The Iran-backed Hezbollah militia rejected a new ceasefire in Lebanon and demanded Israel withdraw troops from the country which Israel refused, undermining US President Donald Trump’s efforts to halt fighting there to forge peace with Tehran.
Iran has made a ceasefire in Lebanon a condition for any peace deal with Washington, and has suggested in recent days that it could intervene directly if Israel keeps up attacks there.
However, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem rejected a US-brokered agreement between Israel and the Lebanese government to halt the fighting. Hezbollah had not been party to the negotiations. There was no immediate response from Israel, Lebanon or the US.
Israel kept up strikes in southern Lebanon, and Defence Minister Israel Katz said Israeli forces would not be withdrawing from the area or halting operations in the country, which they invaded in March in parallel with the war in Iran. The commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Quds Force – which established Hezbollah in 1982 – said Israel must at a minimum withdraw to positions it held before the war began.
Reuters
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