Assessing Lebanon’s Costs: Latest Israel-Hezbollah War’s Economic and Human Impact
Lebanon’s War Toll: Human, Structural, and Economic Consequences
BEIRUT, June 16 (Reuters) - Lebanon has suffered the deadliest spillover of the regional war triggered by the U.S.-Israeli strikes on Iran more than three months ago, which is set to end with a deal between Washington and Tehran.
The conflict spread to Lebanon on March 2, when Iran-backed group Hezbollah fired on Israel in support of Tehran, triggering an Israeli air and ground campaign.
Here are some of the main costs for Lebanon.
Casualties
Human Losses and Injuries
From March 2 until June 14, the night the U.S.-Iran deal was announced, at least 3,783 people were killed and 11,699 wounded in Lebanon, according to the country's health ministry. The death toll included 247 children, 363 women and 133 healthcare workers. The ministry's figures do not distinguish between civilians and combatants, and Hezbollah has not said how many of its fighters were killed.
The toll surpasses the 3,468 killed in Iran as of late April, when a U.S.-Iran ceasefire was reached.
It is also higher than the ministry's figures for the last Israel-Hezbollah conflict, which lasted from October 2023 to November 2024. That war saw 3,768 people killed, the vast majority of whom were killed after Israel went on the offensive in September 2024.
Israeli Casualties in Lebanon
At least 28 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Lebanon in the latest war, according to a Reuters tally of Israeli military announcements, while four civilians have been killed in Hezbollah attacks. That compares with 73 Israeli soldiers and 45 civilians in northern Israel in the 2023-2024 war.
Destruction
Damage to Infrastructure and Housing
Israel's airstrikes have damaged and destroyed buildings across Lebanon. Most of the damage has been concentrated in the south, but buildings were also destroyed in the capital and its southern suburbs.
Israeli troops occupying a southern swathe of the country have also flattened dozens of villages there, saying their aim is to keep residents of northern Israel safe from attacks by Hezbollah fighters embedded in civilian areas.
Buildings damaged in the south within the first month of the war included hospitals, power stations and water pumping stations.
Extent and Cost of Damage
The latest figures from Lebanon's National Council for Scientific Research, which cover the period from March 2 until May 17, show that more than 68,000 housing units across the country have been damaged or destroyed. Nearly 30,000 of those units are in the three southernmost districts of Lebanon, and more than 8,000 in Beirut and its southern suburbs.
In a report published this month, the United Nations Development Programme said that in Beirut and the southern suburbs alone, the damage amounted to $365 million.
Displacement
Scale of Displacement
More than 1.2 million people have been displaced by Israel's airstrikes and evacuation warnings across Lebanon since March 2, according to Lebanese authorities.
They include hundreds of thousands of people who fled Beirut's southern suburbs, which Israel's military ordered entirely evacuated for the first time during this war.
Return and Ongoing Challenges
Even after the announcement of the U.S.-Iran deal, many displaced did not return home - either because they had no homes to return to or because they were sceptical the ceasefire would hold in Lebanon.
Economic Impact
Macroeconomic Consequences
Lebanon's authorities have not yet assessed the full scale of the war's economic impact, but have said that it derailed the country's recovery from a series of recent crises, including the 2023-2024 war, the Beirut port blast of 2020 and the financial collapse of 2019.
Finance Minister Yassine Jaber told Reuters in May that the war could see Lebanon's economy contract by at least 7% this year.
GDP Decline and Financial Losses
The 2024 war cost Lebanon at least $8.5 billion in physical damage and economic losses, according to the World Bank. Lebanon's real GDP contracted by 7.1% in 2024, the World Bank said, leading to a cumulative GDP decline of nearly 40% since 2019.
