Israel says troops will stay in Lebanon, Gaza despite US-Iran peace deal

JERUSALEM – Israel’s defence minister has said that Israeli forces would remain in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza indefinitely, hours after the United States and Iran agreed to end their war that had ensnared Lebanon.

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I are pursuing a clear policy under which the IDF (Israel Defense Force) will remain in the security zones in Lebanon, Syria and Gaza for an unlimited period of time, in order to protect the border and Israeli communities from there against jihadist elements,” Israel Katz on June 15 said in a statement that did not make any reference to the US-Iran deal.

The US and Iran reached an agreement on June 14 that paved the way for further talks to ultimately end a months-long war that has killed thousands and rattled the global economy.

US President Donald Trump said the deal would reopen the Strait of Hormuz, an economically vital waterway, and that he has authorised “the immediate removal of the United States Naval blockade” on Iranian ports.

Even before the announcement came on June 14, the details that had surfaced in news media reports prompted a flood of criticism and expressions of discontent from Israelis spanning the country’s political spectrum.

Two Israeli far-right ministers on June 15 denounced the deal, insisting their country was not bound by it.

“Trump’s agreement does not bind us. We are not party to this agreement. It does not safeguard our security,” National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said on his Telegram channel, in what was the first reaction from an Israeli official to the deal.

“We must not settle for anything less than the dismantling of Hezbollah. We must not withdraw from a single inch of territory that our soldiers have captured and cleared of terrorist infrastructure,” he said.

Israel has waged two wars against Iran in the past year, the most recent launched in late February with US forces. That war drew in Lebanon after the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah fired missiles into Israel to support Iran.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called the US-Iran deal “bad for Israel”.

“The joint (US-Israel) campaign achieved many successes in weakening Iran, and those achievements have not been in vain,” Smotrich said. “We will have to continue the campaign to bring down the regime ourselves, using creative means, and ensure that Iran never acquires nuclear weapons.”

Smotrich also called for a stronger campaign in Lebanon.

“We will be judged in Lebanon. This is our war, our soldiers, and the immediate security of our northern residents,” he said. “I will continue working to ensure that we stand firm on our position and allow the IDF complete freedom of action to continue pushing Hezbollah farther away.”

Katz, the defence minister, said “holding territory and maintaining security zones are among the IDF’s greatest achievements”.

“Therefore, we oppose an IDF withdrawal from Lebanon, despite all the existing pressures and those that will come,” he said, adding that Netanyahu had informed Trump about this.

Katz also warned Iran that if it attacks Israel in response to its campaign in Lebanon, Israel would retaliate with “full force”.

“We will not compromise on Israel’s paramount security interest and the protection of our citizens, and we will not withdraw from the security zones,” he said.

Israeli experts had been alarmed that elements key to Israel appear not to have been mentioned at all in the peace deal.

“No matter what will happen, President Trump will declare victory, a total win,” said Jacob Nagel, a former acting national security adviser to Netanyahu.

“It’s very easy to say what topics” will be up for future negotiations, Nagel told reporters on June 15 in a video briefing.

But, he said, Iran’s ballistic missiles and its support for proxy groups in the region do not even appear as topics in the publicly circulating details.

Netanyahu’s opponents, commenting before the announcement of the ceasefire, were less charitable.

“A catastrophe from Israel’s perspective,” Avigdor Liberman, a former Israeli defence minister and a right-wing politician, wrote in a social media post on June 14.

Yair Lapid, the centrist leader of Israel’s parliamentary opposition and a former top government minister, said he hoped the reports about the agreement with Iran were not true.

“But if they are,” he said in a statement, “this is one of the most shocking failures of Israel’s foreign and security policy”. AFP