Hezbollah agreed to ceasefire hours before Israel killed Nasrallah, says Lebanon

In a startling disclosure, Lebanese foreign minister Abdallah Bou Habib has claimed that Hezbollah had agreed to a ceasefire hours before Hassan Nasrallah was targeted and killed by Israel's bunker-buster bombs in Beirut.

The Lebanese foreign minister claimed that the Hezbollah chief’s consent to the ceasefire had been communicated to both the Americans and the French. The two Western powers had also confirmed to Lebanon that Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, had also been taken into confidence and had welcomed the initiative.

The Lebanese foreign minister made this sensational claim during an interview with American journalist and political commentator Christiane Amanpour, even as Israel continues to bomb Beirut. CNN has made a point of highlight the video clip, naturally.

Hezbollah claims to have repulsed the Israeli infiltration in the south of Lebanon.

Meanwhile, nearly two days after Iran attacked military bases in Israel, Israel is yet to hit back at Iran — although a defiant Israeli army spokesperson, Daniel Hagari, was quoted as stating that Israel would respond “wherever, whenever, and however we choose”.

All options are said to be on the table, including Iran’s nuclear installations — although US president Joe Biden has publicly stated that his administration did not approve of any such move.

Former Israeli PM Naftali Bennett is one of those who called for a decisive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, however. Echoing a popular sentiment in Israel, he posted on X: ‘We must act now to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme, its central energy facilities, and to fatally cripple this terrorist regime… We have the justification. We have the tools… Iran stands exposed.’

Other military targets and Iranian naval bases cannot be ruled out, nor can targeted assassinations within Iran, say West Asia commentators, as Israel feels the pressure to retaliate.

Joint chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces General Mohammad Bagheri warned Israel, however, that the IRGC is prepared to repeat its missile attack with “multiplied intensity” if Israel strikes back at its territory.

“If the Zionist regime, that has gone insane, is not contained by the US and Europe and intends to continue such crimes, or do anything against our sovereignty or territorial integrity, [the 1 October] operation will be repeated with much higher magnitude and we will hit all their infrastructure,” he said.

Meanwhile, most foreign nationals stranded in Lebanon and wanting to get out have been asked to fend for themselves. There are an estimated 6,000 US citizens, an equal number of people from the UK and as many as 20,000 French nationals stranded in Lebanon. The Indian consulate in Beirut estimates the number of Indians stranded to be around 4,000.

However, with all commercial airlines having suspended their flights from Beirut, the only airline still operating out of Lebanon is the country’s Middle East Airlines (MEA).

While MEA operates 30 flights daily for destinations in Europe and the Middle East, most flights are sold out till the end of October. The earliest available flight to Istanbul is on 27 October and, with rising demand for seats, the airfare has spiked to astronomical levels.

A stranded US citizen told Al Jazeera that she had called the US embassy in Beirut for help on Monday, 30 September, but she was told to find a way out of the country by herself. She recalled how the US State Department swiftly chartered special flights and a ship to evacuate American citizens in Israel after Hamas’ 7 October 2023 attack, by contrast.

Now, the United States has announced on Wednesday , 3 October, that it has arranged a chartered flight to evacuate 100 US citizens from Beirut to Istanbul. This has left the others fuming hotter, not surprisingly.