Killings of reporters would have dropped globally year-on-year in 2023 had it not been for the deaths in Gaza, Israel and Lebanon, the Committee to Protect Journalists said
AFP

Lebanon's Hezbollah will stop firing on Israel if Hamas agrees to a proposal for a truce with Israel in Gaza. According to a report by Reuters, Hamas is now considering a new proposal, a deal that would suspend fighting for 40 days.

The Lebanese armed group has been trading fire with the Israeli military across Lebanon's southern border in support of its Palestinian ally Hamas, which launched a cross-border assault from the Gaza Strip into Israel on Oct. 7 that met heavy Israeli bombardment.

But Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said that anyone who thinks a temporary cease-fire for Gaza will also apply to the northern front is "mistaken."

"We will continue the fire, and we will do so independently from the south, until we achieve our goals," Gallant had told AP.

Five Hezbollah members were slain in two different Israeli bombings on trucks in the border region between Lebanon and Syria, according to a Lebanese security official on Sunday. Hezbollah declared that three of its militants were dead, but it did not specify the location.

Hezbollah has lost more than 130 fighters in Israeli shelling on southern Lebanon, and the killings of al-Arouri and al-Tawil have hiked concern that the war in Gaza could spill over into Lebanon and elsewhere across the region.

Last week, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz warned that "time is running out" to reach a diplomatic solution in southern Lebanon.

"Israel will act militarily to return the evacuated citizens" to its northern border area if no diplomatic solution is reached, he said.

The cross-border shelling has killed about 200 people in Lebanon, including more than 170 Hezbollah fighters, as well as 10 Israeli troops and five Israeli civilians.