The deaths of three Indonesian peacekeepers in southern Lebanon in two separate incidents on March 29 and 30 have prompted calls for President Prabowo Subianto to withdraw the Garuda Contingent from UNIFIL, the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Lebanon. The pressure is politically potent but may prove to be a strategic miscalculation.
Indonesia remains one of the mission’s principal troop contributors. UNIFIL has a mandate in place until December 2026 and a planned drawdown into 2027. A premature withdrawal would not enhance the safety of Indonesian personnel; it would instead hand strategic advantage to the United States and Israel, remove a recognized peacekeeping presence that has supported civilian protection in southern Lebanon, and erode the peacekeeping credibility Jakarta has spent seven decades building. More importantly, such a move would expose a growing tension at the center of Prabowo’s foreign policy – namely, the idea of retreating from a legitimate U.N.-authorized mission while simultaneously engaging with a far more contestable Board of Peace initiative.
The facts on the ground are grim. On March 29, indirect artillery fire struck an UNIFIL position near Adshit Al Qusayr, killing Private First Class Farizal Romadhon and wounding three others – one critically. The following day, two more UNIFIL peacekeepers – Captain Zulmi Aditya Iskandar, and First Sergeant Ikhwan – died when an explosion destroyed their vehicle near Bani Hayyan. These were the latest in a pattern of attacks on U.N. positions in Lebanon. In October 2024, Israeli tanks fired on UNIFIL’s Naqoura headquarters, wounding two Indonesian soldiers.
The mission’s force has already shrunk from over 10,500 to approximately 8,200 as the drawdown accelerates. Croatia has withdrawn. Argentina pulled out in November 2024 due to security concerns. South Korea has announced its departure by the end of 2027. Poland plans to leave by August 2026.
The domestic pressure on Prabowo to pull Indonesian peacekeepers out as well is real and growing. Islamic organizations, opposition figures, and social media have converged on a single demand: bring the troops home. Dave Laksono, the vice chairman of Indonesia’s House of Representatives Commission I, which oversees defense and foreign affairs, publicly called for an evaluation of the TNI’s presence in Lebanon, arguing that the peacekeeping mandate cannot be fulfilled in an active combat zone. An emotional logic now dominates Indonesian social media: “our soldiers are dying, and the government is doing nothing.”
Many Indonesians remain underinformed about the specifics of the current escalation, which intensified after the United States and Israel struck Iran on February 28, 2026, triggering retaliatory strikes and a reopening of the Lebanon front. The political salience of the casualties is undeniable, yet the strategic calculus argues firmly against withdrawal.
For years, Indonesia has been UNIFIL’s single largest troop contributor. As of late March 2026, Jakarta maintained around 756 personnel in southern Lebanon – compared with roughly 774 from Italy, 657 from Spain, 642 from India, and 624 from Ghana – within a total force of about 8,200. These numbers represent a gradual reduction from the 1,200-person battalions of past rotations, as the mission draws down ahead of its December 2026 mandate expiration under U.N. Security Council Resolution 2790, adopted unanimously in August 2025. Brokered by France despite sustained Israeli-U.S. pressure for an abrupt termination, the resolution extended UNIFIL’s mandate for a final year and ordered an orderly drawdown through 2027.
If Indonesia exits early, it would not merely weaken UNIFIL; it would hasten the collapse Washington and Tel Aviv have long sought. The mission’s removal would dismantle a monitoring system that documented nearly 7,800 Israeli airspace violations and more than 1,000 Blue Line crossings in the year following the November 2024 ceasefire. Analysts and Lebanese officials warn that without UNIFIL’s observation capacity, the political cost of renewed Israeli operations on Lebanese soil would fall sharply.
The question of what comes after UNIFIL makes the situation even more urgent. The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) are slated to take over security in southern Lebanon, yet they remain far from fully prepared. France, the European Union, and several regional partners have stepped in to help. The EU launched a 12.5 million euro program to strengthen the LAF in mid‑2025, while Washington followed with $95 million in Foreign Military Financing and another $14.2 million under the Presidential Drawdown Authority for disarmament efforts. A five‑phase LAF deployment plan was approved later that year, with its first stage completed in early 2026.
Still, these initiatives are more scaffolding than structure. Even Beirut acknowledges that UNIFIL’s presence remains vital until a broader political settlement is secured. As the mission’s anchor contributor, Indonesia holds rare leverage to ensure this fragile transition is properly supported — leverage that will disappear the moment Jakarta leaves the field.
This is where the deeper irony of Prabowo’s foreign policy comes into focus. Even as domestic voices demand withdrawal from UNIFIL, a mission with an explicit U.N. mandate, clear civilian protection value, and urgent operational need, Prabowo has invested enormous political capital in U.S. President Donald Trump’s Board of Peace. Jakarta has pledged up to 8,000 troops for the International Stabilization Force in Gaza and accepted a deputy commander role.
In a rare six-hour roundtable with senior journalists and experts at his Hambalang residence on March 17, later published on his YouTube channel, Prabowo offered his most detailed public defense of the decision. He framed Indonesia’s membership as a continuation of its longstanding defense of Palestinian interests, argued that Indonesia “must have leverage” in the process, and clarified that Jakarta would not pay the reported $1 billion fee for a permanent seat. Crucially, he stated that Indonesia is “moving forward in a very careful manner,” pausing troop deployment plans to Gaza amid the escalating Iran conflict, and conditioning continued membership on whether the platform produces tangible benefits for Palestine.
Should it prove “counterproductive,” he said, Indonesia would terminate its membership in the Board of Peace.
The contrast between UNIFIL and the Board of Peace, however, remains analytically devastating. UNIFIL’s mandate is U.N.-sanctioned, multilateral, and rooted in Security Council resolutions stretching back to 1978. The Board of Peace was created by executive fiat, with Trump appointing himself chair for life with veto power. Its charter, as Human Rights Watch has noted, mentions neither human rights nor accountability. Palestine is not represented on the Board, but Israel is a full member. Major Western democracies – the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and France – declined to join, citing overlap with and potential undermining of existing U.N. mechanisms.
Prabowo’s peacekeeping diplomacy would gain real strength from strategic coherence across both theaters. Staying the course in UNIFIL completing the Garuda Contingent’s mandate through the 2027 drawdown would prove that Indonesia honors its obligations even as Israeli forces repeatedly target peacekeepers and violate Gaza ceasefire terms. This is a principled stance befitting Jakarta’s seven-decade peacekeeping legacy, from Egypt in 1956 to Lebanon today.
Indonesian casualties create a “blood price” diplomatic debt that compounds daily – leverage with the U.N. Secretariat (which condemned the attacks), France (which needs Jakarta to hold UNIFIL’s line), and Washington: “Your escalation, our casualties. Now deliver on trade, defense, and Palestinian safeguards.” Retreat costs nothing now but erodes credibility forever. Staying builds value every day as fewer nations pay this price, letting Jakarta extract tangible returns before the window closes in December 2026. Indonesia’s resolve deserves the diplomatic returns it can now command.