Beirut, Nov. 7, (dpa/GNA) – US envoy Amos Hochstein on Tuesday appealed for calm at Lebanon’s southern border with Israel, following weeks of skirmishes after the start of the Israeli war on Gaza.
“Restoring calm on the southern border” of Lebanon with Israel is “of utmost importance to the United States,” he told reporters after meeting with Lebanese Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri, who is close to the Shiite movement Hezbollah.
“The United States does not want to see the conflict in Gaza escalating and expanding into Lebanon,” Hochstein said.
The US envoy, who arrived in Beirut earlier Tuesday, also met with caretaker Prime Minister Nagib Mikati.
The state-run Lebanese National News Agency quoted the US official as saying that discussions are under way to reach a humanitarian pause in Gaza.
The Gaza war began on October 7 with Hamas carrying out massacres in Israel. The situation on the border with Lebanon deteriorated amid Israel’s air and ground campaign to root out Hamas in Gaza.
There have been deaths on both sides, including civilians, in daily tit-for-tat attacks between the Israeli army and the pro-Iranian Hezbollah group.
Hezbollah has ties to Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip.
The powerful group is considered Iran’s most important non-state ally and is part of the self-proclaimed “Axis of Resistance,” a front of militias with the aim of fighting Iran’s arch-enemy Israel.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah warned on Friday of a military escalation on the Israeli-Lebanese border in his first speech since the outbreak of war.
The US has warned Hezbollah in Lebanon and its ally Iran several times not to open a new front.
GNA