Rome, Italy. Lebanon and Israel resumed U.S.-led talks on Tuesday, with Beirut seeking progress towards an Israeli withdrawal from southern Lebanon under a framework agreement. Expectations for rapid progress remained low.
Framework agreement
The two-day talks at the U.S. embassy in Rome are intended to establish how to implement an agreement reached at a June 26 meeting in Washington, Lebanese officials told Reuters.
The agreement called for an end to the Lebanon conflict, the disarmament of militant groups in an apparent reference to Hezbollah, the deployment of Lebanese troops in the south and the progressive withdrawal of Israeli forces.
One Lebanese official said holding the talks in Italy would allow both delegations to consult their governments more easily during negotiations.
Military presence and continued conflict
Israel’s military occupies what it calls a “buffer zone” extending about 10 km into Lebanon along the entire Israeli border. Israeli officials say the zone is needed to protect northern Israeli communities from attacks launched by Hezbollah.
Deadly Israeli strikes have continued, while Hezbollah has rejected both the agreement and efforts to disarm it. Israel has said its troops would remain in southern Lebanon as long as Hezbollah remained armed.
U.S.-led diplomacy has advanced since Hezbollah and Israel returned to war on March 2 amid the wider regional conflict, despite objections from the Iran-backed group. Hezbollah believes only Iranian pressure on Washington can secure an end to the war and an Israeli withdrawal.
Iran sought an end to the Lebanon war as part of an interim agreement with Washington signed last month, but the deal has been shaken over the past week by renewed U.S.-Iranian hostilities in the Gulf.
Positions ahead of negotiations
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said in Tel Aviv on Tuesday that implementing the framework agreement was “the only way forward” and that Israel would “demonstrate goodwill in Rome.”
Saar said Israel was prepared to proceed with two “pilot zones” in southern Lebanon, where the agreement envisages Hezbollah’s disarmament, an Israeli withdrawal and the deployment of Lebanese troops.
In comments published by his office on Monday night, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said he had instructed Lebanon’s delegation to demand the “immediate start” of Israel’s withdrawal from the two pilot zones “before any other discussion.”
