Friday, June 5, 2026 - In a strongly worded statement, the Iran-backed group's leader Naim Qassem said negotiations had been "futile" and "humiliating" for Lebanon, and rejected categorically by "broad segments of the Lebanese people".
It comes after Israel and Lebanon announced a renewal of
their fragile ceasefire with the creation of "pilot" security zones
inside Lebanon in which Hezbollah operatives would be banned. It also required
Hezbollah to stop attacking Israel.
Donald Trump later said he had spoken to Hezbollah and
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and progress was being made.
Trump added "I think you're going to see things happen
over there".
"It would be really nice if Lebanon could have some
peace. Lebanon's been under attack for so many years and always like an
underdog, and it would be really nice if it could end," he said.
Before Trump's comments, the leader of Hezbollah - which was
not part of the talks - said the "supposed ceasefire", interpreted as
Hezbollah halting fire and withdrawing fighters from the southern front with
Israel, amounted to surrender and would fulfil Israel's objectives.
The mood was similar on the streets of Beirut's southern
suburbs - a stronghold of Hezbollah, also known as Dahieh - with a storekeeper
expressing doubts about the agreement.
Sami, who has run his business there for 25 years, told the
BBC: "You cannot have a ceasefire from one side, it's going to be an all
side or no ceasefire."
There had been strikes in Lebanon on Thursday, he said. If
this was supposed to be a truce, what did that make it?
"This is surrender. This is not a peace agreement. This
is a surrender agreement," he added.
Across the road, Hadi, whose family store has been around
for 35 years, said he saw no hope - and that this was not a new feeling.
"My generation, my dad's generation, my grandpa's
generation, they didn't see anything of hope from these people - not
necessarily the Israeli people. You can say the Israeli government," he
said.
The agreement between Israel and Lebanon, reached after a
fourth round of US-mediated talks in Washington, is contingent on the
"evacuation of all [Hezbollah] operatives" from an area between the
Israeli border and the Litani river, about 30km (19 miles) to the north, which
is currently occupied by Israeli ground forces.
According to the deal, the US would help guide the creation
of "pilot zones in which the Lebanese Armed Forces will take exclusive
control of the territory to the exclusion of all non-state actors".
It did not include any maps to indicate where the pilot
zones would be located, or any explanation of how they might work in practice.
The agreement followed a partial ceasefire announced on
Monday, which Lebanon said would see Israel refrain from bombing the Lebanese
capital, Beirut, in exchange for Hezbollah not attacking Israel.
The two countries' representatives will meet again on 22
June to hold further talks "with a view toward reaching a comprehensive
agreement".
By sitting down to rare talks with Israel, Lebanon's
government may have hoped Hezbollah would simply be swept along, and find it
hard to be the ones saying no to peace.
The US - which was brokering the talks - will have hoped for
a boost to its efforts to strike a peace deal with Iran, which insists any
agreement must include peace in Lebanon too.
But while a majority of Lebanon's population do not support
Hezbollah, there is not great enthusiasm for Israel's invasion either. And in
rejecting the deal outright, the militant group clearly sees political
advantage in portraying itself as the only force capable of resisting Israel
and fighting on.
Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim militia, political party and social
movement, is Lebanon's most powerful group and, with support from Iran, has
built an armed force more formidable than the Lebanese army and has fought a
series of conflicts with Israel. It is designated as a terrorist organisation
by Israel and many other countries, including the UK and U
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said the ceasefire
"could be implemented within 24 hours of its final approval" by all
concerned parties.
Meanwhile, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said the
Israeli military would "for the time being, continue its fire and
operations on the ground" in order to "dismantle terrorist
infrastructure in the area".
Lebanese media reported multiple Israeli strikes across
southern Lebanon on Thursday.
The state-run National News Agency (NNA) said five people
were killed in air strikes on the Bekaa Valley town of Sohmor on Thursday, and
that another person was killed when a motorcycle was targeted by an Israeli
aircraft in the town of Maaroub, near the city of Tyre.
Later the Lebanese health ministry said at least eight
people were killed and 15 others injured on Thursday in a series of strikes
targeting the towns of Sohmor, Masaken and Arab Al-Jalil in southern Lebanon.
The United Nations peacekeeping force in Lebanon (Unifil)
meanwhile said one of its peacekeepers had died of wounds he sustained when
mortar shells struck his position near Marjayoun late on Wednesday.
The Israeli military accused Hezbollah of firing the mortars
that landed inside the UN position overnight, killing the personnel member. The
group has not yet commented on the incident.
Serbia's defence ministry identified the peacekeeper as
Senior Sergeant Milovan Jovanovic, one of around 170 Serbians in the
7,500-strong UN force.
Separately, the Israeli military announced on Thursday that
one of its soldiers, Capt Eitan Shmuel Lemberg, had been killed in southern
Lebanon.
It also said it had identified impacts of several
"suspicious aerial targets" in an area of southern Lebanon where
Israeli troops were operating on Thursday afternoon. No injuries were reported,
it added.
Hezbollah said earlier that it had targeted Israeli troops
and military vehicles in the Lebanese town of Qantara and the area of Beaufort
Castle with attack drones and rockets on Thursday.
Lebanon was drawn into the war between the US, Israel and
Iran on 2 March, when Hezbollah launched rockets into Israel in retaliation for
an Israeli strike that killed Iran's supreme leader. Israel responded with an
air campaign across Lebanon and a ground invasion in the south.
A US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon on 16
April failed to stop the fighting, and last week Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu ordered the Israeli military to intensify its strikes on Hezbollah
and advance deeper into Lebanon in response to drone and rocket attacks on
communities in northern Israel.
At least 3,526 people have been killed in Lebanon since the
start of the war, according to the country's health ministry. Its figures do
not distinguish between combatants and civilians.
The UN says more than one million people have also
registered themselves as displaced in Lebanon, where Israeli evacuation orders
cover more than an eighth of the country.
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