Israel Lebanon peace study examined 18 years of UN meetings
A study by Monash University and Sciences Po found that 18 years of United Nations meetings helped curb Israel-Lebanon border friction but did not solve the wider conflict. The researchers reviewed talks held from 2006 to 2023 between Israeli and Lebanese military officials.
The paper, titled Rituals without Rapprochement? Managing Hostility at the Tripartite Meetings in the United Nations Mission in Lebanon, examined the Tripartite Meetings run by the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, or UNIFIL. Those sessions brought together the Israel Defence Force, the Lebanese Armed Forces and UNIFIL representatives.
Following the end of the 2006 Israel-Hizballah War ceasefire process, the meetings began as an ad hoc arrangement on the exact day the UN ceasefire took effect. After that, they took place every four to six weeks for 18 years, until 2023.
Monash and Sciences Po study
According to the study, that routine created predictable habits and turned the process into a ritual. The authors found that the format reduced day-to-day tension and helped civilians maintain normal life in UNIFIL’s area of operation.
Dr Vanessa F. Newby from Monash University’s School of Social Sciences said technical deconfliction could not replace a political settlement. She said the meetings contained escalation at a tactical level while leaving the conditions for future violence in place.
Newby said, “In the absence of a wider political settlement, the meetings helped contain escalation at the tactical level, while the underlying conditions for future violence remained in place, at times allowing antagonistic emotions, including mutual blame, resentment and victimhood to fester.”
For 18 years, the international community often treated the Tripartite Meetings as proof that arch enemies could engage in peace talks. However, the research found that the strict choreography used to keep the meetings going also narrowed what participants could discuss.
Professor Chiara Ruffa from the Centre for International Research, or CERI, at Sciences Po found that the priority shifted toward keeping both sides in the room. In her assessment, that focus created a false sense of progress toward peace.
Ruffa said the long calm on the border removed immediate triggers for conflict. As a result, the Israel Defence Forces and Hizballah had a decades-long window to rebuild military strength and reset strategy for a future war.
The authors said the findings are not a simple failure verdict on UNIFIL. Instead, the study argues that a mission working in a highly constrained political environment could manage hostility, but it could not fix deeper grievances on its own.
Meanwhile, the study offers a lesson for current Middle East diplomacy. Bringing adversaries into the same room matters, but it is not the same as resolving the political conditions that make renewed violence possible.
