Two weeks after Israel abandoned a US-led ceasefire proposal with Hezbollah, the US is not actively seeking to revive the deal and is resigned to shaping and limiting Israeli operations in Lebanon and against Iran rather than halting hostilities, a US official told CNN. The US's inability to stop Israel's intensive bombing campaign and ground invasion of Lebanon, which has killed more than 1,400 people and displaced more than 1 million in less than three weeks, raises questions about whether Benjamin Netanyahu's government will meet the Biden administration's demands for further events. It left the White House looking helpless again, with Gaza-like restraint ignored. There are serious concerns within the Biden administration that the limited operations Israel has promised will soon escalate into a large-scale and protracted conflict, according to officials. US-led efforts to negotiate a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas have also failed. As in Gaza, U.S. officials said Israel initially planned a much larger ground attack on Lebanon before the United States persuaded it to withdraw. But they also recognize what they learned last year: that U.S. influence over Israeli military operations is limited.
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