support for its campaign against the two leaders, including from its ally, Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who has instead been working to improve relations with both. While many members of Berri's parliamentary bloc reportedly view the proposed Framework Agreement as a waste of time and resources, they are instead placing their hopes on the still-suspended Iranian-US Memorandum of Understanding, pending the resumption of negotiations between Tehran and Washington.
The source said Qassem's call for dialogue has effectively been ignored by Hezbollah's opponents as long as the group continues to insist on retaining its weapons and rejects placing all arms exclusively under state control.
Hezbollah, the source added, continues to act as though its unilateral decision to support Gaza and Iran, and to independently determine questions of war and peace, did not trigger a political and security upheaval in Lebanon, while refraining from responding to ongoing Israeli violations and attacks.
The source also noted that Hezbollah did not claim responsibility for the explosion in the southern Lebanese town of Majdal Zoun, which killed two Israeli soldiers and wounded seven others after they entered a booby-trapped house.
The decision may have been made on Berri's advice, the source suggested, unlike Hezbollah's earlier claim of responsibility for launching six rockets in retaliation for Israel's assassination of Iran's Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, despite Qassem's earlier pledge that Hezbollah would not intervene on Iran's behalf.
The source questioned whether the group would maintain its current policy of denying Israel a pretext for escalating its military operations.
In the same context, the cabinet source said Hezbollah has refused to comment publicly on the explosion, while a source within the Shiite Duo, the alliance of Hezbollah and the Amal Movement, did not rule out the possibility that Israel itself was behind the incident. The cabinet source expressed hope that Hezbollah would continue to exercise restraint.
The source argued that both Israel and Hezbollah are seeking to buy time, albeit for different reasons. Israel, the source said, is using military pressure on Lebanon to buy time until the October 27 Knesset elections, without offering concessions that would facilitate implementation of the Framework Agreement.
Lebanese officials accuse Israel of obstructing its implementation, although Washington has so far appeared to understand Lebanon's position. That assessment could change, however, if the United States increases pressure on Israel to produce a breakthrough following the seventh round of negotiations, hosted in Rome for the second time. Lebanon is pinning its hopes on direct intervention by President Donald Trump to achieve such a breakthrough.
By contrast, Hezbollah continues to pursue what the source described as a strategy of patience, refraining from responding to Israeli violations despite Qassem's warning that the situation would not be allowed to return to what it was before March 2. The party views the seventh round of negotiations as another exercise in buying time, a position that aligns with some lawmakers affiliated with Berri.
They argue that progress should be measured by a timetable for Israeli withdrawal and the expansion of "pilot areas" under Lebanese Army deployment to include occupied towns and villages, provided that the ceasefire and cessation of hostilities are firmly established to allow displaced residents to return home. Hezbollah, however, is said to be placing all of its political bets on Iran, treating the Iranian-US memorandum as a preferable alternative to the Framework Agreement, which many of its lawmakers have openly called to scrap.
The source questioned whether Hezbollah and Israel would continue buying time for opposing strategic objectives or whether US intervention could break the current deadlock in the Rome II negotiations. Trump, the source noted, had promised President Aoun during their meeting in Washington that the United States would provide full support for implementing the Framework Agreement as the only viable path to separating Lebanon's political track from Iran's and preventing the country from remaining hostage to both sides' delaying tactics.
The source also argued that Qassem's renewed call for dialogue is itself another means of buying time. Otherwise, the source asked, what purpose does the initiative serve while Hezbollah simultaneously attacks Aoun and Salam and has largely cut off communication with its political opponents, including many former allies who distanced themselves after the group's intervention in support of Gaza and Iran?
The source recalled that Hezbollah had previously pledged to turn the page on past disputes to facilitate a new political dialogue, but said such talks appear futile as long as Qassem insists on maintaining his current positions while expecting others to negotiate on that basis, without acknowledging that Lebanon's involvement in regional conflicts fundamentally altered the country's political and security landscape.
According to the source, Qassem's attacks on Aoun and Salam reflected his frustration over the government's decision to withdraw the accreditation papers of Mohammad Reza Sheibani, Iran's ambassador-designate to Lebanon. Hezbollah had reportedly hoped a compromise would allow Sheibani to assume his post before August 25, when the courtesy entry visa granted to him upon arrival at Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport expires.
The source added that Hezbollah had already suspended direct dialogue with Aoun, relying instead on occasional contacts through presidential adviser Brigadier General André Rahal, despite assigning MP Hassan Fadlallah responsibility for presidential relations—a role previously handled by Mohammad Raad, head of Hezbollah's parliamentary bloc. No meeting has taken place between Aoun and Fadlallah, the source said, adding that the latter instead launched political attacks against the president, effectively closing the door to reviving dialogue.
As a result, Aoun now holds Hezbollah responsible for the breakdown in communications, arguing that any party seeking dialogue should refrain from making accusations against the head of state. The source said Hezbollah's campaign has only deepened its political isolation by pushing most Lebanese political forces to rally behind Aoun.
The party, the source added, miscalculated in assuming that pressure on the president would persuade him to reverse the government's decision regarding Sheibani's accreditation or ignore the Cabinet's ban on Hezbollah's military and security activities. Lebanon's disputes, the source concluded, cannot be resolved through political pressure but only through dialogue guided by the country's national interest.
The question remains whether Hezbollah and Netanyahu will continue to buy time, or whether US pressure will push the Rome II talks toward implementation measures that restore momentum to the Framework Agreement as the only viable path for leading Lebanon out of its crises.
