President Donald Trump announced Thursday that the leaders of Israel and Lebanon had reached a ceasefire agreement, coming as fighting raged between Israel and the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group.
In an article on Truth Social, he said that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu “agreed that to achieve PEACE between their countries, they will officially begin a 10-day ceasefire at 5 p.m. ET.”
He said he had “directed Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Rubio” to work with countries to achieve “lasting PEACE.”
There was no immediate confirmation of the deal from Israel or Lebanon. Hezbollah, which is also a powerful political party in Lebanon, did not participate in the negotiations. A senior Hezbollah official told NBC News on Wednesday that “discussions on the agreement are ongoing, with progress linked to the Israeli position”.
FORSUBSCRIBERS
Richard Engel explains why he is reporting from the Israel-Lebanon border02:10
Trump’s announcement comes after Iran insisted on strikes against Lebanon must end as part of any long-term peace agreement with the United States and Israel.
A ceasefire in Lebanon “is as important as a ceasefire in Iran,” Tehran’s chief negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Thursday morning, adding: “In the Islamabad negotiations and thereafter, we seriously continued our efforts to compel adversaries to establish a permanent ceasefire in all conflict zones.”
Israeli forces continued their widespread strikes across Lebanon, while continuing a ground invasion of the south of the country, even after the temporary ceasefire agreement in the Iran war took effect last week. The United States and Israel denied that the deal covered Lebanon, while Iran pointed to statements by the Pakistani mediator suggesting that was the case.
Violence in Lebanon erupted last month after the United States and Israel began their military campaign in Iran, when Hezbollah militants fired rockets into Israel. Israel responded with strikes across Lebanon, promising to establish a vast “security zone” along the south of the country.
The ceasefire agreement is the result of direct negotiations that began Tuesday with an in-person meeting in Washington between the ambassadors of Lebanon and Israel to the United States. The meeting marked the first direct talks between the two countries in decades.
More than 2,100 people have been killed in Lebanon since the start of the war, according to Lebanese authorities, and more than a million others have been displaced from their homes.
Relatives of Ghadir Baalbaki, 19, killed in an Israeli airstrike on Tuesday, mourn at his funeral in Tyre, Lebanon.Hussein Malla / APIn Israel, 21 people have been killed since the start of the Iran war, including victims linked to strikes by Iran and Hezbollah.
In a phone call Wednesday, President Donald Trump asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to desist from strikes in Lebanon to help ensure the success of upcoming negotiations with the Iranian regime, two senior administration officials told NBC News.
Trump confirmed this conversation in an interview with NBC News last Thursday, saying that the Israelis were “winding down” their operations in Lebanon.
“I’ve spoken with Bibi and he’s going to be discreet. I just think we need to be a little more discreet,” Trump said.
It’s a development history. Please check again for updates.
