Rome talks close without breakthrough ahead of Israeli elections
Israel stepped up its attacks in southern Lebanon after two of its soldiers were killed by an explosive device in a booby-trapped building in the village of Majdal Zoun, an area the Israeli military has held for months. Israel accused the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah of violating a ceasefire and struck what it said was the group’s infrastructure in the region, including a Hezbollah command center and weapon-storage facilities, according to the Israeli military. The strikes followed weeks of relative calm.
A senior Lebanese official said the strikes added awkward complications to the seventh round of U.S.-brokered talks between Israeli and Lebanese diplomats in Rome, which ended Thursday without a significant breakthrough.
The direct, ambassador-level meetings, which began in April, mark a historic diplomatic breakthrough for neighboring countries that have technically been at war since Israel’s founding in 1948. Leaders of both countries say they want to see the disarmament of Hezbollah, a movement that has operated from Lebanon since the 1980s and is not a party to the negotiations.
American, Israeli and Lebanese officials are finding no easy options to disarm the group, which has fought Israel for years. Israeli military officials privately acknowledge that Hezbollah cannot be disarmed by Israeli force alone and that doing so requires a political agreement.
Lebanese officials are hoping the talks produce a long-term end to Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon and the withdrawal of Israeli ground troops who are occupying swaths of southern Lebanon. The monthslong negotiations have yielded some progress: Israel last month handed over several villages to the Lebanese military and has reduced the intensity of its operations following pressure from the White House. Iran has said a ceasefire in its war with the United States is contingent on a ceasefire in Lebanon.
U.S., Israeli and Lebanese officials are also pushing ahead with a plan to train and vet elite units of the Lebanese military to work toward disarming Hezbollah as Israel withdraws, The Wall Street Journal reported. A confrontation between Hezbollah and Lebanon’s regular army would be extremely sensitive in a country with a history of civil war.
Lebanon had hoped the latest round would bring a deal on Israel handing back more villages, but Israel resisted, U.S. and Lebanese officials said. Israel is instead pushing for a third-party state to verify that territory being returned to Lebanon is cleared of Hezbollah fighters, infrastructure and arms, the officials said, with Italy a front-runner for the role.
Israel has also continued large-scale demolitions of Lebanese villages in recent weeks, a practice Lebanese diplomats have asked it to halt.
Lebanese officials say they do not expect a major diplomatic breakthrough or a complete Israeli withdrawal from Lebanon until after Israeli elections this fall. Netanyahu faces difficult national elections in October, and withdrawal from what Israel calls buffer zones it has captured in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria is likely to be unpopular with his right-wing voter base.