Lebanon’s president, Joseph Aoun, has called for a fresh ceasefire with Israel after extensive IDF strikes on Hezbollah targets in the country’s capital, Beirut.
Condemning Hezbollah’s wave of rocket attacks on northern Israel, launched in retaliation for the Israeli strike which killed Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last weekend, Aoun said the group’s actions risked turning his country into “a second Gaza”.
"The launch of a few rockets from Lebanon toward Israel was a trap and an almost overt ambush for Lebanon and the Lebanese state and the Lebanese people,” he told European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen without naming Hezbollah, according to a readout provided by his office.
"There are those who wanted these rockets to lure the Israeli army to infiltrate inside Lebanon, and to invade some of its regions, and perhaps even to occupy them.”
This, he said, was intended to force Lebanon into “direct confrontation with the Israeli aggression”.
Instead, Aoun called on the international community to support the implementation of a new ceasefire between the two nations.
Such a ceasefire was agreed in late 2024 after more than a year of IDF operations in Lebanon, prompted by Hezbollah’s attacks on northern towns beginning the day after Hamas’ October 7 massacres in the south.
Under the US-backed deal, the Lebanese Army was required to disarm Hezbollah and deploy to areas it formally controlled to prevent a resurgence of terror.
At the same time, Israeli troops stationed in southern Lebanon, having heavily degraded Hezbollah’s presence there, would withdraw to make way for their Lebanese counterparts.
However, the IDF never completed this withdrawal, claiming that the Lebanese Army was not deploying quickly or effectively enough and that pulling out would risk a power vacuum that could be filled by the terror group.
And, since the renewal of rocket attacks during the war with Iran, Israel has been pushing ground forces deeper into the southern regions to adopt what a military spokesman called an “enhanced forward defence posture”.
According to the Financial Times, Israeli officials are preparing for a protracted conflict with Hezbollah, which could outlast the offensive against Iran.
"[The goal is] to inflict enough damage [on Hezbollah] that there is not this constant fear of having to evacuate the northern residents,” one source told the paper.
To this end, Israel has launched a series of airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs, regarded as a Hezbollah stronghold, in recent days.
But Aoun insisted that a ceasefire would allow his government to suppress the group domestically and avoid confrontation with Israel.
And, last week, his administration pushed through a ban on all Hezbollah’s military activities despite its significant political influence.
The president claimed his security forces would enforce the ban “in a clear and decisive manner” and called on Israel to halt its strikes to allow them to do so.
To get more news, click here to sign up for our free daily newsletter.