Lebanon did tell Iran and Europe to butt out this morning. They know how to actually end the Iranian grip on their country, and it’s not by relying on France, the EU, or the United Nations. Or even the US, which has taken a hands-off posture in Lebanon since the 1983 bombing of the Marine Corps barracks by Hezbollah.
The only partner that could rid Lebanon of Tehran’s proxy terror army is the country they have steadfastly refused to recognize for the last 80 years. Desperation makes for obvious bedfellows in this case, and Benjamin Netanyahu will at least explore the potential for an alliance with Beirut:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday announced that his cabinet would begin ceasefire and Hezbollah disarmament talks with Lebanon “as soon as possible,” in light of the current active warfront between the IDF and Hezbollah and the upcoming peace talks with Iran in Islamabad.
“The negotiations will focus on disarming Hezbollah and establishing peaceful relations between Israel and Lebanon,” the prime minister said.
This announcement came just minutes before Hezbollah launched a barrage of rockets, triggering sirens in northern Israel.
The negotiations, expected to begin next week, will be conducted between Israeli ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter and Lebanese ambassador to the United States Nada Hamadeh Moawad, Israeli sources told The Jerusalem Post.
Lebanon had long refused to negotiate directly with Israel, largely under pressure from its Shi’ite minority and Hezbollah’s armed intervention. That began to change a few weeks ago, when it became clear that Hezbollah would reopen the war on behalf of Iran while using Lebanon as its base. Lebanon had long promised to disarm Hezbollah and demilitarize the sub-Litani region; as I noted this morning, Beirut had pledged that in multiple agreements, the most recent being the November 2024 cease-fire with Israel, which stopped the armed conflict that started with the October 7 massacres by Hamas. The UN Security Council ordered that to happen in 2006 in UNSC Resolution 1701, and sent UNIFIL peacekeepers that ended up as a screening force while Hezbollah expanded and dug into the sub-Litani region.
Israel had expressed willingness to talk with Lebanon, but not at the expense of Hezbollah attacks on Israel, which began shortly after the war with Iran started. Netanyahu’s announcement today pushes that effort forward, but Israel will not end its operations against Hezbollah while talks proceed. Axios reports that Netanyahu offered the talks under some pressure from Donald Trump, who wants to get the Strait of Hormuz fully reopened, but he’s not backing down on ejecting Hezbollah from Lebanon first:
PM Netanyahu:
There is no ceasefire in Lebanon, we are continuing to Hezbollah very hard… the negotiations with Lebanon aim to dismantle Hezbollah’s weapons and secure a historic, lasting peace agreement, we are aiming for more peace plans in the Middle East. pic.twitter.com/UdsvLA9vB8
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) April 9, 2026
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he has instructed his cabinet to launch direct negotiations with Lebanon as soon as possible.
- However, an Israeli official told Axios that Israel would not observe a ceasefire in Lebanon.
Why it matters: Netanyahu’s statement follows calls on Wednesday with President Trump and White House envoy Steve Witkoff. Senior U.S. officials said Witkoff asked Netanyahu to “calm down” the strikes in Lebanon and open negotiations. …
An Israeli official told Axios: “No ceasefire in Lebanon. The negotiations with the Lebanese government will begin in the coming days.”
Netanyahu won’t order a cease-fire again, and it’s worth noting that Trump didn’t ask for one – at least according to Axios. Netanyahu can’t afford to stop against Lebanon and Hezbollah at this point without a real action plan to disarm and eject the terror network from southern Lebanon, and preferably the entirety of the country. The sudden pause in the fighting with Iran has created a political headache for Netanyahu in Israel, where voters (correctly) assess that national survival depends entirely on regime change in Tehran, not just a temporary level of compliance by current regime remnants. Opposition leader Yair Lapid gave a speech earlier today to accuse Netanyahu of leading Israel into a “strategic debacle” and “selling lies” to the US to cover it. Netanyahu cannot afford a stalemate on the northern front at the same time.
At least Netanyahu only has political headaches. The government in Beirut has existential headaches in constantly serving as Iran’s proxy battleground. It finally realized that no one will come to its rescue when it comes to the Tehran Captivity, except possibly the country it treated as an enemy for the last 80 years. The Lebanese want Hezbollah out; they have tried to negotiate with them to disarm and retreat, and they have tried threats. Nothing works because Hezbollah has become too entrenched, largely due to the impotent nature of Lebanon’s erstwhile allies in Europe and in Turtle Bay, who keep engineering agreements that Hezbollah and Iran refuse to honor. It will take an army to break Iran’s grip on Lebanon through its Hezbollah proxy, and the only army with both the will and capacity to achieve that mission is the IDF.
Direct talks signal the seriousness of the situation. Hezbollah is a cancer that metastasizes directly out of Tehran, and it’s time to remove the tumor before it finally kills the patient.
Editor’s Note: For decades, former presidents have been all talk and no action. Now, Donald Trump is eliminating the threat from Iran once and for all.
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