Local Leadership in Northern Israel Opposes Pending Ceasefire with Hezbollah

The heads of municipalities and towns in northern Israel have expressed strong opposition to the pending ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon and the Hezbollah terror organization, charging that it endangers the residents of the north and does not block Hezbollah from threatening them again.

The leaders met on Monday evening and expressed fierce resistance to the agreement.

The majority of the Israeli citizens in northern Israel, over 80,000, were evacuated from their homes in the days following the October 7th attack by Hamas in southern Israel, as it was feared Hezbollah would launch a similar attack in the north.

At least 46,561 residents of the region remain internal refugees from their homes, according to November 26 figures from the Prime Minister’s Office.

Moshe Davidovich, chairman of the Mate Asher Regional Council, warned that signing the agreement would worsen the current situation.

“The government is returning the situation, in my humble opinion, to a worse situation than the evening of October 7. If October 7th was relatively quiet, then here we will see a renewed strengthening of Hezbollah,” he warned.

David Azoulay, head of the Metula Council, attacked the agreement, which he called “a surrender agreement.”

Gabi Ne’eman, head of the Shlomi Council, complained that “we don’t know anything about the agreement, we are not being updated, we feel that the state has abandoned us.”

Yasser Jadaban, head of the Kisra-Sami’a Council, also warned against “giving Hezbollah the opportunity to rearm. As long as Iran supports Hezbollah, it will continue to arm itself.”

He further demanded that “there should be no talks with Lebanon as long as the abductees have not returned home,” referring to the 101 Israelis who are being held hostage by Hamas in Gaza.

The leaders threatened they would instruct their citizens not to return home, placing a burden on the state which has been paying for their housing since their hastily evacuation over a year ago.

Minister Yitzhak Wasserlauf, Minister for the Development of the Periphery, the Negev, and the Galilee, told the leaders that he would “do everything to prevent this agreement. You are the arrowhead of the north, I work for you, I am your mouthpiece, I will support your every decision to prevent the return of residents, and I understand you.”

On Tuesday, Shlomi Council head Ne’eman told Radio Kol Barama that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “has proven himself during this war and I very much hope that he will not go to an agreement that will abandon us. But no one has spoken to us, and we are not being included. We are defending our lives.

“We will not return to our homes until we are completely safe. I expect that the prime minister will not decide to go to an agreement before he hears the heads of the authorities,” he added.

Speaking to Radio 103, Eitan Davidi, chairman of Moshav Margaliot, called on the residents of the north not to return to their homes.

“I call on all residents not to return to the moshavim, not to return to the kibbutzim, not to return to Kiryat Shmona. Do not return because they [the government] are abandoning us. Because the massacre that [Hezbollah’s] the Radwan force will commit here in a few years, the massacre in the south will pale in comparison to what will happen here,” he stated.

Menachem Horowitz, a reporter and a resident of Kiryat Shmona, told Radio 103 in apparent despair that “if we withdraw from Lebanon after all the destruction and all the severe harm, will Hezbollah be deterred for another 18 years? I want a security zone, I want the only army that will rule Lebanon to be the Lebanese army – but I cannot manage my life according to what I want.”

Lt. Col. (res.) Yiftach Ron Tal warned during an interview with Radi Kol Barama that the pending agreement was “very problematic. In my opinion, there are many question marks in it, I do not know how such an agreement guarantees the return of the residents to their homes, which is the ultimate goal of the war.”

“The area south of the Litani [River, close to Israel’s border] has not been completely cleared, and the agreement allows Lebanese residents to return to the borderline,” and Hezbollah can use the civilian setting as a cover for its actions, as it has in the past, he cautioned.

The agreement with Lebanon is expected to be approved by the Cabinet only, and not by the government or the Knesset, ostensibly because it is a security ceasefire agreement, not a diplomatic agreement.

In the meantime, the condition of a 75-year-old woman from Nahariya who was hit by a rocket barrage Monday night continues to be serious. The Galilee Medical Center stated Tuesday that the woman, who suffers from shrapnel and a blow to the head, is sedated and on life support.

On Tuesday morning, rocket sirens sounded in Kiryat Shmona and the surrounding towns, coming hours before Netanyahu is expected to convene the Security Cabinet to approve a truce with Hezbollah after more than a year of warfare.