“Today, Australia and Israel have a strong bilateral relationship traversing trade, agriculture, technology, security and more. It’s a relationship which will only grow stronger built around our devotion to democracy in a world where our values and way of life faces old and new threats.”

Loading

The United States is leading the diplomatic dash to deter Israel from striking Lebanon’s capital Beirut or major civil infrastructure in response to a deadly rocket attack on the Golan Heights, five people with knowledge of the drive said.

Washington is racing to avert a full-blown war between Israel and the Iranian-backed Lebanese movement Hezbollah after the attack on Golan Heights, according to the five people who include Lebanese and Iranian officials plus Middle Eastern and European diplomats.

Israel and the US have blamed Hezbollah for the rocket strike, though the group has denied responsibility.

The focus of the high-speed diplomacy has been to constrain Israel’s response by urging it against targeting densely populated Beirut, the southern suburbs of the city that form Hezbollah’s heartland, or key infrastructure like airports and bridges, said the sources who requested anonymity to discuss confidential details that haven’t been previously reported.

Lebanon’s deputy parliament speaker Elias Bou Saab, who said he had been in contact with US mediator Amos Hochstein since Saturday’s Golan attack, said Israel could avert the threat of major escalation by sparing the capital and its environs.

“If they avoid civilians and they avoid Beirut and its suburbs, then their attack could be well calculated,” he said.

Israeli officials have said that their country wants to hurt Hezbollah but not drag the region into all-out war. The two Middle Eastern and European diplomats said Israel hadn’t made any commitment to avoiding strikes on Beirut, its suburbs or civil infrastructure.

The US State Department said it wouldn’t comment on the specifics of diplomatic conversations. “Our support for Israel’s security is ironclad and unwavering against all Iran-backed threats, including Hezbollah,” a spokesperson said.

White House spokesperson John Kirby said that Israel had every right to respond to the Golan strike. “But nobody wants a broader war,” he added. “As for conversations over the weekend, you bet we’ve had them and we had them at multiple levels. But I’m not going to detail the guts of those conversations.”

The Israeli Prime Minister’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment, while Hezbollah declined to comment.

Reuters

Get a note directly from our foreign correspondents on what’s making headlines around the world. Sign up for the weekly What in the World newsletter here.