Israel and the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah are set to implement a ceasefire on Wednesday as part of a US-proposed deal for a 60-day ceasefire to end more than a year of hostilities.
The text of the deal has not been published and Reuters has not seen a draft.
Israel’s Security Cabinet has approved this deal and it will be placed before the entire cabinet for review. Lebanon and Hezbollah have agreed to the proposal and the Lebanese Cabinet will meet on Wednesday to formalize its approval.
The deal, negotiated by US mediator Amos Hochstein, is five pages long and includes 13 clauses, according to a senior Lebanese political source with direct knowledge of the deal.
Here is a summary of its key provisions.
stop hostilities
Two senior Lebanese political sources with direct knowledge of the agreement said the halt to hostilities would begin 12 hours after the announcement expected on Tuesday night, with both sides expected to stop firing by Wednesday morning.
One of them said Israel was expected to “cease carrying out any military operations, through land, sea and air, against Lebanese territory, against civilian and military targets and against Lebanese state institutions. “
All armed groups in Lebanon – that is, Hezbollah and its allies – will stop actions against Israel, the source said.
Israeli army retreated
Two Israeli officials said Israeli forces would withdraw from southern Lebanon within 60 days.
Lebanese officials told Reuters that Lebanon had previously pressed Israeli troops to withdraw as quickly as possible within the ceasefire period. The senior Lebanese political source said he now expects Israeli troops to withdraw within the first month.
Hezbollah pulls north, Lebanese army deployed
Hezbollah fighters will leave their positions in southern Lebanon and move north to the Litani River, which flows about 30 kilometers (20 miles) north of the border with Israel.
His return will not be public, the senior Lebanese political source said. He said the group’s military facilities would be “destroyed” but it was not immediately clear whether the group would dismantle them itself, or whether the fighters would take their weapons with them as they retreated.
A Lebanese security source told Reuters the Lebanese army would deploy about 5,000 troops south of Litani, including 33 checkpoints along the border with Israel.
“Deployment is the first challenge – then how to deal with locals who want to return home,” the source said, noting the risks of unexploded ordnance.
Israeli attacks on Lebanon have displaced more than 1.2 million people, many of them from South Lebanon. Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah told Reuters that Hezbollah views the return of displaced people to their homes as a priority.
Thousands of people displaced from northern Israel are also expected to return home.
monitoring system
Elias Bou Saab, deputy speaker of Lebanon’s parliament, told Reuters that a key issue in the final days of the ceasefire’s conclusion was how it would be monitored.
Bou Saab said the trilateral mechanism already in place between the United Nations peacekeeping force in southern Lebanon (UNIFIL), the Lebanese army and the Israeli army would be expanded to include the US and France, with the US chairing the group.
An Israeli official and a Western diplomat told Reuters that Israel would be expected to flag potential breaches in the monitoring mechanism and France and the US would work together to determine whether a breach had occurred.
unilateral israeli attack
Israeli officials have stressed that Israeli forces would continue to attack Hezbollah if it identified threats to its security, including transfers of weapons and military equipment to the group.
An Israeli official told Reuters that Amos Hochstein, the US envoy who negotiated the deal, had directly assured Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel could carry out such attacks on Lebanon.
Netanyahu said in a televised address after the security cabinet meeting that Israel would attack Hezbollah if it violated the agreement.
The official said Israel would use drones to monitor activities on the ground in Lebanon.
Lebanese officials say the provision is not in the deal they agreed to, and that they will protest any violation of their sovereignty.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
