The Israeli army issued an evacuation call for several areas of south Lebanon Thursday, including a Palestinian refugee camp, warning it was poised to hit Hezbollah targets in those areas.

"Hezbollah's terrorist activities force the IDF (army) to act forcefully against it in these areas, and we do not intend to harm you," the Israeli military's Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee said in a post on X.

The family WhatsApp group chat buzzed with constant messages. Israel was escalating its airstrikes on villages and towns in southern Lebanon. Everyone was glued to the news.

Reda Gharib woke up uncharacteristically early that day, Sept. 23. Living a continent away in Senegal, he scrolled through videos and pictures shared by his sisters and aunts of explosions around their neighborhood in Tyre, Lebanon's ancient coastal city.

Negotiations for a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah have made significant progress in the last 24 hours but the Biden administration hasn't reached a final agreement with either Israel or Lebanon, two U.S. officials with direct knowledge of the issue told U.S. news portal Axios.

Hezbollah on Wednesday said it fired rockets at a military training camp southeast of Israel's Tel Aviv.

The Iran-backed group said in a statement that it targeted a camp "for training special units southeast of Tel Aviv with advanced rockets."

Lebanon's health ministry said at least 19 people were killed on Wednesday in Israeli strikes on two areas in the eastern Baalbek region.

Caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein had signalled during a phone call Wednesday that a ceasefire in the Israel-Hezbollah war was possible before U.S. elections are held on November 5.

"The call today with Hochstein suggested to me that perhaps we could reach a ceasefire in the coming days, before the fifth" of November, Mikati said in a televised interview with Lebanese broadcaster Al-Jadeed.

U.S. President Joe Biden met Wednesday with the president of Cyprus, the nearest European Union nation to the wars in Gaza and Lebanon, to discuss new cease-fire efforts by the U.S. and mediators in the Middle East.

The small Mediterranean island has played a critical role in efforts to get humanitarian aid into Gaza since the war between Hamas and Israel began more than a year ago.

Hezbollah has informed the relevant parties, specifically Speaker Nabih Berri, who is tasked with negotiating with U.S. envoy Amos Hochstein, that it agrees to a 60-day truce in Lebanon and a full and comprehensive implementation of Resolution 1701, MTV reported Wednesday evening.

The United States and other mediators are ramping up efforts to halt the wars in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, circulating new proposals to wind down the regional conflict during the Biden administration's final months.

Negotiations on both fronts have been stalled for months and none of the warring parties have shown any sign of backing down from their demands.

Hezbollah's new leader, Sheikh Naim Qassem, on Wednesday warned Israel it would pay a heavy price if its forces remain in Lebanon, stressing his group was ready for a prolonged conflict.