Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has ordered troops to move further into Lebanon in the battle against Iran-backed Hezbollah, he said on Sunday, despite a ceasefire announced more than six weeks ago, Ada Derana reported, citing Reuters.
“I instructed the (military) to expand its ground manoeuvre in Lebanon,” Netanyahu said in a statement, adding that the aim was to “deepen and expand our grip on the places that were under Hezbollah’s control.”
Citing the escalating violence, France called for an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Monday, the French foreign ministry said. The directive came in the latest advance after Israeli troops seized the 900-year-old Beaufort Castle and its strategic ridge in southern Lebanon — a vantage point Israel had not held since its 2000 withdrawal after 18 years of occupation.
The fighting in Lebanon has been the broadest spillover of the Iran war, displacing more than 1.2 million Lebanese through Israeli strikes and evacuation orders since March 2, when Hezbollah began firing rockets and drones into Israel to back its ally Iran. The incursion has so far killed more than 3,370 people according to the Lebanese government, while Israel says 24 of its soldiers and four civilians have been killed over the same period.
The Israeli military already controlled territory up to the Litani River in Lebanon, but troops are now pushing to the Zaharani River around 10 km further north, the report said. On Sunday the military issued an evacuation warning for residents south of the Zaharani, and conducted more than 40 strikes across southern Lebanon, according to Lebanese security sources and state news. Eight people were killed when overnight airstrikes on Saturday hit the southern village of Deir El Zahrani.
Naftali Bennett, a challenger to Netanyahu in an upcoming Israeli election, said he sought stronger action in Lebanon, including hitting suburbs of Beirut. Defence Minister Israel Katz said soldiers would retain Beaufort as part of Israel’s security zone in southern Lebanon and circulated a photo of the castle with the Israeli flag and that of the military’s Golani brigade. “The campaign is not over yet. We are all determined to crush Hezbollah’s power,” he said.
On Friday, the U.S. military had hosted Israeli and Lebanese defence representatives in Washington to pursue a U.S.-brokered plan to forge peace between the two countries and disarm Hezbollah. The two sides had agreed on May 15 to extend the April ceasefire by 45 days through Washington-mediated talks.
Talal Atrissi, a sociology professor at the Lebanese University and an analyst close to Hezbollah, said the photo of the Israeli flag over Beaufort Castle was intended as a message to Israeli society that the military was managing to achieve goals in Lebanon despite the challenges posed by Hezbollah’s kamikaze-drone use. The Israeli military was also operating near Nabatieh, a major Hezbollah stronghold in southern Lebanon, the report said. There were no immediate comments from Lebanon or from Hezbollah.
