NAKOURA: Israel and Lebanon on Thursday reached a US-brokered maritime border agreement that opens up lucrative offshore gas fields to neighbors who are technically at war.
US President Joe Biden hailed the “historic” deal, which comes after Western powers called for opening up new energy production and reducing the risk of supply cuts from Russia.
The agreement was signed separately by Lebanese President Michel Aoun in Beirut and Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid in Jerusalem and entered into force after the documents were handed over to mediators.
“The two sides took final steps to implement the agreement and submitted the final paperwork to the United Nations in the presence of the United States,” Biden said in a statement.
Israel’s enemy, the Lebanese Hezbollah group, said it would end its “extraordinary” offensive against the country, after threatening to attack Israel for months before the deal was signed if it crossed the border. reaches foreign gas reserves. Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah said in a televised address that our mission has been completed.
The deal comes as Lebanon hopes to extricate itself from what the World Bank describes as one of the world’s worst economic crises in modern history, and as Lepid is ahead of general elections on November 1. Trying to close in on days of great success.
The letters were exchanged in the southern Lebanese border town of Naqura in the presence of US mediator Amos Hochstein and UN Special Coordinator for Lebanon Joanna Wronecka, who will now submit the new maritime coordinates to UN headquarters in New York.
“Energy – especially in the Eastern Mediterranean – should not be a source of conflict, but a source of cooperation, stability, security and prosperity,” Biden said. takes steps closer to being more secure, integrated and prosperous, providing benefits for all people in the region.”
Hours before it was signed, Lepid claimed that Lebanon’s intention to sign the agreement amounted to de facto recognition of the Jewish state. He said that it is not every day that an enemy state recognizes Israel in a written agreement before the entire international community.
Aoun refuted Lapid’s claim, saying that “the demarcation of the Southern Sea border is a technical task that has no political implications”.
The deal comes as political parties in Israel – including Lapid’s centrist Yesh Atid – face what will be a fifth general election in less than four years.
Veteran right-wing leader and longtime prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is eyeing a comeback and earlier this month dismissed the naval deal as an “illegal gimmick.”
London-listed Energean said on Wednesday it had started producing gas from an offshore field crash at the heart of the border agreement, a day after Israel gave the green light.
