American mediator Amos Hochstein, who helped broker the ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah that went into effect today, spoke to Israel's Channel 12 News this evening (Wednesday) about the agreement. It was his first public interview since the ceasefire.

"Over the last three months or so, really an effort to bring into an actual ceasefire. I think the real issue was the linkage that Hezbollah had made between Lebanon and Gaza and being able to break that linkage. De-linking the two conflicts was the key to solving this one," Hochstein said.

In response to critics of the deal from figures like Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, Hochstein said, "Hezbollah is weakened, it is degraded, and at some point, you have to say, 'what's the point of degrading it [further]? At some point you have to get to a deal itself."

Addressing concerns that a better deal or outcome could have been reached, he said, "There are fantasy deals that are utopia where you get a ceasefire deal with a security zone, etc. But those will never happen. There will never be an agreement that also has Israel as an occupying force in another country. That country will not sign that deal."

"So you have to choose, and if you choose to have a dead zone or a demilitarized zone, then you are there as an occupier and you are not there in agreement. Which means that while you may have two, three kilometers inside Lebanon, or maybe even four or five, there's no agreement to stop shooting at Israel from longer ranges. As every Israeli today knows, it's no longer just about five or ten kilometer ranges. It's about much further," he said.

According to Hochstein, "It's much more important to get an arrangement where we can enforce Hezbollah not being able to return to the south, not being able to rebuild its terrorist infrastructure, not being able to rebuild its terrorist infrastructure, which is in the agreement, and having an agreement to stop firing rockets and UAVs and rebuilding its arsenal against Israel."