Hezbollah announced on Tuesday an aid programme for Lebanese who lost their homes in the war with Israel, with benefits capped at $14,000 per household, despite US and Lebanese sanctions on the militant group.
The announcement also comes despite US sanctions on Iran, which backs Hezbollah with weapons and resources, and tighter controls by the Lebanese authorities on Hezbollah's funding and supply routes, after the group emerged significantly weakened from two wars with Israel since October 2023.
At a press conference in Beirut's southern suburbs, the head of Hezbollah's Executive Council, Ali Daamouch, announced assistance of up to $14,000 per household for residents of Beirut and its southern suburbs, and $12,000 for other regions.
The assistance will go to displaced people whose homes have been destroyed or made uninhabitable, and to residents of areas in the south occupied by Israel, on the condition that beneficiaries do not have a second home, Daamouch said.
“The aim of the project is to support those directly affected who have been displaced from homes that have been destroyed or damaged and who do not have alternative accommodation,” he said.
Hezbollah will pay the assistance in four instalments over the course of a year, he added, without specifying the source of the funds or the number of beneficiaries the Shia movement can cover.
The aid announcement was the first from Hezbollah since it drew Lebanon deeper into war with Israel on 2 March in support of Iran, which the US and Israel began attacking on 28 February. Israel had already been striking southern Lebanon before that.
In December 2024, after an earlier war with Israel in support of Gaza, Hezbollah announced similar assistance worth $77 million to the displaced, describing it as a "a gift from the Iranian people and Hezbollah".
During the press conference, Daamoush said that "reconstruction and providing shelter for displaced people are the responsibility of the state," adding that the issue "must be kept out of political calculations". Hezbollah's critics say the state must not bear the burden for a war it did not choose.
Israeli attacks since 2023 have destroyed or damaged more than 290,000 homes, according to provisional figures from Lebanese authorities, particularly in the south of the country and in Beirut's southern suburbs, strongholds of Hezbollah.
The total cost of the two wars could exceed $27 billion, Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said in September, citing World Bank estimates.
He said the state, already reeling under a crushing financial crisis for the past seven years, does not have the means to rebuild southern regions destroyed by the war.
Despite a US-backed framework agreement signed between Lebanon and Israel in late June, Israeli strikes and demolitions have continued in southern Lebanon.