The Blogs: Sovereignty Is Not a Privilege. It Is a Liability.

If Rockets Come from Lebanon, Why Should Israel Care Who Fired Them?

In a June 21, 2026 interview on Channel 14, Israeli National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir declared:

Lebanon, all of Lebanon, should become our playground. All of Lebanon should be our target.
And they tell me, ‘Wait a second, there is Lebanon and there is Hezbollah.’
I do not accept this artificial approach.

His remarks were widely condemned.

Many news reports portrayed the statement as extreme because it allegedly blurred the distinction between Lebanon and Hezbollah. Some commentators argued that such rhetoric validates Hezbollah’s narrative that the organization is inseparable from the Lebanese state.

Yet I find myself agreeing with the core principle underlying Ben-Gvir’s statement.

Not because I believe Lebanon and Hezbollah are literally the same entity.

Rather, because I do not believe the distinction is particularly relevant to the question of responsibility.

The real question is simple:

Why should Israel care?

Why should Israel care whether the rockets were launched by Hezbollah, a militia, a political movement, a revolutionary guard, a tribal army, or some other armed organization?

The only reason Israel should care about Hezbollah’s identity is the same reason every nation studies its adversaries: to know its enemy, understand its capabilities, and defend itself more effectively.

Beyond that, Hezbollah’s internal relationship with Lebanon is fundamentally Lebanon’s problem.

My position is straightforward:

A state is fully responsible for hostile acts originating from its territory, regardless of its internal political arrangements or inability to control non-state actors.

Or, put differently:

Sovereignty is not merely a privilege. It is a liability.

If a state claims sovereignty over territory, it assumes full responsibility for what occurs there.

This principle is not unique to Lebanon.

Imagine Iran claiming that attacks against Israel are not the responsibility of Iran but only of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Few would accept such an argument.

But the problem goes even deeper.

Once responsibility depends on internal organizational distinctions, states acquire a powerful incentive to blur those distinctions deliberately. A government could create, sponsor, tolerate, arm, or coordinate with a nominally independent organization and then claim that the organization’s actions are not the state’s responsibility.

In such a system, the separation itself becomes a strategic asset.

The more ambiguous the relationship, the easier it becomes to deny responsibility.

The state can enjoy the benefits of hostile action while avoiding the costs. It can support aggression, influence events, and pressure its adversaries while insisting that someone else pulled the trigger.

This creates an obvious moral hazard. If plausible deniability reduces responsibility, governments have an incentive to cultivate plausible deniability.

The target state is then drawn into endless debates about organizational charts, chains of command, degrees of influence, and internal political arrangements. Was the attack carried out by the government, by a militia, by a proxy, by a revolutionary guard, by a resistance movement, or by some semi-autonomous armed faction?

From the target state’s perspective, these distinctions may be interesting. They may even be important for intelligence purposes.

But they do not change the fundamental fact that the attack originated from territory under the sovereignty of a state.

That is why I prefer a simpler principle:

A sovereign state is fully responsible for hostile acts originating from its territory.

Such a rule leaves far less room for gamesmanship, ambiguity, and plausible deniability.

Likewise, if a government cannot prevent a heavily armed organization from operating freely, launching attacks, stockpiling weapons, and exercising military power from its territory, that failure does not eliminate responsibility. It creates responsibility.

Indeed, if inability to control armed groups were accepted as an excuse, sovereignty would become a one-way street. States would enjoy all the rights of sovereignty while avoiding its obligations.

The common response is that Lebanon is weak, fragmented, and unable to control Hezbollah.

But that argument raises an uncomfortable question.

If a state cannot control a significant portion of its territory, cannot monopolize the use of force, and cannot prevent cross-border attacks, in what meaningful sense is it exercising sovereignty over that territory?

International law may continue to recognize such a state as sovereign. As I have argued in The Most Misunderstood Law in the World, what is commonly referred to as “international law” is better understood as a system of political commitments among states rather than a consistently binding legal order in the domestic sense.

But even if one accepts its framework on its own terms, legal recognition does not erase responsibility.

The distinction between Lebanon and Hezbollah may matter to diplomats, journalists, academics, and international lawyers.

For Israel, however, the central fact remains unchanged.

The attacks originate from Lebanese territory.

The sovereign recognized by the world as exercising authority over that territory is Lebanon.

Responsibility therefore rests with Lebanon.

This is not because Lebanon and Hezbollah are identical.

It is because sovereignty without responsibility is not sovereignty at all.

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