John Bolton, the former top U.S. diplomat, has revealed that the Bush administration deliberately resisted calls for an immediate ceasefire during Israel’s invasion of Lebanon last summer, because it wanted to give Israel more time to carry out military strikes. Bolton, who at the time was the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said the U.S. decided to join efforts to end the conflict only when it was clear Israel’s campaign wasn’t working. Bolton told the BBC he was “damned proud of what we did” to prevent an early ceasefire. Bolton also said the U.S. was deeply disappointed at Israel’s failure to remove the threat from Hezbollah. More than 1,000 Lebanese civilians and 43 Israeli civilians died in the war. Israel also lost 116 soldiers. The total number of Hezbollah fighters killed is unknown.