Trump says Israel and Lebanon have agreed to a 10-day ceasefire
President Donald Trump on Thursday announced that the leaders of Israel and Lebanon had reached a ceasefire deal, which came as fighting raged between Israel and the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.
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In a post on Truth Social, he said that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “have agreed that in order to achieve PEACE between their Countries, they will formally begin a 10 Day CEASEFIRE at 5 P.M. EST.”
Trump said that he had “directed Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Rubio” to work with the countries toward achieving “a Lasting PEACE,” adding that he had invited Aoun and Netanyahu to take part in peace talks at the White House.
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam welcomed the ceasefire in a post on X, saying it had been a key objective for Lebanon in talks this week. “While congratulating all Lebanese on this achievement, I offer my condolences to the families of the martyrs who fell, and I express my solidarity with them, with the wounded, and with the citizens who were forced to flee their cities and villages,” he said.
There was no immediate confirmation of the deal from Israel. Hezbollah, which is also a powerful political party in Lebanon, has not been part of the talks. A senior Hezbollah official told NBC News on Wednesday that “if Israel is fully committed to a complete cessation of hostilities … then this matter would be subject to consideration by Hezbollah.”
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Trump’s announcement comes after Iran insisted that strikes on Lebanon must stop as part of any longer-term deal for peace with the U.S. and Israel.
A ceasefire in Lebanon “is as important as a ceasefire in Iran,” Tehran’s top negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said Thursday morning, adding: “In the Islamabad negotiations and afterwards, we have been seriously pursuing efforts to compel the adversaries to establish a permanent ceasefire in all areas of conflict.”
Israeli forces had continued with widespread strikes across Lebanon, as well as pushing on with a ground invasion of the country’s south, even after the temporary ceasefire deal in the Iran war that took effect last week. The U.S. and Israel had denied that the agreement covered Lebanon, while Iran pointed to statements from mediator Pakistan suggesting that it did.
The hostilities in Lebanon broke out last month after the U.S. and Israel began their military campaign in Iran, when Hezbollah militants fired rockets at Israel. Israel retaliated with strikes across Lebanon, vowing to establish a sweeping “security zone” along the country’s south.
The ceasefire deal grew out of direct negotiations that kicked off Tuesday with an in-person meeting in Washington between the Lebanese and Israeli ambassadors to the U.S. The meeting marked the first direct talks between the countries in decades.
More than 2,100 people have been killed in Lebanon since the war started, according to Lebanese authorities, and more than 1 million have been displaced from their homes.
In Israel, 21 people have been killed since the outbreak of the Iran war, including casualties related to strikes by both Iran and Hezbollah.
In a phone call last Wednesday, Trump asked Netanyahu to pull back on the Lebanon strikes to help ensure the success of upcoming negotiations with the Iranian regime, two senior administration officials told NBC News.
Trump confirmed that conversation in an interview with NBC News last Thursday, saying Israel was “scaling back” operations in Lebanon.
“I spoke with Bibi and he’s going to low-key it. I just think we have to be sort of a little more low-key,” Trump said.
