Hezbollah cannot buy back Shia support as group promises $14,000 to displaced families

Under the plan presented by Hezbollah Executive Council chairman Ali Damoush, eligible families in Beirut and its southern suburbs will reportedly receive $14,000.

Hezbollah’s financial assistance to displaced families in southern Lebanon, capped at $14,000, is only the first step in a long process if the Iran-backed group hopes to regain the trust and support of Lebanon’s Shia community, Lieutenant-Colonel (res.) Moran Levavoni, a researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS), told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.

Levavoni spoke with the Post a day after Hezbollah announced it would provide up to $14,000 in financial assistance to families whose primary homes were destroyed during this year’s war with Israel.

Under the plan presented by Hezbollah Executive Council chairman Ali Damoush, eligible families in Beirut and its southern suburbs will reportedly receive $14,000, namely $8,000 for furniture and $6,000 for rent. Families elsewhere in Lebanon will reportedly receive $12,000, comprising $8,000 for furniture and $4,000 for rent. The amounts maintain the same rates as in 2024.

The assistance is not extended to families who lost their homes during war in 2006

The assistance has not been extended to those families who lost their homes during Hezbollah’s 34-day war in 2006 and have still not been compensated, Levavoni noted. The war, triggered by a Hezbollah cross-border raid, displaced around one million Lebanese. The Lebanese government estimated direct war damage at $2.8 billion and lost output and income in 2006 at $ 2.2 billion.

While there may have been anger toward Hezbollah at the time, Levavoni argued that the “rift” between Lebanon’s Shia community and Hezbollah widened in 2023, when the terror group decided “to support Gaza on the back of the local population.”

Majority of Lebanese support a deal with Israel, poll says

According to a poll conducted by Statistics Lebanon, a Lebanese public opinion research organization, and published last week, Hezbollah’s standing among the country’s Shia population has weakened significantly. Of the 800 Shia adults surveyed in September, 42.1% expressed disappointment, anger, or concern over Hezbollah’s leadership and conduct.

A majority of respondents, 67.4%, also said they did not believe Hezbollah had achieved any or all of its objectives in the war. Reflecting this apparent lack of confidence, 63.3% supported some form of agreement with Israel, whether through direct negotiations, mediation, or a comprehensive regional deal to end the conflict. Meanwhile, 71.1% said decisions on war and peace should be made solely by Beirut.

Most respondents, 66.4%, also said they would support Hezbollah transferring its weapons to the state, while only around a third said the terrorist group should retain its arsenal.

Hezbollah’s first step toward rebuilding trust should be to compensate those affected by the war, Levavoni said.

“They can try to minimize [the damage] by starting to pay refunds to the population, the people, the families that were away from their homes, and for the damaged villages,” he said. “And only after that, they can start thinking about regaining the trust.”

Despite the damage to Hezbollah’s standing, the organization retains some support among Lebanon’s Shia population. The poll found that 37.1% of respondents still had a high level of trust in Hezbollah, while another 22.4% expressed some trust. Meanwhile, only 38.5% admitted there was some level of distrust.