Middle East: Netanyahu dismisses Lebanon cease-fire reports

Lebanon's Foreign Minister Abdallah Bouhabib has called for an immediate cease-fire and has warned that the crisis in Lebanon is a threat to the entire region.

"The crisis in Lebanon threatens the entire Middle East," Bouhabib said. "We wish today to reiterate our call for a cease-fire on all fronts."

Bouhabib welcomed efforts by the United States and France to move urgently toward a cease-fire before the situation spiraled out of control.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called on Israel and the Lebanese Hezbollah militant group to agree to a 21-day cease-fire in her address before the United Nations General Assembly.
She warned of the harm an escalation would have to peace and security.

"A broader regional escalation would not bring anyone long-lasting security," Baerbock said.
Germany's top diplomat also said that the lack of progress was sometimes frustrating and painful: "We are not giving up on seeking a political vision for Israelis and Palestinians to be able to live peacefully side by side."

"For me, resignation is simply not an option, because that would mean that the playbook of terrorism and extremism carries the day," Baerbock said.

Wednesday saw a group of states — Western nations such as the US, France and Germany, together with Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar — call for a three-week cease-fire.

A halt in fighting is intended to create space to explore diplomatic solutions. However, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said a truce was not imminent and that it would continue with attacks in Lebanon.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has added his voice to calls for a cross-border cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon.

During his address to the UN General Assembly in New York, Starmer urged both sides, avoid catastrophe, and agree to a cease-fire amid escalating clashes across the Lebanon border.

"I call on Israel and Hezbollah: Stop the violence. Step back from the brink. We need to see an immediate cease-fire to provide space for a diplomatic settlement," he said in his first speech at the UN General Assembly.

Starmer warned that the alternative is "more suffering for innocent people on all sides and the prospect of a wider war that no one can control and with consequences that none of us can foresee."

Starmer also called for a cease-fire in Gaza and the release of hostages held by Hamas.

French President Emmanuel Macron has called on the United States to increase pressure on Israel to accept a plan for a 21-day cease-fire in Lebanon.

Macron made the comments to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and said there was time for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to commit to the plan.

"I do believe that the US now has to increase the pressure on the prime minister of Israel to do so," he said. If Netanyahu refused, Macron said France would raise the matter at the United Nations Security Council.

"We wait for all the partners to be very vocal and committed with us in order to send this clear message: Israel cannot invade Lebanon today. War is not possible in Lebanon today; it would be a huge mistake, a huge risk of escalation," he said.

Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, which governs the West Bank but not the Gaza Strip, has called on the international community to stop sending weapons to Israel in his address to the UN General Assembly in New York.

"Stop this crime. Stop it now. Stop killing children and women. Stop the genocide. Stop sending weapons to Israel. This madness cannot continue. The entire world is responsible for what is happening to our people in Gaza and the West Bank," he said.

He said Palestinians were being "subjected to one of the most heinous crimes of our era, it is the crime of a full-scale war, of genocide, that Israel is perpetrating." 

The International Court of Justice is investigating a case filed by South Africa alleging that Israel is committing "genocidal acts" in its Gaza offensive, breaching the 1948 UN Genocide Convention. Israel has strongly denied the accusation.

Abbas said the war had killed more than 40,000 people in Gaza alone and injured tens of thousands of others. The conflict began after Hamas-led militants launched a terror attack against Israel on October 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking around 250 hostages.

"Hundreds of Palestinian families have been annihilated," he said. "Thousands have died because of the spread of disease and epidemics and the shortages in medicine and water."

He said Israel had destroyed the Gaza Strip "almost entirely," saying the territory was "no longer fit for life."

Abbas also accused Israel of "launching a new aggression" on Lebanon, which has been hit by waves of Israeli strikes in recent days.  

"We condemn this aggression, and we demand that it stops immediately," he said.

Mohammed Hussein Surour, the head of one of Hezbollah's air force units, was killed in an Israeli strike in Beirut's southern suburbs, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) military said. 

"Surur joined Hezbollah in the 80s, filling various roles," the IDF said online, using an alternate spelling of his name.

"The IDF will continue to undermine the capabilities of the terrorist organization and to dismantle the organization's top command."

This is the latest in a series of Israeli attacks on the Lebanese capital targeting high-ranking Hezbollah officers, after taking out Ibrahim Kobeisi, a leading figure in the Islamist group's rocket division, two days ago, and Ibrahim Akil, a member of Hezbollah's top military body, the Jihad Council.

Earlier reports of an impending cease-fire between the two sides were denied by Israel.

An Israeli airstrike on a school being used as a shelter in northern Gaza has killed at least 14 people, according to Palestinian medics.

The Hamas-run Health Ministry and the Civil Emergency Service said several people were wounded and others were missing after a missile hit the Al-Falouja School in the Jabalia refugee camp.

The Israeli military said the attack was aimed at a Hamas militant command center inside the compound.

Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of using civilian buildings for military purposes. The militant group denies this.

The Israeli military says it is carrying out "precise strikes" in the Lebanese capital, Beirut.

It said more details would be released later.

Witnesses told the Reuters news agency a large blast was heard in Beirut's southern suburbs, with thick smoke billowing from the area. 

Both AFP and Reuters cited unnamed sources as saying that Israel was targeting a senior Hezbollah commander.

The attack comes two days after a strike in Beirut killed senior Hezbollah commander Ibrahim Kobeisi. Israel has recently targeted several high-profile Hezbollah members in strikes on southern Beirut.

Reports on a potential cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah have triggered a wave of reactions from right-wing Israeli ministers, who rejected the possibility of stopping the attacks in Lebanon's south.

Israel Katz, Israel's foreign minister, posted on social media that a truce was not going to happen until the country reached its "total victory," a term often used by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to argue against the possibility of stopping the war without reaching the goal of dismantling Hamas in Gaza.

"There will be no cease-fire in the north," Katz said in an apparent reference to the Lebanese border.

"We will continue to fight against the Hezbollah terrorist organization with all our strength until total victory and the safe return of the residents of the north to their homes."

Hezbollah, a Shiite Muslim political party and militant group that is backed by Iran, is considered a terrorist organization by several other states. The EU has designated only its armed wing as a terrorist organization.

Katz is currently acting Israeli prime minister due to Netanyahu's trip to New York.

Lebanon's state-run National News Agency says an Israeli airstrike late on Wednesday killed 23 Syrians near the city of Baalbek, according to the Associated Press.

The mayor of the northeastern town of Younine, where the strike occurred, said four Syrians and four Lebanese were also wounded in the strike, which hit a building housing the Syrians.

He said most of the dead were women and children

The village is in the Bekaa Valley, which runs along the Syrian border.

Lebanon hosts nearly 780,000 registered Syrian refugees fleeing the civil war there, and hundreds of thousands who are unregistered.

The London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Thursday that more than 100 Syrian refugees had been killed since the beginning of the Israeli strikes in Lebanon, including 23 women and 32 children. 

Benjamin Netanyahu's office has ruled out media reports about a cease-fire proposal between Israel and militant group Hezbollah.

"The report on a cease-fire is not true," a statement read. "This is an American-French offer, to which the prime minister hasn’t responded yet."

Netanyahu asked the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to continue the fighting "in full force," the statement read.

Members of Netanyahu's government have publicly criticized the plan.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has said it expects a further dip in Lebanon's economy in 2024 amid the war in Gaza and other geopolitical turmoil.

The bank predicted a contraction of 1% in 2024, a sharp downward revision of its May estimate that the country's economy would see slight growth.

In a report, the bank said Lebanon had lost more than 40% of its GDP since 2018.  The country is currently struggling with rampant inflation, among other economic woes. 

The bank's prediction comes as Israel and Hezbollah step up cross-border hostilities in a spillover from Israel's war against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The EBRD was founded in 1991 to help former Soviet bloc nations turn to free-market economic models.

Since then, its scope has been enlarged to include countries in the Middle East and North Africa.

The US, the EU and Arab nations were among those to release a joint statement late on Wednesday calling for an immediate 21-day cease-fire across the Israel-Lebanon border between Israel and Hezbollah.

"We call for an immediate 21-day cease-fire across the Lebanon-Israel border to provide space for diplomacy," the statement reads. "We call on all parties, including the Governments of Israel and Lebanon, to endorse the temporary cease-fire immediately."

It also reiterated calls for a cease-fire in Gaza.

The statement was issued after talks, led by France and the US, at the UN Security Council session in New York.

The call comes after a major escalation in the conflict that has seen thousands of Israeli strikes across southern and eastern Lebanon as well as the capital Beirut, leaving hundreds dead. Hezbollah has also fired barrages of rockets into Israel.

The fighting in Lebanon is "intolerable and presents an unacceptable risk of a broader regional escalation," the statement said.

"It is time to conclude a diplomatic settlement that enables civilians on both sides of the border to return to their homes in safety," said the joint statement issued by the United States, Australia, Canada, European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati has expressed hope in a cease-fire proposal announced by France on Wednesday.

Although the details of the French-US plan had not yet been revealed, Mikati said it could possibly bring an end to the conflict between Israel and Hezbollah.

"France stood by our side in the darkest circumstances, the best proof being the efforts France is making today in collaboration with the United States in order to issue a joint communique that enjoys international support and which would put an end to this dirty war," Mikati told the UN Security Council in New York.

"I am here today hoping to come out of this session with a serious solution ... to put pressure on Israel to achieve an immediate cease-fire on all fronts and to restore stability and security to our region," the premier said.

French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot said on Wednesday that Paris and Washington were working to push through a 21-day cease-fire in Lebanon shortly after presidents Joe Biden and Emmanuel Macron held talks at the United Nations Security Council session.

Details were not immediately made available, but the idea behind the temporary cease-fire is "to allow for negotiations and a more sustainable cease-fire."

"There has been important progress in the past few hours," Barrot said later in the evening.

The announcement of a cease-fire proposal came after the Israeli army said it was preparing in case of a ground assault in Lebanon.

ab/rc (AFP, dpa, AP, Reuters, EFE)