Hezbollah rejected US overtures, still open to diplomacy to avoid wider war

Iran-backed Hezbollah has rebuffed Washington’s initial ideas for cooling tit-for-tat fighting with neighbouring Israel, such as pulling its fighters further from the border, but remains open to U.S. diplomacy to avoid a ruinous war, Lebanese officials said.
U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein has been leading a diplomatic outreach to restore security at the Israel-Lebanon frontier as the wider region teeters dangerously towards a major escalation of the conflict ignited by the Gaza war.
“Hezbollah is ready to listen,” a senior Lebanese official familiar with the group’s thinking said, while emphasising that the group saw the ideas presented by veteran negotiator Hochstein on a visit to Beirut last week as unrealistic.
Hezbollah’s position is that it will fire rockets at Israel until there is a full ceasefire in Gaza. Hezbollah’s rejection of the proposals presented by Hochstein has not been previously reported.
Despite the rejection and Hezbollah’s volleys of rockets in support of Gaza, the group’s openness to diplomatic contacts signals an aversion to a wider war, one of the Lebanese officials and a security source said..
Israel has also said it wants to avoid war, but both sides say they are ready to fight if necessary. Israel warns it will respond more aggressively if a deal to make the border area safe is not reached.