Trump says Iran talks may resume as Israel, Lebanon open direct track

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that US-Iran peace talks could resume this week, while
Israel and Lebanon agreed to launch direct negotiations, signaling movement on two key
fronts in efforts to ease the Middle East conflict.

The parallel diplomatic openings came even as violence persisted, underscoring both the
fragility of the process and Washington’s push to stabilize a region shaken by the over-six
week war.

Trump told The New York Post a new round of talks with Tehran could take place in Pakistan
“over the next two days,” after saying the day before that unnamed Iranian officials had called
him seeking a deal.

At the same time, Israel and Lebanon agreed to open direct talks after meeting in
Washington, in what amounted to a rare diplomatic breakthrough between two countries
formally at war for decades.

The negotiations were fiercely opposed by the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which said
it fired rockets at more than a dozen towns in northern Israel just as the meeting got
underway.

Washington is pressing for an end to the Israel-Hezbollah conflict, fearing it could unravel the
fragile two-week ceasefire in its own war with Iran, after earlier talks with Tehran in Pakistan
failed to produce a breakthrough.

Lebanon was drawn into the broader war when Hezbollah attacked Israel in support of Iran,
its key ally, triggering an Israeli ground invasion and strikes that have killed more than 2,000
people and displaced more than a million.

The Washington meeting — the first direct, high-level talks since 1993 — was mediated by US
Secretary of State Marco Rubio and involved the Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors to the
United States.

“This is a historic opportunity,” Rubio said as he welcomed the ambassadors, acknowledging
the “decades of history” weighing on the process.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said he hoped the talks would “mark the beginning of the
end of the suffering of the Lebanese people.”

A State Department spokesperson later described the discussions as “productive,” adding:
“All sides agreed to launch direct negotiations at a mutually agreed time and venue.”

Israeli ambassador Yechiel Leiter said the two countries had discovered they were “on the
same side” in the goal of liberating Lebanon from Hezbollah while Lebanese envoy Nada
Hamadeh Moawad called the meeting “constructive,” but said she had pressed for a ceasefire.

Israel is occupying parts of southern Lebanon and has resisted any pause in fighting that
leaves Hezbollah intact, arguing that the group remains the central obstacle to peace

Pressure on Tehran

Even as diplomacy advanced, Trump sought to tighten pressure on Iran with a naval
blockade.

US Central Command said the measures cover “vessels of all nations entering or departing
Iranian ports and coastal areas.”

On Tuesday, it said no vessels had transited the strait and six had complied with orders to
turn back, though maritime tracking data suggested several ships that had visited Iranian
ports had crossed since the blockade began.

Iran’s military command called the blockade an act of piracy and warned that if the security
of its harbors was threatened, “no port in the Persian Gulf and the Arabian Sea will be safe.”

Analysts said Trump was aiming not only to choke off Iranian revenue but also to pressure
Beijing, the biggest buyer of Iranian oil, to push Tehran to reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

China called the blockade “dangerous and irresponsible” after Trump threatened to sink any
vessel seeking to leave or dock at Iranian ports.

Still, the truce agreed last Wednesday between Washington and Tehran remained in place.

Stock markets climbed on renewed hopes for a deal to end the war and reopen the waterway,
while the main international oil contracts fell back, with Brent North Sea Crude at $94.79 a
barrel and West Texas Intermediate at $91.28.

The US Treasury said it did not plan to renew a temporary easing of sanctions on Iranian oil
that was introduced to soften war-related supply shocks.

Before the Washington meeting, Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem had called for the
negotiations to be scrapped and vowed to keep fighting.

Foreign ministers from 17 countries, including Britain and France, urged both sides to seize
the opportunity to bring lasting security to the region.

Enrichment sticking point

At the heart of any renewed US-Iran diplomacy is the dispute over Tehran’s nuclear program.
UN chief Antonio Guterres said there was “no military solution” to the conflict and that peace
required “persistent engagement and political will.”

“Serious negotiations must resume,” he told journalists in New York.

Senior Pakistani sources told AFP that Islamabad was working to bring Iran and the United
States together for a second round of talks.

Trump has insisted any deal must permanently bar Iran from becoming nuclear-armed, after
launching the war on the claim that Tehran was seeking an atomic bomb — an allegation it
denies.

Media reports said the United States sought a 20-year suspension of Iran’s uranium
enrichment program during the weekend talks.

Iran, in turn, proposed suspending its nuclear activity for five years, an offer US officials
rejected, The New York Times reported.

Diplomatic efforts also accelerated elsewhere, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in
Beijing hours after speaking to his Iranian counterpart.
Moscow has offered to hold Iran’s enriched uranium safely as part of any deal.