The United States' special envoy for the Middle East, Amos Hochstein, decided to extend his visit to Beirut until Wednesday, political sources in Tel Aviv said. The envoy, who was expected in Israel on Wednesday morning, will arrive there by Thursday at the latest.
Despite the positive signals from Washington about Hochstein’s visit to the Lebanese capital, Israelis cast doubt on the likelihood that a deal could be reached to end the war on Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The sources said US officials are very serious about reaching a possible ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war. “Coordination is ongoing between the administration of President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump, who are both determined to end the war,” the sources stressed.
As evidence, they said, Washington has decided to place a US general at the head of a military technical committee tasked to achieve the total deployment of the Lebanese army in southern Lebanon.
However, Israel is skeptical. It believes Hezbollah is maneuvering and will not accept the Israeli terms of the US proposal.
The sources said the Israeli army is indirectly taking part in the Hochstein-led negotiations by exerting pressure on Lebanon and intensifying its attacks on the capital, not just its southern suburbs where Hezbollah has a strong presence, as well as the South and eastern Bekaa region.
Former head of Israeli Defense Intelligence Professor Amos Yadlin, who held a meeting with Hochstein recently, revealed that the ceasefire agreement with Lebanon is making great progress.
He said a deal could be announced this weekend. “The most important thing is that the agreement between Israel and Washington on the US guarantees is ready. If an agreement is reached in Beirut on those guarantees, a ceasefire deal will be signed and put into effect,” Yadlin said.
Biden sent a message to Israel that the US administration will not only serve as a guarantor to Israel, but it has also given it legitimacy in its right to self-defense, he revealed.
“In Washington, they agree with us that Israel has cancelled its known MABAM doctrine (the ‘war between the wars’), and is now ready to wage a war whenever it is attacked. Hochstein and other mutual friends of Israel and Lebanon have made this clear, but this policy has to be understood in Lebanon, Syria and Iran,” he added.
Meanwhile, the majority of officials close to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remain pessimistic about reaching a ceasefire deal with Lebanon.
The right-wing newspaper Israel Hayom quoted an Israeli political source as saying that “an agreement is not likely to be reached in the near future.”
Instead, it said, the Israeli military has approved plans to attack the southern suburbs of Beirut, carry out assassinations wherever possible, even in the majority-Christian part of east Beirut and continue to target Hezbollah positions in southern Lebanon.
On Tuesday, Bezalel Smotrich, the far-right minister of finance, said, “We will not agree to any arrangement that is not worth the paper it is written on.”
Addressing the ceasefire efforts, Netanyahu told a Knesset meeting that “the important thing is not the piece of paper.”
