A follow-up meeting between Israel's ambassador to the US, Yechiel Leiter, and his Lebanese counterpart, Nada Mouawad, will be held in Washington under the auspices of US State Department representatives. According to reports, those expected to attend in addition to the ambassadors are Secretary of State Marco Rubio, senior State Department adviser Mike Needham, US Ambassador to Lebanon Michel Issa and US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee.
The first direct negotiations between Israel and Lebanon in nearly four decades opened in Washington last week with US mediation. After the meeting, Israel struck an optimistic tone. Ambassador Leiter expressed confidence that a peace agreement could be reached and said the goals included the complete dismantling of Hezbollah and freeing Lebanon from Iranian influence, while the Prime Minister's Office said the dialogue was intended to advance the terrorist organization's disarmament and establish relations between the two countries.
At the same time, according to a statement issued by the US State Department, the three sides agreed to launch a direct negotiation process aimed initially at shoring up the existing ceasefire and later examining the possibility of a broader agreement.
The ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, which was announced by President Donald Trump last Thursday, is set to expire in three days under the original understandings. However, according to a source familiar with the details who spoke to Agence France-Presse, Lebanon is expected to request a one-month extension of the ceasefire during the trilateral meeting. At the same time, Israel continues to exercise its right to self-defense against Hezbollah through targeted strikes on the terrorist organization.
Meanwhile, amid the continuing escalation with the Hezbollah terrorist organization, the US Embassy in Beirut issued a travel warning calling on US citizens to "depart Lebanon while commercial flight options remain available," and urged those choosing not to leave to "prepare contingency plans for emergency situations and monitor the news for new developments."
While President Trump is pushing for a meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Lebanese President Joseph Aoun, official Lebanese sources said Tuesday that conditions for a meeting between the two heads of state had not yet matured. They said a ceasefire must first be stabilized, Israel's withdrawal from southern Lebanon must begin and the Lebanese army must be deployed.
