HUGE: Lebanon Signs Deal With Israel; Recognizes Israel as a State

The formal recognition is a huge development.

Netanyahu: ‘Historic’ understandings with Lebanon a ‘massive blow’ to Hezbollah, Iran

Mark Dubowitz: Lebanon has recognized Israel as a sovereign state and agreed to end the state of war. That would have been unthinkable without U.S. and Israeli successes against the Islamic Republic in Iran and Hezbollah—and @SecRubio’s diplomacy. Many obstacles remain, but this is a hopeful sign in a region that rarely offers one (Dubowitz).

What spurred it? A shared fear of Iran.

Barak Ravid at Axios: The framework brokered by the Trump administration is the most significant political agreement between Israel and Lebanon in four decades — but all parties involved know the vision of peace it lays out may never materialize. Mixed with the skepticism is deep concern that the deal could lead to a violent response from Hezbollah that could throw the country back into civil war. The agreement also seems to contradict some of the understandings reached between the U.S. and Iran in Switzerland, and could thus complicate that fragile truce….  “There wasn’t a lot of trust between Israel and Lebanon, but eventually both parties understood they needed to get a deal in order to keep control of the process and not allow Iran in,” a source with direct knowledge said (Axios).

Notably: [Lebanese President Joseph] Aoun received approval from the Gulf states, including Saudi Arabia, to reach an agreement with Israel. A senior diplomatic source in the Gulf confirmed to Israel Hayom that Aoun consulted with several Gulf leaders, including United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and received both men’s blessing for the move (Israel Hayom).

Hezbollah, Iran’s dangerous proxy, has repeatedly dragged Lebanon into devastating wars against the will of its government and people, most recently this March.

It has built a vast military infrastructure inside Lebanon, fired tens of thousands of rockets and drones at Israeli… pic.twitter.com/ufkRPmETxP

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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a press conference this evening and made the following remarks:
“Dear citizens of Israel, yesterday before the start of the Sabbath, we achieved a historic accomplishment for the State of Israel. Following direct negotiations between Israel and Lebanon, mediated by the US, we have reached a framework of understandings that allows us to move forward toward ending the conflict, and, G-d willing, eventually reaching a peace agreement between the two countries.

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Under these understandings, the US and Lebanon have recognized Israel’s right to maintain the security zone inside Lebanon for as long as it is required for our security. We will continue to hold it until Hezbollah and the rest of the terrorist organizations are disarmed, and until no further threat to Israel is posed from Lebanon.

I want you to know – this is a massive blow to Iran and Hezbollah. Iran tried to force a withdrawal from southern Lebanon upon us. You heard these demands all the time, and you also heard their disappointment and their criticism of the agreement – both theirs and Hezbollah’s. I stood firm on our vital interests and forcefully opposed the notion of forcing a withdrawal upon us.

Lebanon, Israel, and the US are essentially saying to Iran: This is none of your business. You have no status here. You have no involvement and no role, not you, not Hezbollah, and not any terrorist organization.

Israel and Lebanon have agreed on two adjacent areas near the Yellow Line, recommended by the IDF, where there will be a pilot program for disarming Hezbollah and transferring the territory to the control of the Lebanese army.

This is a tremendous achievement, because what were they trying to do? They tried to get us out of there through all kinds of means and pressures. That, of course, will not happen.

I thank President Trump and Secretary of State Rubio for their involvement, their contribution, and for achieving these understandings. I thank the government of Lebanon and the people of Lebanon; they showed great courage. I thank Israeli Ambassador to the US Yechiel Leiter, and our team, they faithfully represented Israel in the talks.

We are breaking the Iranian axis of terror, but we are also breaking the Iranian diplomatic axis.

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We managed to reach this framework of understandings for a simple reason: Because we struck Hezbollah hard. And Hezbollah, which expected assistance from Iran, did not receive it, because we struck Iran hard. All of this was done thanks to the heroism of our fighters, and also thanks to the wise and courageous decisions we made.

I want to remind you of what the situation was in Lebanon: Hezbollah had 150,000 missiles and rockets, and we eliminated about 90 percent of this vast arsenal. We astonished them with the pagers, we eliminated Nasrallah, and we eliminated the commanders of the Radwan Force.

In the last two weeks alone, we eliminated over 200 terrorists, and since the beginning of the war, over 9,000 Hezbollah terrorists!

We took control of the Beaufort and we are staying in the Beaufort; we took control of the Ali Taher ridge, and of Bint Jbeil – they are under our control. We are eliminating their terrorist infrastructure throughout the entire area, in the entire Yellow Zone; we are simply wiping out the terrorist infrastructure. There are bunkers there, there are tunnels there, there are terrorist villages there; we are wiping the, all out. We are not done yet, we still have work to do, especially regarding the global problem of explosive drones, and in this too, we will be the first in the world to find a solution.

But what is clear is one thing: There is a historic achievement here. This agreement strengthens Israel and Lebanon, and weakens Iran and Hezbollah. And G-d willing, this is a sign of things to come.

We will continue to do everything necessary to restore security to the residents of the North, just as we successfully did in the South. We did it once again thanks to the heroism of the fighters and commanders, and also thanks to your steadfast resilience, residents of the North. We are bringing you not only security assistance, but also over 20 billion shekels to restore prosperity to the North.

This is what I want to see: A quiet border between us and Lebanon, a border of peace. And in the North, I want to see security, peace, and prosperity.

What happened in the South, which is currently prospering in the western Negev, will also happen in the North. This is my goal, and with your help and G-d’s help, we will achieve it.”