By Laila Bassam, Pesha Magid and Steve Holland<\/p>\n
BEIRUT\/JERUSALEM\/WASHINGTON, June 19 (Reuters) – Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah agreed to a ceasefire on Friday, a U.S. official said, after an escalation in hostilities in Lebanon sorely tested the U.S.-Iranian interim deal to end the wider Middle East conflict.<\/p>\n
A senior Israeli official and two Hezbollah sources confirmed \u200cthe ceasefire to Reuters, which the U.S. official said was due to begin at 4 p.m. (1300 GMT)<\/p>\n
\u201cIf Hezbollah does not attack us, then for us it is not \u200ca time of war,\u201d the Israeli official said. Israeli forces would remain in southern Lebanon, the official added.<\/p>\n
Two Lebanese security sources said Israel carried out a dozen airstrikes in the first hour after the ceasefire came into effect, but none \u200bwere recorded after 5 p.m.<\/p>\n
An Israeli military official confirmed that there had been no strikes since 5 p.m. but denied that Israel had carried out a dozen strikes after 4 p.m. A Reuters journalist in northern Israel saw airstrikes ongoing inside Lebanon at around 4:50 p.m.<\/p>\n
At around 8 p.m Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) said a drone strike killed two people on a motorbike on a southern Lebanese highway.<\/p>\n
The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the drone attack.<\/p>\n
Israeli airstrikes had killed at least 47 people in Lebanon since midnight, the Lebanese health ministry reported. Israel reported \u200cfour of its soldiers killed in south Lebanon in one of the \u2060deadliest Hezbollah attacks of the war.<\/p>\n
The Iran deal requires the United States, Iran, and their allies to declare an immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including Lebanon. Violence has picked up over the course of the week after initially abating when the agreement was first \u2060announced.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah earlier told Reuters that Iran had informed the group that talks with Washington could not continue without a comprehensive ceasefire.<\/p>\n
The senior U.S. official told Reuters that the ceasefire was worked out by negotiators for the U.S. and Qataris with help from Iran.<\/p>\n
“Hezbollah and Israel have agreed to a ceasefire,” the U.S. official said. \u201cWe understand that after the exchange of fire earlier today, Israel and Hezbollah are now \u200bin \u200ba ceasefire.”<\/p>\n
Israel, which was not consulted in the negotiations that led to this week’s U.S. memorandum of understanding with \u200bIran, has bristled at the apparent requirement that it halt its campaign \u200cin Lebanon, which it invaded after Hezbollah fired across the border in solidarity with Tehran on March 2.<\/p>\n
The Israeli official said Israel had the freedom to act against emerging threats and threats to its forces and territory.<\/p>\n
Earlier, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had vowed to “extract a very heavy price” from Hezbollah for the killing of the four soldiers.<\/p>\n
Israeli officials have voiced anger at the U.S.-Iran pact, saying it does not go far enough to address Israeli concerns over Iran’s nuclear programme.<\/p>\n
DEADLY AIRSTRIKES<\/p>\n
Israel said it carried out strikes targeting Hezbollah operatives and infrastructure across several areas in response to repeated Hezbollah ceasefire violations.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah denied it had violated the ceasefire, and accused Israel of repeatedly violating truce terms, including the terms of the U.S.-Iran agreement. A statement from the group accused \u200cIsraeli forces of carrying out attacks that killed civilians, destroying homes and infrastructure, and continuing its ground incursions.<\/p>\n
Heavy \u200bfighting overnight was concentrated in an area north of the Litani River known as Ali al-Taher hill – high ground \u200bstrategically important to Hezbollah where Israeli forces had sought to advance, a senior Lebanese security \u200bsource said.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah said its fighters ambushed an Israeli force advancing near the hill, destroying three Merkava tanks with guided missiles and targeting troops with rocket \u200cand artillery fire. Hezbollah said it later attacked Israeli forces that had \u200bsought to enter the area to retrieve casualties.<\/p>\n
Israel \u200bhas seized a self-declared security zone in the south, saying it aims to shield northern Israel from Hezbollah attack. Its forces have been razing villages in the south where they say Hezbollah has embedded itself.<\/p>\n
Hezbollah has continued to launch attacks on Israeli positions in the south this week, including with explosive drones that have killed and injured troops.<\/p>\n
Lebanon’s health \u200bministry has recorded 3,912 people killed in Lebanon as a result \u200cof Israeli attacks since March 2, including 746 medics, women and children.<\/p>\n
Israel’s death toll from this round of hostilities with Hezbollah includes at least 32 soldiers and \u200bfour Israeli civilians.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Jana Choukeir and Eman Abouhassira in Dubai, Maya Gebeily and Nazih Osseiran in Beirut; Avi Ohayon in northern Israel; Writing by Jana Choukeir \u200band Tom Perry; Editing by Aidan Lewis, Alison Williams, Peter Graff, Toby Chopra and Sanjeev Miglani)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Laila Bassam, Pesha Magid and Steve Holland BEIRUT\/JERUSALEM\/WASHINGTON, June 19 (Reuters) – Israel and Iran-backed Hezbollah agreed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[100,8504,37,97,2425,1559,93,2509,973,683],"class_list":["post-168356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-hezbollah","tag-hezbollah-attacks","tag-israel","tag-israeli-airstrikes","tag-israeli-forces","tag-israeli-official","tag-lebanon","tag-northern-israel","tag-southern-lebanon","tag-u-s"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/116778585461045695","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168356","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=168356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}