A 10-day ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon has gone into effect. It began at midnight local time (21:00 GMT on Thursday), after being announced by US President Donald Trump.
Published On 16 Apr 202616 Apr 2026
Share
April 16 (UPI) — President Donald Trump announced that Israel and Lebanon agreed to a 10-day cease-fire starting at 5:00 p.m., pausing Israel’s six-week war on Hezbollah in that country.
Trump spoke with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday, both leaders confirmed, and agreed to the cease-fire and to work toward a more permanent peace between their countries.
Aoun and Netanyahu spoke to each other separately because Aoun declined to participate in a call with the Israeli leader because Israel was still bombing Lebanon, CNN reported.
“These two Leaders have agreed that in order to achieve PEACE between their Countries, they will formally begin a 10 Day CEASEFIRE,” he said in a post on Truth Social.
Vice President J.D. Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Dan Caine have been directed to work with officials of both countries to achieve a more lasting peace.
Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in a statement thanked the United States, France, the European Union, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Qatar and Jordan for helping to accomplish the cease-fire he had pursued “since the first day of the way,” NBC News reported.
After the United States and Israel launched the Iran war, Israel also launched offensives against the Iran-backed militia Hezbollah in Lebanon, from which it often launches attacks at Israel.
This week, delegates from the neighboring countries conducted diplomatic talks for the first time since 1993, meeting in Washington, D.C., to discuss a cease-fire and the larger issue of Hezbollah’s hijacking of Lebanese lands in order to target Israel.
Netanayhu said Thursday in a video statement that Israeli forces would “remain in a 10-kilometer security zone, which will allow us to prevent infiltration into communities and anti-tank missile fire.”
Calling the negotiations potentially historic, Netanyahu said that Israel’s chief goal is to disarm Hezbollah and its ability to invade or launch weapons across the Lebanese border into Israel.
“That is where we will remain,” he said. “We are not leaving.”
After the diplomatic talks on Wednesday, Rubio reinforced that a key part of the meeting and now peace talks between the two nations is to end Hezbollah’s destabilizing influence in Lebanon and the wider Middle East.
“We have to remember the Lebanese people are victims of Hezbollah,” Rubio said, also noting that accomplishing a lasting peace “will take time.”
A projectile crosses the sky above the West Bank city of Nablus, on Friday. The Israeli military reported that it had detected missiles launched from Iran toward Israel, several of which struck central Israel. Photo by Alaa Badarneh/EPA
March 27 (UPI) — Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Friday that his country “will exact [a] heavy price” for Israeli strikes on infrastructure Friday.
In a post on X, he said the strikes hit two of Iran’s largest steel factories, a power plant, civilian nuclear sites and other infrastructure.
“Israel claims it acted in coordination with the U.S.,” Araghchi wrote.
The airstrikes came less than a day after U.S. President Donald Trump extended a pause on U.S. attacks on Iran’s energy sites for 10 days. Trump said he extended the deadline because negotiations between the United States and Iran had been going “well,” and Iran had permitted several oil tankers to transit the Strait of Hormuz.
The “attack contradicts POTUS extended deadline for diplomacy,” Araghchi wrote.
“Iran will exact HEAVY price for Israeli crimes.”
The Guardian reported that the airstrikes hit the Khondab heavy-water plant near Arak and a uranium production facility in Ardakan. They also hit steel plants in Khuzestan and Mobarakeh.
Iran’s state-run Tasnim news agency said Tehran was considering launching attacks on six steel factories in Israel in retaliation for Friday’s attack.
The Israeli military said Friday it had intercepted missiles launched by Iran, NBC News reported.
“A short while ago, the [Israel Defense Forces] identified missiles launched from Iran toward the territory of the State of Israel,” the military said in a statement. “Defensive systems are operating to intercept the treat.”
Speaking Friday evening at the Future Investment Initiative in Miami, Trump said Iran is “on the run,” one month after the United States and Israel jointly began attacking the country. The violence came amid negotiations in which the United States sought to limit Iran’s nuclear program.
“Tonight, we’re closer than ever to the rise of the Middle East that is finally free at least from Iranian terror, aggression and nuclear blackmail,” Trump said.
Iran is “being decimated,” he added.
“We are talking now, they want to make a deal.”
The United States offered a proposed 15-point peace plan to Iran this week, but Araghchi said Iranian officials had no plans to negotiate it “for now.”
“This is Israel’s war, and people of the region and people of the U.S. are paying the price for it,” he said.
Iran’s Red Crescent Society reported Friday that more than 70,000 residential units, 600 schools and 300 health facilities had been damaged since the start of the war.