The deputy leader of Hezbollah’s political council Mahmud Qomati said Wednesday the group was preparing an official public funeral for former chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, killed two months ago in an Israeli strike.

Hezbollah postponed the service "in order to organize a funeral. We are preparing for this funeral worthy" of Nasrallah, Qomati told a press conference in Beirut’s southern suburbs, adding that the service would be "public and official".

An Israeli security official says Israeli forces remain in their positions hours after a ceasefire took place and will only gradually withdraw from southern Lebanon.

The official, speaking Wednesday on condition of anonymity under military briefing rules, would not say when troops would begin the withdrawal but said it would be completed during the 60-day period laid out in the ceasefire agreement.

France’s foreign minister underlined his country’s role in brokering an agreement that ended fighting between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah alongside the U.S., saying the deal wouldn’t have been possible without France’s special relationship with its former protectorate.

“It’s a success for French diplomacy and we can be proud,” said the minister, Jean-Noël Barrot, speaking hours after the ceasefire went into effect Wednesday.

The Lebanese army asked displaced people returning to southern Lebanon to avoid frontline villages and towns near the border where the Israeli military is still present until the troops withdraw, as a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah appeared to take hold.

"With the ceasefire coming into effect, the army is taking the necessary measures to complete its deployment in the south," the army said in a statement. "The army command calls on citizens to wait before returning to frontline villages and towns that Israeli enemy forces have penetrated, awaiting their withdrawal."

Some people in Israel who have been displaced by fighting with Lebanese Hezbollah say the ceasefire deal doesn’t make them feel secure enough to go home.

Some 50,000 people have been displaced from a string of cities, towns and villages along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon. Those communities have been pummeled by Hezbollah rocket and drone fire for 13 months, with dozens of houses damaged and in need of rebuilding or rehabilitation.

Lebanon’s caretaker government on Wednesday approved a U.S.-brokered ceasefire with Israel.

The move was largely a formality but also signaled the government’s commitment to its part in the deal, including deploying Lebanese soldiers along the border with Israel and cooperating with United Nations peacekeepers.

Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri called Wednesday for another effort to fill the country’s long-vacant presidency just hours after a ceasefire to halt hostilities between Hezbollah and Israel went into effect.

Lebanon has been without a president since October 2022, as its deeply divided parliament has been unable to elect a new head of state. The last effort to elect a president was more than a year ago.

Thousands of Lebanese displaced by the war began the journey back home as a ceasefire took hold on Wednesday, with many celebrating an end to the deadly fighting.

The truce brings to a halt a war that has killed thousands in Lebanon and resulted in mass displacement on both sides of the border.

U.S. President Joe Biden said a Lebanon truce will take effect early Wednesday, after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said a ceasefire with Hezbollah would allow Israel to focus its attention on Hamas and arch-enemy Iran.

Hezbollah has said it accepts the ceasefire proposal with Israel, but a senior official with the group said Tuesday that it had not seen the agreement in its final form.

“After reviewing the agreement signed by the enemy government, we will see if there is a match between what we stated and what was agreed upon by the Lebanese officials,” Mahmoud Qamati, deputy chair of Hezbollah’s political council, told the Al Jazeera news network.