Lebanese officials, including President Aoun and Prime Minister Salam have been in “intensive contact” with the US and French government in recent days, as Israel escalates its airstrikes against southern Lebanon and threatens attacks on the capital city of Beirut.
The US and France are meant to be the guarantors of the ongoing ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, though Israel has launched hundreds of attacks during that period and says it has the US’s blessing to attack as they wish.
France is probably more likely to step in over the recent attacks than the US, as the Trump Administration has threatened to back further Israeli escalation. French officials have also been more comfortable criticizing Israel for ceasefire violations than the US has been.
A handful of rockets were fired from southern Lebanon toward the Israeli village of Metula late last week. There were reportedly as many as six rockets, half were intercepted and the other half fell harmlessly, at least one of them before it crossed the border. The Lebanese Army found and dismantled the “primitive rocket launchers” apparently used.
No group has claimed credit for the attack, and Hezbollah denied involvement. Hezbollah generally has more than just “primitive” launchers, so it may well be some other faction. Israel, however, blamed Hezbollah and escalated attacks across the south.
At least eight Lebanese were reported killed in the Israeli strikes, with casualties reported in Ayta ash-Shaab and the coastal city of Tyre. Attacks were also reported in Kfar Kela, a village immediately across the border from Metula.
Israeli DM Israel Katz insisted that Beirut will face the same fate as Metula, and after scores of attacks on residential areas of metro Beirut during the Israeli invasion in late 2024, there is concern that new airstrikes will happen there as well. So far though, the strikes are confined to the south, with Israeli artillery attacking Shebaa on Monday morning.
Lebanese parliament speaker Nabih Berri says he believes Israel’s escalation is designed to try to force Lebanon to agree to a new plan of normalization. The opposition to normalization is pronounced because of repeated Israeli attacks and Israeli forces actively occupying five military outposts in the south, as well as occupying the Shebaa Farms region, which Lebanon claims as its own.
Lebanese officials have said no normalization is possible while all those problems remain. While Israeli officials sometimes speak of the potential for normalization, it is never linked to actually resolving any of these issues, with Katz saying recently the intention is to remain in those military outposts for the long term.
