DUBAI
\nIran has reaffirmed support for its Lebanese ally \u200bHezbollah and demanded that Israel withdraw from southern Lebanon, underscoring complications facing an interim deal to end the broader conflict between the U.S. and Iran.
\nTehran has made a ceasefire between \u200cIsrael and Hezbollah a condition for any peace deal with Washington to resolve the regional war, now in its fourth month, and restart shipping through the Strait of Hormuz.
\nThe latest round of fighting between Hezbollah and Israel erupted at the start of March, two days after the U.S. and Israel launched strikes against Iran. Hezbollah said its actions were in support of Tehran.
\n\u201cThis war will end only when it ends in Lebanon as well,\u201d Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi told Lebanese TV \u200bstation Al Mayadeen late on Thursday.
\n\u201cThe end of the war on Lebanon must be accompanied by the withdrawal of Israeli forces from the territories they have occupied,\u201d he said.
\nThe comments came \u200bafter Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem rejected a U.S.-brokered pact between Israel and the Lebanese government to halt the fighting in Lebanon. The deal did not provide for an Israeli withdrawal and Hezbollah had not been party to the negotiations.
\nIsrael has kept up strikes in southern Lebanon, and has said its forces would not withdraw or halt operations in the country amid increasing friction \u200bwith the U.S.
\nHezbollah said on Friday it had carried out two attacks on Israeli troops in south Lebanon, including near the recently captured Beaufort Castle, while Lebanese security services said Israeli airstrikes hit towns across southern Lebanon.<\/p>\n
Fighting flares across region despite ceasefires
\nMohsen Rezaei, an adviser to Iran\u2019s supreme leader, said Hezbollah had \u201cmade great sacrifices in the recent war and it is our ally. Therefore, we support Hezbollah and remain firmly committed to our obligations toward it.\u201d
\nIn comments reported by the semi-official Mehr news agency, Rezaei cautioned Israel against following through on threats to resume strikes against Beirut, the Lebanese capital.
\n\u201cToday we again warn this sinister regime to leave Lebanon. They should know that Lebanon will be an \u200binseparable part of any agreement and any ceasefire,\u201d he said.
\nLebanon\u2019s parliament speaker and Hezbollah ally Nabih Berri said on Friday he would agree to the withdrawal of the Iran-backed group from southern Lebanon if \u200bIsraeli troops simultaneously left territory they occupy in the country.
\nLebanon\u2019s President Joseph Aoun on Friday accused Iran\u2019s Revolutionary Guards of using Lebanon as a \u201cbargaining chip\u201d in negotiations with the U.S., telling CNN this was \u201cunacceptable\u201d.
\nAlong with Lebanon, residents of \u200cGaza, northern Israel and Kuwait have all been under fire this week, despite U.S.-arranged ceasefires that President Donald Trump said involved \u201cshooting in a more moderate manner\u201d, rather than a total halt to fighting.
\nOn Friday, Iran\u2019s navy said it had fired warning shots at U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Oman to counter \u201cmaritime mischief and harassment and the hijacking of commercial vessels and oil tankers\u201d. Earlier, U.S. forces said they had boarded an oil tanker in the Indian Ocean and that they would continue to block \u201cvessels providing material support to Iran\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
DUBAI Iran has reaffirmed support for its Lebanese ally \u200bHezbollah and demanded that Israel withdraw from southern Lebanon, underscoring complications facing an interim deal to end the broader conflict between the U.S. and Iran. Tehran has made a ceasefire between \u200cIsrael and Hezbollah a condition for any peace deal with Washington to resolve the regional …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":98667,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-98677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=98677"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98677\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":98693,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/98677\/revisions\/98693"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/98667"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=98677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=98677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=98677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}