Israel and Lebanon have agreed to start negotiations on disputes over the land border between them, officials said on Tuesday, offering a possible opportunity to resolve disagreements that have contributed to decades of tensions and conflict.
In a statement, Morgan Ortagus, President Trump’s deputy Middle East envoy, said that the United States was bringing Israel and Lebanon together to discuss the demarcation of the border. She said discussions would also focus on the future of five Israeli military outposts in Lebanon and of Lebanese prisoners still held in Israel after a cease-fire deal last year largely halted more than a year of cross-border warfare.
The Israeli prime minister’s office said there was an agreement to establish working groups to discuss the three topics. A Lebanese official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to talk about sensitive diplomacy, confirmed that Israel and Lebanon agreed to engage in negotiations about demarcating the border.
It was not clear under what format officials planned to hold the talks or indeed, if they would actually go ahead. Israel and Lebanon don’t have direct formal diplomatic relations.
But if Israel and Lebanon succeed in achieving an agreement on the border, it would undermine an argument by Hezbollah, the militant group that is an influential force in Lebanon, for maintaining its arms, analysts said. Hezbollah has long contended that it was fighting what it described as Israel’s occupation of Lebanon.
“If a deal on the border is done, Hezbollah’s alibi will be gone,” said Mohanad Hage Ali, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut. “It will pull the rug out from under them.”
A day after Hamas launched a surprise attack from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Hezbollah started firing rockets and mortars into northern Israel in solidarity with the Palestinian militant group.
Tit-for-tat attacks across the Israeli-Lebanese border ensued for months until Israel carried out a massive escalation against Hezbollah, killing top leaders, targeting its weapon caches, and launching a ground incursion into Lebanon.
In late November, Israel and Lebanon signed a cease-fire agreement that was contingent on both Israel and Hezbollah ceding control of southern Lebanon to the Lebanese military by the end of January.
Israel, however, still controls five points in southern Lebanon. Israeli officials have argued Hezbollah hasn’t lived up to its side of the agreement and still posed a threat to Israelis in northern Israel, while the militant group has accused Israel of violating the November agreement by not withdrawing.
“Everyone involved remains committed to implementing the cease-fire agreement and to fully implementing all its terms,” Ms. Ortagus said.
Two U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to communicate with the media, said they hoped the talks would be convened soon, without mentioning a specific time frame.
One of the U.S. officials said there were 13 specific places where Israel and Lebanon have disagreements on the border.
In 2022, Israel and Lebanon reached an agreement to delineate the maritime border between the two countries. That deal settled the location of the two countries’ exclusive economic zones in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, demarcating where each has the sole right to extract resources.
After that, there was talk by U.S. officials about beginning land border negotiations, a plan envisioned by Amos Hochstein, a top Biden administration envoy. But the war in Gaza put those plans on hold.
The announcement on future border talks on Tuesday came after a meeting of officials from the United States, Israel, Lebanon, France and the United Nations about the implementation of the cease-fire.
Following that meeting, the office of Lebanon’s newly elected president, Joseph Aoun, said Israel had released four Lebanese citizens whom it had detained during the war last year. It said Israel would set free a fifth Lebanese citizen on Wednesday.
The Israeli prime minister’s office said Israel had released five Lebanese detainees as “a gesture” to Mr. Aoun.
The number of people detained by Israel in the latest conflict in Lebanon is thought to be fairly low, and the Israeli military did not immediately respond to a query about how many remain in Israeli custody.
Aaron Boxerman and Euan Ward contributed reporting to this article.
