WASHINGTON — President Biden starkly instructed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu Monday to abandon reported plans for an imminent invasion of southern Lebanon to clear out Hezbollah-held areas days after the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah.
“Israel may now be launching a limited operation into Lebanon. Are you aware of that? Are you comfortable with their plan?” a journalist asked Biden at the White House.
“I’m more aware than you might know, and I’m comfortable with them stopping,” the president replied.
“We should have a cease-fire now,” he added.
Biden’s clear instruction comes as Netanyahu’s government is widely expected to invade its northern neighbor to prevent the Iran-backed group from firing rockets across the border in revenge for the death Friday of Nasrallah, 64, who led Hezbollah for more than three decades.
Israel’s airstrike that killed the terrorist leader flattened an area of residential buildings in the Lebanese capital and followed a stunning series of operations to demobilize the radical Shiite group before it had a chance to escalate its own operations.
Less than two weeks before the strike, a covert Israeli operation killed at least 42 people and injured thousands more by blowing up the pagers that Hezbollah commanders used to communicate.
Biden has had a difficult relationship with Netanyahu, despite the retiring 81-year-old president also casting himself as a longtime supporter of Israel.
Last year, Biden declared himself a “Zionist” and traveled to the Jewish state within days of the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre of about 1,200 people, which started the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip.
For his support of Israel in that conflict, anti-Israel protesters bestowed the nickname “Genocide Joe,” which they shouted at Biden during public events and even painted on the White House’s gates.
But Biden also increasingly denounced Netanyahu for mounting civilian casualties in the Gaza Strip and paused the delivery of some heavy bombs as an expression of disapproval.
If Israel does proceed with reported plans to attack Lebanon, it wouldn’t be the first time that a US ally in the region ignored an American leader’s demands.
In 2019, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan invaded Kurdish-held parts of northern Syria after Trump withdrew embedded US troops — with Erdoğan ignoring Trump’s blunt warning, “Don’t be a tough guy. Don’t be a a fool!”
That incursion ended when the US used sanctions against Turkey to force a cease-fire.
