Trump says Israel and Lebanon have agreed a 10-day ceasefire

President Donald Trump on Thursday announced that the leaders of Israel and Lebanon had reached a ceasefire deal, which came as fighting raged between Israel and Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah.

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In a post on Truth Social, he said that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun and Israel’s Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu “have agreed that in order to achieve PEACE between their Countries, they will formally begin a 10 Day CEASEFIRE at 5 P.M. EST.”

He said that he had “directed Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Rubio” to work with the countries towards achieving “a Lasting PEACE.”

There was no immediate confirmation of the deal from Israel or Lebanon. Hezbollah, which is also a powerful political party in Lebanon, has not been part of the talks. A senior Hezbollah official told NBC News on Wednesday that “discussions over the agreement are ongoing, with progress tied to the Israeli position.”

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Trump’s announcement comes after Iran insisted that strikes on Lebanon must stop as part of any longer-term deal for peace with the U.S. and Israel.

A ceasefire in Lebanon “is as important as a ceasefire in Iran,” Tehran’s top negotiator Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said on Thursday morning, adding: “In the Islamabad negotiations and afterwards, we have been seriously pursuing efforts to compel the adversaries to establish a permanent ceasefire in all areas of conflict.”

Israeli forces had continued with widespread strikes across Lebanon, as well as pushing on with a ground invasion of the country’s south, even after the temporary ceasefire deal in the Iran war that took effect last week. The U.S. and Israel had denied that the agreement covered Lebanon, while Iran pointed to statements from mediator Pakistan suggesting that it did.

The violence in Lebanon broke out last month after the U.S. and Israel began their military campaign in Iran, when Hezbollah militants fired rockets at Israel. Israel retaliated with strikes across Lebanon, vowing to establish a sweeping “security zone” along the country’s south.

The ceasefire deal grew out of direct negotiations that kicked off Tuesday with an in-person meeting in Washington between Lebanon and Israel’s ambassadors to the U.S. The meeting marked the first direct talks between the countries in decades.

More than 2,100 people have been killed in Lebanon since the war started, according to Lebanese authorities, and more than a million others have been displaced from their homes.

In Israel, 21 people have been killed since the outbreak of the Iran war, including casualties related to strikes by both Iran and Hezbollah.

In a phone call last Wednesday, President Donald Trump asked Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to pull back on the Lebanon strikes to help ensure the success of upcoming negotiations with the Iranian regime, two senior administration officials told NBC News.

Trump confirmed that conversation in an interview with NBC News last Thursday, saying the Israelis were “scaling back” operations in Lebanon.

“I spoke with Bibi and he’s going to low-key it. I just think we have to be sort of a little more low-key,” Trump said.