Amos Hochstein arrives in Israel following truce talks in Beirut, as top Hezbollah official says the ball is now in Israel’s court.
By David Rosenberg, World Israel News
U.S. special envoy to the Middle East Amos Hochstein arrived in Israel Wednesday, following extensive talks with Lebanese and Hezbollah officials in Beirut, as part of a last-ditch effort by the Biden administration to secure a truce between Israel and Hezbollah before the president leaves office on January 20th.
Hochstein declared Wednesday that he had made “additional progress” in talks with Nabih Berri, speaker of the Lebanese parliament and a leader of Amal, a Shi’ite movement with ties to Hezbollah.
Berri has served as an interlocutor for Hezbollah in talks with Hochstein.
“The meeting today built on the meeting yesterday, and made additional progress,” Hochstein said. “So I will travel from here in a couple of hours to Israel to try to bring this to a close if we can.”
This week’s talks have yielded a “real opportunity” to reach a deal, Hochstein added.
According to Axios, Hochstein was slated to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Thursday morning, after having met with Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer Wednesday evening.
Hezbollah secretary-general Naim Qassem, successor to Hassan Nasrallah, appeared to signal his group’s support for the American draft proposal for a ceasefire, saying Wednesday that a truce is “in Israel’s hands.”
In a televised address, Qassem said Hezbollah had presented its “comments” on the American proposal to Hochstein via Berri, signaling its willingness to cooperate in the “indirect negotiations” with Israel.
“These comments were presented to the US envoy and they were discussed with him in detail,” Qassem said.
“The comments we presented show that we approve this track of indirect negotiations through Speaker Berri.”
Qassem rejected Israel’s demand that Israel retain the right to operate militarily in Lebanon should Hezbollah abrogate the ceasefire.
The U.S. draft proposal presented to Lebanese officials and Hezbollah earlier this month focuses on three main points: the disarming of Hezbollah forces both north and south of the Litani River; the formation of an international committee headed by an American general to oversee the implementation of the ceasefire; and Israel’s right to respond military in Lebanon should Hezbollah violate the truce – but only after the committee has exhausted attempts to restore the peace.