{"id":12889,"date":"2026-03-10T15:48:06","date_gmt":"2026-03-10T15:48:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/12889\/"},"modified":"2026-03-10T15:48:06","modified_gmt":"2026-03-10T15:48:06","slug":"israel-snubs-lebanon-proposal-to-negotiate-says-too-late","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/12889\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel snubs Lebanon proposal to negotiate, says ‘too late’"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted an area in Beirut’s southern suburbs [Getty]<\/p>\n

Israel has responded coldly to Lebanon\u2019s proposal to end the war and is adamant about continuing the assault on Hezbollah<\/a> until the group is militarily destroyed.<\/p>\n

Lebanon\u2019s leaders have called for direct negotiations with Israel<\/a>\u00a0to reach a settlement and end fighting, which resumed Monday last week and led to hundreds of Lebanese killed in Israeli strikes.<\/p>\n

Hezbollah had launched rockets at Israel following the assassination of Iran\u2019s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on 28 February. It was the first attack by the group on Israel since late 2024.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s bombing of the country has killed more than 480 people in a week and has forcibly displaced nearly 700,000 others from Shia-majority regions.<\/p>\n

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun presented a proposal<\/a> calling for an immediate halt to all Israeli attacks on the country, the prompt provision of logistical support to the Lebanese armed forces to enable them to fully disarm Hezbollah, and the start of direct talks with Israel under international auspices to reach a permanent ceasefire.<\/p>\n

But official Lebanese sources told The New Arab\u00a0that “there has been no Israeli response so far to Aoun\u2019s initiative” and that US messages conveyed to Lebanese officials indicate that “the situation is extremely difficult and complex”.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Washington had previously warned Lebanon that this would happen if Beirut procrastinated on the issue of disarming Hezbollah.<\/p>\n

The sources also noted that Israel is currently insisting on carrying out Hezbollah\u2019s disarmament itself by military force, after the Lebanese state “proved unable to do so” \u2013 particularly as the group\u2019s operations demonstrate that it remains present and active on the ground.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s Channel 12 reported that the Lebanese government tried to open direct communication channels with the Israelis via US envoy to Turkey and Syria Tom Barrack, but he described Lebanon\u2019s initiative as “nonsense”, stressing that there would be no negotiations unless Hezbollah was disarmed.<\/p>\n

The Israeli government completely refused Aoun\u2019s initiative, saying it was “too late”, and current efforts are focused on dismantling Hezbollah\u2019s capabilities, Channel 12 added.<\/p>\n

Despite Beirut\u2019s efforts to disarm the group since late 2024 \u2013 and the Lebanese army\u2019s announcement that its disarmament plan was complete south of the Litani river \u2013 Hezbollah has refused to fully give up its weapons.<\/p>\n

After Hezbollah decided to join the Iran war, the Lebanese government labelled the Islamist movement’s military and security apparatus as “illegal”, with dozens of its members arrested since then.<\/p>\n

As Israel presses on with its offensive, Hezbollah has also vowed to continue fighting, refusing Lebanese government initiatives to negotiate with Israel.<\/p>\n

Israeli strikes continued on Tuesday on Shia-majority areas, including southern Lebanon and Beirut’s southern suburbs, which have seen mass evacuations since hostilities resumed on 2 March.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted an area in Beirut’s southern suburbs [Getty]…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":12890,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[100,37,93,626,3623,51],"class_list":{"0":"post-12889","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-lebanon","8":"tag-hezbollah","9":"tag-israel","10":"tag-lebanon","11":"tag-lebanon-israel-conflict","12":"tag-tom-barrack","13":"tag-united-states"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116205669732520045","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12889","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12889"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12889\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12890"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12889"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12889"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12889"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}