WASHINGTON — President Biden spoke from the Rose Garden Tuesday to tout a cease-fire plan between Israel and Hezbollah — claiming credit for helping broker the agreement after months of fighting.
“I just spoke with the prime ministers of Israel and Lebanon. I’m pleased to announce that their governments have accepted the United States proposal to end the devastating conflict between Israel and Hezbollah,” Biden, 82, said.
Biden said that “this is designed to be a permanent cessation of hostilities.”
Biden spoke from the Rose Garden to tout a cease-fire plan between Israel and Hezbollah. REUTERS
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted Beirut’s southern suburbs on Nov. 26, 2024. AFP via Getty Images“What is left of Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations will not be allowed,” Biden said of the Iran-backed terrorist group based in Lebanon.
“What is left of Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations will not be allowed — and I emphasize, will not be allowed — to threaten the security of Israel again,” Biden said of the Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group.
“Over the next 60 days, the Lebanese army and state security forces will deploy and take control of their own territory,” he went on.
Biden touted the plan as a “permanent cessation of hostilities.” AP Photo/Ben Curtis
Biden called on Hamas to free the remaining hostages in his remarks. Photo by SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images“Once again, Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure in southern Lebanon will not be allowed to be rebuilt and over the next 60 days, Israel will gradually withdraw its remaining forces and civilians.”
The plan calls for the Islamist group to “roughly north of” southern Lebanon’s Litani River to put them far from the Israeli border, a US official said.
Israeli troops on Tuesday reached the river, which the Jewish state has long sought as the northern extent of a desired protective buffer.
Biden said that “civilians on both sides will soon be able to safely return to their communities and begin to rebuild their homes, their schools, their farms, their businesses and their very lives.”
Biden noted that the plan prevents Hezbollah’s terrorist infrastructure from being rebuilt in Lebanon. REUTERS/Nathan Howard
Residents embrace at the site of a rocket attack on Nov. 24, 2024 in Rinatya, Israel. Getty ImagesThe deal, approved by Israel’s cabinet after significant involvement by France’s government, comes as Biden has failed to broker a cease-fire deal between Israel and the Hamas terrorist group in the Gaza Strip.
“Just as the Lebanese people deserve a future of security and prosperity, so do the people of Gaza,” the outgoing president added in the Rose Garden.
“Now Hamas has a choice to make. Their only way out is to release hostages, including American citizens, which they hold and in the process bring an end to the fighting, which would make possible a surge of humanitarian relief.”The Israeli military in the past two month killed the leaders of both Hamas and Hezbollah — with longtime Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah killed in a Sept. 27 airstrike in Beirut just 10 days after a covert Israeli operation killed and wounded hundreds of the group’s operatives by detonating the pagers they used to communicate.
A senior Biden administration official told reporters on a press call that he had briefed members of President-elect Donald Trump’s team on the developments and “they seem to be supportive.
“Hezbollah is extremely weak at this moment, both militarily and politically, and this is the opportunity for Lebanon to reestablish its sovereignty over its territory,” that official said.
