Larijani voices Tehran’s support for Beirut in cease-fire talks
Ali Larijani, a senior advisor to the Leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolution, said on Friday that Tehran will support any decision taken by the Lebanese government and the country’s resistance movement Hezbollah in current talks on a potential cease-fire deal with Israel.
“We do no intend to obstruct anything. We are after a solution to the problems,” Larijani said after meeting Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati and Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri.
Larijani, referring to Lebanon’s Hezbollah, said the Islamic Republic would support the resistance front under all circumstances.
“We support the resistance under all circumstances,” he added, noting that his ongoing trip to Lebanon was meant to convey this message.
The official also said he had conveyed a message from Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei to Berri, but did not provide any information on its content.
Larijani commented on an announcement made by the Lebanese prime minister earlier in the day, in which he said Lebanon “prioritized” implementation of the UN Security Council Resolution 1701.
Adopted to end Israel’s 2006 war on Lebanon, the resolution has trusted preservation of security in southern Lebanese areas with UN peacekeepers.
“We support whatever important issue that is accepted by the Lebanese authorities and resistance,” Larijani said.
Diplomacy aimed at securing a cease-fire in Lebanon showed tentative signs of progress on Thursday as Israel pounded the northern county, including heavy airstrikes on the stronghold of the Hezbollah resistance movement near Beirut, Reuters reported.
Pressing its offensive against the group, Israel hit Beirut’s southern suburbs, carrying out intense attacks there for a third consecutive day.
Plumes of smoke rose over Dahiyeh, where Israeli strikes destroyed five buildings, sources familiar with the damage said.
In addition, Israeli strikes in the eastern city of Baalbek killed at least 20 people while 11 died in an Israeli aerial bombardment of towns in southern Lebanon, authorities and Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA) said.
Draft truce proposal
Meanwhile, the US ambassador to Lebanon on Thursday submitted a draft truce proposal to Berri, two senior Lebanese political sources told Reuters, without providing details.
Israel insists on retaining the right to target Hezbollah in Lebanon even after an agreement, a condition Lebanon firmly rejects.
The Israeli regime also struck the upscale Mazzeh district of Damascus on Friday, the second such attack in as many days to hit the neighborhood home to embassies, security headquarters and United Nations offices, Syrian state-run media said.
“Israeli aggression targets Mazzeh area in Damascus,” SANA said, after reporting a deadly Israeli strike on the district a day earlier.
The attacks coincided with the presence of Larijani in Syria, and his meetings with President Bashar al-Assad and other Syrian officials on Thursday.
The two sides discussed further solidification of bilateral relations amid heightened escalation in the region as they underscored the need for putting an end to Israel’s atrocious onslaught on the besieged Gaza Strip and Lebanon.
Larijani stressed the Islamic Republic’s standing by Syria and its willingness to provide all forms of support for it, hailing the pivotal role of Damascus in the region. Assad, for his part, underlined his country’s adherence to the Palestinian historic rights and support for the struggle of the Lebanese and Palestinian people with all means. The Syrian president also called for stopping Israel’s massacres and an end to the occupying regime’s mass genocidal crimes.