Beirut will not accept ‘partial solutions’: FM

Courtesy: The Cradle co

BEIRUT: Lebanese caretaker Foreign Minister, Abdallah Bou Habib, voiced on 6 February the nation’s rejection of recent Israeli and international demands seeking to push Lebanese resistance group, Hezbollah, north of the Litani River, saying Beirut will not accept ‘partial solutions’ to resolving the cross-border conflict.

“Western countries demand the retreat of Hezbollah for about eight to ten kilometers north of Litani,” Bou Habib said in an interview with Nida al-Watan. “This is a formula that Lebanon rejects. [Beirut] will not accept ‘partial solutions’ that do not bring the desired peace and do not secure stability but will lead to the renewal of the war again and again.”

Instead, the foreign minister called for a “comprehensive implementation of UN Resolution 1701.”

UN Resolution 1701 was issued following the 2006 Israel–Hezbollah war, which called for, among other things, respect for the Blue Line, a border drawn up by the UN in 2000.

Bou Habib expressed Lebanon’s demands in relation to the liberation of Shebaa Farms and the Kfarchouba hills, saying, “What we hear from some foreign ministers of the Western countries is that Israel is not in the question of this withdrawal, and our answer was that Lebanon will only accept a complete solution to all border issues with Israel, and half solutions do not work and will not [be accepted].”

He also demanded that part of a potential deal be for Israel to “stop the air, land and sea violations that have exceeded 30,000 violations since 2006.”

On 5 February, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said that “time is running out” in relation to a diplomatic solution with Lebanon, adding to his French counterpart Stephane Sejourne during her visit to Israel that “if we do not reach a diplomatic solution on Lebanon, we will move militarily to return the residents of Israeli towns on Lebanon’s borders,”

Hezbollah has recently released statistics showing that over 230,000 settlers had evacuated because of their operations since 8 October.

US special envoy Amos Hochstein paid a visit to Israel to speak with Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in an attempt to develop a plan to de-escalate the crossfire between Lebanon and Israel.

Gallant requested for Hezbollah to be pushed back 8–10 kilometers from the border, an increase of UN forces and Lebanese army in the area, and the means to return settlers to the northern settlements.

Hezbollah’s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah said during a recent speech in reference to Israeli threats and negotiation talks, “we don’t fear war, and there are no talks before the war on Gaza ends.”