Hezbollah’s new chief says he’s keen to just accept ceasefire with Israel

Hezbollah’s new leader today declared he would agree to a ceasefire with Israel under acceptable terms – but said a viable deal has yet to be presented and insisted he would not ‘beg’ to end the hostilities.

‘If the Israelis decide that they want to stop the aggression, we say we accept, but on the conditions that we see as appropriate and suitable,’ Naim Qassem said in a pre-recorded speech – his first as the Lebanese group’s secretary-general – broadcast this afternoon.

Israel has not yet presented a ceasefire proposal, but its energy minister Eli Cohen told Israeli public radio this morning that the security cabinet is currently discussing terms and is in the process of finalising a deal. 

‘There are discussions, I think it will still take time,’ Cohen told Israeli public radio.

According to Israel’s Channel 12 television, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held talks with ministers on Tuesday evening on Israel’s demands in return for a 60-day truce.

These include a Hezbollah pullback to north of the Litani River, some 20 miles from the Israeli frontier, the Lebanese army’s deployment along the border, an international intervention mechanism to enforce the truce, and a guarantee that Israel will maintain freedom of action in case of threats.

It remains to be seen whether Hezbollah would accept such terms – although it is thought that much of its military capabilities in southern Lebanon have been eroded by Israeli ground operations and incessant aerial bombardments. 

But Qassem also said in his speech he would press on with the ‘war plan’ outlined by his predecessor Hassan Nasrallah.  

News that Israel is hashing out a ceasefire proposal comes as the United States and other mediators ramp up efforts to halt the wars between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. 

Negotiations on both fronts have been stalled for months, but the White House is keen to circulate new proposals to wind down the regional conflict in the final throes of the Biden administration.

According to Israeli media, US President Joe Biden‘s Middle East adviser Brett McGurk and special envoy Amos Hochstein will head to the region on Thursday to meet Netanyahu and other Israeli officials to discuss conditions for a ceasefire with Hezbollah.

Their goal is to implement the deal prepared by Hochstein, which is based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701.

According to the resolution, which brought an end to Israel’s last war with Hezbollah in 2006, only the Lebanese army and UN peacekeeping force UNIFIL would be deployed in areas south of Lebanon’s Litani River near the Israeli border.

But Israel is unlikely to trust UN peacekeepers and Lebanese troops to keep Hezbollah out of a re-established buffer zone in Lebanon. 

It wants the freedom to strike the militants if needed, while Lebanese officials want a complete withdrawal of Israeli troops. 

Separately, the US, Egypt and Qatar have proposed a four-week cease-fire in Gaza during which Hamas would release up to 10 hostages, according to an Egyptian official and a Western diplomat.

Under the plan, humanitarian aid to Gaza would be scaled up, but there would be no guarantees of future talks on a permanent cease-fire, the official said. 

The latest proposal is based on an initiative by Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi, who proposed a two-day cease-fire in exchange for the release of four hostages last week. 

But Hamas still appears unwilling to release scores of hostages without securing a lasting cease-fire and a full Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, even after the killing of its top leader, Yahya Sinwar, earlier this month.

Netanyahu, who has always said he is open to temporary truces for the release of hostages, said in a statement that he had not received a formal proposal based on the Egyptian initiative but ‘would have accepted it immediately.’ 

But the Israeli Prime Minister has continually crushed hopes of ceasefires, ordering his troops to ‘continue fighting with full force’. 

Israeli pundits say that an end to hostilities in Lebanon is within reach now that the Israeli army has considerably eroded Hezbollah’s military capability.

Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said on Tuesday that Hezbollah’s ‘residual capabilities in terms of missiles and rockets’ were estimated to be at 20 per cent, and added that it had been ‘pushed back from all villages’ on the border with Israel.

‘Thanks to all the army’s operations these past months and particularly these past weeks… Israel can come in a position of strength after the entire Hezbollah leadership was eliminated and over 2,000 Hezbollah terrorist infrastructures were hit,’ said Eli Cohen. 

Despite these setbacks, Hezbollah on Wednesday fired a surface-to-surface missile, setting off alert sirens in many towns and villages of north and central Israel as far as Netanya, north of Tel Aviv.

The missile disintegrated while airborne and did not cause casualties, the army said.

The war in Lebanon began late last month, nearly a year after Hezbollah began low-intensity cross-border fire into Israel in support of Hamas following its October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

Israel’s conflict with Hezbollah has killed at least 1,754 people in Lebanon since September 23, according to a tally of health ministry figures, although the real number is likely to be higher due to gaps in the data.

Israel’s military says it has lost 37 soldiers in its Lebanon campaign since it launched ground operations on September 30.

Meanwhile, the IDF’s retaliatory offensive on Gaza following the October 7, 2023 attacks has killed over 43,000 Palestinians, according to local health authorities, who do not say how many were combatants but say more than half were women and children.

Around 100 hostages are still being held in Gaza, about a third of whom are believed to be dead.

Qassem’s statement that Hezbollah would be open to accepting a proposed ceasefire deal comes just one day after he was elected as the Lebanese group’s secretary-general to replace the slain Hassan Nasrallah after spending more than 30 years as deputy.

Qassem’s accession marks the first time Hezbollah has had a new leader since February 1992 when Shia cleric Nasrallah took power and oversaw the group in its transition from a militant force into a political party and regional powerhouse. 

Hashem Safieddine, the head of Hezbollah’s executive council, was initially tipped to succeed Nasrallah.

But he too was killed in an Israeli strike on Beirut’s southern suburbs shortly after Nasrallah’s assassination.

Hezbollah said Qassem was elected by the Shura Council as it pledged to keep ‘the flame of resistance burning’ until victory is achieved against Israel.

But Israeli defence minister Gallant yesterday shared a photo of Qassem with the caption: ‘Temporary appointment. Not for long’ – a chilling warning that the new leader would be targeted immediately by Israeli bombs.  

Qassem was born in Beirut in 1953 to a family from the village of Kfar Fila on the border with Israel and taught chemistry in Lebanon before turning to politics.

His political career began with the Amal Movement but left that group in 1979 on the heels of the Islamic revolution in Iran which was a precursor to the formation of Hezbollah.

He was among the group’s founding members in 1982, and was appointed deputy chief in 1991 by the group’s then-secretary general, Abbas al-Musawi.

Qassem retained the position when al-Musawi was killed in an Israeli helicopter attack months later and became one of Hezbollah’s leading spokesmen after Nasrallah replaced al-Musawi as secretary general.

He regularly conducted interviews with foreign media organisations and even penned a book on the group’s history in 2005. 

Qassem was the most senior Hezbollah official to continue making public appearances after Nasrallah largely went into hiding following the group’s 2006 war with Israel.