The US ambassador to Lebanon submitted a draft truce proposal to Lebanon’s speaker of parliament Nabih Berri on Thursday to halt fighting between militant organisation Hezbollah and Israel, two political sources told Reuters, without revealing details.
The US has sought to broker a ceasefire that would end hostilities between its ally Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah, but efforts have yet to yield a result. Israel launched a stepped-up air and ground campaign in late September after cross-border clashes in parallel with the Hamas-Israel war in Gaza.
US ambassador Lisa Johnson met with Berri, a Hezbollah ally and the typical conduit for diplomacy with the group, on Thursday to submit Washington’s first written proposal in at least several weeks, two senior Lebanese political sources said.
“It is a draft to get observations from the Lebanese side,” one of the sources told Reuters. Neither source could provide details on the contents of the proposal.
There was no immediate comment from the US embassy in Beirut.
Results of draft proposals so far
Truce initiatives so far have been focused on better implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended the last round of conflict between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006 and stipulates that southern Lebanon must be free of arms that do not belong to the Lebanese state.
Draft proposals leaked in recent weeks include details on a monitoring mechanism that could involve other countries.
Lebanon has endorsed 1701 as the way out of the current conflict. Israel, however, has demanded that it retain the right to carry out any targeting of Hezbollah if it violates the provisions of the truce or poses a threat to Israel.
Lebanese officials say that “direct enforcement” by Israel has not been formally floated to Lebanon, but that it would be rejected by Beirut.
“The idea that Israel can enforce at any time — that is unthinkable,” one of the political sources said on Thursday.
Israel strikes on military sites in Damascus kill 15 people
Fifteen people have been killed in Israeli strikes on residential buildings in Damascus, Syrian state media is reporting, and Israel said the attacks targeted military sites and the headquarters of the Islamic Jihad group.
The buildings targeted were located in the suburbs of Mazzeh and Qudsaya, both in the west of the Syrian capital, SANA news agency reported on Thursday, citing a Syrian military source.
Israel has been carrying out strikes against Iran-linked targets in Syria for years but has ramped up such raids since last year’s October 7 attack by Palestinian militant group Hamas on Israel that sparked the Gaza war.
Commanders in Hezbollah and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards based in Syria have been known to reside in Mazzeh, according to residents who fled after recent strikes that killed some key figures from the groups.
Hezbollah is a Lebanese Islamist political party and militant group formed in 1982 after Israeli forces invaded southern Lebanon that year.
It is backed by Iran and leads a multi-party alliance that holds just under half the seats in Lebanon’s parliament.
Hezbollah is listed as a terrorist organisation by countries including Australia, the US, Israel, Germany and the UK. The European Union lists only its military wing as a terrorist organisation.
However, Hezbollah itself makes no distinction between its political and military wings.
