Israel will continue military operations in Lebanon and will not withdraw from the country despite a new ceasefire agreed on Wednesday, Defence Minister Israel Katz said on Thursday, complicating the prospects for the agreement’s implementation.
Katz said Israeli forces would remain in swathes of southern Lebanon as part of what Israel describes as a buffer zone to protect northern communities from Hezbollah attacks. Hundreds of thousands of Lebanese civilians displaced from the south since fighting began in March would also not be permitted to return, he said. Israel would continue to “dismantle terrorist infrastructure in the area” and retained “freedom of action, backed by the United States, to strike in Beirut in response to attacks on Israeli communities and territory,” Katz added.
Israel and Lebanon agreed to the new ceasefire on Wednesday following US-mediated talks. Under the agreement, Hezbollah — which did not participate in the negotiations — is required to cease all attacks on Israel and withdraw its fighters from the area south of the Litani River. The Lebanese military is to take exclusive control over the territory. Hezbollah has yet to comment on the agreement. Before it was announced, the group said it had conducted two drone and rocket attacks on Israeli troops inside Lebanon just after midnight on Wednesday.
Israel invaded Lebanon in March in pursuit of Hezbollah after the Iran-backed group fired across the border in support of Tehran. The fighting has killed thousands of people and displaced more than a million Lebanese from their homes. Lebanon has become a sticking point in negotiations to end the wider Iran war, with Tehran refusing to agree any peace deal with Washington unless a ceasefire also covers Lebanon.
An earlier ceasefire in April, subsequently extended, failed to end the violence, with both sides continuing to carry out attacks.
BEN-GVIR CALLS CEASEFIRE A “SERIOUS MISTAKE”
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir called the ceasefire a “serious mistake” on Thursday and said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should bring it to the cabinet for a vote. Ben-Gvir said Hezbollah would not honour the withdrawal requirement and that the Lebanese Armed Forces were incapable of enforcing compliance.
“The Lebanese state is a partner of Hezbollah,” he said. “In practice, Hezbollah will only grow stronger, and instead of defeating it, Israel is accepting its very existence.”
Ben-Gvir also referenced Trump’s intervention on Monday, when the US president said Israel would not carry out strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs after Netanyahu had announced he had ordered them. That announcement drew criticism from Netanyahu’s political opponents and some allies that the prime minister had yielded sovereignty to Washington.
“There are moments when one must know how to say ‘no’ even to the President of the United States, and if we fail to do so, we will meet Hezbollah next time when it is far stronger and much more dangerous,” Ben-Gvir said.
(Reuters)