negotiations

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Nov. 7 (UPI) — Lebanon faces the dilemma of whether to go ahead with negotiations with Israel to end the ongoing cycle of violence and prevent a full-scale war despite Hezbollah‘s rejection of the talks — highlighting a deep political divide within the country.

The Hezbollah-Israel war, which broke out when the Iran-backed group opened a support front for Gaza on Oct. 8, 2023, never came to an end, even after a cease-fire agreement was reached on Nov. 27, 2024.

Israel has continued its unrestrained attacks on Hezbollah, causing further casualties and destruction. It has refused to withdraw from five strategic positions it still occupies in southern Lebanon, refrained from releasing Lebanese prisoners detained during the war, and prevented displaced residents from returning to their border villages turned to ruin.

The Lebanese Army’s successful advance in taking control of southern Lebanon and eliminating Hezbollah’s military presence along the border and south of the Litani River, as stipulated by the cease-fire agreement, does not seem sufficient for Israel, which wants Hezbollah to be completely disarmed.

In fact, Hezbollah, which suffered heavy losses during the war, has refrained from firing a single shot in retaliation to Israel’s continued air and drone strikes, which allegedly target the group’s remaining arms depots and military infrastructure beyond southern areas of the Litani River.

However, Hezbollah’s recent claims that it has fully recovered, restructured its military capabilities and rebuilt its command structure — coupled with its refusal to disarm or support Lebanese President Joseph Aoun in his new approach to negotiations with Israel — put the country at risk of another round of war.

While Aoun said that Lebanon has no choice but to engage in talks with Israel to end its occupation and halt its attacks, Hezbollah rejected any attempt to involve the country in new negotiations — outside the framework of the “mechanism” committee responsible for supervising the implementation of the ceasefire accord — arguing that they would only serve “the enemy and its interests.”

Hisham Jaber, a Lebanese military expert and former Army general, said it is the Lebanese state — not Hezbollah — that should negotiate with Israel, based on terms set by President Aoun: no direct or political negotiations, only military-security talks conducted via a third party, such as the U.S. or the United Nations, and no use of force to complete Hezbollah’s disarmament.

Jaber said that indirect talks with Israel had proven successful, recalling the 2022 U.S.-mediated maritime border deal that ended a years-long dispute between Lebanon and Israel over the ownership of natural gas fields.

“Why not do that again?” he told UPI. But to sit at the negotiation table, he added, the United States, which is pressuring Lebanon to accept the talks, should ensure that Israel withdraws from southern Lebanon and releases the prisoners, instead of “cornering us.”

What Lebanon wants is for Israel to abide by the truce accord through the “mechanism” committee, which is made up of Israel, Lebanon, the United States, France and the United Nations. However, the newly proposed negotiations, although their framework is still unclear, would also address land border disputes and other issues.

“There is a need for an agreement on the disputed points along the border, and this is not within the mandate of the mechanism,” said Riad Kahwaji, a Middle East security analyst, adding that the truce committee is charged with ensuring Hezbollah’s disarmament, the return of prisoners, and Israel’s withdrawal behind the [U.N.-drawn] Blue Line that existed before the last war in October 2023.

If the new negotiations with Israel proceed and result in a final land border agreement, it would lead to the cessation of the state of war between the two countries, and “the 1949 Armistice will prevail,” Kahwaji said..

“But, of course, Hezbollah does not want an end to the state of war between Lebanon and Israel, because that would require it to disarm, causing it to lose its value for Iran and its significance and standing within its own popular base,” he told UPI. “Its resistance will no longer be needed or relevant.”

However, Hezbollah’s attempts to rearm appear extremely difficult after the group lost its main supply route after the overthrow of its key ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, as well as its long-standing access to Beirut’s port and airport, which it had used for years to smuggle weapons and funds.

It is now impossible for Hezbollah to smuggle large weapons, such as heavy missiles, across the border with Syria, though it may still attempt to acquire Grad rockets, anti-tank Kornet missiles and drones.

“If Hezbollah goes into another war with Israel, it will be using whatever is left from its arsenal, which is not that much,” Kahwaji said, noting that the group now has “a different leadership” after Israel killed most of its top leaders and military commanders, and that “its popular base is exhausted … so the repercussions will be huge.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “is acting as a victor,” refusing to make any concessions and imposing all his conditions, he added.

Lebanon has been facing mounting pressure, especially from the United States and Israel, to disarm Hezbollah even forcibly. Authorities prefer a quiet approach to avoid a confrontation between the Lebanese Army and the militant group, which could create divisions within the army and potentially spark a civil war.

Jaber, the former Army general who is well-informed about Hezbollah, said Washington should instead understand and support Lebanon’s approach, because the group “is ready to hand over its weapons” if Israel stops its attacks and withdraws in line with the truce accord.

“Hezbollah is prepared to relinquish its offensive weapons first, followed by its defensive weapons at a later stage, as part of a national defense strategy,” he said. “This is now an attrition war, not between two parties, but led by only one [Israel].”

Iran, which has funded and armed Hezbollah since its formation in the early 1980s, no longer is interfering in the group’s day-to-day affairs, but remains keen to preserve it as a political and military entity -a card in its hand — after “losing all its other cards in the region,” Jaber said.

With Israel threatening to expand its attacks and launch a full-scale war to force the complete disarmament of Hezbollah, Lebanon remains with few options: diplomacy and political pressure.

“It is in Lebanon’s best interest to seize this opportunity and drag Israel into negotiations to end the war and the conflict,” Kahwaji said.

Los Angeles city leaders are at a critical juncture ahead of the 2028 Summer Olympics, with potentially hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars at stake.

They are in negotiations with LA28, the private committee overseeing the Games, for the use of the city’s police, traffic officers and other employees during the Olympics and Paralympics.

Millions of visitors are expected to pour into downtown L.A., the Sepulveda Basin and the Westside when the Olympics kick off in July 2028. Security, trash removal, traffic control, paramedics and more will be needed during the 17-day event and the two-week Paralympics the following month.

Under the 2021 Games agreement between LA28 and the city, LA28 must reimburse the city for any services that go beyond what the city would provide on a normal day. The two parties must agree by Oct. 1, 2025, on “enhanced services” — additional city services needed for the Games, beyond that normal level — and determine rates, repayment timelines, audit rights and other processes.

LA28 has billed the Games as a “no cost” event for the city. Depending on how “enhanced services” are defined, the city, which is in a precarious financial state, could end up bearing significant costs. One of the biggest expenses will be security, with the LAPD, as well as a host of other local, state and federal agencies, working together to keep athletes and spectators safe.

Overtime for Los Angeles police officers, and any other major expenses, would be acutely felt by a city government that recently closed a nearly $1-billion budget deficit, in part by slowing police hiring. The city continues to face rising labor costs and diminished revenues from tourism.

At the same time, President Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, recently passed by Congress, includes $1 billion for security and planning of the Games. But what those funds will cover — and what will be covered by LA28 — are not yet known.

Against that backdrop, civil rights attorney Connie Rice sent a six-page letter dated July 17 to Mayor Karen Bass and other city leaders, asking questions about the enhanced services agreement and urging the city to take a tough stance. Rice said city staffers reached out to her because they were worried that the agreement wouldn’t adequately protect the city.

“Los Angeles faces multiple fiscal hazards that many current leaders negotiating this and other Olympics agreements, will not be around to face,” Rice wrote. “The City cannot afford an additional $1.5 billion hit in 2028 because city officials inadequately protected taxpayers in 2025.”

Rice’s letter asks if LA28 and the city have resolved differences about the definition of venue “footprints,” or perimeters around sporting events, with the footprint changing depending on whether it’s defined by a blast radius, a security perimeter or other factors.

The letter questioned why LA28 isn’t paying the city up front for costs, using money in escrow, and asked if LA28 has provided the city with a budget for security, transit and sanitation.

Rice, in an interview, said she wants to ensure the Games are indeed “no cost.”

Both Paul Krekorian, who heads Mayor Karen Bass’ major events office, and an LA28 representative declined to directly address Rice’s letter.

“The City and LA28 have been collaborating for years to ensure that all Angelenos benefit from the Games for decades to come,” said Krekorian. “While the [agreement] is currently under negotiation, we fully expect that LA28 will be successful in its fundraising efforts to deliver the Games.”

The city routinely provides police officers and traffic officers for major events, such as Dodgers games and the Grammy Awards. In 2022, the Rams reimbursed the city $1.5 million for resources it provided for the team’s Super Bowl parade, according to City Administrative Officer Matt Szabo.

Last month, Szabo’s office released a document on the city’s investor website outlining potential liabilities facing the city, including some related to the 2028 Games. The document noted that roughly $1 billion in security costs will have to be paid by the city if they are not covered by LA28 or the federal government.

Jacie Prieto Lopez, LA28’s vice president of communications, told The Times that security and other planning costs haven’t been finalized.

Rice’s letter questioned whether LA28 would cover the cost of security. Prieto Lopez didn’t directly answer when asked by The Times if LA28 will cover the LAPD’s expenses.

“We are grateful that the Administration and Congress recently appropriated $1 billion in security funding and we will continue to work with our partners at the federal, state and local levels, including the City of LA, to ensure a safe, secure and successful Games,” Prieto Lopez said in an email.

How the $1 billion from the Big Beautiful Bill is distributed will be determined by the Federal Emergency Management Agency through the Homeland Security Grant Program, which is focused on preventing terrorism and other threats.

Anita Gore, a spokesperson for the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services, told The Times that she expects those funds to be managed by the state through the Homeland Security Grant process.

The Office of Emergency Services is the “coordination hub” for the Games and is overseeing a statewide task force focused on security, traffic management and more, Gore said.

At a recent hearing in Sacramento, LA28 Chief Executive Reynold Hoover said the nonprofit continues to push for federal support for the Games. He said the $1 billion recently approved by Congress will “help us with that initial funding requirements for security.”

Hoover told a Senate subcommittee in June that LA28 is asking the federal government to fully reimburse the public agencies that will provide critical security at the Games.

A representative for the Department of Homeland Security declined to answer questions about how the $1 billion will be used.

Trump’s mercurial nature and past attacks on California make it difficult for some city leaders to gauge how his administration will handle funding for the Games.

Rep. Nellie Pou of New Jersey, the top Democrat on the Congressional Task Force for Enhancing Security for Special Events, held a public hearing last month on preparing for the World Cup and Olympics. She told The Times that she has not received any specifics about the $1 billion.

“This administration has withheld and frozen other federal funding appropriated by Congress, so we cannot simply assume that World Cup or Olympic security funding will make it to our communities,” she said.

Krekorian, when asked about Pou’s concerns, said the city “is in direct communication with state and federal partners, as well as LA28, about the allocation of these funds.”

July 14 (UPI) — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has announced that Europe’s retaliatory tariffs on U.S. goods have been delayed to allow more time for negotiations.

The retaliatory measures, worth about $24 billion, were to go into effect on Monday. They were first announced in March in response to Trump’s imposing a 25% tariff on all steel and aluminum imports, and were previously paused for talks between the two governments.

On Saturday, Trump announced an additional 30% tariff would go into effect on EU goods starting Aug. 1. In a letter to von der Leyen, he explained that if the EU retaliated, whatever percentage of tariff they responded with would be added to the EU’s overall levy.

During a press conference Sunday, alongside Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto, she said their retaliatory measures have been paused until Aug. 1.

“This is very important. This is now the time for negotiations,” she said. “But this also shows are are prepared for all eventual scenarios.”

She told reporters that they have always preferred to negotiate a solution with the United States and that “we will use the time that we have now until the first of August.”

If an agreement is not reached with the United States, she said they are prepared to respond.

“We’ve prepared for this and we can respond with countermeasures if necessary,” she said.

Trump has turned to tariffs as a tool to even out trade deficits, as a negotiation tactic and as an attempt to spur the domestic manufacturing industry.

The U.S. trade deficit with the 27-member EU was $235.6 billion last year, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

SEOUL — As the Trump administration has been churning out trade threats this week, South Korea, a crucial trading partner and military ally, has been struggling — like many — to navigate the uncertainty that looms over trade negotiations with Washington.

On Monday, Trump sent a letter dictating new tariff rates to 14 countries including South Korea, which was hit with a 25% tax. The levies were set to kick in Tuesday, but were postponed to Aug. 1. Trump left the door open for another extension, telling reporters the new deadline was “firm but not 100% firm,” depending on what trade partners could offer.

But it’s unclear whether the additional three weeks will be enough to resolve the longstanding disagreements between Washington and Seoul. One of the biggest points of contention is South Korea’s auto industry, which was the third biggest exporter of automobiles to the U.S. last year.

Although White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday that Trump’s phone was ringing “off the hook from world leaders all the time who are begging him to come to a deal,” the tone in Seoul has been reserved.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, left, walks across the tarmac on Sunday as President Trump boards Air Force One. On Monday, Trump dictated new tariff rates to 14 countries, including a 25% tax on South Korea.

(Jacquelyn Martin / Associated Press)

Last week, ahead of the initial July 8 deadline, South Korean President Lee Jae Myung, who took office last month, said “it’s difficult to say for certain that we can finish [the trade talks] by July 8.”

“Both sides are doing their best and we need to come up with an outcome that can be mutually beneficial to both parties, but we still have not yet been able to clearly establish what each party wants,” he added.

Since then, senior South Korean trade officials have been dispatched to Washington with the hopes of bringing a deal within striking distance.

“It’s time to speed up the negotiations and find a landing zone,” Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo said after meeting with U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Monday.

So far, the only two countries that have struck new trade deals with the Trump administration are the U.K. and Vietnam.

But the Lee administration has maintained a note of caution. At a high-level meeting held Tuesday to discuss the current state of the negotiations, Lee’s presidential chief of staff for policy, Kim Yong-beom, reportedly emphasized the “national interest” over speedy dealmaking, instructing officials to support tariff-affected industries and “diversify” South Korea’s export markets.

Under a decades-long free trade agreement, South Korean tariffs on most U.S. goods are already zero, meaning there are fewer concessions Seoul can offer, analysts say. And on the key points of contention such as automobiles, there is little daylight to be found.

“This announcement will send a chilling message to others,” Wendy Cutler, vice president of the Washington-based Asia Society Policy Institute and former deputy U.S. trade negotiator, said in a post on X.

Trump’s letter also suggested that the U.S. will “not be open to reprieves” from sectoral tariffs, including those on automobiles, Cutler added.

South Korean trade officials have stressed that removing or significantly reducing the 25% tariffs on cars is a top priority.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt holds a trade letter sent by the White House to South Korea during a news conference on Monday.

(Al Drago / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

But South Korean cars from Hyundai and Kia factor significantly into the $66-billion trade deficit that Trump has decried as unfair. Last year, South Korea was the third biggest exporter of automobiles to the United States, to the tune of $34.7 billion. It bought $2.1 billion worth of cars from the U.S.

Until now, the country’s flagship automakers Hyundai and Kia have been able to sidestep any major tariff shocks, achieving instead record sales in the first half of the year by selling existing inventory in the U.S.

But many believe it is only a matter of time until they will have to raise vehicle sticker prices, as some competitors have done. Both companies’ operating profits are now forecasted to hit double-digit declines compared with the previous year.

The U.S. has also reportedly demanded concessions that touch on sensitive issues of food or national security in South Korea — a far harder sell to the public than the expanded manufacturing cooperation that South Korea has sought to center in the trade talks.

Among these are opening up South Korea’s rice market to U.S. imports and allowing Google to export high-precision geographic data to its servers outside of South Korea.

As an essential crop that represents a significant portion of farmers’ incomes, rice is one of the few heavily protected goods in South Korea’s trade relationships. Under its free trade agreement with the United States, Seoul imposes a 5% tariff on U.S. rice up to 132,304 tons, and 513% for anything after that.

U.S. Army soldiers attend a ceremony last month in Dongducheon, South Korea. A 2021 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that it cost $19.2 billion to maintain American troops in South Korea from 2016 through 2019.

(Kim Jae-Hwan / SOPA Images via Getty Images)

The South Korean government has long denied Google’s requests to export high-precision geographic data — which is used for the company’s map services — on the grounds that it could reveal sensitive military sites that are essential for defense against North Korea. Last year, Ukraine accused Google of exposing the locations of some of its military systems to Russia.

Equally vexing are Trump’s long-running demands that Seoul should pay more to host the some 28,500 U.S. troops stationed in South Korea.

“South Korea is making a lot of money, and they’re very good. They’re very good, but, you know, they should be paying for their own military,” Trump said at a White House Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, adding that he told South Korea it should pay $10 billion a year.

Over a four-year period from 2016 through 2019, the total cost of maintaining U.S. troops in South Korea was $19.2 billion, or around $4.8 billion a year, according to a 2021 report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. Over that period, South Korea footed about 30% of the total annual costs, in addition to providing indirect financial support such as waived taxes or foregone rents.

Under the Special Measures Agreement, the joint framework that governs this arrangement, Seoul’s payments have grown over time. Under the latest version, which covers 2026 to 2030, Seoul’s annual contribution beginning next year will be $1.19 billion, an 8.3% increase from 2025, and will increase yearly thereafter.

Trump’s demand for nearly 10 times that — along with the threats that the U.S. might pull its troops from the country — has previously drawn widespread outrage in the country, spurring calls by some for the development of South Korea’s own nuclear arsenal.

“The Special Measures Agreement (SMA) guarantees stable conditions for U.S. troops stationed in Korea and strengthens the joint South Korea – U.S. defense posture,” a spokesperson for South Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in response to Trump’s comments.

“Our stance is that the South Korean government will adhere to the 12th SMA, which was agreed upon and implemented in a legitimate manner.”

July 6 (UPI) — Tariffs are set to return to previous levels on the first of August for countries that haven’t agreed on new deals, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Sunday.

Bessent said on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday, just three days prior to the Trump administration’s July 9 deadline for tariffs to return, that it would be notifying 100 smaller countries that “if you don’t move things along, then on August 1, you will boomerang back to your April 2 tariff level.”

The tariffs were originally set to take effect in April but were pushed back to this Wednesday while countries worked with the Trump administration to reach new deals on products from their countries, a window that allowed dozens of countries to work out the details of between 10% and 50%.

The Trump administration has said reaching deals with some countries has been increasingly difficult.

August 1st is not a new deadline, Bessent said Sunday, but an opportunity to arrive at new tariff deals.

“We are saying this is when it’s happening,” Bessent said Sunday. “If you want to speed things up, have at it. If you want to go back to the old rate, that’s your choice.”

The administration has signaled that there may be some flexibility around the new timeline for key trading partners, but National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” President Donald Trump would make the ultimate decision.

“There are deadlines, and there are things that are close, and so maybe things will push back the dead, past the deadline,” Hassett said. “In the end the president’s going to make that judgment.”

The administration did not name the 12 countries that it would be communicating with this week about the tariff negotiations.

SEOUL, July 3 (UPI) — South Korean President Lee Jae Myung said Thursday that his government is working hard to strike a trade deal with the United States on impending tariffs but expressed doubt as to whether talks will be concluded before next week’s deadline.

“It is clear that tariff negotiations are not very easy,” Lee said at a press conference marking his first 30 days in office.

“We need to create a mutually beneficial result that is helpful to both parties, but it has not yet been clearly defined what the two parties want,” he said.

South Korea is facing 25% tariffs threatened by U.S. President Donald Trump as part of his sweeping package of “Liberation Day” trade measures. Trump announced the tariffs in April but quickly put their implementation on hold for 90 days — a deadline that is approaching on July 8.

Tariffs on steel and automobiles, two key industries in South Korea, are already in place.

South Korea is seeking an extension on the 90-day pause and sent a delegation to Washington last week to ask for an exemption from all U.S. reciprocal and product-specific tariffs.

Lee said Thursday that it was “difficult to confirm whether we can conclude tariff negotiations by July 8.”

“But I can tell you that we are continuing to work hard,” he said. “We are also exploring many topics for our discussion from various perspectives. I can only say that we will do our best.”

Lee took office last month in a snap election precipitated by former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s botched martial law attempt in December. In his first press conference as president, Lee focused his remarks on restoring economic growth and stabilizing people’s livelihoods.

“The top priority is to relieve the suffering of the people and create a country that grows and leaps forward again,” he said.

Domestic political turmoil and an uncertain trade environment have shaken the export-dependent Asian powerhouse, which saw its economy unexpectedly shrink in the first quarter of the year.

In late May, the Bank of Korea lowered its GDP growth forecast for 2025 from 1.5% in February to 0.8%, citing a slow recovery in domestic demand and the expected impact of U.S. tariffs. At the same time, the central bank cut its benchmark interest rate for the fourth time since October, lowering it by a quarter percentage point to 2.5%.

Since taking office, President Lee has pledged to boost the economy through fiscal stimulus and other policy measures.

Last month, the government announced a second supplementary budget worth more than $14.7 billion, which will include cash handouts, debt relief measures and investments in sectors such as construction and artificial intelligence. The move follows a $10.1 billion package that was previously approved by parliament.

Lee also vowed on Thursday to work toward improving relations with North Korea on a tense Korean Peninsula.

“We will thoroughly prepare for provocations, while resuming severed communications between the South and the North and opening the way for peace and coexistence on the Korean Peninsula through dialogue and cooperation,” he said.

The president pointed to his recent order for the suspension of propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts across the DMZ to North Korea as a positive step. Pyongyang responded by stopping its own loudspeaker blasts of bizarre noises such as metallic screeching and animal sounds.

“As North Korea has recently responded to the government’s preemptive suspension of broadcasts to the North, I believe that a virtuous cycle of peace is possible,” Lee said.

Canada had approved a 3 percent digital tax last year in June, and the first set of payments is due on Monday.

United States President Donald Trump has announced that the US is immediately ending trade talks with Canada in response to the country’s digital services tax on technology companies, marking a clear escalation of pressure tactics.

Trump, in a post on his Truth Social platform on Friday, called the Canadian tax a “direct and blatant attack on our country” and said, “Based on this egregious Tax, we are hereby terminating ALL discussions on Trade with Canada, effective immediately.”

He added, “We will let Canada know the Tariff that they will be paying to do business with the United States of America within the next seven day period.”

Canada had approved the Digital Services Tax Act on June 20, 2024, and it came into force shortly after on June 28. Under this, Canada will charge a tax of 3 percent on the digital services revenue a firm makes from Canadian users above 20 million Canadian dollars ($14.6m) in a calendar year.

Businesses have been calling for a pause, saying it would increase the cost of providing services, as well as risk drawing the wrath of the US government. But the Canadian federal government so far has refused and is proceeding with the plans. The Canadian Revenue Authority is set to start collecting the tax on Monday and will cover revenue retroactively from 2022.

Last week, Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne suggested to reporters that the digital tax may be negotiated as part of broader, ongoing US-Canada trade discussions, Bloomberg News reported. Those discussions seemed to have been going well, and a trade deal was expected in July. Now, the status of that deal is unclear.

Carney’s office issued a brief statement on Friday saying, “The Canadian government will continue to engage in these complex negotiations with the United States in the best interests of Canadian workers and businesses.”

‘Escalation’

“This is definitely escalation from Trump,” said Vina Nadjibulla, vice president of research and strategy at the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada. “But we have seen this tactic before. Canada will need to work behind the scenes to find an off-ramp without giving in to his demands,” she said.

“Digital tax is also part of Trump’s negotiations with the European Union [which has similar levies]. Canada will need to coordinate with the EU and other partners as it contemplates its response,” Nadjibulla added.

Rachel Ziemba, adjunct senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security, told Al Jazeera that while Trump’s declaration was unfortunate, it was “not surprising”, adding that it would also act as a scare tactic for the European Union, with whom the US is still negotiating its trade deal.

Tariffs on Canadian goods are bad for both the US and Canada as they increase the cost for businesses and ultimately consumers, experts say.

Canada is the second-largest trade partner for the US after Mexico, and last year, it bought $349.4bn of US goods and exported $412.7bn, according to US Census Bureau data. Canada has already been hit by Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminium, as well as some auto parts and cars. The Canadian economy has started to slow down, and unemployment is at a high 7 percent.

In an emailed statement to Al Jazeera, Candace Laing, president and CEO of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, said that while “some last-minute surprises should be expected” as negotiations approach deadlines, “our position on the Digital Services Tax has been consistent, but primarily for the reason that it’s self-defeating in nature”.

“That said, it’s a pivotal time for Canada-US relations. The tone and tenor of talks has improved in recent months, and we hope to see progress continue,” Laing said.

Israel launched a campaign against former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger after he blamed the Israelis for the breakdown of his mission to achieve an interim agreement with Egypt following the 1973 war, according to declassified British documents

The documents, unearthed by MEMO in the British National Archives,  showed that the Israeli government lobbied US Congressmen to turn American opinion against Kissinger, accusing him of “delivering” Israel to Egypt and “humiliating” Israeli ministers.

In late March 1975, Kissinger’s shuttle diplomacy between Israel and Egypt collapsed. Although he initially avoided publicly assigning blame, he privately told his UK counterpart, James Callaghan, that Israeli leaders were primarily responsible. Kissinger argued that the Israelis had “locked themselves into an inflexible position on non-belligerency,” that “wouldn’t allow them to escape”. He also informed his British counterpart that he “warned the Israelis once the step-by-step process had broken down the situation might change rapidly to their disadvantage”.

Egypt publicly declared that Kissinger’s approach had failed due to Israeli intransigence, specifically their insistence on non-belligerency, which Egypt rejected before a comprehensive settlement involving all aspects of the Arab-Israeli conflict, including the Palestinian issue, is reached.

READ: Saddam ‘used’ Jordan’s King Hussein against Egypt ahead of Kuwait invasion, UK documents show

Following the breakdown, the administration of President Gerald Ford began a comprehensive reassessment of its Middle East policy. The US National Security Council (NSC) informed the British embassy that the review “will be far reaching and will include an examination of military and economic assistance to Israel” and focusing on “principles underlying US policy rather than on tactical considerations”.

Although the Ford Administration avoided publicly blaming either party, US media reports suggested that Kissinger viewed Israel as primarily responsible for the failure. This impression was reinforced when it was revealed that President Ford had sent a strongly worded letter to Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, criticising Israel’s inflexibility before the breakdown of the negotiations.

British Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) files show that the US NSC told British Ambassador Peter Ramsbotham “in confidence” that Ford’s message to Rabin had been “very tough” and had referred critically to Israeli stubbornness during the negotiations.

Ramsbotham reported that while the Israeli embassy denied “in the strongest possible terms” any responsibility for the failed talks, support for Israel in the US “will come under increasing critical scrutiny.”

Relations between Kissinger and Israel deteriorated further. British Ambassador to Israel William B. J. Ledwidge observed increasing distrust toward Kissinger in the Israeli press, a sentiment he believed was encouraged by Israeli leaders. Ledwidge reported the relations were “in the process of becoming distinctly worse than the relations between Israel and the United States administration”. He assessed that this was “clearly inspired by briefing from Israel’s leaders”.

In a highly secret report, Ledwidge noted that the Israelis were “making no secret of the fact that Kissinger is angry with them for their stubbornness in the recent negotiations and President Ford agrees with him”.

After talking to “enough of well-informed” Israelis, Ledwidge concluded that Israel’s leaders were “worried by the strength of the disapproval which is being expressed by Washington”. “In the present situation the fact of Kissinger’s anger with Israel is perhaps more important than the justice of accusations against them”, the ambassador added.

Leon Dulzin, then treasurer of the Jewish Agency and a Likud leader, also complained to the ambassador that there as “very little negotiation” during Kissinger’s shuttle accusing the top US diplomat of aiming at “persuading the Israelis to give Sadat what he wanted”. Dulzin, a former Israeli cabinet minister and trusted by leading Zionists overseas, added that Kissinger “had never really accepted the proposition that Israel was entitled to any price in return beyond a continuation of American economic and military aid and general goodwill”.

A satirical drawing showing Israel pandering to Henry Kissinger of the United States while Egypt’s President Sadat gets away with the oil rich Sinai desert. [David Rubinger/CORBIS/Corbis via Getty Images]

An Israeli source close to Rabin told the ambassador that the Israeli prime minister believed that Kissinger “had tried to deliver the Israelis to Sadat” and he (Kissinger) “had become angry when he found that it would not work”. Rabin came to the conclusion that “he only wished he could talk directly to the Egyptians” without Kissinger’s go-between.

At a dinner with visiting US Congressmen, Shimon Peres, then Israel’s defense minister, accused Kissinger of “humiliating” him, complaining that he played role in delaying his important visit to the US. Peres asked the Congressmen to “say as much (about Kissinger claimed behaviour) when they returned to Washington”.

Another player was Yehoshua Rabinowitz, then Israeli minister of finance who was also informed by Washington that he must postpone his visit to discuss economic aid yet once more. Sources told the UK ambassador that Rabinowitz understood that he will not be received until the re-assessment of American Middle East policy was completed. Rabinowitz detected the “hand of Kissinger in the repeated delays of his mission”, the sources said.

The dispatches from the British embassy in Tell Aviv indicated that the Israelis were talking “as if they were convinced that Kissinger himself is the chief organiser of the present wave of American displeasure which has reached such heights”.

Senior official in Israeli Foreign Ministry Yeshayahu Anug strongly criticised Kissinger in a conversation with the UK ambassador. He said “for the first time we saw him (Kissinger) behaving like a Jew”. Anug argued that when the shuttle went wrong, Kissinger “behaved as if he had been personally betrayed by the Israelis and lost his cool completely”.

In his assessment, the ambassador concluded that many Israelis “feel that the Zionist State does indeed irritate Kissinger”.

The documents also reveal that some Israeli figures questioned Kissinger’s personal attitude toward their country. According to Ledwidge, the Israelis who knew Kissinger believed when Israel was founded in 1948, he regarded it as “an aberration that could not be last”. They acknowledged that he changed his mind later. But Kissinger had been criticised because since the 1967 war, he has always been convinced that Israel “would be obliged to evacuate all the territories she had occupied as a result of the pressure of international opinion”.

READ: Sheikh Zayed lacked faith in US protection of allied Arab leaders during difficult times, British documents reveal

An account of a secret briefing Kissinger gave to Jewish leaders in December 1973 showed him making harsh comments about Israel’s military performance during the Yom Kippur War and emphasising the limits of US support.

According to this account, shown to the British ambassador by an Israeli diplomatic official “in strict confidence”, Kissinger “was brutally unsympathetic to Israel throughout his briefing”.  He was quoted as saying “Israel had lost the Yom Kippur war strategically and that even if she had surrounded and defeated the Third Egyptian Army, she would not have reversed the verdict”.

“If there were another war, the US might not be able, even if she were willing; to mount an airlift and Israel might fare worse than she had in 1973”. He even accused Israelis of “misleading the Americans about their military plans during the latter part of the war”.

In a separate dispatch, the British embassy in Washington reported that Kissinger “has suspected for months that the Israelis were casting him for the role of “fall guy”. The British ambassador to Tel Aviv commented that “no doubt the Israelis have had for a long time past a contingency plan for doing precisely this’ and perhaps they “have now reached the point of putting it into effect”.

British diplomats in London concluded that while the Israelis had reasons to criticise Kissinger, they were mistaken to view his actions as motivated by personal animosity. Instead, they believed that Kissinger’s pressure aimed to avoid another conflict that “would ultimately damage Israel and the West more than the Arabs”. As seen by Michel S Weir, Assistant Under-Secretary and director of Middle East and North Africa, Israel considered the pursuit of this major objective and any final settlement, which would involve it giving up most of the foreign territory she is occupying, as “personal spite”. This was considered as a “measure of the chasm that separates Israeli thinking from that of the outside world”.  In as much as the Israelis had accepted the idea of withdrawal, Kissinger was “surely entitled to feel betrayed, Weir concluded.

READ: Kissinger, Ford outraged by Israel humiliating the US in the eyes of Arabs, British documents reveal

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.

May 14 (UPI) — The United States has imposed additional Iran-related sanctions, as the Trump administration negotiates with Tehran on a new nuclear weapons deal.

The sanctions announced Tuesday by the U.S. Treasury target an Iranian oil smuggling network the Trump administration accuses of generating billions of dollars for the Tehran regime’s military and proxy forces.

Fifteen front companies, buyers and facilitators in Hong Kong, mainland China, the Seychelles and Singapore were hit by the punitive measures, along with 52-year-old Iranian national Mohammad Khorasani Niasari and two shipping vessels.

The secondary sanctions were levied due to their links to Sepehr Energy Jahan Nama Pars Company, which the previous Biden administration blacklisted in November 2023 for overseeing the Iranian Armed Forces General Staff’s network of front companies that it uses to sell commodities, including oil, internationally — funds that are used to further Iran’s weapons and nuclear programs and other destabilizing activities.

According to Treasury officials Sepehr Energy obfuscates the origin of these oil shipments through a series of deals involving between multiple front companies it owns. Some of the entities that were blacklisted Tuesday were established in China and Hong Kong.

Among the tactics deployed to conceal the oil’s Iranian origin is the use of ship-to-ship transfers at sea before the cargo reaches China. Once in the country, Sepehr Energy relies on complicit local agencies willing to aid their sanctioned sales.

Khorasani is a financial inspector for Sepehr Energy and its affiliates and was sanctioned Tuesday for helping to manage the Iranian Armed Forces General Staff’s transactions.

“As long as Iran devotes its illicit revenues to funding attacks on the United States and our allies, supporting terrorism around the world and pursuing other destabilizing actions, we will continue to use all the tools at our disposal to hold the regime accountable,” State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said in a statement.

The sanctions are the latest the Trump administration has imposed since early February when President Donald Trump resumed his so-called maximum pressure policy from his first term — an effort that failed to coerce Iran into returning to the negotiating table for a new nuclear weapons deal.

During his first term in office, Trump imposed sanctions against Iran and unilaterally withdrew the United States from a landmark Obama-era multinational nuclear accord aimed at preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon.

Trump applied his maximum pressure campaign of sanctions and political pressure to force Tehran to negotiate a new deal he believed would be better. Instead, the Middle Eastern country ignored its obligations under the accord and escalated its nuclear weapons program to the point where the U.S. government estimates Iran could need as little as a week to produce enough weapons-grade uranium for a single nuclear bomb.

However, talks about a new nuclear deal between the two countries have resumed during the Trump’s second term, with State Department deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott telling reporters in at a Washington press conference on Tuesday that the negotiations “continue to show progress.”

There have been four rounds of informal talks with the fifth round yet to be scheduled.

Trump, speaking in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, called on Iran to abandon its nuclear ambitions and accept “a much better path toward a far better and more hopeful future” or expect consequences. The United States under administration of both Democrats and Republicans have said they will not permit Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon.

“I want to make a deal with Iran,” Trump said. “This is an offer that will not last forever. The time is right now to choose. We don’t have a lot of time to wait.”

The Trump administration is demanding that Iran discontinue its uranium enrichment program and dismantle its facilities. Iran has said it will not compromise on its enrichment capabilities.

On Monday, after the United States blacklisted three Iranians and a related technology firm involved in nuclear weapons research, Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs Majid Takht-Ravanchi suggested there was a possibility of negotiating on its enrichment allotments.

For a limited period of time, we can accept a series of restrictions on the level and volume of enrichment,” he said, state-run Press TV reported.

“We have not yet gone into details about the level and volume of enrichment.”

According to the Treasury, since Trump announced the resumption of his maximum pressure campaign, the United States has sanctioned 253 individuals, entities and vessels related to Iran and its proxies.