Israel continued its military incursion into southern Lebanon today, a day after Israeli-Lebanese security and military talks in Washington that the US Department of Defense described as "constructive," without any tangible progress on a ceasefire or the issue of Hezbollah's weapons, amid a clear divergence between the two sides, suggesting that military operations will continue until further notice. According to available information, the Lebanese delegation, led by Ambassador Simon Karam and including military officers, demanded a halt to Israeli air and ground operations and an end to the policy of evacuating villages, in addition to a withdrawal from the الأراضي entered by the Israeli army, the activation of the committee monitoring the cessation of hostilities (the mechanism), and stronger military and logistical support for the Lebanese army to enable it to carry out its plan to remove Hezbollah's weapons from south of the Litani River, while stressing a US-guaranteed role in enforcing the ceasefire.
By contrast, the Israelis argued that the Lebanese army had not completed the "cleansing" of the area south of the Litani of Hezbollah weapons, pointing to the continued presence of arms, rockets, and fighters, and presented maps of sites they said were used for weapons storage south and north of the Litani, demanding that the army dismantle them. The Israeli side insisted on establishing a buffer zone along the Blue Line, with direct security coordination with the Lebanese army, and deploying surveillance cameras facing north of the Litani powered by artificial intelligence, in addition to advanced systems for monitoring movement and weapons. It also focused on Hezbollah's loitering attack drones and the need to establish mechanisms to control the places where they are manufactured and developed.
Meanwhile, diplomatic estimates indicate that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is pushing to accelerate and intensify operations in the south in the absence of serious US pressure, with the possibility of expanding the incursion into unexpected areas. Sources spoke of potential targets including the Awali or Zahrani rivers, and of opening battles in Jabal al-Rayhan and Iqlim al-Tuffah, while the Israeli army announced the evacuation of seven areas in the south and the Bekaa toward north of the Zahrani, at the same time that two Lebanese soldiers were wounded by an Israeli drone. In recent days, the Israelis have recorded field advances with their arrival at Beaufort Castle, a strategic point overlooking vast areas south and north of the Litani. It is seen as a platform for advancing toward Kfartebnit and the Ali al-Taher hill overlooking Nabatieh from the east, as part of a route understood to aim at bringing Nabatieh under fire control via the Zawtar axis toward Mifdoun. The Beaufort hill also overlooks wide areas of Jabal al-Rayhan and the road linking the western Bekaa to the south, while the Israelis are advancing on the Dbayn axis, where they carried out major demolitions, reaching the town of Blat, which overlooks Kfarreman, the Khardali road, Wadi Barghaz, and Jabal al-Rayhan, with Barghaz considered a strategic objective according to some sources.
