By Maayan Lubell and Laila Bassam
Jerusalem/Beirut: Israel’s cabinet will meet on Tuesday to approve a ceasefire deal with Hezbollah, a senior Israeli official said on Monday, while a Lebanese official said Beirut had been told by Washington that an accord could be announced “within hours”.
The signs of a diplomatic breakthrough were accompanied by heavy Israeli airstrikes on Beirut’s Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs as Israel pressed on with the offensive it launched in September after almost a year of cross-border hostilities.
Smoke rises after an Israeli airstrike on Dahiyeh, in the southern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon.Credit: AP
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office declined to comment on reports that both Israel and Lebanon had agreed to the text of a deal. But the senior Israeli official told Reuters that Tuesday’s cabinet meeting was intended to approve the text.
Israeli officials had said earlier that a deal to end the war was getting closer, though some issues remained, while two senior Lebanese officials voiced guarded optimism even as Israel continued to bombard Lebanon and Hezbollah kept up rocket fire.
Israel’s UN ambassador Danny Danon said Israel would maintain an ability to strike southern Lebanon under any agreement. Lebanon has previously objected to wording that would grant Israel such a right.
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The US has pushed for a deal to end over a year of hostilities between Iran-backed Hezbollah and Israel, which erupted in parallel with Israel’s war against the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas in Gaza and has drastically escalated over the last two months.
In Beirut, Elias Bou Saab, Lebanon’s deputy parliament Speaker, told Reuters there were “no serious obstacles” left to start implementing a US-proposed ceasefire with Israel “unless Netanyahu changes his mind”.
He said the proposal would entail an Israeli military withdrawal from south Lebanon and regular Lebanese army troops deploying in the border region, long a Hezbollah stronghold, within 60 days.
A sticking point on who would monitor compliance with the ceasefire had been resolved in the last 24 hours with an agreement to set up a five-country committee, including France and chaired by the United States, he said.
A Western diplomat said another stumbling block had been the sequencing of Israel’s withdrawal, the Lebanese army’s deployment and the return of displaced Lebanese to their homes in south Lebanon.
Hostilities have intensified in parallel with the diplomatic flurry: over the weekend, Israel carried out powerful airstrikes, one of which killed at least 29 people in central Beirut, while Hezbollah unleashed one of its biggest rocket salvos yet on Sunday, firing 250 missiles.
In Beirut, Israeli airstrikes levelled more of the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs on Monday, sending clouds of debris billowing over the Lebanese capital.
Efforts to clinch a truce appeared to advance last week when US mediator Amos Hochstein declared significant progress at talks in Beirut, then held meetings in Israel.
Reuters
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