Hezbollah chief rejects US-backed Israel-Lebanon ceasefire terms

After US announces ceasefire agreement between Israel and Lebanon, Hezbollah’s secretary-general says the terror group will not adhere to the truce.

By World Israel News Staff

Hezbollah Secretary-General Naim Qassem rejected the terms of a US-backed Israel-Lebanon ceasefire framework Thursday, saying the group would not accept any agreement that conditions an end to fighting on its disarmament or withdrawal from southern Lebanon.

Qassem’s remarks came a day after Israel and Lebanon agreed in Washington to implement a ceasefire contingent on a halt to Hezbollah fire and the evacuation of the group’s operatives from areas south of the Litani River.

The agreement, announced by the United States after two days of talks between Israeli and Lebanese representatives, also calls for the creation of “pilot zones” in which the Lebanese military would take exclusive control and exclude all non-state actors.

Hezbollah was not a party to the talks.

In a statement carried by Hezbollah’s Al-Manar outlet, Qassem called the result of the direct negotiations “absurd, humiliating and shameful for Lebanon,” saying it was rejected by wide segments of the Lebanese public.

He said the Washington declaration reflected “the basic principles that America and Israel see for Lebanon’s submission to the Greater Israel project.”

Qassem said making the disarmament of Hezbollah the starting point for any agreement would amount to “executing Lebanon’s strength” and creating an existential threat to what he called Lebanon’s resistance population.

“The declaration is a roadmap for the annihilation of part of the Lebanese people and the enslavement of the rest,” he said.

Hezbollah has long rejected demands that it disarm, while Israel, the United States and Lebanon’s internationally recognized government have all pushed for the Lebanese state to exercise exclusive authority over weapons and security.

Qassem said Hezbollah was interested only in a full end to Israeli attacks, a ceasefire and an Israeli withdrawal.

“We are concerned only with a comprehensive halt to the aggression, a ceasefire and Israel’s withdrawal,” he said.

He added that any ceasefire must apply to all of Lebanon, not only the south.

“There must be a comprehensive ceasefire. There is no division between the south and the rest of Lebanon, and no freedom for the Israeli enemy to kill in Lebanon,” Qassem said. “As long as the occupation exists, the resistance continues.”

The Hezbollah leader also denied that the group had given any commitment not to respond to Israeli attacks.

“We did not give anyone a commitment not to resist the aggression or respond to its aggression,” he said. “As long as the aggression continues, we will confront it with all the strength we possess, and we will reach it where we decide and where we can.”

He warned that continued Israeli strikes on Lebanese villages would bring retaliation.

“As long as our villages are not safe, are being bombed and destroyed, and our people are being killed, the settlements will not be safe,” he said.

The US-Israel-Lebanon statement said the ceasefire depends on a complete halt to Hezbollah fire and the removal of Hezbollah operatives from the South Litani Sector.