If it holds, the ceasefire would bring an end to nearly 14 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, which escalated in mid-September into all-out war and threatened to pull Hezbollah's patron Iran and Israel into a broader conflagration.

The ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon began on Wednesday morning, a day after Israel carried out its most intense wave of airstrikes in Beirut since the start of the conflict, killing at least 42 people across the country.

BEIRUT (AP) — Israeli warplanes struck central Beirut and the city’s southern suburbs on Tuesday, raising smoke over the Lebanese capital ahead of a planned vote by Israel’s leadership on whether to accept a U.S.-brokered ceasefire aimed at ending more than a year of fighting with Hezbollah militants.