Smoke rises after an Israeli strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs, following an escalation between Hezbollah and Israel amid the US-Israeli conflict with Iran, Lebanon. Photo: REUTERS/Mohamed Azakir

Hezbollah is exploiting Lebanon’s health-care system as a shielded pillar of its terrorist infrastructure, embedding its operatives within ambulances and medical facilities while expanding its operational reach — as fragile negotiations between Beirut and Jerusalem continue.

On Monday, the Alma Research and Education Center, which focuses on Israel’s security challenges along its northern border with Lebanon, released a study exposing how Hezbollah’s health system — while presented as civilian and humanitarian in nature — operates in practice as a central pillar of the Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group’s military apparatus.

As Israel stepped up its offensive campaign against Hezbollah, international media outlets have repeatedly accused the Israeli government of deliberately targeting medical personnel, ambulances, and hospitals over the course of the conflict.

However, the newly released report shows that Hezbollah’s health organizations are part of a coordinated system in which civilian sectors — education, welfare, and health-care — are mobilized to support and advance military operations.

Under this framework, health-care personnel are systematically embedded within the group’s military apparatus, at times operating alongside its forces and even taking part in operations.

Functioning as Hezbollah’s de facto Ministry of Health, the Islamic Health Organization sits at the center of the terrorist group’s medical network, running hospitals, clinics, and emergency services that fill the void left by Lebanon’s collapsing public system.

However, beyond their civilian appearance, these medical bodies also serve clear military roles, operating as Hezbollah’s integrated medical corps embedded with its forces.

Like much of the country’s medical infrastructure, ambulances and facilities have also been used to transport operatives and weapons, and at times to store arms or function as mobile command posts.

The report explains that this overlap is deliberate, part of a broader system designed to enable operational flexibility while exploiting the protected status of medical actors.

This “human shield” tactic — in which military assets are placed within civilian environments — is meant to complicate strikes, raise political costs, and undermine the legitimacy of Israeli action.

Under international law, medical facilities and personnel retain protected status only so long as they are not engaged in military activity.

Hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel reignited on March 2, when the terrorist group opened fire in support of Iran two days after the start of the joint US-Israeli military campaign against the Iranian regime. 

Since then, Israeli forces have established a “buffer zone” extending 5 to 10 km (3 to 6 miles) into Lebanese territory, which officials say is meant to shield northern residents from Hezbollah attacks amid thousands of rockets and drones fired throughout the war.

Earlier this month, the United States brokered a 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon. The deal was separate from Washington’s efforts to de-escalate tensions with Iran, though Tehran had pushed for Lebanon to be included in any broader framework for stopping hostilities.

Last week, US President Donald Trump announced a three-week extension of the truce to allow more time for negotiations and diplomatic efforts.

Even though the US-backed ceasefire has sharply reduced violence, negotiations and prospects for lasting peace remain fragile, with Israeli forces still launching strikes while positioned in southern Lebanon to maintain its buffer zone and dismantle Hezbollah infrastructure.

For its part, the Iranian proxy has repeatedly said it has “the right to resist” what it calls occupying forces, while rejecting direct negotiations between Beirut and Jerusalem and any resulting agreements. Meanwhile, Hezbollah has kept up its drone and rocket attacks against northern Israel as well as Israeli troops in Lebanon.

On Monday, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem reiterated that the group will not give up its weapons and opposes Israel-Lebanon peace talks, reaffirming its stance despite international pressure.

“These direct negotiations and their outcomes are as if they do not exist for us, and they do not concern us in the slightest,” the terrorist leader said in a statement.

“We will continue our defensive resistance for Lebanon and its people. No matter how much the enemy threatens, we will not back down, we will not bow down, and we will not be defeated,” Qassem continued.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun seemingly lashed out at Hezbollah’s continued defiance of his government, indirectly calling the group “traitors.”

“What we are doing is not treason. Traitors are those who drag their country into war to serve foreign interests,” the Lebanese leader said in a statement. 

“My goal is to bring an end to the war with Israel, similar to the ceasefire agreement. I will not agree to reach a humiliating agreement,” Aoun continued.

The Lebanese government agreed to disarm Hezbollah as part of a previous US-brokered ceasefire with Israel. However, Israeli leaders have expressed frustration with Beirut’s inability to follow through, in part over fear of igniting a civil war inside Lebanon, arguing Israel’s military will do the job by force if necessary.