Mikati says Lebanon in a state of war, urges Israel to stop attacks
Lebanon’s National News Agency reports that caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati made the call during a visit to a Lebanese army operations centre in the south of the country on Saturday.
“We are always advocates of peace, and our choice is peace and the implementation of Resolution 1701. Israel must stop its repeated attacks on Lebanon, and stop the war in Gaza, and everyone must implement International Resolution No. 2735,” he was quoted as saying.
Resolution 1701 is the UN Security Council order that helped end the 34-day war between Israel and Lebanon in 2006, while Resolution 2735 is the one the council adopted earlier this month, urging Israel and Hamas to implement a three-phase ceasefire deal.
Israeli jets bomb southern Lebanon overnight
The Israeli military says its jets bombed Hezbollah’s operational infrastructure and a military structure in the towns of Taybeh and Rab Thalateen in southern Lebanon.
The attacks took place during the night, it said in a post on X.
US, Europe warn Lebanon’s Hezbollah to back down
US and European mediators are trying to keep intensifying cross-border attacks between Israel and Hezbollah from spiralling into a wider Middle East war.
Hopes are fading for a ceasefire in Israel’s war on Gaza that would calm attacks by Hezbollah and other Iran-allied groups. With the stalled talks in mind, American and European officials are delivering warnings to Hezbollah about taking on the military might of Israel, Reuters quoted current and former diplomats as saying.
They’re warning Hezbollah shouldn’t count on Western nations being able to restrain Israeli leaders if they decide to execute battle-ready plans for all-out war on Lebanon.
Gerald Feierstein, a former senior US diplomat in the Middle East, said “it certainly seems the Israelis are still … arranging themselves in the expectation that there will be some kind of conflict … an entirely different magnitude of conflict”.
Analysts expect other Iran-allied groups in the region would respond far more forcefully than they have for Hamas, and some experts warn of ideologically motivated fighters streaming into the region to join in.
While Iran, which is preoccupied with a political transition at home, shows no sign of wanting a war now, it sees Hezbollah as its strategically vital partner in the region – much more so than Hamas – and could be drawn in.
A woman carries a child as she walks past buildings destroyed during previous Israeli military fire on the southern Lebanese village of Aita al-Shaab, near the border with northern Israel on Saturday
