NPR's Michel Martin talks to Amos Hochstein, senior adviser to President Biden, about the latest ceasefire deal in Gaza and his earlier negotiations for a ceasefire in Lebanon.

With the deadline looming for the terms of a fragile cease-fire between Israel and Hezbollah to be met, an American diplomat on Monday said “much progress” had been made recently.

U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein said on Monday that he was happy to see the Israeli army withdraw from the western sector of Lebanon back to Israel.

Hochstein is also reportedly demanding that Hezbollah hand all it weapons south of the Litani River over to the Lebanese military

It is the second such pullout since a Nov 27 ceasefire, and came after United Nations peacekeepers and Lebanon’s prime minister late last month called on the Israeli army to speed up its withdrawal from Lebanon’s south.

Lebanon is geared to select a new president this week as the army has made significant strides in taking over for IDF troops deployed in southern Lebanon

Israel, with backing from the United States, is reportedly working to extend the 60-day ceasefire agreed with the Lebanese Hezbollah militia at the end of November, according to a media report. The move aims to prevent the ceasefire,

The Biden administration in its final days is shifting more than $100 million in military aid from Israel and Egypt to Lebanon as it tries to bolster a ceasefire agreement it helped mediate between Israel and Hezbollah.

Israel and Hezbollah agreed to pull their forces out of southern Lebanon before the end of January. The area will then be secured by the Lebanese army and UN peacekeepers, as part of the agreed conditions of the ceasefire.

MTV Lebanon reported that Hochstein will propose extending the ceasefire and IDF withdrawal by 60 days due to the failure of the Lebanese Army to deploy sufficient troops in the south.

An Israeli official told The Post that plans for the withdrawal of the IDF “don’t change the fact that after the ceasefire terminates, Israeli forces will need to remain in southern Lebanon.”