Hezbollah reject ceasefire proposals
Hezbollah tonight dismissed international ceasefire proposals as “Israeli conditions”, accusing foreign envoys of allowing Israel time to continue its military offensive to force Lebanon into submission.
“The international envoys have conveyed Israeli conditions,” said Hezbollah legislator Hussein Haj Hassan. “These conditions are rejected.”
“We accept what secures our country’s interest and pride and dignity and not to submit to Israeli conditions,” he said on al-Jazeera television.
He spoke after UN and EU envoys as well as France’s prime minister discussed with Lebanon’s government ways to end the six-day-old ferocious fighting between Israeli troops and Hezbollah guerrillas.
Israel has demanded the guerrillas release two Israeli soldiers they captured and pull far back from the border as conditions for any ceasefire.
Hezbollah’s Al-Manar television, in its primetime news bulletin, accused the envoys of coming to Lebanon for a “clear-cut objective to give more time for enemy aircraft to carry out more destruction and devastation so that someone can raise the banner of surrender”.
Hezbollah said it wanted an unconditional ceasefire. Al-Manar pledged to continue firing rockets on Israel, warning: “This is the beginning. Beware of our cyclone.”
