In a surprise announcement posted to his Truth Social platform Wednesday, former US President Donald Trump confirmed that Israel and Lebanon have reached an agreement for a 10-day ceasefire set to enter into force at 10pm local time Thursday, or 5pm EST. The announcement came after Trump held separate calls with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Trump wrote in his post that both leaders had agreed to implement the temporary truce to open a path toward long-term peace between their two nations, and he extended an invitation to both leaders to attend high-level peace talks at the White House. These talks would mark the first substantive negotiations between Israel and Lebanon since 1993, and the first planned White House meeting of its kind since 1993, Trump added, noting that both sides have expressed a desire for lasting peace and that he expects rapid progress.
The announcement caps days of behind-the-scenes US diplomatic efforts to arrange the first direct highest-level contact between the Lebanese and Israeli heads of state in decades. However, senior Lebanese government sources have pushed back on the narrative of coordinated direct talks, revealing that President Aoun refused to hold a direct call with Netanyahu before a ceasefire was formally put in place.
This diplomatic friction comes just two days after Washington hosted a first round of direct ambassador-level talks between Israeli and Lebanese envoys, the first such official direct engagement between the two nations since 1993. The senior Lebanese official explained that Lebanon had already demonstrated goodwill by participating in the Washington talks, but would not take an additional step that would grant Netanyahu a symbolic political victory he failed to achieve through military force on Lebanese soil. The official added that a pre-ceasefire call between Aoun and Netanyahu would carry severe domestic political consequences for Lebanon, warning it could trigger widespread internal unrest that would destabilize the already fragile country.
The current crisis erupted after US-Israeli strikes on Iran killed Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on March 2, prompting Lebanese Shia movement Hezbollah to launch a retaliatory cross-border rocket strike against Israel. In response, Israel launched a sustained, large-scale military campaign across Lebanon. A truce agreement was reached to pause US-Israeli military operations against Iran starting April 8 that was meant to include Lebanon, but Israel continued its offensive, leveling entire towns and villages across southern Lebanon. Despite the ongoing fighting, Iranian officials have continued to prioritize a ceasefire in Lebanon as part of ongoing diplomatic negotiations with the US to end the broader regional conflict.
Even as news of the impending ceasefire broke Thursday morning, Israeli forces continued their military campaign. After Israeli media reported that a direct call between Aoun and Netanyahu would happen imminently, Israeli warplanes targeted and destroyed the Qasmiyeh bridge, the last remaining crossing connecting southern Lebanon to the rest of the country. Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency confirmed that enemy aircraft carried out two consecutive strikes on the structure, which connected the Sour and Saida regions, leaving it completely destroyed.
The Qasmiyeh strike is part of a broader Israeli campaign to sever transportation links across southern Lebanon. Last month, the Israel Defense Forces announced it would target all bridges and crossings along the Litani River, which cuts across southern Lebanon from east to west, a move designed to isolate large swathes of the territory from the rest of the country. In recent weeks, the military has carried out that plan, damaging or destroying at least nine spans across the river. The Qasmiyeh bridge had already been hit in late March, suffering major damage, but Lebanese military engineers had partially repaired it and reopened it to traffic just last week. According to Lebanese outlet L’Orient Today, Lebanese soldiers stationed near the bridge preemptively closed access roads ahead of Thursday’s strike, but the attack still completely shattered the crossing, leaving it irreparable, a Lebanese security official told Reuters.
The ongoing Israeli strikes have continued to claim civilian lives across the country. On Thursday alone, at least 11 people including women and children were killed in multiple Israeli strikes across southern Lebanon, while one additional person was killed in a strike targeting a vehicle on the highway connecting Beirut to Damascus, the capital of neighboring Syria. Official Lebanese government data puts the total death toll from Israeli attacks in Lebanon since March 2 at more than 2,190 people.
The violence has disproportionately targeted medical and humanitarian personnel. On Wednesday, Lebanese paramedic organizations confirmed that the Israeli military killed four rescue workers and wounded six more in three sequential targeted strikes on the southern village of Mayfadoun. The strikes deliberately targeted medical teams in waves: the first wave hit medics responding to a call for wounded civilians, the second struck responders who arrived to assist the first team, and a third hit medics rushing to support both groups. The Lebanese Ministry of Health reports that 91 healthcare workers have been killed by Israeli forces in the past six weeks alone.
Israel has not carried out large-scale strikes on Beirut since April 8, when the military conducted roughly 100 simultaneous strikes across Lebanon in a 10-minute window that killed more than 350 people. But deadly strikes against civilian and infrastructure targets across southern Lebanon have continued unabated, as Israeli ground forces push forward with their incremental ground invasion into the southern part of the country. Notably, the US announcement of the ceasefire deal made no mention of Hezbollah, the political and military movement that controls much of southern Lebanon and has been Israel’s primary opponent in the ongoing fighting.