Sixth round of Israel-Lebanon talks begins in Rome, with focus on IDF pullout ‘pilot’

Lebanon wants immediate movement on plans agreed to last month for its army to take control of designated zones, while Jerusalem still has misgivings

Lebanon and Israel resumed talks on Tuesday, this time in the Italian capital, with Beirut hoping for progress toward securing an Israeli withdrawal from south Lebanon under a US-brokered deal, although expectations for swift progress were low.

The sixth round of talks represented the first meeting between the sides since a framework agreement was signed between the two countries in Washington last month.

The negotiations are expected to focus on the pilot program, which will see the Lebanese Armed Forces move into territory the IDF will withdraw from, with the aim of ensuring that it is clear of Hezbollah weapons.

Israel’s Ambassador to Washington Yechiel Leiter leads the Israeli delegation.

A US military delegation met with representatives of Lebanon’s army in Beirut earlier this week to discuss the implementation of Israel’s withdrawal.

A Lebanese official told AFP over the weekend that his country would take part in the planned talks, after Beirut had previously conditioned participation on Israel withdrawing from the areas designated for the pilot program.

Ahead of the new round, a senior Israeli official told Channel 12 on Monday that the sides will discuss — and likely disagree over — the pace of the pilot program.

“In Lebanon, they are trying to assert as much control as possible over the process, to enable the expansion of the pilot program in the future,” the official told the network. “As far as we’re concerned, as long as the first pilot doesn’t prove itself, there will be no further withdrawals.”

The official added that there was a disagreement over the metrics by which to determine whether the Lebanese military had completed its mission.

US-led diplomacy has emerged since Hezbollah and Israel returned to war on March 2 amid the wider regional conflict. It has moved forward despite strong objections from the Iran-backed terror group.

Iran demanded an end to the war in Lebanon as part of its interim deal with Washington signed last month, but that agreement has been shaken over the last week by renewed US-Iranian hostilities in the Gulf.

Israel’s ​military is holding what it describes as a “security zone” about 10 kilometrs (six miles) into Lebanon along the entire length of the Israeli border. Israeli officials say the zone ‌is ⁠necessary to protect northern Israeli communities from attacks launched by Hezbollah.

A meeting in Washington on June 26 produced an agreement that called for an end to the Lebanon conflict, the disarmament of armed groups, as well as the deployment of Lebanese troops to the south and the progressive withdrawal of Israeli forces.

But deadly Israeli strikes have continued and Hezbollah has rejected the agreement as well as efforts to disarm it. Israel, meanwhile, has said its troops would remain in southern Lebanon as long as Hezbollah remains in possession of its weapons.

Lebanese and Israeli officials are meeting at the US embassy in Rome on Tuesday and Wednesday to set out how to implement the framework deal, Lebanese officials told Reuters. One of the officials said moving the talks to Rome would make it easier for both countries’ delegations to consult their governments for guidance as they negotiate.

Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Monday that Italy had offered to host the talks to continue work toward a genuine ceasefire in Lebanon.

“We are also very pleased that Rome can serve as the venue for these meetings. In this way, our capital becomes a capital of peace,” Tajani said ahead of a European Union meeting in Brussels on Monday.

The Lebanese presidency announced on Monday that its delegation to Rome had been instructed “to demand the immediate start of Israeli forces’ withdrawal from the two pilot zones before any further discussion.”

In comments published by his office, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said he hoped the Rome meeting would yield “tangible and practical steps on the ground.”

One of the Lebanese officials said the country’s delegation to Tuesday’s talks would seek the gradual and sequential withdrawal of Israeli troops “one zone after another.”

The June 26 agreement said two zones had been identified as a starting point. A US official said last week that the US military’s Central Command (CENTCOM) was coordinating with both Lebanon and Israel to launch the pilot zones.

Israel’s military has forced the local Lebanese population from their homes and carried out controlled explosions, demolishing entire villages. It says it is destroying vast infrastructure, including underground tunnels, used by Hezbollah.

Tehran had demanded the ceasefire in Lebanon in order to conclude a memorandum of understanding with Washington on June 17.

But the region has seen a renewed escalation in recent days, with the US carrying out a third consecutive night of strikes against Iran ahead of the planned reimposition on Tuesday of its naval blockade of Iranian ports, and Tehran striking multiple countries in the region.

Analyst Orna Mizrahi, of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) in Tel Aviv, told AFP that Iran wants to establish a link between negotiations over the US-Iran war and Lebanon, “but we have the wish to disconnect it.”

She added that Tehran’s priorities today are the Strait of Hormuz and the nuclear file.

“The Iranians are using Lebanon as an excuse. They will always use it as an excuse.”

Karim Bitar, a lecturer at Sciences Po Paris, told AFP that the risk of major fighting returning to Lebanon as a result of the regional escalation “is, of course, not negligible.”

“But I think that Iran today will think twice before asking Hezbollah to launch new strikes against Israel,” he said.

Tehran “wants to maintain Hezbollah as a long-term deterrent tool and does not want to use it immediately to open a new front,” he added.