- 11:35
Hezbollah and its global Intifada allies claim that the overwhelming majority of Lebanese, Arabs, and people of conscience view Israel as pure evil, a cancer to be eradicated. Yet if this hatred is truly so deep and universal, why does Lebanon still need to enforce its heavy-handed law boycotting Israel?
The statute criminalizes any contact with Israelis, threatening offenders with up to ten years of hard labor. Genuine popular revulsion should not require such coercion. The law therefore exposes a core falsehood about attitudes toward Israel in Lebanon. Without state enforcement, many Lebanese would choose to engage with the Jewish state.
Passed in June 1955 as part of the Arab boycott regime against Israel at the time, the statute is overly broad and ambiguous. It forbids any Lebanese—directly or indirectly—from entering into any transaction, whether financial, cultural, intellectual, or of “any other nature whatsoever,” with individuals or entities in Israel or working in its interests. Israeli goods are banned outright.
While on paper the law’s enforcement falls under a special boycott office supervised by the Ministry of Economy, in practice it has metastasized. Lebanon’s courts have paired the law with penal codes on “contact with the enemy,” turning even a WhatsApp message, a social media interaction, an academic exchange, or a journalistic interview into potential treason. Penalties include hard labor, fines, blacklisting, and asset seizure.
In recent years, the law has been weaponized against journalists, activists, artists, opposition figures, and anyone who dares to question Hezbollah’s monopoly on thought. But if anti-Israel sentiment were truly the spontaneous will of the Lebanese people, none of this machinery would be necessary. Citizens would simply shun Israelis. Instead, the Hezbollah-dominated state threatens them with prison to suppress natural human curiosity, economic self-interest, and political dissent. Rather than protecting a national consensus, the law manufactures one.
The Hezbollah regime also tightly controls Lebanese access to information. Disney’s 2025 film Snow White was banned from Lebanese cinemas simply because it stars Gal Gadot, an Israeli. Israeli news websites are blocked. In bookstores, titles deemed positive toward Israel cannot be found. In 1996, then-Prime Minister Rafic Hariri had to personally intervene to allow the import from Jordan of the Arabic translation of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s book A Place Among the Nations.
As a result, the main sources available to Lebanese readers on Israel are often the works of Edward Said, Noam Chomsky, and Norman Finkelstein, all fiercely anti-Israel. Chomsky and Finkelstein have both appeared multiple times on Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television and have met with the late Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. Alongside these works, readers can also readily purchase Hitler’s Mein Kampf.
With such a tightly curated diet of information and a total ban on direct communication with Israelis, one would expect monolithic hatred on the “Lebanese street.” Yet a survey of 500 Lebanese conducted in late March found no such consensus. Only 42 percent opposed peace with Israel, while 32 percent supported it and 25 percent were undecided. In a country where information and contact are so heavily restricted, the fact that support for peace is already within striking distance of a majority is remarkable.
Public opinion in a free society should not be treated as a fixed element of national identity. It should be shaped by open debate and by the interests of the people. Repealing the 1955 boycott law would finally allow peace advocates to campaign openly and explain why ending this self-imposed isolation serves Lebanon’s national interest.
The U.S. is reportedly pressing Lebanon to scrap the law as part of Beirut’s ongoing talks with Jerusalem. While this external pressure is welcome, the decision ultimately rests with Lebanon’s Parliament. Repealing this archaic statute would assert Lebanon’s sovereignty and the liberties of its people. In a free country, the state has no right to dictate whom its citizens may speak to.
This does not mean abandoning legitimate national security concerns. Laws against treason remain essential. Any Lebanese who pledges allegiance to Israel or materially aids it against Lebanon should face justice. But simply talking to Israelis or visiting Israel is not treason.
By contrast, pledging allegiance to a foreign power, such as Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, is textbook treason. Hezbollah and its fighters should be forced to choose: sever their ties with Tehran or face prosecution. The Lebanese must then stand at an equal distance from Israel, Iran, and all other nations in the region.
Repealing the 1955 boycott law would be an act of national liberation. It would free the Lebanese people from an outdated ideology enforced by coercion rather than conviction. If hatred of Israel is truly overwhelming and natural, it will survive without the force of law. If it is not, and mounting evidence suggests many Lebanese are open to a different path, then genuine engagement with Israel can begin.
Hezbollah claims to speak for the masses. The time has come to let the Lebanese people speak for themselves.
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