Israel's Netanyahu says troops will continue to fight Hezbollah “with full force” while the US and France propose a ceasefire

The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected international calls for a ceasefire with Hezbollah Thursday, hours after President Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron issued a joint statement urging them to support a temporary ceasefire proposal with broad international support. The U.S. and French leaders on Wednesday urged both sides in the standoff to support the proposal, but neither had signaled support by Thursday, and the exchange of deadly fire continued.

“This is a US-French proposal to which the prime minister has not even responded,” Netanyahu's office said on Thursday, also rejecting another report that said the Israeli president had ordered his military to “moderate” the attack on Hezbollah to make room for discussions on a possible ceasefire.

“The report about the alleged order to ease the fighting in the north is the opposite of the truth,” Netanyahu's office said. “The prime minister has ordered the Israeli forces to continue fighting at full strength.”

Israel's Foreign Minister Israel Katz made it clear on social media early Thursday: “There will be no ceasefire in the north.”

Biden and Macron, who are both in New York this week for the United Nations General Assembly, jointly called for a temporary ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah late Tuesday after Israeli airstrikes in Lebanon killed more than 630 people this week, according to the country's Health Ministry.

In Israel, several people have been injured by Hezbollah's relentless rocket and drone attacks, most of which can be shot down by the country's state-of-the-art missile defense systems.

The escalation of violence began on October 8, when Hezbollah declared it was attacking Israel to support Palestinians in the region. Gaza Strip comes under fire as Israel launched its devastating retaliation for the Hamas terrorist attack the day before.

The Exchange of fire between Israel and Hezbollah – which is larger and far better armed than its Hamas allies – has fuelled fears of a wider war in the Middle East that could draw the US, Israel's closest ally, and Iran, Hezbollah's backer, directly into the fighting.

Tens of thousands of people from communities on both sides of the border have already been forced to flee their homes by the ongoing exchange of fire, and many thousands more have fled the south of the country since Israel began bombing Hezbollah targets in Lebanon with air strikes last week.

“It is time for an agreement on the Israeli-Lebanese border that ensures security and protection so that civilians can return to their homes,” the French-American statement said. “The exchange of fire since October 7, and especially over the past two weeks, threatens to trigger a much larger conflict and harm civilians. We have therefore worked together in recent days on a call for a temporary ceasefire to give diplomacy a chance to succeed and avoid further escalations across the border.”

Biden and Macron said their ceasefire proposal was supported by the United States, Australia, Canada, the European Union, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

“We call for broad agreement and immediate support from the governments of Israel and Lebanon,” the two heads of state said.

In a speech in London on Thursday, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin described the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah as “deeply disturbing.” He acknowledged that there was a risk of all-out war. He called on Israel and Hezbollah to choose “another path” and find a diplomatic solution.

“The best way forward is to seek a ceasefire that allows for diplomatic steps,” Austin said.

Asked about comments from Netanyahu's office earlier in the day, Austin said he believed neither Israel nor Hezbollah wanted a major war and said he remained “optimistic that the right things will happen.”

The Israeli military said overnight that the Israeli air force had “attacked approximately 75 terrorist targets of the terrorist organization Hezbollah in the Bekaa region and southern Lebanon, including weapons depots, ready-to-launch rocket launch sites, terrorists and terrorist infrastructure.”

On Thursday, Lebanon's state news agency reported that an Israeli airstrike hit a building housing workers from Syria, killing 23 people and wounding eight, The Associated Press reported.

Eleanor Watson contributed to this report.