Israel Extends Southern Lebanon Withdrawal Past Sunday Deadline

Israel Extends Southern Lebanon Withdrawal Past Sunday Deadline

The Israeli army’s withdrawal from the southern part of Lebanon is expected to last for longer than the 60 days stipulated in the ceasefire agreement, Netanyahu’s office of the Prime Minister states, asserting that the agreement is not yet fully implemented by Lebanon.

The announcement on Friday came shortly after the Israeli army struck towns in the southern border region of Lebanon only two days before when it was scheduled to withdraw troops by the ceasefire agreement that it has signed with Hezbollah.

The officially-owned National News Agency (NNA) announced on Friday that Israeli forces had engulfed the south, destroying homes and burning residences in Aitaroun, destroying one church in Qantara, and causing an explosive within Rab Thalathin.

The raids were announced against Israeli news reports Friday that Netanyahu’s administration was looking for ways to maintain troops in Lebanon longer than the timeframe that was stipulated by the ceasefire.

According to the terms of the ceasefire under the terms of the truce, the Lebanese army will be deployed along with United Nations peacekeepers in the south, as the Israeli military is withdrawn over 60 days.

Hezbollah plans to withdraw its troops north of the Litani River, about 30km (20 miles) away from the border, and demolish any remaining military structures in the south.

“There have been positive movements where the Lebanese army and UNIFIL have taken the place of Hezbollah forces, as stipulated in the agreement,” Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer told reporters about UNIFIL, the United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon.

“We’ve also made clear that these movements have not been fast enough, and there is much more work to do,” the minister declared, adding that Israel was keen for the deal to go on.

Hezbollah made it clear in a statement that any violation of an agreement is unacceptable. It urged those who signed the deal to push for the agreement to be implemented with “full [Israeli] withdrawal and the deployment of the Lebanese army to the last inch of Lebanese territory and the return of the people to their villages quickly.”

The deal, which was negotiated by France and the United States and France in November, brought to an end one year of war caused by Israel’s war on Gaza.

The war reached its peak in the form of an enormous Israeli offensive that killed several thousands of civilians in Lebanon, displaced over 1.2 million residents, and left Hezbollah extremely weak.

On Friday, the Israeli Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper reported that Israel requested US President Donald Trump’s newly-formed administration to delay the time limit. Saying that the Lebanese army has been deployed too slowly in the south and permitted Hezbollah to regroup.

National Unity party leader Benny Gantz, the ex-defense minister who left the country’s cabinet of war the year before, was mentioned in the report as saying that the military must keep on working and “intensify operations against any violation by Hezbollah—minor or serious.”

A UN source has told Al Jazeera that while Israeli forces were withdrawing from large areas of central and western regions of southern Lebanon and the south, data from field sources suggested they were planning to hold locations to the east.

The UN peacekeeping force has repeatedly documented Israeli violations of the conditions of the ceasefire.

David Wood, International Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Lebanon David Wood, senior analyst for Lebanon at the International Crisis Group, has told Al Jazeera that Israel’s delay is at risk of sabotaging the ceasefire and that the Lebanese army doesn’t have many options, especially when Israeli troops are still within the borders of Lebanon.

“But also, I think there’s a symbolic aspect to this,” he added while speaking from Beirut.

“For as long as Israel remains inside Lebanese territory, it can potentially reinforce Hezbollah’s narrative that the Lebanese state alone, through the army, cannot resist Israeli occupation and therefore needs assistance from the continuation of Hezbollah’s military wing and its armed resistance.”

The Israeli delay in withdrawing comes as Lebanese citizens returned home to their homes in the south to discover them devastated.

The Lebanese military has asked residents in Naqoura’s city of Naqoura, a coastal village Naqoura, not to go back home due to their security due to the destruction trail left behind by the Israeli forces.

Source: Al Jazeera and news agencies