Israel threatens to expand war if Hezbollah truce collapses

Israeli soldiers gather near tanks during a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, near Israel's border with Lebanon in northern Israel, Dec 3, 2024. (Photo: REUTERS/Ayal Margolin)
In its strongest threat since the truce was agreed to end 14 months of war with Hezbollah, Israel said it would hold Lebanon responsible for failing to disarm militants who violate the ceasefire.
"If we return to war we will act strongly, we will go deeper, and the most important thing they need to know: that there will be no longer be an exemption for the state of Lebanon," Defence Minister Israel Katz said.
"If until now we separated the state of Lebanon from Hezbollah... it will no longer be [like this]," he said during a visit to the northern border area.
On Monday, Hezbollah shelled an Israeli military post, while Lebanese authorities said at least 12 people were killed in Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon. Another person was killed on Tuesday by a drone strike, Lebanon said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said any infraction of the truce would be punished, however small.
"We are enforcing this ceasefire with an iron fist," he said ahead of a cabinet meeting in the northern border city of Nahariya. "We are currently in a ceasefire, I note, a ceasefire, not the end of the war," he added.
DIPLOMACY
Top Lebanese officials urged Washington and Paris to press Israel to uphold the ceasefire, after dozens of military operations on Lebanese soil that Beirut has deemed violations, two senior Lebanese political sources told Reuters on Tuesday.
The sources said caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Speaker of Parliament Nabih Berri, a close Hezbollah ally who negotiated the deal on behalf of Lebanon, spoke to officials at the White House and French presidency late on Monday.
Mikati, quoted by the Lebanese news agency, said that diplomatic communications had intensified since Monday to stop Israeli violations of the ceasefire. He also said a recruitment drive was underway by the Lebanese army to strengthen its presence in the south.
The truce came into effect on Nov 27 and prohibits Israel from conducting offensive military operations in Lebanon, while requiring Lebanon to prevent armed groups including Hezbollah from launching attacks on Israel. It gives Israeli troops 60 days to withdraw from south Lebanon.
Lebanon's Mikati met in Beirut on Monday with US General Jasper Jeffers, who will chair the monitoring committee.
Two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters that France's representative to the committee, General Guillaume Ponchin, would arrive in Beirut on Wednesday and that the committee would hold its first meeting on Thursday.
"There is an urgency to finalise the mechanism, otherwise it will be too late," one of the sources said, referring to Israel's gradual intensification of strikes despite the truce.