As President Donald Trump tries to manufacture some form of a Lebanon “ceasefire” acceptable to the U.S.’s rogue ally Israel, a senior Hezbollah politician told Drop Site that any agreement must include a total end to Israeli bombing and a complete withdrawal of occupation forces from Lebanese territory. Ibrahim Al-Moussawi, a member of the Lebanese parliament with the Loyalty to the Resistance bloc, criticized the Lebanese government for agreeing to direct talks with Israel in the midst of the ongoing, massive attacks on Lebanon that have killed more than 2,100 people, including over 170 children, since early March.

“We reject direct negotiations. Of course we don’t accept that the Lebanese go there and surrender to the dictations and to the will and to the hegemony of the American and Israeli warmongers,” said Al-Moussawi in an interview with Drop Site. “None of the conditions of Lebanon has been met, none of the requirements and the goals of Lebanon has been met. This is going to be rejected not only by Hezbollah, but by the majority of the people.”

Trump, for purely short-term strategic reasons, is pushing for a ceasefire announcement—reportedly as soon as tonight. His administration has offered full support for Israel’s ongoing bombing and ground invasion of Lebanon. But the policy has become complicated over the past week as the U.S. and Iran have engaged in backchannel talks with Pakistan about conducting another round of negotiations. Tehran has repeatedly said that failure to secure a ceasefire in Lebanon could derail any potential agreement.

On Wednesday, the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the U.S. met in Washington, D.C., the highest level, publicly known direct talks between the two governments since 1993. Hours after the meeting ended, Trump claimed on Truth Social that the leaders of Israel and Lebanon would speak by phone on Thursday. “Trying to get a little breathing room between Israel and Lebanon. It has been a long time since the two leaders have spoken, like 34 years. It will happen tomorrow. Nice!,” Trump wrote.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has come under intense criticism from Hezbollah and other factions in Lebanon for authorizing direct talks with Israel while it conducts intense attacks that have forcibly displaced more than 1.1 million people—a fifth of Lebanon’s population—since early March and inflicted widespread destruction of villages and neighborhoods throughout the south. The Lebanese government has engaged in these talks with Israel without seeking a consensus from Lebanon’s diverse political factions, or allowing formal parliamentary debate, and has done so over the explicit objections of Hezbollah, whose forces would be at the center of any deal reached with Israel.

A direct call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would be unprecedented and would spark mass anger inside Lebanon.

“Do not comply with Trump’s orders to make contact with Netanyahu. If you do, you will sever the last thread that still exists between us, the people, and you,” wrote Hasan Illaik, a prominent Lebanese analyst and host of a popular YouTube show, in a post on X. “If you do it, it will mean that your presidency ends in that very instant, and more dangerously, it will be an announcement that you have proceeded to implement an American-Israeli decision to destroy the country, and history will then remember you at the very bottom of the ranks.”

Lebanese officials claimed early Thursday that they had “no information” about a call, but did not explicitly deny it was under discussion. Some Lebanese analysts told Drop Site that Trump’s post may have been floated as a trial balloon to gauge public reaction. Lebanese TV later reported that Aoun had refused a call with Netanyahu. Moments after that, U.S. officials told Lebanon’s MTV that Trump planned to have Aoun and Netanyahu join a three-way call. The Lebanese presidency confirmed in a statement that Aoun spoke with Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Thursday.

Over the past several days, the Trump administration has scrambled to try to push through an agreement acceptable to Israel, which maintains that it will not end its war against Lebanon until Hezbollah is disarmed or defeated. Ha’aretz and other Israeli media outlets reported that senior Israeli military commanders had been told to prepare their forces deployed in southern Lebanon ahead of a truce that would reportedly take effect Thursday between 7 p.m. and midnight local time. Lebanon has not confirmed any agreement has been reached.

“I would take any ceasefire declaration on the part of the US or Israel with a huge grain of salt at this point. The talks themselves —Israeli-Lebanese and to a lesser extent, U.S.-Iranian, are starting to look more like a means of warfare through other means,” said Amal Saad, a lecturer on international relations and politics at Cardiff University in the UK who is writing a book on Hezbollah and the Axis of Resistance. “This could well be another ploy to deceive, buy time to reconstitute or give cover to the Lebanese government to quickly normalize Israel and its aggression before the fighting resumes.”

Following the talks on Wednesday, the State Department released a statement emphasizing that the aim of the meeting was to develop a framework for disarming Hezbollah and increasing cooperation between Israel and the Lebanese government.

“This is nonsense,” said Al-Moussawi. “This is something that no one can accept. This is stripping Lebanon from its points of strength. You’re talking about honorable people fighting on the front to defend Lebanon.” Al-Moussawi, the former head of Hezbollah’s media relations department, was first elected to Lebanon’s parliament in 2018. He is a journalist and academic and holds a PhD in philosophy from the University of Birmingham in the UK. “I’ll tell you, as long as the occupation continues, the resistance will continue,” he stated. “And the resistance has every right to fight back if the Lebanese army isn’t equipped enough to fight back,” he added. “We should be thanked for what we are doing and not to be accused or not to be delegitimized because of this.”

When Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif formally announced on April 7 that a two-week ceasefire agreement had been reached between the U.S. and Iran, he emphasized that the agreement would apply to all territories involved with the war. “I am pleased to announce that the Islamic Republic of Iran and the United States of America, along with their allies, have agreed to an immediate ceasefire everywhere including Lebanon and elsewhere, EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY,” Shehbaz wrote in a post on X.

The specific mention of Lebanon by Shehbaz was significant. Iranian negotiators had repeatedly emphasized that any deal must include an end to Israel’s scorched earth attacks against southern Lebanon. Iran’s ally Hezbollah entered the war on March 2, two days after the start of the U.S.-Israeli war against Iran and had stunned the region by exhibiting a continued capacity to strike Israel and fight off invasion forces. Soon after the U.S.-Iran agreement was announced, Netanyahu said that he would not end Israel’s war against Lebanon and ratcheted up the bombing. Israel conducted one of its heaviest aerial assaults on Lebanon, dropping 160 munitions within 10 minutes in what some Lebanese have come to call “Black Wednesday.” Within 24 hours more than 350 people had been killed, and over 1,200 wounded, in Israeli attacks, one of the bloodiest days in Lebanon since the 1982 Israeli invasion.

Iran charged that the Israeli attacks and the refusal to halt its bombing “blatantly violates the initial ceasefire,” while Trump claimed Lebanon was “not included in the deal,” calling Israel’s war against Lebanon a “separate skirmish.”

Initially, Lebanese officials insisted that Lebanon should be included in the deal, but soon shifted their diplomatic language to calls for a separate ceasefire. On April 9, a Lebanese official told Reuters that Lebanon had been advocating for a temporary ceasefire on a “separate ​track but the same model” as the Iran agreement, effectively signaling acceptance of the U.S. and Israeli rejection of Lebanon’s inclusion in the Iran deal.

The State Department reiterated Wednesday that it would not abide by the terms announced by Shehbaz regarding a Lebanon ceasefire, saying in a statement that “any agreement to cease hostilities must be reached between the two governments, brokered by the United States, and not through any separate track.” Pakistan, which is the main mediator of the Iran negotiations, continues to insist that Lebanon is part of the initial deal. “Peace in Lebanon is essential for peace talks,” said Tahir Andrabi, a spokesperson for Pakistan’s foreign ministry, at a briefing Thursday. “Israeli attacks against Lebanon constitute a grave violation of international law and fundamental humanitarian principles.” Several European nations also signed onto a joint statement endorsing the agreement and emphasizing the importance of including Lebanon.

Al-Moussawi said that the Lebanese government’s decision to capitulate to the U.S. demand for bilateral negotiations with Israel rather than insist that Trump uphold the terms of the agreement with Iran opened the door for continued Israeli attacks. “This has opened a window for the Israelis to make more massacres in Lebanon,” Al-Moussawi said. “This massacre has taken place simply because of the lack of responsibility of the Lebanese officials because they [excluded] themselves from the ceasefire that has been put as a core requirement by the Iranians,” Al-Moussawi said. “They are responsible and they are partners in the killing of their own people.”

The speaker of the Iranian parliament, Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, spoke to Nabih Berri, the speaker of Lebanon’s legislature, on Thursday and reiterated that Iranian negotiators continue to demand the ceasefire apply to Lebanon. “We have been seriously pursuing forcing the enemies to establish a permanent ceasefire in all conflict areas according to the ceasefire agreement because for us, the ceasefire in Lebanon is as important as the ceasefire in Iran,” Ghalibaf said, according to IRIB, the official Iranian broadcast network.

Some supporters of Hezbollah were angry that Iran did not halt the negotiations with the U.S. once it became clear that Israel was going to continue its war against Lebanon in violation of the announced ceasefire framework. Al-Moussawi, however, said he is confident Iran is prioritizing a Lebanon ceasefire. “We want the result to happen, to pressure the Israelis, to pressure the Americans and this is what the Iranians are doing. The most important card in the Iranian hands is the Strait of Hormuz. And they continue to say we will not open the Strait of Hormuz unless you include Lebanon in the agenda of the ceasefire,” Al-Moussawi said. “Iran has never abandoned the Lebanese. Iran has proved to be very faithful and loyal to its allies and to its friends.”

The Lebanese government is in a difficult position. While it is the internationally recognized authority ruling Lebanon, it cannot force Hezbollah to abide by an agreement that the resistance movement rejects. Israel and the U.S. have consistently described their vision for a ceasefire as an agreement that involves Israel and the Lebanese Army jointly disarming Hezbollah. Hebrew media outlets close to Netanyahu have reported that Israel is promoting a plan to effectively create a West Bank-type structure in southern Lebanon, dividing it into three sections. Israeli forces would establish a long-term presence in a “buffer zone,” continue its military operations against Hezbollah in a second zone until the resistance group is disarmed and after which Lebanese forces would deploy. A third zone would involve Lebanese forces engaging in disarmament operations against Hezbollah.

President Aoun, in a meeting with the British Secretary for Middle East Affairs on Thursday, said Lebanon was calling for the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Lebanon as part of an agreement for the Lebanese army to deploy in the south. “The decisions taken by the government, particularly those related to the exclusivity of arms, will be implemented in the interest of Lebanon and to ensure the protection of all Lebanese people who aspire to see their state solely responsible for maintaining security, stability, and public safety in the country,” Aoun said, according to a readout of the meeting. He added that a ceasefire would enable “the Lebanese army to redeploy up to the international borders.”

Al-Moussawi dismissed the reported Israeli buffer zone plans and said Hezbollah would never accept it. Hezbollah, he argued, is necessary because the Lebanese army is incapable of defending the country from Israeli aggression. “No one can disagree that the official [Lebanese] authorities have to have a monopoly of arms. This is one of the definitions of a state,” he said. But, he added, Lebanon “has never had an army that is equipped enough or that has the political [backing] by the leaders or the officials to defend or protect Lebanon…to fight back against the Israelis.”

Hezbollah stunned many international observers with the ferocity of its attacks against Israel when it joined the war alongside Iran in early March. Both Israeli and U.S. officials had portrayed the group as severely degraded and a remnant of its previous stature, yet it launched repeated missile attacks and has fought off Israeli attempts to impose a broader occupation in southern Lebanon. Hezbollah’s stance stood in stark contrast to Lebanon’s official armed forces.

In early April, as Israeli attacks ravaged southern Lebanon, the Lebanese army announced its forces had withdrawn from southern border villages, leaving residents without even the semblance of protection. “The villagers, the people of the villages in southern Lebanon—Christians, Muslims—they were begging the army to stay,” Al-Moussawi said. “But officials ordered the army not to fight back, not to protect, not to defend, but simply to withdraw.” he added, “One of the important [jobs of the] Lebanon state is to defend and protect its people. This is what the army should be.”

The day after the Hamas-led attacks on October 7, Hezbollah entered the Gaza war, opening what it called a second front against Israel. Less than a year later, in September 2024, Israel unleashed its strongest campaign of attacks on Lebanon since the 2006 invasion. It conducted an assassination campaign targeting Hezbollah officials and civilian workers with exploding pagers, massively bombed civilian neighborhoods and ultimately assassinated Hezbollah’s Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. By November 2024, over 3,800 people had been killed and more than 1.2 million forcibly displaced. That month, Israel and Lebanon signed a ceasefire agreement, which Israel systematically violated on a nearly daily basis, killing over 340 people in the period leading up to March 2, the day Hezbollah joined the Iran war.

After the U.S. and Israel initiated the war against Iran in February, which began with the assassination of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other senior political and military leaders, Hezbollah announced it was entering the war and began launching missiles at Israel. “We saw that this is the proper time for us to engage in the war and to retaliate because Israel would be preoccupied with fighting against a huge regional power, which is Iran,” said Al-Moussawi. “You’re talking about a war that has never been stopped by the Israelis. We were retaliating.”

Israel has a multi-decade track record of violating ceasefire agreements, including with Lebanon. “The Israelis say, ‘Yes, we had reached a ceasefire,’ but they continue to assassinate, they continue to kill,” said Al-Moussawi. “This is not something that Lebanon should accept, not on the resistance level, not on the official level. This is something that should come to a total stop. The Israelis should be pressured in order to respect a full ceasefire and not to be given the liberty to do whatever they want anytime, anywhere in Lebanon.”

“Without the Americans, you know, I know, everybody knows, that the Israelis cannot continue the war,” Al-Moussawi added. “It’s the American administration that should be held responsible for this. Without America, I believe we would have been released from all of this terrorism, Israel, a long time ago.”

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