The new threat comes just days after Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah’s top military official in Beirut
News Desk - The Cradle
“We will not allow any threats against the inhabitants of the north, and maximum enforcement will continue and even intensify,” the minister said while addressing Israel’s Knesset.
“As we proved a few days ago with the elimination – there will be no calm in Beirut, nor order and stability in Lebanon, until the security of the State of Israel is guaranteed,” he added, referring to Israel’s assassination of Hezbollah chief of staff Haitham Ali al-Tabtabai in Beirut’s southern suburb days ago.
“If Hezbollah does not give up its weapons by the year’s end, we will work forcefully again in Lebanon,” Katz went on to say. “We will disarm them.”
Katz added that Washington has given Beirut until the end of this year to disarm the Lebanese resistance, but said, “I do not believe that Hezbollah will hand over its weapons voluntarily.”
The Israeli minister also said Tel Aviv is considering withdrawing from the maritime border deal reached indirectly between Lebanon and Israel in 2022. “We will reconsider our position on the maritime border agreement with Lebanon, because it contains many weaknesses and serious problematic issues,” he said.
The maritime border deal was reached before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government came to power, while opposition leader Yair Lapid was still prime minister. Netanyahu and his coalition slammed the deal at the time, threatening to nullify it.
The Lebanese state has not yet been able to reap the benefits of the agreement due to delays by a western and Gulf-led consortium of energy firms. Beirut was informed that no commercially viable gas was found in the Qana gas field, and the consortium has continued to stall in submitting a technical report on the matter.
Katz’s comments came as Lebanon officially finalized a maritime border agreement with Cyprus.
The defense minister’s new threat against Lebanon also comes one day ahead of Pope Leo XIV’s visit to the country.
Israel assassinated Hezbollah’s chief of staff and four other members of the resistance over the weekend in a strike on Beirut that injured dozens, including women and children. A top Hezbollah official said Israel “should be worried” after the strike. The Lebanese government is reportedly urging Hezbollah not to retaliate.
Over the past several weeks, Israel has significantly escalated its attacks on Lebanon. It claims Hezbollah is quickly rebuilding its military capabilities, and has made several US-backed threats to begin a broad campaign against Lebanon.
The Lebanese military is dismantling Hezbollah’s presence south of the Litani River in line with the ceasefire agreement. Hezbollah has rejected a Lebanese cabinet decision, issued in August under heavy US pressure, which called for the group’s full disarmament by the end of this year.
The resistance movement says it is eventually willing to discuss a national defensive strategy which would incorporate its weapons into the Lebanese army, but refuses to hold talks on the matter while Israel continues its attacks and occupies several areas in southern Lebanon.
Washington is pressuring the Lebanese state and demanding that it quickly disarm Hezbollah by force, even at the risk of a civil war.
US officials have publicly backed Israeli threats and have warned that Lebanon faces a major assault if it does not force the resistance to surrender its weapons.
Israel has killed over 300 people in Lebanon since the ceasefire was reached last year. Since the start of this month alone, at least 38 people have been killed by Israeli attacks.
No comments:
Post a Comment