US Senior Envoy in Beirut Says Gaza Truce May Not Necessarily Lead to Calm on Lebanon-Israel Border

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri shakes hands with US envoy Amos Hochstein in Beirut, Lebanon March 4, 2024. (Reuters)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri shakes hands with US envoy Amos Hochstein in Beirut, Lebanon March 4, 2024. (Reuters)
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US Senior Envoy in Beirut Says Gaza Truce May Not Necessarily Lead to Calm on Lebanon-Israel Border

Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri shakes hands with US envoy Amos Hochstein in Beirut, Lebanon March 4, 2024. (Reuters)
Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri shakes hands with US envoy Amos Hochstein in Beirut, Lebanon March 4, 2024. (Reuters)

A senior US envoy visiting Beirut Monday said if a truce is reached in the Gaza Strip it would not automatically translate to calm along the volatile Lebanon-Israel border which has witnessed a rise in tensions.

Since the Israel-Hamas war started, Lebanon's militant group Hezbollah has been exchanging fire with Israel almost daily, displacing thousands of people and spiking fear the conflict may spread in the region.

Amos Hochstein ’s comments came hours after Hezbollah's deputy leader, Naim Qassem, reiterated that the only way to stop the war along the Lebanon-Israel border is to end the war in Gaza.

Hochstein, a senior adviser to US President Joe Biden, began his talks by meeting Lebanon’s Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, a Hezbollah ally. He later met caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and is scheduled to meet other officials and politicians during his visit.

“The United States remains committed to advancing lasting security solutions achieved through diplomatic process,” Hochstein told reporters after he met Berri. He said such a move would allow tens of thousands of Lebanese and Israelis who were displaced by the conflict “to safely return” to their homes.

Hochstein’s visit came as the US, Qatar and Egypt have been trying for weeks to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas and to convince the Palestinian group to release some of the scores of hostages it is still holding since the Oct. 7 attack that sparked the war.

It also comes as Israeli rescuers said Monday a foreign worker was killed and several others wounded by an anti-tank missile fired from Lebanon. The Magen David Adom rescue service said it treated seven people, including two in serious condition.

Meanwhile, Hezbollah said its fighters aborted two infiltration attempts the night before by Israeli troops into a border area in southern Lebanon.

Since the Israel-Hamas war began, more than 215 Hezbollah fighters and nearly 40 civilians were killed on the Lebanese side while in Israel, nine soldiers and 10 civilians were left dead in the attacks.

“I’m mindful that my arrival comes on the heels of a tense few weeks on both sides of the border,” Hochstein said.

“An escalation will certainly not help Lebanon rebuild and advance forward at this critical time in Lebanon’s history,” he added in an apparent reference to Lebanon’s historic economic crisis that has been ongoing since 2019.

“A temporary ceasefire is not enough. A limited war is not containable and the security paradigm along the Blue Line has to change in order to guarantee everyone’s security,” Hochstein said referring to the Lebanon-Israel border.

Asked if a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip will include Lebanon, he said it is not necessary “that when you have a ceasefire in Gaza, it automatically extends. That is why we are here today to be able to have a conversation and discussions” on the situation in Lebanon.

Israeli officials have threatened a wider war in Lebanon if Hezbollah does not withdraw its elite fighters north of the Litani River as stipulated in a 2006 truce that ended a 34-day Israel-Hezbollah war.

Western diplomats have brought forward a series of proposals for a cessation of hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah, most of which would hinge on Hezbollah moving its forces 7-10 kilometers (about 4-6 miles) away from the border.

Qassem, Hezbollah’s deputy leader, blasted the United States in a speech Monday during a conference held in the group’s stronghold south of Beirut attended by Muslim clerics from several regional states. He blamed Washington for using its veto power three times to prevent resolutions at the UN Security Council to end the war in Gaza.

“We have said it clearly that whoever wants to be a mediator should mediate to stop the aggression,” Qassem said in his speech. He added that those who don’t want the war to expand in the region should deal with the cause “which is the brutal and criminal aggression by America and Israel against Gaza.”

“Stop the aggression on Gaza and the war will stop in the region,” he said.



At Least 11 Sudanese Killed in Drone Strike on Displacement Camp

A soldier extinguishes a fire following a drone strike in Ad-Damar, Sudan, April 25, 2025. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig
A soldier extinguishes a fire following a drone strike in Ad-Damar, Sudan, April 25, 2025. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig
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At Least 11 Sudanese Killed in Drone Strike on Displacement Camp

A soldier extinguishes a fire following a drone strike in Ad-Damar, Sudan, April 25, 2025. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig
A soldier extinguishes a fire following a drone strike in Ad-Damar, Sudan, April 25, 2025. REUTERS/El Tayeb Siddig

At least 11 people were killed after a drone strike by the Rapid Support Forces hit a displacement camp in Sudan's River Nile state, the governor said in a statement, in an attack that also took out the regional power station for the fourth time.
The RSF, which denies carrying out drone attacks and did not respond to a request for comment, has targeted power stations in army-controlled locations in central and northern Sudan for the past several months, but the strikes had not previously left major death tolls, said Reuters.
"This morning we heard a large explosion and we found two families that had been burnt completely inside their tents, while they were sleeping," said teacher Mashair Hemeidan as she shed tears.
"We had left Khartoum fearful of the war and now the war has followed us here. I don't know where I will go with my family and children, we have no shelter or place to go to," she added.
The escalation of such strikes, which have hampered the country's electrical grid and plunged millions into weeks-long blackouts, comes two years into a damaging war as the army has been pushing the paramilitary force out of central Sudan.
Ground fighting in the war is now focused in the Darfur region, where the RSF is fighting to seize the army's remaining foothold, driving hundreds of thousands from their homes. There has also been fighting in western Omdurman, part of the capital where the RSF remains present.
The Friday morning attack by multiple missiles, which set some of the tents on fire, injured 23 other people, a medical official said. Reuters witnesses saw at least nine children among the injured.
"My nine-year-old son Ahmed was killed today, and now my nine-year-old Fadi and my seven-year-old Omnia are in the hospital," said Fadwa Adlan, a resident of the camp.
Some 179 families displaced by the fighting in the capital had been living in difficult conditions in an abandoned building and surrounding tents outside the town of al-Damer, receiving little in the way of humanitarian assistance. The camp was located about three kilometers (1.9 miles) from the Atbara power station which was also struck.
On Friday, authorities could be seen hosing down the residents' belongings destroyed in the fire and breaking down the camp. Residents were seen boarding buses to an unknown location.