US envoy Morgan Ortagus is in Beirut this week for meetings. Her visit follows a trip to Israel, where she was shown the country’s northern border, and comes as Israel continues to strike Hezbollah and after an IDF drone was downed by UNIFIL. Lebanon wants the Israeli strikes into its territory to cease.
Israel wants to see Hezbollah disarmed. Hezbollah says it will not disarm. The US has sought to engage with Lebanon. US envoy Tom Barrack and Ortagus have both tried various methods. However, Beirut is, as ever, cunning.
Al-Akhbar, which is seen as a pro-Hezbollah media outlet, noted that there is a positive atmosphere in Lebanon amid Ortagus’s visit. Lebanon’s president has stressed the “need to activate the work of the Cessation of Hostilities Monitoring Committee [the mechanism], particularly with regard to halting ongoing Israeli violations and attacks on Lebanon.”
The report says that Ortagus “met with President Joseph Aoun at Baabda Palace and discussed the general situation in the country and the steps needed to restore calm and stability to the south, according to the Lebanese Presidency.” Aoun says he wants to see UN Resolution 1701 implemented, which is supposed to enable the Lebanese army to deploy to the south and would also mean that Hezbollah would not be present with arms there.
Ortagus also met with Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri in Lebanon. “They discussed the general situation and field developments related to daily Israeli violations and attacks on Lebanon, in addition to the work of the five-member technical committee monitoring the ceasefire [the mechanism] and activating its role,” the report said. It was seen as a long and positive meeting.
Berri has been a key figure in Lebanon for five decades. He is a Shi’ite politician in charge of the Amal political group.
US envoys, Beirut discuss Israeli attacks in Lebanon
“The US envoy also met with Prime Minister Nawaf Salam at the Government Palace and discussed with him developments on the ground related to the Israeli attacks,” wrote the report.
Aoun also said, “Lebanon is a country committed – government, institutions, people, society, and individuals – to exerting every possible effort to combat all forms of imminent terrorism, and we have demonstrated this on the ground and in our own country.”
During his participation in the opening of a regional conference, he noted that “the Lebanese Army, like all Lebanese armed forces, made great sacrifices in confronting terrorists,” emphasizing that “we defeated them in military confrontations, as well as in security confrontations and in intellectual, cultural, and civil confrontations,” Al-Akhbar added.
Aoun explained that “what we see every day, of the enormous resources being allocated for wars, conflicts, and killing of people, confirms to us that allocating even a part of them for national security and civil peace is capable of eliminating terrorist plots and saving innocents.”