Israeli forces kill 22 protesters demanding their withdrawal in Lebanon
White House announces deadline extended for Israeli troop presence in Lebanon
Israeli forces in southern Lebanon on Sunday opened fire on protesters demanding their withdrawal in line with a ceasefire agreement, killing at least 22 and injuring 124, Lebanese health officials reported.
Hours later, the White House said that Israel and Lebanon had agreed to extend the deadline for Israeli troops to depart southern Lebanon until Feb. 18, after Israel requested more time to withdraw beyond the 60-day deadline stipulated in a ceasefire agreement that halted the Israel-Hezbollah war in late November.
Israel has said that it needs to stay longer because the Lebanese army has not deployed to all areas of southern Lebanon to ensure that Hezbollah does not re-establish its presence in the area. The Lebanese army has said it cannot deploy until Israeli forces withdraw.
The White House said in a statement that "the arrangement between Lebanon and Israel, monitored by the United States, will continue to be in effect until February 18, 2025." It added that the respective governments "will also begin negotiations for the return of Lebanese prisoners captured after October 7, 2023."
The Hezbollah-Israel conflict was fought in parallel with the Gaza war, and peaked in a major Israeli offensive that uprooted more than a million people in Lebanon and left the Iran-backed group badly weakened. Some 112,000 Lebanese remain displaced.
There was no immediate comment from the Israeli government, but Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati confirmed the extension.
The announcement came hours after demonstrators, some of them carrying Hezbollah flags, attempted to enter several villages to protest Israel's failure to withdraw from southern Lebanon by the original Sunday deadline.
The dead included six women and a Lebanese army soldier, the Health Ministry said in a statement. People were reported wounded in nearly 20 villages in the border area.
The Israeli army blamed Hezbollah for stirring up Sunday's protests.
It said in a statement that its troops fired warning shots to "remove threats in a number of areas where suspects were identified approaching." It added that a number of suspects in proximity to Israeli troops were apprehended and were being questioned.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said in a statement addressing the people of southern Lebanon on Sunday that "Lebanon's sovereignty and territorial integrity are non-negotiable, and I am following up on this issue at the highest levels to ensure your rights and dignity."
He urged them to "exercise self-restraint and trust in the Lebanese Armed Forces." The Lebanese army, in a separate statement, said it was escorting civilians into some towns in the border area and called on residents to follow military instructions to ensure their safety.
Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, whose Amal Movement party is allied with Hezbollah and who served as an interlocutor between the militant group and the U.S. during ceasefire negotiations, said that Sunday's bloodshed "is a clear and urgent call for the international community to act immediately and compel Israel to withdraw from occupied Lebanese territories."
An Arabic-language spokesperson for the Israeli military, Avichay Adraee, posted on X that Hezbollah had sent "rioters" and is "trying to heat up the situation to cover up its situation and status in Lebanon and the Arab world."
He called on Sunday morning for residents of the border area not to attempt to return to their villages.
United Nations Special Co-ordinator for Lebanon Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert and the head of mission of the UN peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL, Lt.-Gen. Aroldo Lazaro, called in a joint statement for both Israel and Lebanon to comply with their obligations under the ceasefire agreement.
Recommitment urgently needed… <a href="https://t.co/1bDXq12n0M">pic.twitter.com/1bDXq12n0M</a>
—@JeanineHennis"The fact is that the timelines envisaged in the November Understanding have not been met," the statement said. "As seen tragically this morning, conditions are not yet in place for the safe return of citizens to their villages along the Blue Line."
UNIFIL said that further violence risks undermining the fragile security situation in the area and "prospects for stability ushered in by the cessation of hostilities and the formation of a government in Lebanon."
It called for the complete withdrawal of Israeli troops, the removal of unauthorized weapons and assets south of the Litani River, the redeployment of the Lebanese army in all of south Lebanon and ensuring the safe and dignified return of displaced civilians on both sides of the Blue Line.
'We will rebuild'
In the village of Aita al-Shaab, families wandered over flattened concrete structures looking for remnants of the homes they left behind. No Israeli forces were present.
"These are our houses," said Hussein Bajouk, one of the returning residents. "However much they destroy, we will rebuild."
Bajouk added that he is convinced that former Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, who was killed in an Israeli strike in Beirut's southern suburbs in September, is really still alive.
"I don't know how much we're going to wait, another month or two months ... but the Sayyed will come out and speak," he said, using an honorific for Nasrallah.
On the other side of the border in the Israeli kibbutz of Manara, Orna Weinberg surveyed the devastation of the recent conflict on her neighbours and the Lebanese villages on the other side of the frontier. The sound of gunfire sporadically popped in the distance.
"Unfortunately, we have no way of defending our own children without harming their children," Weinberg, 58, said. "It's a tragedy to all sides."