COLUMN: Netanyahu, Three Fronts — A War Without End Programmed in the Middle East

Introduction: The Declaration That Changes Everything

A ceremonial speech, a doctrine of conquest

On June 25, 2026, before a graduating class of combat officers in southern Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu spoke the words that confirm what many still refused to admit: Israel will remain in Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza without any time limit. Not a declaration of war. Not a declaration of victory. A declaration of permanent occupation. A doctrine carved in stone before applauding soldiers, while the world continues to talk about ceasefires.

The exact words of Netanyahu: "We will remain in Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza for as long as necessary." Translated without diplomatic filter: there is no planned end. There is no withdrawal timeline. There is no political boundary between war and occupation. This is no longer an operation. It is an assumed, declared, claimed state policy.

Minister Katz in echo: posture becomes doctrine

On the same day, Defense Minister Israel Katz publicly confirmed his government's position: "The IDF will remain in the security zones in Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza for an unlimited period." This is not Netanyahu alone. This is the unanimous position of the Israeli security cabinet. One voice, two ministers, one single message: Israel has no intention of leaving.

What is striking is the synchronization. Netanyahu speaks before officers. Katz confirms for the international press. The message is coordinated, calibrated, intentional. This is not a verbal slip from a leader under pressure. It is national strategy communication — directed at allies, enemies, and the Israeli people simultaneously.

The "One Battle After Another" Doctrine: When War Becomes a Way of Life

The origins of a strategy without horizon

The "One Battle After Another" doctrine was not born from October 7, 2023. It was theorized progressively by Netanyahu over the course of his mandates, but it found its clearest expression in the months following the Hamas attacks. The central idea: Israel cannot afford peace if peace means vulnerability. Every threat must be eliminated. Every front must be controlled. And if a new threat emerges, you go after it.

The JINSA (Jewish Institute for National Security of America) has analyzed this doctrine in detail. It rests on three pillars: preemption (strike before being struck), power projection (maintain a military presence projected far from Israel's recognized borders), and unlimited duration (never set a withdrawal date as that signals weakness). It is a coherent doctrine. It is also a doctrine that renders peace structurally impossible.

What Israeli experts themselves say

Journalist Amos Harel of Haaretz has described Netanyahu's victory speeches as "hollow promises" on four separate occasions. This is not a radical left-wing commentator. This is the historic military correspondent of Israel's most respected newspaper. When Harel says Netanyahu promises victories that never come, people listen.

The organization J Street, bringing together major Israeli security experts, published a clear report rejecting Netanyahu's "permanent war" doctrine. Their argument: this strategy exhausts Israel's human and financial resources, radicalizes civilian populations in occupied territories, and deteriorates international alliances in the long term. These are not naive pacifists. These are strategists who see the limits of a doctrine without end.

Gaza: 40 Permanent Military Posts, a Besieged Population

The satellite images that do not lie

On June 3, 2026, Al Jazeera published satellite images revealing that Israel was building new permanent military posts in Gaza. Forty identified positions. Concrete structures. Access roads. Demarcated buffer zones. These are not temporary war camps. These are installations designed to last. Israeli military terminology calls them "security zones." International law terminology calls them occupation.

Israel today controls more than 60% of Gaza's territory, according to assessments by international humanitarian organizations. Population displacement has concentrated hundreds of thousands of civilians in reduced areas without adequate sanitary infrastructure. Netanyahu speaks of security. Field reports speak of critical humanitarian conditions. Both realities coexist, and it is precisely this coexistence that makes the international debate so difficult to resolve.

No political plan, no visible exit

The question no one in Netanyahu's cabinet publicly asks: what is the political plan for Gaza after the military occupation? Who will govern? How will an economy reconstruct in a devastated territory? Who will ensure civilian security if the IDF remains but Hamas is eliminated? The absence of answers to these questions is not an oversight. It is a political choice — deliberately avoiding planning the exit so as not to have to announce it.

American and European experts have repeatedly warned that an occupation without a political plan inevitably generates a new generation of armed resistance. The void left by Hamas will be filled — by whom, using what methods, with what degree of radicalization? These questions remain unanswered in the Netanyahu doctrine. One battle after another. Without asking what comes after the last battle.

Lebanon: Fourth Occupation, Fourth Cycle of Violence

1978, 1982, 2006, 2024: a history that stutters

Israel has invaded or occupied Lebanon four times since 1978. Each time, the security justification was real: missiles, bombs, cross-border attacks. Each time, the occupation lasted longer than expected. Each time, it generated precisely the kind of armed resistance it claimed to crush. Hezbollah itself was born largely in reaction to the Israeli occupation of 1982. It is a lesson history has taught four times. And yet here we are, about to ignore it a fifth time.

The November 2024 ceasefire agreement provided for an Israeli withdrawal within 60 days. That deadline was not respected. Netanyahu extended the military presence. Minister Katz explicitly declared: "We oppose IDF withdrawal from the security zone in Lebanon, despite all existing and future pressures." All pressures. Including those from allies. Including those from the United States.

The buffer zone that becomes a control zone

Israeli forces have established a buffer zone 15 kilometers into Lebanese territory. What Tel Aviv calls a security zone, Beirut and the international community call a violation of sovereignty. Lebanese villages are within this zone. Farmers cannot access their land. Displaced families cannot return home. UN Security Council Resolution 1701 demanded Israeli withdrawal. It is ignored.

What is particularly striking is that even Trump — arguably Israel's most unconditional ally in decades — pushed for an agreement in Lebanon. The November 2024 agreement was partly an American initiative. And Netanyahu circumvented it. When you ignore even your principal ally and financial and military protector, you measure how profoundly the current Israeli government's doctrine is disconnected from any diplomatic constraint.

Syria: Territorial Opportunism in the Name of Security

Assad's fall as a window for expansion

The fall of Bashar al-Assad in December 2024 opened a political and military vacuum in Syria. Israel acted immediately. In the days following the regime's collapse, Israeli forces took control of the Golan buffer zone and advanced beyond the demarcation line established since 1974. In total, Israel now controls a zone of 15 kilometers in recognized Syrian territory, beyond the annexed Golan.

The official justification: preventing pro-Iranian armed groups from settling in the zone, recovering chemical and conventional weapons left behind by the routed Syrian army. These are legitimate security concerns. But Israel also struck hundreds of targets in Syria over a few weeks — military bases, weapons depots, infrastructure — well beyond what immediate security would require. This is the strategic exploitation of a moment of a neighbor's weakness.

The new Syrian government protests, the world watches

The new Syrian government led by the forces that toppled Assad has formally protested against Israel's military presence in Syria. The Arab League condemned it. The European Union expressed concerns. The United States was far more discreet. And Netanyahu held his course: presence unlimited, justification security-based, diplomatic discussions conditional on demilitarization of the zone by the Syrian government — a condition the latter has neither the means nor the internal legitimacy to satisfy immediately.

What is happening in Syria looks dangerously like a territorial fait accompli dressed up as a temporary measure. You occupy. You secure. You declare you're not leaving. You wait for the world to get used to it. It is precisely the logic Netanyahu has applied in the West Bank for years with illegal settlements under international law. Syria may simply be the next chapter of a book whose ending has been written for a long time.

The US-Iran Agreement and Israel: A Fracture in the Alliance

The June 17 MoU and Tel Aviv's reaction

On June 17, 2026, the United States and Iran signed a nuclear memorandum of understanding (MoU). The agreement provided for a significant reduction of Iran's nuclear program in exchange for progressive sanctions relief. For Washington, this is a diplomatic victory that moves the scenario of a nuclearized Iran further away. For Tel Aviv, it is a potential betrayal.

Netanyahu responded by maintaining his declaration of permanent occupation — as a direct signal to Washington that the American-Iranian agreement does not change Israeli policy. The timing is not coincidental. Eight days after the MoU was signed, Netanyahu publicly repeats: Israel is withdrawing from nowhere. The underlying message is clear: even if the United States has found common ground with Tehran, Israel retains its total freedom of action and does not consider itself bound by the diplomatic implications of that agreement.

An alliance fraying under pressure

The relationship between Israel and the United States is transforming. Under Trump, it experienced a phase of near-total alignment. But the agreement with Iran, the pressures for withdrawal from Lebanon, the growing criticism in the US Congress — even among some Republicans — about the humanitarian cost of the war in Gaza: all of this is creating new friction. Netanyahu seems to calculate that Israel can maintain its course independently of Washington's preferences, as long as military aid continues to flow.

This calculation may be sound in the short term. It is risky in the medium term. American military aid to Israel amounts to several billion dollars annually. It requires Congressional votes. And unconditional support for Israel is no longer as monolithic a position within the Republican Party as it was five years ago. If Netanyahu pushes his de facto independence too far, he risks finding himself one day without the military support that makes it possible.

International Pressure: Rejected, Ignored, Circumvented

International law as background scenery

UN Security Council resolutions accumulate. Resolution 1701 on Lebanon. Multiple resolutions on Gaza. Decisions by the International Court of Justice. Netanyahu considers them, according to his own declarations, unacceptable constraints on Israel's right to defend itself. This is not a new Israeli position — it dates back to the founding of the state. But the current scale of rejection, on three simultaneous fronts, is unprecedented in decades.

The International Criminal Court has issued an arrest warrant against Netanyahu for alleged war crimes in Gaza. Several European countries would be legally required to arrest him if he traveled to their territory. Netanyahu no longer travels freely in Europe. This is not a symbolic sanction. It is a real break with the diplomatic normalcy of the past fifty years.

A divided European Union, silent Arab states

The European Union is deeply divided over Israel. Countries like Hungary and the Czech Republic unconditionally support Tel Aviv. Countries like Spain, Ireland, and Belgium have recognized the Palestinian state and condemned Israeli operations. There is no unified European policy, which concretely means there is no coherent European pressure. Netanyahu exploits this division masterfully.

As for the Arab states that had begun normalization with Israel — the Abraham Accords signed under Trump — the situation is delicate. Saudi Arabia has suspended its normalization discussions. The United Arab Emirates maintain their relations but avoid public statements of support. Bahrain stays silent. The regional dynamic that seemed to be pointing toward Israel's integration into the Arab Middle East is frozen. Perhaps permanently frozen.

Israel's Communication Strategy: Film to Justify

The image war as a parallel front

The Israeli army has developed a sophisticated communications strategy since October 7, 2023. Every strike on a military target is documented, explained, accompanied by a map or video. Every operation is presented with its tactical context. The IDF has a communications machine in English, French, Spanish, Arabic — designed for international audiences. This is a direct response to the lessons of 2006 and 2009, when Israel lost the battle for global public opinion.

This strategy is effective with certain audiences. Less so with others. Images of destruction in Gaza circulate equally on social media, often amplified by pro-Hamas or pro-Iranian actors but also by independent journalists and credible humanitarian organizations. The narrative war is as intense as the war on the ground. And in this war, Netanyahu wins tactical battles but loses ground long-term in world opinion.

Information control in occupied zones

Independent journalists' access to Gaza remains extremely restricted. Most reporting on the humanitarian situation in Gaza comes from local Palestinian journalists, often at the risk of their lives — several dozen have been killed since the conflict began. The organization Reporters Without Borders has documented Israel as one of the countries responsible for the most journalist deaths in this conflict.

In Lebanon and Syria, access to Israeli-controlled zones is similarly limited. This control of information in occupation zones is not unique to Israel — other armies do the same. But combined with the declaration of permanent occupation, it raises a legitimate question: if the presence is indefinite, who will document its effects on civilian populations? The international right of scrutiny over a supposedly temporary occupation disappears when the occupation becomes permanent and assumed.

Civilian Casualties: The Silence of the Body Count

Numbers contested without being refuted

Gaza's Ministry of Health — administered by Hamas, which creates a real credibility conflict — reports tens of thousands of civilian deaths since October 2023. Independent organizations like Airwars and academic institutions have attempted to cross-reference these figures with other sources. Estimates vary, but the trend is consistent: a high proportion of victims are civilians, including women and children.

Israel methodically contests these figures — questioning the distinction between combatants and civilians, highlighting Hamas's use of civilian infrastructure as shields. These challenges have a partial factual basis: Hamas does indeed use civilian populations for protection. But they do not erase the legal responsibility of the Israeli army to apply the principle of proportionality in international humanitarian law, regardless of the adversary's behavior.

The normalization of grief in Israeli and Arab opinion

What strikes me most is the simultaneous normalization of grief on both sides. In Israel, the families of hostages still held in Gaza demonstrate every week. The trauma of October 7 remains vivid, present, painful. And at the same time, in Arab countries, in Palestinian diaspora communities, the deaths in Gaza are mourned, documented, carried as a collective burden. Both griefs are real. Both are legitimate. And they do not speak to each other.

Netanyahu capitalizes precisely on this separation of realities. He speaks to his electorate in the language of trauma and survival. Arab governments speak to their populations in the language of solidarity and injustice. Between the two, there is no bridge. No common narrative. No shared political project that would allow imagining something other than permanent war.

The Hostages: A Just Moral Cause Used as a Political Shield

A legitimate cause used as political cover

There are Israeli hostages still held in Gaza since October 7, 2023. This is a human reality of absolute gravity. Families have been waiting for months, sometimes more than a year and a half, not knowing whether their loved ones are alive. These families deserve all the political and moral support a society can offer. And Netanyahu uses their cause — legitimately at first — as justification for his entire military policy.

The problem, documented by several hostage families themselves, is that the Netanyahu government has on multiple occasions refused or sabotaged release agreements that could have brought hostages home in exchange for a ceasefire. Hostage family members have demonstrated against Netanyahu, accusing him of prioritizing the continuation of the war over the return of their loved ones. This is not an accusation from the opposition or hostile media. It is the complaint of direct victims.

When protecting the hostages justifies permanent occupation

The argument advanced by Netanyahu: Israel cannot withdraw its forces as long as the hostages are not released. This is a position with its own internal logic. But it creates a vicious circle: Israel will not accept a ceasefire without the release of hostages, and Hamas will not release hostages without a ceasefire and commitment to Israeli withdrawal. This circle has no exit unless one of the parties breaks its position.

The June 25 declaration does not break this circle. It solidifies it. If Israel remains "without any time limit," there is no incentive for Hamas to negotiate a hostage release in exchange for a withdrawal that will never come. The logic of Netanyahu's permanent war is perhaps his worst betrayal of the hostage families he claims to be protecting.

The Arab World's Response: Paralysis and Complicity

Governments caught between two fires

Moderate Arab governments — Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE — are in an impossible position. Their populations are deeply sympathetic to the Palestinians. Their strategic interests align them with the West and with the regional stability that a managed relationship with Israel represents, in their view. This tension between domestic public opinion and pragmatic foreign policy paralyzes them.

Egypt, which shares a border with Gaza and regularly negotiates hostage release agreements, has maintained its relations with Israel while publicly condemning military operations. Jordan, which has had a peace treaty with Israel since 1994 and a 500-kilometer common border, walks on eggshells. Saudi Arabia has conditioned any normalization on concrete progress toward a Palestinian state — a condition that Netanyahu categorically refuses in the current context.

Iran as indirect beneficiary of chaos

There is a cruel paradox in the current dynamic: Iran is one of the main beneficiaries of Netanyahu's policy. By keeping the conflict active on three fronts, Israel prevents any normalization between moderate Sunni Arab states and Tel Aviv — a normalization that would have isolated Tehran. By refusing any political plan for Gaza, Israel guarantees that the Palestinian cause remains a mobilization vector for pro-Iranian movements throughout the region.

And meanwhile, Iran has signed a nuclear memorandum of understanding with the United States. Tehran has obtained implicit recognition of its right to a supervised civilian nuclear presence, in exchange for non-proliferation guarantees. This is a result that Netanyahu fought against with all his diplomatic strength and could not prevent. The Netanyahu doctrine has maximized military pressure on its proxy enemies — Hamas, Hezbollah, Syrian militias — but has not prevented the diplomatic rise of its principal adversary.

The Human and Economic Cost for Israel Itself

A society under strain since October 2023

Israeli society has been bearing a state of permanent war for more than thirty months. Reservists mobilized for extended periods, often at the expense of their professional and family lives. Internal tensions between advocates of a negotiated solution and advocates of military continuation. An economy affected by declining tourism, the halt of activities in certain northern zones, colossal military costs, and the deterioration of Israel's sovereign credit rating by international agencies.

The Israeli military budget has reached record levels. American aid compensates for part of this cost, but not all. Israeli arms exports — a major economic sector — have been disrupted by boycotts and export restrictions imposed by certain European countries. Israeli tech, one of the economy's pillars, is experiencing international recruitment difficulties, with some foreign engineers refusing to work in a country under an international arrest warrant.

The internal fractures that war temporarily masks

Before October 7, 2023, Israel was going through a deep political crisis over Netanyahu's judicial reform — a reform that had put hundreds of thousands of demonstrators in the streets for months. That crisis has not disappeared. It was suspended by the urgency of war. But Israeli political experts know it will resume with all its virulence when — if ever — the war calms down.

Netanyahu knows this too. A peace, a real ceasefire, a military withdrawal: that would bring the judicial reform back to the surface, the corruption charges against him, the ongoing investigations. The war is also a screen for him. It unifies. It justifies. It postpones. One battle after another applies not only to Israel's enemies. It applies also to Netanyahu's internal political opponents.

Scenarios for Tomorrow: Three Possible Futures

Indefinite continuation: the most probable in the short term

The most likely scenario in the six-to-twelve-month horizon is the continuation of current policy: occupation maintained on all three fronts, low-intensity combat compared to the peaks of 2023-2024, diplomatic pressures absorbed or ignored, sporadic and unproductive negotiations on the hostages. This is the status quo of permanent war — neither total victory nor defeat, but an occupation that normalizes in practice while remaining illegal in law.

This scenario is politically viable for Netanyahu as long as the governing coalition holds and American military aid continues to flow. It is humanly unsustainable for the civilian populations in occupied zones. And it is silently accumulating the conditions for the next explosion — a new radicalized generation, devastated economies, destroyed infrastructure.

Political change in Israel: necessary but uncertain

The second scenario requires a change of government in Israel. Polls show strong opposition to Netanyahu — a majority of Israelis want early elections, according to several polls conducted in 2025-2026. But the Israeli electoral system, proportional and fragmented, makes forming an alternative government extremely complex. And Israeli opposition parties are not necessarily advocates of rapid withdrawal — they often criticize the management of the war, not its objectives.

A different government in Israel does not automatically mean peace. But it could significantly change the diplomatic dynamic. An Israeli Prime Minister who is not under an international arrest warrant, who does not need far-right ministers to maintain his coalition, and who can travel freely to Washington and Europe would have much more room to explore negotiated exits.

Palestinian and Israeli Youth: Two Generations Prisoners of the Conflict

Children born in war who know nothing but war

There is a dimension of this crisis that geopolitical analyses struggle to fully capture: the impact on the generations growing up in this conflict. Children born in Gaza after October 7, 2023 have known only war, destruction, displacement. Children born in Israel after October 7 are growing up with the traumatic memory of the attacks, the fear of rockets, the absence of reservists from their families. These two parallel youths, who do not speak to each other, who do not know each other, are the human material of the conflict's next generation.

Radicalization is not an abstract phenomenon. It is manufactured in bombed schools, in bereaved families, in humiliations suffered at checkpoints, in stories of fear transmitted from parents to children. A military occupation that will last — according to Netanyahu — "as long as necessary, without any time limit" does not create the conditions for a de-escalation of these radicalities. It guarantees them. Every additional year of prolonged occupation is another year of radicalization of the next generation.

What a common future would require — if anyone dared imagine it

The rare Jewish-Arab coexistence programs that still exist — civil associations, educational projects, shared artistic initiatives — are marginal in the current context. But they persist. Israelis and Palestinians continue, outside any political structure, to work together, share spaces, imagine a different future. This is not a political solution. It is a sign of life. A refusal to let the governments' conflict entirely define the relationship between peoples.

Building lasting peace — in ten years, in twenty years, if that possibility ever opens — will require precisely this foundation: Israelis and Palestinians capable of seeing each other as human beings rather than abstract enemies. The Netanyahu doctrine does not build this foundation. It erodes it methodically, occupation after occupation, trauma after trauma. That may be its heaviest cost: not only the lives lost today, but peace made more difficult tomorrow.

Conclusion: A Doctrine Without Exit, a Burden for the Future

When "as long as necessary" means forever

Netanyahu's declaration of June 25, 2026 may not be retained in history books as the speech that changed everything. It contains no revelation: Israel has maintained its military positions for months despite pressure. But it put into words what was only a de facto policy. It publicly assumed what the facts on the ground already showed. And in international politics, words carry weight. Saying "without any time limit" is officially closing diplomatic doors.

The Middle East will one day emerge from this cycle. The history of deep regional conflicts — Northern Ireland, the Balkans, South Africa — shows that there is always, eventually, a political tipping point that makes the unthinkable possible. But these tipping points require actors who have a vision beyond their own political survival. They require leaders capable of speaking to their adversaries. They require political courage where the current doctrine sees only battles to be won.

The responsibility of spectators: not resigning ourselves

Faced with a declared and assumed doctrine of permanent war, the most dangerous response is resignation. Telling ourselves it is too complex, it has lasted too long, nothing can change. That would be abandoning civilian populations — Israeli, Lebanese, Syrian, Palestinian — to a fate presented as inevitable but which is, in reality, the result of human political choices, reversible, modifiable.

Columnists, journalists, engaged citizens have a role to play: refusing the normalization of disaster. Continuing to ask the uncomfortable questions. Continuing to demand transparency about what is happening in the occupied zones. Continuing to remind that international law is not a decorative ornament but the only framework that allows different peoples to coexist without destroying each other. Netanyahu has chosen his doctrine. History will choose its verdict.

Signed Maxime Marquette, columnist

Columnist's transparency box

Editorial positioning

This column expresses a personal point of view on Netanyahu's declaration of June 25, 2026 regarding Israeli military presence in Lebanon, Syria, and Gaza. It does not claim neutrality — a column is not a factual report. It is based on verifiable facts and sources cited in the Sources section, but the interpretation is the columnist's own.

The columnist considers that Netanyahu's permanent war doctrine carries serious risks for regional stability and for Israel itself, independently of the legitimacy of Israel's initial security concerns. This position is assumed and transparent.

Limits and zones of uncertainty

Several aspects of the Middle East situation remain opaque, particularly what is concretely happening in the occupied zones on a daily basis, the secret negotiations on the hostages, and the actual private positions of the American administration. This column works with publicly available and verifiable information at the time of writing, namely June 26, 2026.

Any factual error reported will be corrected. The interpretive positions, on the other hand, belong to the register of opinion and will only be modified in the presence of new substantive facts, not on the basis of ideological disagreements.

Sources

Primary sources

Al Jazeera — Netanyahu: "We will remain in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza as long as required" — June 25, 2026

Middle East Eye — Israeli forces to remain in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza without time limit — June 25, 2026

Al Jazeera — Israel is building more military posts in Gaza, satellite imagery shows — June 3, 2026

The Guardian — Israel Katz: IDF will stay in Lebanon security zones despite all pressures — June 15, 2026

Secondary sources

JINSA — One Battle After Another: Netanyahu's New Security Doctrine — 2026

J Street — Top Israeli Security Experts Reject Netanyahu's Forever War Doctrine — 2026

Adnkronos/Financial Times — One Battle After Another: The New Netanyahu Doctrine — April 1, 2026