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Amos Hochstein, a top Biden administration envoy to the Middle East, has seldom stayed overnight on trips to Beirut over the past year, so the extended visit may be a positive sign.
A top U.S. envoy met with Lebanese officials for a second day on Wednesday, continuing an unusually long visit amid cautious optimism over a potential cease-fire agreement in the war between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.
Amos Hochstein, the senior Biden administration envoy, met again with Nabih Berri, the Hezbollah-allied speaker of the Lebanese Parliament, who has emerged as the group’s point man in the U.S.-led negotiations. Mr. Hochstein was expected to continue on to Israel depending on the outcome of discussions in Beirut, according to a Lebanese official briefed on the discussions, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy.
During repeated rounds of shuttle diplomacy over the past year, Mr. Hochstein has seldom stayed overnight in Lebanon, so the extended visit may be an indication that negotiations are inching forward.
Mr. Hochstein said at a news conference on Tuesday that the gaps between the two warring sides had “narrowed” in discussions in recent weeks, though ultimately any results from the negotiations would be “the decision of the parties.”
“We have a real opportunity to bring this conflict to an end,” Mr. Hochstein said. “As the window is now, I hope the coming days yield a resolute decision,” he added.
Israel’s war with Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, escalated in September and has resulted in a humanitarian crisis, killing more than 3,500 people in Lebanon and displacing almost a quarter of the population. It is now the bloodiest conflict inside Lebanon since the country’s civil war, which lasted from 1975 to 1990.
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