JERUSALEM: Israel approved Sunday a proposed map for the Jewish State's maritime borders with Lebanon different from Lebanon's proposed map and will submit it to the U.N. for an opinion.

Israel’s maps lays out maritime borders that conflict significantly with those proposed by Lebanon in its own submission to the United Nations.

"The Cabinet today approved the draft of the northern maritime border of Israel," said a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office. "This line demarcates the area of the state's economic rights, including the exploitation of natural resources."

"The outline that Lebanon submitted to the U.N. is significantly further south than the line Israel is proposing," Netanyahu said at the meeting.

Israel's map could bring it into fresh conflict with Lebanon, with both countries disagreeing on where the border lies.

"It also conflicts with the line that we have agreed upon with Cyprus and, what is more significant in my eyes, it conflicts with the line that Lebanon itself agreed upon with Cyprus in 2007."

"Our goal is to determine Israel's position regarding its maritime border, in keeping with the principles of international maritime law," Netanyahu said.

Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Sunday that Israel will seek a U.N. opinion on its maritime borders where lucrative offshore gas fields have been found.

"We will soon be presenting the United Nations headquarters in New York with our position on our maritime borders," Lieberman told Israeli public radio.

"We have already concluded an agreement on this issue with Cyprus... Lebanon, under pressure from Hezbollah, is looking for friction, but we will not give up any part of what is rightfully ours," he added.

Israel has been moving to develop several large offshore natural gas fields in the Mediterranean that it hopes could help it to become an energy exporter. However, Israel does not have officially demarcated maritime borders with Lebanon, which argues that gas fields lie inside its territorial waters.

But Lieberman said the Jewish state had "very strong arguments under international law" for its position, adding that the foreign and justice ministries had been working together to set them out.

Lebanon has repeatedly voiced its fears that Israel could extract gas and oil reserves that it says are located within its own territorial waters. In its policy statement, Prime Minister Najib Mikati’s Cabinet also expressed commitment to securing maritime resources. 

“The government is committed ... to defending Lebanon in confronting any aggression through all legitimate and accessible means and to retaining its right to use its water and oil resources and to consolidate its maritime borders," the Cabinet's policy statement said.

Lebanon has also asked the U.N. to help demarcate Lebanon's maritime borders in line with Security Council Resolutions 1701, 425, 426.

In August 2010, Lebanese MPs passed a law authorizing exploration and drilling of offshore oil and gas fields. Five months later, Cyprus signed a memorandum of cooperation with Israel for surveying and mapping in joint research energy projects.

Lebanon has criticized the Cyprus-Israel agreement, describing it as a violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty and economic rights.

The two biggest known offshore fields, Tamar and Leviathan, lie off Israel's northern city of Haifa.

Tamar is believed to hold at least 8.4 trillion cubic feet of gas (238 billion cubic meters), while Leviathan is believed to have reserves of 16 trillion cubic feet (450 billion cubic meters).

In recent weeks, an Israeli company has also announced the discovery of two new natural gas fields, Sarah and Mira, around 70 kilometers (45 miles) off the city of Hadera further south. – With The Daily Star