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Lebanon says Israel responds to negotiation with more attacks; Israel's top military lawyer quits over video of detainee abuse
Lebanon says Israel responds to negotiation with more attacks; Israel's top military lawyer quits over video of detainee abuse
by AFP Staff Writers
Beirut, Lebanon (AFP) Oct 31, 2025

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun on Friday accused Israel of responding to its offer to negotiate by intensifying its air strikes, the latest of which killed two people in south Lebanon.

Despite a November 2024 ceasefire with the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, Israel maintains troops in five areas in southern Lebanon and has kept up regular air strikes.

Aoun had called for negotiations with Israel in mid-October, after US President Donald Trump brokered a ceasefire in Gaza.

"Lebanon is ready for negotiations to end the Israeli occupation, but any negotiation... requires mutual willingness, which is not the case," Aoun said on Friday.

Israel "is responding to this option by carrying out more attacks against Lebanon... and intensifying tensions", he added during a meeting with German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul.

Wadephul offered his support, stating that he would urge his Israeli counterpart Gideon Saar to withdraw Israeli troops from southern Lebanon.

"Israel must withdraw. I understand that Israel has security needs... But in fact, we now need a process of mutual trust-building," the German minister said.

Wadephul also encouraged the Lebanese government to ensure there is "a credible, transparent and rapid process of disarming Hezbollah".

He acknowledged that is "a mammoth task" but contended it is "a basic prerequisite for this country to experience stability and for there to be no further conflict with Israel".

Lebanon's health ministry said two Israeli strikes on Friday killed two people in the south of the country.

Earlier Lebanon's official National News Agency (NNA) said an Israeli drone targeted a man on a motorbike in the village of Kunin.

The Israeli military said it had killed "a Hezbollah maintenance officer" who was working to reestablish the Iran-backed group's infrastructure sites in southern Lebanon.

The strike came a day after the Israeli military killed a municipal worker in a raid in the Lebanese border village of Blida.

Aoun ordered the army on Thursday to confront such incursions.

Hezbollah first began launching cross-border fire at Israel following the outbreak of the war in Gaza in October 2023, kicking off a more than year-long conflict that culminated in two months of open war before last year's ceasefire was agreed.

Israel, however, has never stopped carrying out air strikes on Lebanon -- usually saying it is targeting Hezbollah positions -- and has stepped up the attacks in recent days.

Israeli attacks on Lebanon have killed at least 25 people in October, including one Syrian, according to an AFP toll based on figures from the Lebanese health ministry.

On Tuesday, the spokesman for the UN rights commission, Jeremy Laurence, said Israeli forces had killed 111 civilians in Lebanon since the ceasefire went into effect.

Lebanese Foreign Minister Youssef Raggi asked his visiting German counterpart on Friday to "help put pressure on Israel to stop its attacks".

"Only a diplomatic solution, not a military one, can ensure stability and guarantee calm in the south," Raggi was quoted by the NNA as saying.

He added that "the Lebanese government is continuing to gradually implement its decision to place all weapons under its control".

Hezbollah was badly weakened during the war, and the United States has intensified pressure on Lebanese authorities to disarm the group.

Hezbollah and its allies oppose the plan.

Israel's top military lawyer quits over leaked video of Palestinian detainee abuse
Jerusalem (AFP) Oct 31, 2025 - The Israeli military said its top lawyer resigned on Friday during an investigation into a leaked video appearing to show soldiers severely abusing a Palestinian detainee.

The case triggered international outrage and protests within Israel, and focused on footage taken at the Sde Teiman military base in southern Israel last year.

Sde Teiman has been used to hold Gazans since the start of the war in the Palestinian territory, sparked by Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.

"The Military Advocate General, MG Yifat Tomer-Yerushalmi, submitted a request this morning to conclude her position," a military statement said, without specifying the reasons for her resignation.

"The Chief of the General Staff is confident that a thorough and truthful inquiry will be conducted regarding the matters discussed," the statement added.

Earlier this week, it was announced that a criminal investigation had been launched into the leaking of footage from Sde Teiman appearing to show the abuse by soldiers.

The Israeli military said in February that it had filed charges against five reservist soldiers connected with the mistreatment.

The statement said they were charged with "acting against the detainee with severe violence, including stabbing the detainee's bottom with a sharp object, which had penetrated near the detainee's rectum".

It added "the acts of violence have caused severe physical injury to the detainee, including cracked ribs, a punctured lung and an inner rectal tear".

The case was brought before the military justice system after the release of the video.

According to a copy of the military prosecutor's resignation letter published by Israeli media on Friday, Tomer-Yerushalmi acknowledged that her office had released information to the media after politically motivated protests tried to thwart the investigation into the abuse.

"The IDF is a moral and law-abiding army, and therefore, even during a painful and prolonged war, it must investigate illegal acts," the resignation letter said.

Defence Minister Israel Katz welcomed the resignation as "a good thing" on Friday.

"Those who slander IDF soldiers have no place in the army," he said, according to a statement from his office.

In October 2024, a UN commission found thousands of detainees were subjected to "widespread and systematic abuse" in Israeli military camps and detention facilities that amounted to a "war crime and crime against humanity of torture".

Israel called the accusations "outrageous", adding it was "fully committed to international legal standards regarding the treatment of detainees".

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