Basim Mroue
AP / August 31, 2023
BEIRUT – A senior U.S. envoy visiting Beirut said Thursday that Washington is looking into possibilities for solving a decades-old border dispute between Lebanon and Israel, a year after he brokered a deal on the maritime frontier between the two nations.
Amos Hochstein, a senior advisor to U.S. President Joe Biden, also expressed disappointment with Lebanon’s reluctance to implement reforms amid the country’s historic economic meltdown. He spoke to reporters at the end of a two-day visit to Lebanon during which he met with the caretaker prime minister, the Parliament speaker and other officials.
Hochstein last year brokered a maritime border deal between Lebanon and Israel paving the way for gas exploration in the area, in what many hope will eventually help pull Beirut out of its economic crisis. Lebanon and Israel have formally been at war since Israel’s creation in 1948.
Asked whether he is coming to mediate between Lebanon and Israel over their disputed land border, Hochstein said that he listened to the views of the Lebanese government, then visited the border area “to learn more about what is needed in order to be able to achieve an outcome.”
Hochstein added that he now plans to hear the Israeli view “and to make an assessment if this is the right time and if we have a window of opportunity to be able to achieve it.” He added that the U.S. “always supports what enables stability and security.”
Chebaa Farms and the Kfar Chouba hills were captured by Israel from Syria during the 1967 Mideast war and are part of Syria’s Golan Heights that Israel annexed in 1981. The Lebanese government says the area, that has been a source of tension for years, belongs to Lebanon.
Lebanon has been in the grips of its worst economic and financial crisis in its modern history, rooted in decades of corruption and mismanagement by the country’s political class. Despite the fact that the crisis has been ongoing for nearly four years, the country’s ruling class has been resistant to reforms demanded by the international community in order to release billions of dollars in soft loans and investments.
Earlier in August, an offshore drilling rig arrived at its destination in the Mediterranean Sea off Lebanon’s coast and will start operations soon.
“I am optimistic. I’m always optimistic about what is possible in Lebanon, but I’m also impatient about the pace of reform,” Hochstein said. “I’m disappointed by all the lost opportunities.”
He added that “as Lebanon takes steps to put the country on the path toward economic growth and peace, it can count on the U.S. for continued support.”
He added that the Lebanese people are hoping to see a president elected and a fully functioning government take office. Lebanon has been without a president since October of last year and is currently run by a caretaker government.
“The absence of empowered leaders has been detrimental to the country and it’s the people of Lebanon who have been paying the greatest price for the impasse,” he said.
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US could help settle Lebanon, Israel border dispute, White House adviser says
Reuters / August 31, 2023
BEIRUT – The United States is exploring the possibility of resolving the long-standing border dispute between Lebanon and Israel, senior White House adviser Amos Hochstein said on Thursday at the end of a two-day visit to Lebanon.
Hochstein said it was “natural” to look into the issue following the delineation in 2022 of the maritime border between the two countries, which paved the way for offshore exploration activities to begin on behalf of Lebanon last week.
The senior White House adviser said he visited southern Lebanon during his trip “to understand and learn more about what is needed to be able to potentially achieve an outcome”.
“It is time for me to hear from the other side, and to make an assessment if this is a right time,” he said.
Lebanese caretaker Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib told Reuters that Hochstein had said he would speak to Israel next and if both agreed, “America would be ready to work with us”.
The current demarcation line between the two countries is known as the Blue Line, a frontier mapped by the United Nations that marks the line to which Israeli forces withdrew when they left south Lebanon in 2000.
Tensions have flared along it this summer, with rockets being fired at Israel during flare-ups of Israeli-Palestinian violence, and members of the heavily armed Lebanese group Hezbollah or its supporters facing off with Israeli forces.
Lebanon’s caretaker foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib said last week that determining the land border could put an end to those tensions.
The U.N. peacekeeping force known as UNIFIL, which had its one-year mandate renewed on Thursday, has hosted meetings of Lebanon, Israel and the United Nations on points of contention preventing the delineation of the land border.
Reporting by Maya Gebeily and Issam Abdallah; editing by Mark Heinrich, Jonathan Oatis and Andrew Heavens
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US might mediate Lebanon-Israel border dispute: White House adviser
Al-Jazeera / August 31, 2023
Amos Hochstein said it was ‘natural’ to resolve the issue after the 2022 delineation of the maritime border.
The United States may get involved in mediating the end of a border dispute between Lebanon and Israel that has caused tensions cross-border violence in recent months, a senior White House adviser has said.
At the end of a two-day visit to Lebanon on Thursday, Amos Hochstein said it was “natural” to resolve the issue, building on the 2022 delineation of the maritime border between the two countries.
The senior White House adviser said he visited southern Lebanon during his trip “to understand and learn more about what is needed to be able to potentially achieve an outcome”.
“It is time for me to hear from the other side, and to make an assessment if this is a right time,” he said.
The maritime border delineation has led to Lebanon beginning offshore exploration activities last week.
The land demarcation line between Lebanon and Israel is known as the Blue Line, a border that the United Nations marked when Israeli forces withdrew from southern Lebanon in 2000 after an occupation that began during the Lebanese Civil War in 1982.
The past few months have seen spikes of violence at the border, with rockets fired at Israel after Israeli attacks against Palestinians, and forces belonging to the Lebanese Shia Muslim Hezbollah group fighting with Israeli forces.
The village of Ghajar has been at the centre of the tension. It is divided by the Blue Line between Lebanon and Israel, but the latter has occupied the whole village since 2006, and Lebanese officials have said that Israel has been building a wall around the whole town.
Israel has complained to the UN about military-style tents that Hezbollah has erected near Ghajar.
Lebanon’s caretaker foreign minister, Abdallah Bou Habib, said solving the border dispute could ease these tensions.
UN peacekeeping force UNIFIL has hosted meetings between Lebanon, Israel and the United Nations on the issue.
SOURCE: AL-JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES
