HEZBOLLAH agreed to a ceasefire hours before its leader Hassan Nasrallah was assassinated in an Israel air strike on Beirut, Lebanese Foreign Minister Abdallah Bou Habib said today

The sensational claim came during an interview with Christiane Amanpour on US broadcaster CNN.

Mr Habib said that Mr Nasrallah’s agreement to the ceasefire had been communicated to both the US and French governments.

He confirmed that they had told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who reportedly welcomed the initiative.

The Lebanese prime minister also said he had heard that US special envoy for the Middle East Moss Hochstein was in the process of being dispatched to Lebanon to negotiate a temporary ceasefire before the assassination took place.

However, Lebanese journalist Rania Khalek told the Morning Star that Mr Nasrallah had said on many occasions that he would only agree to a ceasefire if Israel ended its war on the Palestinians in Gaza.

She said: “I question whether Nasrallah would agree to decouple from Gaza. I would imagine there may have been some agreement for a temporary ceasefire, but only if there was also a ceasefire in Gaza.

“But the key issue here is that the Israelis murdered Nasrallah and continue to kill anyone who stands in the way of their genocide and territorial expansionist ambitions.”

Ms Khalek added: “In any case, we must be clear that any US talks about ceasefires are lies and entirely about buying time for the Israelis to regroup to carry out its atrocities.”

Meanwhile, the Israeli military warned civilians to evacuate the city of Nabatieh and other communities in southern Lebanon that lie north of a United Nations-declared buffer zone, signalling that it may attempt to widen a ground operation launched earlier this week against the Hezbollah militant group.

Residents were told to leave Nabatieh and other settlements north of the Litani river, which formed the northern edge of the zone established by the UN security council in 2006 after the last Israeli invasion.

However, unconfirmed reports emerged that Israel forces were bombing the escape routes that fleeing civilians would need to use.

At least eight Israeli soldiers have already been killed in clashes with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, where Israel has announced the start of what it describes as a limited ground incursion, but many others call an invasion. 

Independent left MP Jeremy Corbyn said: “Israel is slaughtering thousands of people in Lebanon because it has been allowed to act with total impunity.”

He condemned the British government for fuelling “the machinery of war” and demonstrating an “indifference to human life” that has endangered everyone.

“All of this was entirely avoidable, if only political leaders had the willingness to uphold the universal application of international law,” Mr Corbyn argued.

“Without further de-escalation, unimaginable horror is on the horizon. But as we stand on the brink of a major regional war, do not forget those who lie dead in its wake.”

The Lebanese Red Cross said an Israeli strike had wounded four of its paramedics and killed a Lebanese army soldier as they were evacuating wounded people from the south. 

It said a convoy accompanied by Lebanese troops was targeted near the village of Taybeh despite co-ordinating its movements with UN peacekeepers. 

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.

On Wednesday night, an Israeli air strike on a flat in central Beirut killed at least nine people, including seven civilian emergency workers. 

Israel has been pounding areas of the country where the militant group has a strong presence since late September, but it has rarely struck in the heart of the capital.

There was no warning before Wednesday night’s attack, which hit a building not far from the city’s UN headquarters, the prime minister’s office and the parliament.

Residents reported a sulphur-like smell following the strike and Lebanon’s National News Agency reported that Israel had used phosphorus bombs. 

Human rights groups have previously accused Israel of using white phosphorus incendiary shells on towns and villages in southern Lebanon. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It did claim today to have struck around 200 Hezbollah targets across Lebanon, including weapons storage facilities and observation posts. It said the strikes killed at least 15 Hezbollah fighters.

The militant group said its fighters had detonated a roadside bomb when Israeli forces entered the Lebanese border village of Maroun el-Ras, killing and wounding soldiers. It was not possible to independently confirm the claims made by either side.

Israel and Hezbollah have exchanged rocket attacks since October 8 last year and displaced some 60,000 Israelis from communities in the north. 

Israel’s retaliatory strikes over the past year have displaced tens of thousands of people on the other side of the border.

The escalating violence in Lebanon has opened a second front in the war that began nearly a year ago with Hamas’s surprise October 7 attack on southern Israel from the Gaza Strip.

Fears of a wider conflict have continued to mount after Iran’s missile attack on Israeli military bases on Tuesday, though Israel has yet to retaliate.

Israeli military spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari bragged on Wednesday that his country would respond “wherever, whenever and however we choose.”

US President Joe Biden has reportedly said that he will not support an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear installations.

Nonetheless, former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett is one of those who is calling for a decisive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities. 

“We must act now to destroy Iran’s nuclear programme, its central energy facilities and to fatally cripple this terrorist regime,” he posted on the X social media platform.

Iranian armed forces joint chief of staff General Mohammad Bagheri warned Israel that Tuesday’s operation “will be repeated with much higher magnitude and we will hit all their infrastructure.” 

The UN security council held an emergency meeting on Wednesday night to address the spiralling conflict.

Iranian ambassador to the UN Amir Saeid Iravani said his country had launched nearly 200 missiles at Israel as a deterrent to further violence, calling the action “a necessary and proportionate response to Israel’s continued terrorist aggressive acts over the past two months.”

He also accused Washington of complicity “in Israel’s crimes” through its provision of weapons.

Israell UN ambassador Danny Danon claimed that “the time for empty calls for de-escalation is over.”

He called Iran’s missile barrage “a cold-blooded attack against 10 million civilians” and “an unprecedented act of aggression.”