PM maintains Lebanon ceasefire call as US backs Israel

Australia remains in support of a ceasefire in Lebanon as the US backs Israel's incursion targeting Hezbollah in the country's south.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese insists his government's position remains in lockstep with Western allies after a US State Department spokesman supported a "limited incursion" by Israel to hit Hezbollah.

Mr Albanese said he supported Israel's right to defend itself but did not explicitly back Israel's attacks against Hezbollah across the Lebanese border.

The prime minister called for de-escalation and rejected criticism it contradicted supporting Israel's right to defend itself.

"You need a de-escalation in order to have a diplomatic solution," he told Sky News on Wednesday.

"If you don't say that's the case, are you saying this conflict should just continue to escalate, ad infinitum with no end?"

US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said "we do support Israel launching these incursions to degrade Hezbollah's infrastructure so ultimately we can get a diplomatic resolution".

Australia and the US joined a host of other countries calling for a 21-day ceasefire across the Israel-Lebanese border to negotiate a longer peace.

Mr Miller said the situation had changed and while a diplomatic solution was ultimately needed, so too was breaking Hezbollah's "stranglehold" on Lebanon.

Australia's federal opposition has been critical of the language used by the Albanese government, saying it was contradictory to call for a ceasefire while supporting Israel's right to defend itself against terrorists.

The coalition did not support a Labor motion in parliament calling for a ceasefire but backed the condemnation of Hamas and remembrance of civilians killed in its October 7 attacks.

International concern is mounting over the situation in Lebanon.

Deaths have climbed into the thousands as Israel targets Beirut and levels residential buildings in missile strikes it says target Hezbollah's infrastructure and weapons.

More than 1200 Australians have arrived home after being evacuated from Lebanon on repatriation flights, with more arriving on Wednesday and Thursday while other planes fly people from Beirut to Cyprus.

A catastrophic humanitarian situation in Gaza is also spurring desperate calls from the international community for a ceasefire, with the strip rendered largely uninhabitable after a year of war between Israel and Hamas.

East Timor's president and Nobel peace prize winner Jose Ramos-Horta criticised the large number of casualties, saying Israel had a right to attack Hamas but needed to do so "strategically, picking them one by one".

"Not go and bulldoze the whole country to find a needle in the process, kill many times over, the children, the women that were killed in Israel," he told AAP.

More than 42,000 people have been killed in Gaza, local health authorities say.

Israel's invasion came after listed terrorist group Hamas killed 1200 people and took 250 hostages on October 7, 2023.

Israel has "lost a lot of goodwill around the world" due to the high number of casualties, Mr Ramos-Horta said.

"Probably they fell into the trap laid out by Hamas, and now it is going to be ... a war of exhaustion that's impossible for Israel to get out of it in glory," he said.