Israel Approves Cease-Fire Deal With Hezbollah

Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at a cease-fire in the Israel-Hezbollah conflict, an emergency NATO-Ukraine session to discuss Russia’s weapons development, and mass protests in support of former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan.

A New Truce for Lebanon

The Israeli government voted on Tuesday to approve a cease-fire deal with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, effective beginning Wednesday. The truce is intended to bring an end to 13 months of heavy cross-border bombardments that have killed nearly 4,000 people, mostly in Lebanon, and have displaced hundreds of thousands more on both sides of the border.

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A New Truce for Lebanon

Under the U.S.- and French-backed deal, Israel will have 60 days to withdraw its troops from southern Lebanon, to be replaced by regular Lebanese army forces with assistance from the United Nations peacekeeping mission in Lebanon. These withdrawals will occur in phases, with the first scheduled to begin within the next 10 days.

During this time, Hezbollah militants will also be expected to pull back roughly 20 miles from the Israeli border to the Litani River. These boundaries reestablish the Blue Line, a 75-mile de facto buffer zone first installed under U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701 to end the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah war.

“The length of the cease-fire will depend on what happens in Lebanon,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said ahead of the Israeli cabinet vote on the proposal. After months of seeking assurances for Israel’s right to defend itself, the truce deal reportedly includes a caveat allowing Israel to react militarily against imminent threats and to disrupt the establishment of any Hezbollah presence or heavy weapons smuggling found near the border. A U.S.-led oversight committee will be created to monitor implementation and address violations.

“We will respond mightily to any breach,” Netanyahu said. Experts believe that his public remarks before the cabinet vote were aimed at rebuffing right-wing criticism to the deal, particularly from far-right cabinet ministers Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, the latter of whom posted on social media that the cease-fire was a mistake.

U.S. President Joe Biden celebrated the deal on Tuesday, saying it was designed to create a “permanent cessation of hostilities.” Iranian officials have been briefed on the cease-fire’s terms, as Tehran backs Hezbollah and other militant groups against Israel as well as has launched its own direct attacks on the country. Netanyahu said on Tuesday that one of the core reasons for the deal was to help Israel focus its attention on Iran’s threats, including its support of Hamas.

“There is genuine hope that any cease-fire deal will last,” Daniel Byman argued in Foreign Policy, though many questions remain, including whether both sides will hold true to the agreement’s terms.

Just hours before the Israeli cabinet voted to approve the truce deal, Israeli forces pounded central Beirut in one of its most intense aerial bombardments yet. According to Lebanon’s Public Health Ministry, at least 10 people were killed in the strikes. At the same time, the Israeli military hit the southern suburb of Dahiyeh, with some strikes reportedly targeting al-Qard al-Hasan, a financial institution tied to Hezbollah, and Israeli forces issued evacuation orders for more than 20 locations around the Lebanese capital.

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What We’re Following

NATO-Ukraine meeting. Ambassadors from Ukraine and NATO’s 32 members convened in Brussels on Tuesday for an emergency session to discuss Russia’s recent weapons developments. Specifically, the officials addressed Moscow’s use of a new medium-range hypersonic ballistic missile last Thursday against a Ukrainian military facility in Dnipro, which European leaders have warned signifies a dangerous escalation to the conflict.

Some Western officials told the New York Times last week that Biden could consider returning nuclear weapons to Kyiv that were taken from it after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov denounced such a tactic on Tuesday as “absolutely irresponsible.” Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly threatened retaliation against Western nations that militarily aid Ukraine, and he formally lowered the country’s nuclear threshold last Tuesday.

This week’s emergency meeting comes as new data on Tuesday revealed that Russian forces are advancing in Ukraine at their fastest pace since Moscow’s 2022 full-scale invasion. According to the independent Russian news group Agentstvo, Russian troops have seized nearly 91 square miles of Ukrainian territory this past week and roughly 232 square miles this month.

Storming Islamabad. The Pakistani military deployed its army to the capital on Tuesday to help quell deadly clashes between police and thousands of civilians calling for the release of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan. At least six people have been killed thus far. Local authorities have been instructed to shoot protesters if necessary. On Monday, the military-backed civilian government imposed a capital lockdown, blocked major highways, and suspended cellular and internet services in several areas.

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has condemned the violence as “extremism” directed at fulfilling “evil political objectives.” Yet Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party aims to release the imprisoned leader and hold fresh elections, with Khan himself urging his backers to “fight till the end.”

Khan was ousted in April 2022 and arrested the following year on dozens of charges, many of which center on corruption. Despite government efforts to stifle public support for Khan, the former leader remains a popular figure, with his party and supporters claiming that the allegations against him are politically motivated and that Sharif’s coalition rigged this year’s general election in his favor.

Reviving Farmgate charges. South Africa’s opposition Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party filed a case at the country’s top court on Tuesday that aims to revive impeachment proceedings against President Cyril Ramaphosa. The case revolves around the so-called Farmgate scandal involving the theft of at least $4 million in foreign cash hidden in furniture on Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala game farm in 2020. The president did not report the theft at the time; it only came to light two years later, in June 2022, when a former intelligence official told police about it and accused Ramaphosa of money laundering and corruption related to the incident.

In 2022, an independent panel found evidence of possible misconduct on Ramaphosa’s part, but South Africa’s National Assembly, of which Ramaphosa’s African National Congress held a majority at the time, voted to reject the report’s findings. To date, Ramaphosa has denied any wrongdoing and has not been charged with a crime. EFF spokesperson Vuyani Pambo argued at the country’s Constitutional Court on Tuesday that the only reason Ramaphosa remains in office is because South Africa’s Parliament refused to hold an impeachment inquiry and that the body acted unlawfully by failing to hold the president to account.

Odds and Ends

A South Korean court sentenced a 26-year-old man to a suspended one-year prison sentence on Tuesday for deliberately gaining weight to avoid active-duty military conscription. According to prosecutors, an exam in 2017 found the individual suitable for active service. But under his friend’s advice, the man doubled his food intake and quit his part-time job, thinking that if he became overweight, then he could avoid active duty. All able-bodied men in South Korea must serve in the military for 18 to 21 months.

The post Israel Approves Cease-Fire Deal With Hezbollah appeared first on Foreign Policy.