BEIRUT \u2013 Hezbollah on Thursday rejected the latest ceasefire agreement reached between Israel and the Lebanese government, demanding a complete Israeli withdrawal. The announcement came as Israeli strikes killed at least four people, according to local authorities, and a U.N. peacekeeper was killed in the crossfire.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah leader Naim Kassem, in a written statement read on TV, said the agreement\u2019s demand that Hezbollah fighters leave southern Lebanon under fire would mean \u201csurrender, defeat and achieving the enemy\u2019s goals.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we are concerned about is an end to the aggression, ceasefire and Israel\u2019s withdrawal,\u201d he said. \u201cWe did not make any commitment to any party to stop resisting as long as there is occupation,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
The ongoing fighting in Lebanon, where Israeli forces have seized large swaths of the south<\/a>, threatens efforts to end the Iran war and reopen the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>, a key transit point for oil and gas whose closure has jolted the world economy<\/a>. <\/p>\n Iran has demanded that any lasting truce extend to Lebanon. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a>, who faces elections later this year, wants to press ahead with Israel’s offensive until Hezbollah no longer poses a threat. Israeli troops have seized around a fifth of Lebanon since Hezbollah began launching rocket and drone attacks in solidarity with Iran days into the wider war.<\/p>\n U.S. President Donald Trump<\/a>, who faced a rare rebuke from Congress<\/a> on Wednesday, has sought to downplay the diplomatic deadlock and the failure of declared ceasefires to end the fighting, telling reporters that in the Middle East, “a ceasefire is when you\u2019re shooting in a more moderate manner.\u201d<\/p>\n Peacekeeper killed in crossfire<\/p>\n A Serbian peacekeeper was killed, and two other peacekeepers were wounded, when a mortar struck their location near Marjayoun, a Christian-majority town that has seen intense fighting, according to the U.N. mission, known as UNIFIL, and Serbia’s Defense Ministry.<\/p>\n Neither said whether the mortar fire came from Israel or Hezbollah.<\/p>\n Lebanon\u2019s state-run National News Agency said a drone strike killed a motorcyclist and wounded four people in the village of Maaroub. It said airstrikes on the village of Sohmor in the Bekaa Valley, in eastern Lebanon, killed three people and wounded others. It also reported airstrikes in other areas of the south.<\/p>\n There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military, which has warned people not to go into parts of southern Lebanon where it says it is striking Hezbollah facilities.<\/p>\n Fighting has raged despite declared ceasefires<\/p>\n Hezbollah resumed its rocket fire days after Israel and the United States launched their surprise attack on Iran on Feb. 28. Before then, Israel had regularly carried out strikes in Lebanon against what it said were militant targets, often killing civilians, despite an earlier truce reached in 2024.<\/p>\n In the southern city of Sidon, many residents reacted to the ceasefire announcement with skepticism, saying previous agreements had failed to stop the violence.<\/p>\n \u201cEvery few days a ceasefire is announced, but people keep getting killed,\u201d said Mayada Hijazi.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s all talk and no action,\u201d said Salah Nassab. \u201cWe keep going back to our homes and then we get displaced again, back and forth. We\u2019re very tired.” <\/p>\n In the latest fighting, Israeli troops have pushed further into southern Lebanon than at any time since the end of Israel’s 1982-2000 occupation. It now occupies arouns a fifth of the country. <\/p>\n More than 3,500 people have been killed in Lebanon and over 1.2 million have been displaced. The fighting has killed 27 Israeli soldiers and three civilians.<\/p>\n The ceasefire came from ongoing Israeli-Lebanese talks<\/p>\n The latest declared ceasefire came about through U.S. brokered talks held between Israel and Lebanon’s government, which accuses Hezbollah of dragging the country into war and had made efforts to disarm it before the latest hostilities.<\/p>\n The ceasefire does not officially include Hezbollah and calls for Lebanon’s armed forces to take control of security zones in Lebanon from which the militants would be banned. Hezbollah has previously said it will only adhere to a ceasefire if Israel halts its attacks and begins withdrawing from the country.<\/p>\n Lebanese President Joseph Aoun on Thursday called the new agreement “the last chance to enter a final and comprehensive ceasefire.\u201d He said Lebanon was ready to implement Wednesday’s deal once he receives responses from relevant factions in Lebanon, including Hezbollah. The United States \u2014 and Trump himself \u2014 would determine how and when the deal is implemented, he told journalists on Thursday.<\/p>\n The agreement states that Hezbollah \u201cis not just an enemy of Israel and an enemy of America, but that it is an enemy of Lebanon” and calls for dismantling it. The government has promised to do so in the past but does not have the capabilities to disarm Hezbollah by force.<\/p>\n The latest agreement did not say when Israel would withdraw from southern Lebanon but said the U.S. would support the Lebanese army as it works to assert control in areas where Hezbollah has long wielded power.<\/p>\n Iran has demanded a durable Lebanon ceasefire<\/p>\n A top Iranian general on Thursday reiterated Tehran’s demand for a full ceasefire in Lebanon and called for Israel to pull troops back to where they were when the wider war began. At that time, Israel held five strategic points along the border.<\/p>\n \u201cSupporting the resistance in Lebanon is the duty of all of us, and eliminating Israel from the region is an achievable goal for Muslims,\u201d Esmail Qaani, the head of the Revolutionary Guard\u2019s elite Quds Force, was quoted as saying by the semiofficial Fars and Tasnim news agencies.<\/p>\n