The U.S. Department of State announced on Friday, following two days of negotiations between Israel and Lebanon in Washington, that an agreement had been reached to extend the ceasefire for 45 days, allowing additional time for further progress in the talks.<\/p>\n
In a statement, the department said that a new round of negotiations will be held in Washington on 2 and 3 June, as part of ongoing efforts to de-escalate tensions between the two sides.<\/p>\n
It added that a parallel track of security talks will begin at the Pentagon on 29 May, with military delegations from Israel and Lebanon participating to discuss border security arrangements.<\/p>\n
The U.S. State Department expressed hope that these talks would contribute to achieving lasting peace between the two countries, based on full recognition of each other\u2019s sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as establishing effective security along their shared border.<\/p>\n
This marks the third round of negotiations between the two sides, which do not maintain diplomatic relations.<\/p>\n
For his part, Israel\u2019s ambassador to Washington, Yechiel Leiter, said after the talks that ensuring his country\u2019s security would remain essential, writing on X: \u201cThere will be good times and difficult times, but the chances of success are high.\u201d<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Lebanese negotiating delegation in Washington said on Friday that extending the ceasefire and launching a U.S.-facilitated security track pave the way toward \u201clasting stability.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement published by the Lebanese presidency, the delegation said: \u201cThe extension of the ceasefire and the launch of a U.S.-sponsored security track provide a necessary margin of stability for our people, strengthen state institutions, and open a political path toward de-escalation and lasting stability.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cFutile War\u201d<\/p>\n
From Beirut, Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam called for Arab and international support for the direct talks his country is holding with Israel, criticizing Hezbollah for dragging Lebanon into what he described as a \u201cfutile war.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking at a dinner hosted by the Al-Makassed Association in Beirut, Salam said: \u201cEnough futile adventures in service of foreign projects or interests. The latest was a war we did not choose but that was imposed on us.\u201d He reiterated the need for Lebanon to have \u201cone weapon only\u201d \u2014 that of the Lebanese army.<\/p>\n
According to Lebanese authorities, Israeli attacks since the start of the war have killed more than 2,900 people in Lebanon, including more than 400 since the ceasefire that took effect on 17 April, and displaced over one million people.<\/p>\n
Source: AFP<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The U.S. Department of State announced on Friday, following two days of negotiations between Israel and Lebanon in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":444399,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[85,46,2286,2287,88,43],"class_list":["post-444398","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-jordan","tag-jordan-news","tag-lebanon","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444398","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=444398"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/444398\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/444399"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=444398"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=444398"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=444398"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}