Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday said its military has “no restrictions” regarding its efforts to target Hezbollah in Lebanon. Israel’s continued operations against the militant group have strained the U.S.-Iran ceasefire reached last week. “The directive from me and the Defence Minister to the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] is clear and has not changed:…
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Israel's government is concerned that the U.S. is effectively legitimizing Iran's influence in Lebanon and eroding Israel's freedom of operation there through new understandings reached in Switzerland and the memorandum of understanding signed with Iran last week, two Israeli sources told Axios.Why it matters: Iran has managed to wrap the situation in Lebanon into its negotiations with the U.S. in order to support its proxy, Hezbollah. The Trump administration accepts that it must now contain Israel's actions in Lebanon in order to advance its diplomacy with Iran.Israeli officials worry the new understandings will undermine months of efforts by the U.S. and Israel to weaken Hezbollah and decrease Iran's influence in Lebanon.More immediately, they're also worried about pushback from D.C. each time they want to conduct a strike on Lebanese soil, or pressure from Trump to withdraw from southern Lebanon while the Hezbollah threat still exists.Driving the news: The U.S.-Iran MOU stipulates that both countries and their allies will end all hostilities, including in Lebanon, and ensure the country's territorial integrity and sovereignty — which are undermined by Israel's ongoing occupation in southern Lebanon.There were several rounds of fighting in the days after it was signed, though the latest ceasefire renewal has held since Saturday.Iran threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz and to skip the Switzerland talks if Israel continued its attacks.Once the talks actually began on Sunday, Lebanon was one of the key issues discussed. The parties agreed to create a new "deconfliction cell," together with Lebanon and the Pakistani and Qatari mediators, to ensure the ceasefire holds.Between the lines: Israeli sources claim that new U.S.-Iran agreements on Lebanon erode previous understandings reached between the Netanyahu government and the Biden administration in 2024, which were blessed by the incoming Trump administration.Under the Nov. 2024 Lebanon ceasefire agreement, brokered by the Biden administration, Israel retained the right to act against both imminent threats and emerging threats posed by Hezbollah. Under the current conditions, Israel's freedom of action appears to be limited to imminent threats only.And while the previous ceasefire-monitoring mechanism involved Israel, Lebanon, the U.S., and France, this time Israel is not a direct participant, while Iran is.Furthermore, the Biden-era monitoring mechanism was focused on coordination to dismantle Hezbollah's military infrastructure in southern Lebanon, while this one will focus on de-confliction between the Israeli military and Hezbollah.Behind the scenes: An Israeli source said that while the nuclear elements of the U.S.-Iran deal concerned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, he is currently much more worried about the Lebanon part.One reason is that Israel's actions against Hezbollah have enormous domestic political salience ahead of October's election."Bibi is hysterical about it," the source said, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname.In recent days, Netanyahu asked his close confidant Ron Dermer, who left government several months ago, to urgently use his relationships within Trump's team to try to influence the U.S.-Iran talks on Lebanon, according to the same Israeli source.The source claimed Dermer's involvement helped lead to a Truth Social post in which Trump threatened to strike Iran if it didn't restrain Hezbollah.A U.S. official confirmed Dermer's participation and said U.S. negotiators in Switzerland spoke to him several times on Sunday to brief him on the Iran talks and get his input. "We were transparent with them," the official said.The other side: Lebanese President Joseph Aoun is willing to accept the new mechanism as long as it is led by the U.S., according to a Lebanese official.Vice President Vance and Trump's envoy Jared Kushner briefed Aoun on the deconfliction mechanism in a call on Monday morning.What they're saying: A senior U.S. official contended that Iran has been deeply involved in Lebanon for decades and claimed Israel doesn't have to be concerned about the new mechanism for Lebanon. "Israel is not out of the mechanism, because the U.S. is in the mechanism. We are so close and coordinated that a direct channel between the U.S. and Iran over Lebanon will only benefit Israel," the U.S. official said.Friction point: "The deconfliction mechanism in Lebanon envisioned by the Trump administration doesn't include Israel and in my view is a major misstep," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of Netanyahu's closest allies in Congress, told Axios.On Monday, Netanyahu issued an unusual joint statement with his Defense Minister Israel Katz and Israel Defense Forces chief of staff Gen.
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After the US and Israel began their war with Iran on Feb. 28, the Iran-backed Lebanese militia Hezbollah was quick to join the fray, firing rockets and drones into Israel. Officials there saw in the crisis sweeping the region a chance to finally drive Hezbollah, already weakened by a series of setbacks, away from Israel’s northern border.
The Iranian delegation negotiating a peace deal with the US in Switzerland almost walked out after a barrage of President Donald Trump's social media posts.
MS NOW's Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski cut into a live press conference to call out Vice President JD Vance's remarks in real time.The vice president spoke to reporters Monday morning in Switzerland, where he's been engaged in high-stakes talks with Iranian officials, and Vance was asked about President Donald Trump's threats to kill those same Iranian negotiators before they returned home if the Strait of Hormuz remained closed."No, they didn't throw a wrench in the system," Vance said, when asked about the president's threats. "The thing with the Iranians, yes, they did threaten to walk out, or at least there were social media threats that they would walk out. But we were negotiating well past 1 in the morning yesterday, so they didn't walk out, and their technical team is still here in Bürgenstock, working with our technical team, actually, as we speak, though, I imagine maybe some of them are taking a break to watch this news conference.""But look, what we told the Iranians yesterday is when you guys engage in what us millennials might call trash talk, you can't expect the president of the United States not to respond and not to correct the record," Vance continue. "So when they say things that aren't true, the president is going to respond to it, I'm going to respond to it, Americans are going to respond to it. When they make threats that aren't rooted in reality, they have to accept that the president of the United States is actually going to set the record straight. That's all that happens.""So, yes, there was a little bit of threatening, there was a little bit of whining," the vice president added. "But at the end of the day, the talks continued and we made great progress."The "Morning Joe" hosts interrupted to react to Vance's excuses for the president's threats."Wow," Brzezinski said."While he waits for the next question," Scarborough said, "we will be talking ... about how every statement from the Trump administration is either projection or confession. That certainly was the case on that last preposterous answer about accusing the Iranians of, quote, trash talk destroying civilizations." - YouTube youtu.be