Lebanon and Cyprus finalize sea border agreement after an almost 20-year impasse - ASSOCIATED PRESS

November 26, 2025 

Updated 2:02 PM GMT+2

By KAREEM CHEHAYEB

BEIRUT (AP) — Lebanon and Cyprus signed a long-delayed sea border agreement on Wednesday, ending an almost 20-year impasse that had stalled some oil and gas exploration in the Mediterranean Sea, as Europe seeks alternatives to Russian fuel.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Cypriot counterpart Nikos Christodoulides signed the agreement at the Baabda presidential palace outside the Lebanese capital, Beirut, finalizing an initial deal first inked in 2007.

Christodoulides called the deal a “historic agreement” in a joint press conference with Aoun, who in turn said the signing sends “a clear ... invitation” to anyone who wants to cooperate with Lebanon.

If Nasrallah attacks Karish gas field, Lebanon will pay the price - Gantz - JERUSALEM POST

SEPTEMBER 15, 2022 20:55
By TOVAH LAZAROFF, ANNA AHRONHEIM

Israel warned that Lebanon would pay the price for any Hezbollah attack on its offshore Karish gas field, even as it said it hoped a US-brokered deal to set a maritime boundary in the north was close to completion.

“If [Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah wants to try and harm and to complicate this process, he is welcome to do so, the price is Lebanon,” Defense Minister Benny Gantz told Reichman University’s 21st World Summit on Counter-Terrorism on Thursday morning. “I hope for his sake that he won’t do this, we are prepared to defend our interests.”

Gantz’ words come as US envoy Amos Hochstein appears to be on the edge of concluding a deal between the Lebanese and Israeli governments to set a maritime border off the Mediterranean Sea. It would give Israel rights to the Karish gas field and Lebanon the right to the abutting Kana gas field.

Israel, Lebanon, and Failed Natural Gas Negotiations - FOREIGN POLICY RESEARCH INSTITUTE

December 11, 2019

Leah Pedro

Over the past decade, there has been a gas revolution in the Eastern Mediterranean, where discoveries of large offshore gas deposits have set up some of the littoral states—notably Israel, Egypt and perhaps Cyprus—as potential significant players in the European natural gas market. This has led to the creation of the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum (EMGF), set up in Cairo this year, to facilitate cooperation among members—Cyprus, Egypt, Greece, Israel, Italy, Jordan, and Palestine, with U.S. support. Lebanon has been late to join in the gas market and has not yet been able to join the EMGF, and Turkey has been excluded for contentious bilateral relationships among members. While there seems to be a chance that further gas deposits are located in Lebanese waters, further exploration and exploitation cannot take place near the Israeli and Lebanese marine border until the contested area is demarcated. The potential profits from oil exploration in the disputed area could bring in as much as US$600 billion over the next several decades. Economic and political possibilities would seem attractive enough to incentivize both sides toward finding common ground. Yet, negotiations to delimit the maritime boundary, set to begin late summer 2019, never came to fruition, and do not seem likely to begin any time soon.

US efforts to start Israel-Lebanon maritime border talks ‘failed’ - Report - THE JERUSALEM POST

July 3, 2019 23:50 

Herb Keinon

Acting Secretary of State David Satterfield’s efforts to get Israel and Lebanon around a negotiating table to discuss marking their maritime border has failed, according to Lebanese reports on Wednesday.

Satterfield, who was confirmed last Friday as Washington’s ambassador to Turkey and could be making his last visit to the region trying to deal with the maritime border issue, met in Beirut on Tuesday with Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil and House Speaker Nabih Berri.

According to these reports, Satterfield told his Lebanese interlocutors that Israel has refused their request for UN sponsorship of the talks, and their demands that the discussions should deal not only with the maritime border but also the land border as well.

Israel and Lebanon have a dispute over an 860 sq. km. area that includes several blocs rich in natural gas.

One of the key sticking points holding up the launch of the negotiations has been whether they will be open ended – Lebanon’s demand – or whether there will be a six-month deadline, Israel’s position.

US-mediated talks between Lebanon and Israel expected to begin in weeks - THE ARAB WEEKELY

Sunday 23/06/2019

Simon Speakman Cordall

TUNIS - Lebanon has agreed to enter US-brokered talks with Israel over a disputed maritime border.

Lebanon has not commented publicly on its participation in such talks; however, Israeli sources indicated that negotiations could begin in July. It is understood that discussions would concern only the maritime border.

Acting US Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs David Satterfield has been shuttling between both countries’ capitals for months and is believed to have achieved a breakthrough after meeting with Lebanese Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil in late May.

A statement, carried by Lebanese state media following a recent Satterfield meeting in Lebanon, said the Foreign Ministry confirmed that no major obstacles remained ahead of negotiations but that more trips were required.

“We started putting the final touches on the form of negotiations and the role of the concerned parties, including the United Nations, Lebanon and Israel, as well as the role of the United States,” the statement said.

Israel’s discovery of the Tamar and Leviathan gas fields in 2009 and 2010, respectively, increased the rate of exploration across the eastern Mediterranean, with discoveries later made in Cypriot and Egyptian waters.

Israel Expects U.S.-mediated Lebanese Sea Border Talks in Weeks - HAARETZ / REUTERS

Jun 04, 2019 8:02 PM

Israel expects to launch U.S.-mediated talks with Lebanon on setting their maritime border within weeks, a senior Israeli official said on Tuesday, naming a UN peacekeeper compound in southern Lebanon as a possible venue.

Lebanon has not commented publicly on whether it would attend talks or on any possible timeline.

The United States, which has been sending a senior envoy on shuttle missions between Lebanon and Israel, also has not announced a date or venue but said it is prepared to help them resolve the dispute.

Formally at war since Israel's 1948 founding, the neighbors have long disagreed on border demarcations in the eastern Mediterranean, an issue that gained prominence in the past decade when large deposits of natural gas were found there.

U.S. trying to mediate Israeli-Lebanese maritime dispute to avoid war - THE JERUSALEM POST

MAY 16, 2019 13:09 ANNA AHRONHEIM

A senior American official mediating the maritime border dispute between Israel and Lebanon is in Tel Aviv in a push to resolve a maritime border dispute between the two enemy countries.

Acting US Assistant Secretary of State David Satterfield was in Beirut on Wednesday and met with Lebanon’s President Michel Aoun and discussed bilateral relations and the latest local and regional developments, Lebanon’s National News Agency reported.

The two also discussed a “working mechanism” to define maritime borders between Israel and Lebanon, NNA said.

"The demarcation of the southern territorial and maritime borders would reinforce stability along the frontier," Aoun was quoting as telling Satterfield, and called on Washington to "contribute to reaching this goal, especially to respect Lebanon's... right to drill for oil and gas.”

According to diplomatic sources quoted by Lebanon’s NNA, Lebanon had received "positive signals of an American desire to play the role of mediator between Beirut and Tel Aviv."

Signs of progress on maritime border between Lebanon and Israel - THE NATIONAL

Nabih Berri supportS larger UN role in the border dispute. AP

April 25, 2019 01:34 PM

Sunniva Rose and Joyce Karam

The US has been actively mediating, and ideas for United Nations supervision role are under consideration

Lebanon says it is ready to demarcate its maritime border with Israel, following US mediation efforts and attempts backed by Cyprus and Greece to broker a deal under United Nations (UN) supervision governing both land and sea borders.

“Lebanon is ready to delineate the maritime borders and the special economic zone through the mechanism adopted for the demarcation of the blue line under the supervision of the United Nations”, Lebanese Parliament speaker Nabih Berri said on Tuesday.

Mr Berri was speaking during a meeting with Major General Stefano Del Col, head of mission and force commander of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), the Lebanese state-run National News Agency (NNA) reported.

Gen Del Col agreed that a UN role in the talks could strengthen maritime security and stability. In the absence of a demarcation, UNIFIL has historically used an unofficial land border, known as a blue line, between Lebanon and Israel land border to maintain peace. Both sides have agreed to the blue line.