Ben Caspit has the scoop this week that chances for an Israel-Hezbollah detente may be “slim but possible” without a Gaza cease-fire. 

Maybe. The assessment all around is that Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian want an off ramp to avoid an escalation of hostilities. We are now into the seventh week since the promised retaliation from Tehran and Beirut to the assassinations via airstrike of Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut on July 30, and of Hamas political bureau chairman Ismail Haniyeh the next day in Tehran, reportedly via a bomb planted in his guest quarters.

That off ramp until now was supposed to be a Gaza cease-fire, but Netanyahu is in no rush. US President Joe Biden’s threat of a last-ditch, take-it-or-leave-it cease-fire option just rolls off Bibi’s back. He couldn't care less. The cards are all with him, and he's keeping them close. The Biden administration, with regard to pressure on Israel, is playing with a pair of deuces, and Bibi has called their bluff for months.

And here’s the latest one, per Caspit: The US side is saying that the enhanced US deployment in the region “may not be there forever” to try to encourage Israel to show restraint in the ever risky tit-for-tat with Hezbollah on its northern front.