With a temporary ceasefire deal between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah apparently holding, residents of southern Lebanon are streaming back to their homes despite warnings from the Israeli and Lebanese militaries that they avoid certain areas. The hope is that the ceasefire will bring an end to nearly 14 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, a conflict that began after Hamas' 7 October massacre last year and which escalated into all-out war in mid-September, threatening to pull Hezbollah's patron Iran and Israel into a broader conflagration. The US- and France-brokered pause in fighting offers a reprieve to 1.2 million displaced Lebanese people who have fled the fighting, as well as tens of thousands of Israelis who evacuated their homes along the two countries' border. The deal does not address the war in Gaza. Approved by Israel late Tuesday, the deal calls for an initial two-month halt to fighting and requires Hezbollah to end its armed presence in southern Lebanon, while Israeli troops are to return to their side of the border. Thousands of additional Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers would deploy in the south, and an international panel headed by the United States would monitor compliance. Israel says it reserves the right to strike Hezbollah should it violate the terms of the deal. Israel is still fighting Hamas militants in Gaza in response to the group's cross-border raid into southern Israel in October 2023. But US President Joe Biden on Tuesday said his administration would make another push in the coming days to try to renew efforts for a deal in the war-ravaged Palestinian enclave. Meanwhile, as the Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire took hold in Lebanon, fighting raged on in the Gaza Strip, where the Health Ministry said 33 bodies had been brought to hospitals over the past 24 hours — raising the death toll in the nearly 14-month-long war to 44,282. The Israeli military claimed it had targeted dozens of Hamas-controlled sites in hard-hit northern Gaza, including weapons storage facilities and military structures, and that it had warned civilians to evacuate the area beforehand. — Euronews
