Middle East crisis live: Israel strikes southern Beirut days after ceasefire agreement with Lebanon | US-Israel war on Iran

Israel strikes southern suburbs of Beirut despite ceasefire agreement with Lebanon

We are seeing reports of Israeli attacks on Beirut’s southern suburbs, Dahiyeh, with at least three explosions heard so far. ⁠The ⁠Israeli military claimed about an hour ago in a post on X that it was striking Hezbollah infrastructure ⁠in the Lebanese capital, without providing evidence.

In a joint statement, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli defence minister Israel Katz said the Israeli military had struck “terrorist” headquarters in Beirut’s ⁠southern suburbs in apparent retaliation for Hezbollah firing toward northern Israel earlier.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency (NNA), meanwhile, said the Israeli attacks on the southern suburbs, where there is strong support for Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed Lebanese militant group and political party, targeted two apartments in two buildings.

There has not been any official confirmation of any casualties or injuries. More details soon..

Key events

Trump says he would not unfreeze Iran’s assets before peace deal is done

Donald Trump had an interview with NBC News’s Meet the Press, which host Kristen Welker said took place on Friday:

In the interview, Trump said he would not unfreeze Iranian assets or lift any sanctions before a peace deal is reached. “Comes after,” he said. “Yeah. If they behave, if they do a good job, we start talking. Yeah.“

Trump also said that he was not demanding that Lebanon be a part of a short-term deal with Tehran.

The US president also reportedly said he wants to keep US troops in the Middle East until “completion” and that the US will seize and destroy Iran’s highly enriched uranium, much of which is believed to be stored extremely deeply underground.

He said the US and Iran are close to making a deal, a point he often repeats despite major sticking points remaining between the two sides: notably Israel’s continuing war on Lebanon, Tehran’s nuclear programme and the status of the strategic Strait of Hormuz. “We’re very close to a deal, or I’m going to blow the hell out of them,” Trump told NBC News.

Israel had already struck the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital at least twice since the first agreement between Lebanon and Israel went into effect as part of the 17 April ceasefire, under which Washington sought to constrain Israel from striking Beirut in return for a halt in Hezbollah fire towards northern Israel.

Today’s strikes on Beirut are likely to derail US peace talks with Iran as Tehran has made it clear that Israel’s assault on Lebanon must stop for that conflict to end.

Despite being engaged in diplomacy with Lebanon, Israel is striking southern Lebanon and ordering mass evacuation orders on a near daily basis.

Hezbollah, which has not been part of the direct negotiations with Israel, has fired rockets and drones into northern Israel and against Israeli troops in southern Lebanon as it rejects pushes for its disarmament and Israeli occupation of some of southern Lebanon.

The US president, Donald Trump, angrily confronted Netanyahu over Israel’s threats to resume airstrikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs during a heated phone call last Monday, according to a report in Axios. It seems that Trump is, however, somewhat limited in his ability to influence Netanyahu’s military actions despite the US’s far superior military power.

At least 3,526 people have been killed in Israeli attacks on Lebanon since the start of the war on 2 March, according to the country’s health ministry. Israel’s renewed war on Lebanon was triggered in response to Hezbollah firing rockets at northern Israel after the US and Israel killed the former Iranian supreme leader in Tehran on 28 February.