Recent US-Iran violence threatens Lebanon's shaky ceasefire
Any agreement between the United States and Iran can also help lower tensions in Lebanon, where a separate truce was under renewed strain after an Israeli strike on southern Beirut killed a commander from militant group Hezbollah on Wednesday.
But recent violence threatens to unravel the fragile truce in effect since April 8 that brought an end to weeks of U.S.-Israeli attacks on Iran.
The U.S. military said Thursday it carried out strikes on Iranian military targets in response, although Tehran charged that it was Washington that had initiated the exchange of fire.
Asked in Washington Thursday if the Iran ceasefire was still on, Trump said: "Yeah, it is. They trifled with us today. We blew them away. They trifled. I call that a trifle."
Lebanon was drawn into the Middle East war when Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and for months of Israeli violations of a ceasefire reached in November 2024.
A U.S. State Department official confirmed Thursday that new Israel-Lebanon talks would take place on May 14 and 15.
It will be the third meeting in recent months between the two countries, which have technically been at war for decades and have no diplomatic relations.
U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said Tuesday that a peace deal between the two sides was "eminently achievable," insisting Hezbollah was the sticking point, rather than any issue between the two governments.
A ceasefire between the two countries, and including Hezbollah, was extended after the last round of talks in Washington, but Israel has kept up its strikes on the group, which has claimed attacks of its own on Israeli forces occupying parts of Lebanon's south.
Lebanon's health ministry reported at least 12 people killed in a series of Israeli airstrikes on Thursday.
Source: Agence France Presse, Naharnet
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