Israeli ambassador to the U.S. on Israel-Hezbollah conflict and bringing home hostages
WASHINGTON (CBS, KYMA/KECY) - Michael Herzog, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S, spoke with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation Sunday.
Hezbollah launched hundreds of rockets and drones at Israel over the weekend as Israel's military said it struck Lebanon with around 100 jets to thwart a bigger attack, in one of the biggest clashes in more than 10 months of border warfare.
"So what happened...is that we identified concrete planning and preparation by Hezbollah to launch a massive missile and drone attack into Israel. And we carried the real time operation in order to degrade those capabilities that were about to be launched at Israel. We were successful. Nevertheless, they launched several 100 rockets into Israel and also drones that were aimed at central Israel. And we intercepted all of them. One of our soldiers was killed by the debris of Israeli interceptors."
Michael Herzog, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S.
When asked if they were escalating towards a "regional war" or that they were "taking a step back," Herzog said:
"I believe that the success of our operation...prevented an escalation to a major war. This threat is still there. We still need a settlement with Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. They followed Hamas by launching a war with Israel on October 8th, and they have been firing thousands of rockets into Israel since then. We give a chance to diplomacy and we hope it works. But if not, we have nearly 70,000 people in Israel, northern Israel, away from their homes, refugees in their own country and we have to make sure they can go back safely to their homes."
During the interview, Brennan and Herzog talked about momentum in bring home the hostages.
"We have an Israeli delegation in Cairo along with all the mediators and Hamas representative and we hope to make progress. As Secretary Blinken said a few days ago, the US put forward a bridging proposal which was accepted by Israel and now it's up to Hamas to say if they accept it or not. So they did send their representative. We are still not 100% sure that they are in the game. We certainly hope so. And if that is the case, we can make progress towards the deal."
Michael Herzog, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S.
To watch more of Brennan's interview with Herzog, click here.
