A top American diplomat on Tuesday said the United States
is trying to avert a greater war along the border
between Israel and Lebanon. The situation is serious.
We have seen an escalation over the last few weeks
and what President Biden wants to do is to avoid
a further escalation to a greater war. Us envoy
, Amos Hochstein was in Beirut following an escalation in
cross border fire between Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants in
Lebanon. Hochstein said he had been dispatched to Lebanon
immediately following a brief trip to Israel because the situation
was serious. Iran backed Hezbollah has been trading fire
with Israel in parallel with the Gaza war that broke
out on October 7 last week. The group fired
the largest volley of rockets and drones in the last
eight months after strike killed a high ranking militant commander
Hochstein has something of a track record in the region
in 2022. He helped negotiate the first ever Israel
Lebanese Accord on a maritime boundary between the two countries
but Hezbollah says it will not halt attacks on Israel
unless there is a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.
Hochstein on Tuesday, urged the Palestinian militant group Hamas
to accept a US backed proposal for a truce,
a ceasefire in Gaza and an alternative diplomatic solution could
also bring the conflict across the blue line to an
end, creating conditions for displaced Lebanese civilians to go
home in the south and for Israeli civilians to go
home in their north. But a ceasefire in Gaza
appears remote. The Israeli military on Tuesday released video
showing what it says were its forces in Rafah where
it claimed it is trying to root out remaining Hamas
brigades and recover hostages. The conflict erupted after Hamas
militants stormed into Israel killing 1200 taking more than 250
captives. According to Israeli tallies, Israel's devastating retaliation
has killed more than 37,000 people in Gaza. According
to Palestinian Health Ministry figures earlier this month, Israeli
special forces staged a daring rescue that freed four hostages
who were taken by helicopter back to Israel. Israel's
military on Tuesday released this video of one of the
pilots in the operation describing his conversation with the newly
freed Shlomi Ziv during the flight to the hospital.
I looked back and I I saw Shlomi looking out
of the window. So I asked the crew chief
that uh was beside him if Shlomi wants to get
in the cockpit and um and talk with us.
So we let him in, we gave him uh
an earphones and uh we had a 10 minutes conversation
with the, with an O to, to just
released from captivity. Yeah, June 8th, the
day of the operation was my birthday and I'm positive
that it's the best, it's the best pre present
that I could get. But for Palestinians in Gaza
, no such happy moments. Residents mourned those killed
in an Israeli airstrike on a commercial street. Um
, Mohammed Daul is the aunt of one of the
dead. They are merchants. They have nothing to
do with anything. They hit them with missiles.
There's no safety. There is no safety. They
are innocent people. They are honest people, they
have nothing to do with anything. They are merchants
, they killed merchants, they killed people, they
killed Children, they killed women. They have mistreated
us. God is our suffice and the best disposer
of our affairs. I can't say anything more than
that. Funerals were held in the no sera refugee
camp on Tuesday after airstrikes there killed 17 people.