Related videos:
The president Donald Trump announced on Thursday a ten-day ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon, effective at 5 PM Eastern Time, marking the first truce agreement between the two countries in decades.
Trump posted the announcement on his platform Truth Social after having phone conversations with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"I just had excellent conversations with the highly respected President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon and Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu of Israel," wrote the Republican leader.
Both leaders will "formally begin a 10-day ceasefire at 5:00 PM (Eastern Time)," Trump confirmed in his statement.
The announcement comes just two days after Israel and Lebanon held their first direct diplomatic discussions since 1993 in Washington, facilitated by Secretary of State Marco Rubio along with the ambassadors of both countries during a two-and-a-half-hour meeting.
"On Tuesday, the two countries met for the first time in 34 years here in Washington, with our great Secretary of State, Marco Rubio," Trump recalled in his post.
In a second message disseminated on the same day, Trump announced that he will invite Netanyahu and Aoun to the White House for what would be the first significant discussions between Israel and Lebanon since 1983, referencing the agreement mediated by the Reagan administration that was never ratified by Beirut.
"Both parties want to see peace, and I believe it will happen quickly," he stated.
The president appointed Vice President JD Vance, Marco Rubio, and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Caine, to work with both countries towards achieving a lasting peace.
Trump framed the agreement within his self-proclaimed trajectory as an international mediator: "It has been an honor for me to resolve nine wars in the world, and this will be the tenth, so let's do it!"
The ceasefire comes amidst an ongoing and high-intensity conflict. The confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon began on March 2, when the Shiite militia fired projectiles towards Israel in response to Operation Epic Fury, the joint offensive by the United States and Israel against Iran that started on February 28.
Since then, Israeli attacks in Lebanon have resulted in at least 2,089 deaths, thousands of injuries, and over a million displaced individuals.
On the same day of the announcement, the Israeli army intensified its operations in Bint Jbeil, in southern Lebanon, destroying 70 infrastructures in just one minute, according to a military statement.
Israel had been explicitly excluded from the two-week ceasefire between the United States and Iran agreed upon on April 7, and Trump himself confirmed the next day that the Israeli attacks in Lebanon constituted a separate skirmish.
The positions of both parties remain distant. Netanyahu stated that Israel's objectives are "the dismantling of Hezbollah's weapons and a real peace agreement that lasts for generations," while President Aoun expressed his hope for "an agreement on a ceasefire in Lebanon, with the aim of initiating direct negotiations between Lebanon and Israel."
Hezbollah, for its part, denounced the direct conversations as a "humiliation" for the Lebanese state, and its leader Naim Qassem described them as an unacceptable concession to Israel.
Aoun, elected president of Lebanon on January 9, 2026, by the Lebanese Parliament after 28 months of presidential vacancy, visited the White House on April 12, where Trump announced a $500 million military assistance package and $1.2 billion in humanitarian aid for the country.
Filed under: