Oct. 26 (EUROPA PRESS) –
The president of the United States, Joe Biden, has called the agreement between Israel and Lebanon on the common maritime border “historic” and has explained that the parties have needed “a lot of guts” to close it.
“I think it’s a historic breakthrough: it took a lot of courage on his part to step forward and it took a lot of guts. I think it took principles and persistent diplomacy to achieve it,” Biden lauded in the framework of a meeting with the Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who is in the United States.
All eyes will be on Thursday in the Lebanese border city of Naqura, where the parties will celebrate the signing ceremony of the agreement sponsored by the US mediator, Amos Hochstein, who will also be present, as confirmed by Washington.
Both Israel and Lebanon agreed to recognize the border buoyed by Israel, allowing Beirut to enjoy exploitation of the area north of Line 23, including the Qana camp, while Israeli authorities maintain control over Karish amid threats from the Lebanese Shiite militia party Hezbollah.
On the sidelines of the pact on the common maritime border between Lebanon and Israel, Herzog took advantage of the meeting with Biden to denounce Iran’s role in the war in Ukraine for providing weapons to Moscow that are “killing innocent people in Ukraine”, according to informed the television channel i24news.
The Israeli president has also denounced the violence that has taken place in Iran in recent weeks as a result of the death of the young Kurdish Mahsa Amini, who died in a police station after being arrested for wearing the veil wrong, which has sparked demonstrations in different parts of the country, with hundreds of deaths.
“This is an example of how Iran crushes its own citizens while moving towards nuclear weapons and supplying lethal weapons that are killing innocent citizens in Ukraine. The Iranian challenge will be a great challenge to be discussed,” he stressed.
Herzog began a two-day visit to the United States on Tuesday and met with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi as well as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken; National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and the mediator of the agreement, Amos Hochstein.
