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US Urges Lebanon to Seize Opportunity, Implement Resolution 1701, Elect a President

US Ambassador to Lebanon Lisa Johnson (Lebanese Army Command's website).
US Ambassador to Lebanon Lisa Johnson (Lebanese Army Command's website).
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US Urges Lebanon to Seize Opportunity, Implement Resolution 1701, Elect a President

US Ambassador to Lebanon Lisa Johnson (Lebanese Army Command's website).
US Ambassador to Lebanon Lisa Johnson (Lebanese Army Command's website).

The United States is urging Lebanon not to miss the opportunity available to restore calm in the South by implementing UN Resolution 1701, even if it means a gradual implementation of the decision.
US envoy and mediator Amos Hochstein has been exerting efforts to end nearly five months of intensifying hostilities between Lebanon's Hezbollah and Israel after the eruption of the Israel-Hamas war.
Prominent parliamentary sources said that although the Quintet Committee on Lebanon suspended its activity until after the end of the holiday season, that did not prevent the United States Ambassador to Lebanon, Lisa Johnson, from intensifying her meetings with Lebanese officials, Asharq Al-Awsat reported.
Johnson has first urged Lebanon’s parliamentarian to end the deadlock preventing the election of a new president, and secondly underscored the necessity of creating political conditions to prevent a spillover of the Gaza war into Lebanon by gradually implementing Resolution 1701, which is what the American mediator is working towards.
The US ambassador was quoted as saying that Hochstein’s shuttle movements between Lebanon and Israel are meant to find a common political ground to guarantee the gradual implementation of Resolution 1701.
This involves increasing the number and equipment of the Lebanese army, which will receive full support to restore calm to the Lebanese-Israeli border.
The spokesman for the United Nations Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) spokesman Andrea Tenenti has warned that the latest developments on the Lebanese-Israeli border are causing significant concern.
In remarks to the Arab Press Agency on Sunday, Tenenit said that the shelling has become more intense and bloody, reiterating that these developments are very concerning, and that this escalation could lead to a much larger conflict.
Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement have been exchanging near-daily fire since October, raising fears all-out conflict could spread across the region.
The cross-border fighting has displaced tens of thousands on both sides and has killed many including Hezbollah fighters and civilians.

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Kurdish Fighters Leave Northern City in Syria as Part of Deal with Central Government

A first contingent of Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters leave Aleppo, headed for SDF-controlled northeastern Syria, in Aleppo, Syria, 04 April 2025. (EPA)
A first contingent of Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters leave Aleppo, headed for SDF-controlled northeastern Syria, in Aleppo, Syria, 04 April 2025. (EPA)
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Kurdish Fighters Leave Northern City in Syria as Part of Deal with Central Government

A first contingent of Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters leave Aleppo, headed for SDF-controlled northeastern Syria, in Aleppo, Syria, 04 April 2025. (EPA)
A first contingent of Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) fighters leave Aleppo, headed for SDF-controlled northeastern Syria, in Aleppo, Syria, 04 April 2025. (EPA)

Scores of US-backed Kurdish fighters left two neighborhoods in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo Friday as part of a deal with the central government in Damascus, which is expanding its authority in the country.

The fighters left the predominantly Kurdish northern neighborhoods of Sheikh Maksoud and Achrafieh, which had been under the control of Kurdish fighters in Aleppo over the past decade.

The deal is a boost to an agreement reached last month between Syria’s interim government and the Kurdish-led authority that controls the country’s northeast. The deal could eventually lead to the merger of the main US-backed force in Syria into the Syrian army.

The withdrawal of fighters from the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) came a day after dozens of prisoners from both sides were freed in Aleppo, Syria’s largest city.

Syria’s state news agency, SANA, reported that government forces were deployed along the road that SDF fighters will use to move between Aleppo and areas east of the Euphrates River, where the Kurdish-led force controls nearly a quarter of Syria.

Sheikh Maksoud and Achrafieh had been under SDF control since 2015 and remained so even when forces of ousted President Bashar al-Assad captured Aleppo in late 2016. The two neighborhoods remained under SDF control when forces loyal to current interim President Ahmed al-Sharaa captured the city in November, and days later captured the capital, Damascus, removing Assad from power.

After being marginalized for decades under the rule of the Assad family rule, the deal signed last month promises Syria’s Kurds “constitutional rights,” including using and teaching their language, which were banned for decades.

Hundreds of thousands of Kurds, who were displaced during Syria’s nearly 14-year civil war, will return to their homes. Thousands of Kurds living in Syria who have been deprived of nationality for decades under Assad will be given the right of citizenship, according to the agreement.

Kurds made up 10% of the country’s prewar population of 23 million. Kurdish leaders say they don’t want full autonomy with their own government and parliament. They want decentralization and room to run their day-to day-affairs.