Reliable sources here said today that Israel has offered to conclude a permanent peace agreement with Lebanon, its northern neighbor, free of any claims or counter-claims and is prepared to recognize the present boundaries as permanent. The offer was said to have been contained in the proposals handed to United Nations mediator Gunnar Jarring in Jerusalem last week. There are no territorial disputes between Israel and Lebanon. The border between the two countries is the same that existed during the Palestine Mandate. Israeli forces occupied 12 Lebanese villages during the 1948 war for independence but evacuated them on their own accord. But Israel does not recognize the 1949 armistice agreement with Lebanon because that country declared itself to be in a state of war with Israel in June, 1967. There were no clashes between Israeli and Lebanese forces during the Six-Day War and the Lebanese border was Israel’s quietest frontier until about a year ago when Palestinian guerrillas began to use the border zone as a staging area for attacks on Israeli settlements. Lebanon, a former French mandated territory, has a population half Christian and half Moslem and a small Jewish community. It is the most westernized of all Arab states in the Middle East.
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