World powers have raised US$1 billion ($1.5 billion) to ease the humanitarian crisis in Lebanon and support its army at a conference in Paris, with France's foreign minister urging Israel to heed the message to ceasefire and focus on diplomacy.
Some 70 government delegations and 15 international organisations met in Paris on Thursday to help Lebanon.
"The message (for Israel) is simple: Ceasefire," France's foreign minister Jean-Noël Barrot told a news conference, reiterating that a Franco-American proposal for a temporary truce was still on the table.
Barrot said more than US$800 million ($1.2 billion), including US$300 million ($451 million) from the United States, had been raised primarily to help up to one million displaced Lebanese people with food, healthcare and education.
A further US$200 million ($301 million) would go to the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF), deemed as the guarantor of internal stability and also vital to implementing 2006 United Nations Security Council resolution 1701, which calls for southern Lebanon to be free of any troops or weapons other than those of the Lebanese state.
France has historical ties with Lebanon and has been working with the US in trying to secure a ceasefire, although the two allies differ in their approach regarding resolution 1701.
After Israel rebuffed a 21-day ceasefire plan in September, Paris' influence has been limited since Israel launched its large-scale onslaught on Lebanon, which has killed more than 2,500 people and displaced at least 1.2 million. Israel says it is targeting the Lebanese group Hezbollah.
"The storm we are currently witnessing is unlike any other, because it carries the seeds of total destruction," Lebanon's caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati told delegates, pleading for more pressure to be put on Israel.
Opening the conference, French President Emmanuel Macron said there must not be a return to past cycles of violence.
"More damage, more victims, more strikes will not enable the end of terrorism or ensure security for everyone," he said.
Israeli strike kills three Lebanese troops
Despite the repeated calls for a ceasefire, there was no sign on Thursday of the conflict abating. Three Lebanese soldiers were killed in an Israeli strike near the border, the Lebanese army said.
The Lebanese soldiers were killed as they were evacuating wounded people on the outskirts of the southern village of Yater, the Lebanese army said.
There was no immediate comment on the strike from the Israeli military, which has previously said it is not operating against the Lebanese army.
UN Security Council resolution 1701 has never been fully implemented, and amid a two-year political power vacuum and a collapsed economy, the Lebanese army has no real weight to play its role in the south of the country.
"The final objective is to recruit, train and equip 6,000 new LAF units," an Italian diplomatic source said, adding that Rome would soon organise its own conference focused on this.
Italy has some 1,000 troops as part of the 10,000-strong United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).
Diplomats say that once there is a ceasefire, the mission will need to be made more robust.
"Let's not reinvent the wheel. We have to make it work," EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said, adding that amending its mandate would need a new UN Security Council vote.
Borrell said there was scope to increase UNIFIL's troop numbers to 15,000 under the current mandate.
"The objective this time is to find conditions that ensure the lasting application of 1701 so that peace returns on both sides," something easier said than done, Barrot said.
