The Israeli cabinet will vote on a ceasefire deal in Lebanon on Tuesday, Benjamin Netanyahu’s spokesperson told CNN, after a source familiar with the matter said the Israeli prime minister had approved the plan “in principle.”
Netanyahu signaled his potential approval for the emerging ceasefire with Hezbollah during a security consultation with Israeli officials Sunday night, the source said.
On Monday, his spokesperson told CNN the Israeli cabinet will vote on the proposed deal on Tuesday and said it is expected to pass.
Israel still has reservations over some details of the agreement, which were expected to be transmitted to the Lebanese government on Monday, the source said.
Those and other details are still being negotiated and multiple sources stressed that the agreement will not be final until all issues are resolved.
Sources familiar with the negotiations said talks appear to be moving positively toward an agreement, but acknowledged that as Israel and Hezbollah continue to trade fire, one misstep could upend the talks.
Israel’s far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir called the deal a “big mistake” and said it would be “a historic missed opportunity to eradicate Hezbollah.” Ben Gvir has also long worked to thwart potential ceasefire deals between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
Benny Gantz, who resigned from Israel’s war cabinet in June over Netanyahu’s handling of the war in Gaza, called on the prime minister to make the details of the ceasefire deal public.
“It is the right of the residents of the north, the fighters and the citizens of Israel to know,” Gantz said.
United States envoy Amos Hochstein said in Beirut last week that a ceasefire deal between Israel and Lebanon was “within our grasp,” but that it was ultimately “the decision of the parties.”
He met Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati and parliament speaker Nabih Berri, the interlocutor with Hezbollah in the talks and said there had been “constructive” and “very good discussions to narrow the gaps.”
“We have a real opportunity to bring conflict to an end,” he added last week. “The window is now.” He departed Lebanon for Israel on Wednesday to try to bring the negotiations “to a close.”
The US-backed proposal aims to achieve a 60-day cessation of hostilities that some hope could form the basis of a lasting ceasefire.
On Sunday, CNN analyst and Axios reporter Barak Ravid cited a source as saying Hochstein had told the Israeli ambassador to Washington on Saturday that if Israel did not respond positively in the coming days to the ceasefire proposal, he would withdraw from the mediation efforts.
Hochstein’s trip to the region followed Beirut responding “positively” to a US-backed proposal to stop the war, Mikati said last week, adding that large parts of the draft agreement were resolved.
Israel launched a major military offensive in Lebanon in mid-September following months of tit-for-tat border attacks which started on October 8 last year when Hezbollah attacked Israeli controlled territory in solidarity with Hamas and Palestinians in Gaza.
Since then, Israel has launched a ground invasion, killed a string of Hezbollah leaders – including one of its founders, Hassan Nasrallah – and injured thousands of people in an attack featuring exploding pagers.
CNN’s Lauren Izso contributed reporting.