US President Donald Trump’s envoy to Lebanon, Morgan Ortagus, arrived in Israel on Tuesday and began her visit with a series of meetings with senior political and security officials.
Participants included the Prime Minister, the Defense Minister, and the head of Military Intelligence, Major General Shlomi Binder. The meetings were part of Washington’s efforts to prevent escalation along the northern border and to uphold the existing ceasefire agreement.
During the discussions, Israeli security officials presented updated intelligence on Hezbollah’s efforts to rebuild and enhance its capabilities. According to the briefing shown to the envoy, Hezbollah continues to violate existing arrangements in the area and restore its military strength, while the Lebanese army fails to enforce those agreements.
Before her meetings with the Prime Minister and Defense Minister, Ortagus met with Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar. In their conversation, Sa’ar outlined Israel’s assessment of Hezbollah’s growing power.
He stated, “The terrorist organization is arming itself at a much faster pace than it is disarming. The responsibility lies with the Lebanese government. There is also a transfer of funds from Iran to Hezbollah through Turkey. This must be stopped.”
Days after deadly Israeli operation in southern Syria, US president says he hopes the neighbors can ‘have a long, prosperous relationship’; PM set for year’s fifth White House visit shortly
US President Donald Trump (left) speaks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Knesset, October 13, 2025. (Chip Somodevilla/ Pool via AP)
US President Donald Trump warned Israel via social media on Monday against destabilizing Syria and its new leadership, shortly before holding a phone conversation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“It is very important that Israel maintain a strong and true dialogue with Syria, and that nothing takes place that will interfere with Syria’s evolution into a prosperous State,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, days after a deadly operation by Israeli forces in the south of the country.
Trump said he was “very satisfied” with Syria’s current performance under former Islamist rebel President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who made a historic visit to the White House in November.
The US president said Sharaa “is working diligently to make sure good things happen, and that both Syria and Israel will have a long and prosperous relationship together.” He added that the United States was “doing everything within our power to make sure the Government of Syria continues to do what was intended” to rebuild the war-torn country.
Good relations between Syria and Israel would add to his efforts for a wider Middle East peace following the fragile Gaza ceasefire in October, said Trump.
Shortly after the social media post, Netanyahu’s office said the prime minister held a phone call with Trump.
According to the Israeli readout, the two leaders discussed “the importance of and commitment to dismantling Hamas’s military capabilities and demilitarizing the Gaza Strip, and discussed the expansion of the peace accords.”
US President Donald Trump speaks upon departing a news conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in foreground, in the State Dining Room of the White House, September 29, 2025, in Washington. (AP/Evan Vucci)
Trump also invited Netanyahu to visit the White House “in the near future,” the premier’s office said.
According to Channel 12 news, Netanyahu is likely to make the trip by the end of this month. The visit would be his fifth since Trump returned to the White House in January.
The call came a day after Netanyahu formally requested a pardon from President Isaac Herzog in his corruption trial, without acknowledging guilt — a pardon Trump has personally backed, including in a public exhortation to Herzog in the Knesset in October and a subsequent letter.
There was no direct mention of Syria in the Israeli readout of the phone call, and there was no immediate readout from Washington.
The Syrian issue is expected to be a prime topic of discussion during Netanyahu’s visit, Channel 12 reported. Trump has been pushing for a security pact between Israel and Syria since Sharaa’s Islamist coalition overthrew longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad a year ago.
But tensions have risen over hundreds of strikes by Israel on Syria. In the deadliest so far, Israeli forces reportedly killed 13 people on Friday in an operation in southern Syria, saying they targeted an Islamist group.
Six Israeli soldiers were wounded in the gun battle. Israel said it set out to arrest two members of the al-Jama’a al-Islamiyya (Islamic Group) terror organization, saying that intelligence information collected in recent weeks indicated that they were planning attacks on Israel.
Troops of the 55th Reserve Paratroopers Brigade detain a suspect in the southern Syrian village of Beit Jinn, early November 28, 2025. (Israel Defense Forces)
Syria condemned the operation as a “war crime,” saying that it denounced “the criminal aggression” of the IDF and that such acts aim to “ignite the region” in conflict.
The IDF has been deployed to nine posts inside southern Syria for nearly a year, since the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. They are mostly within a UN-patrolled buffer zone on the border between the countries. Two posts are on the Syrian side of Mount Hermon.
Troops have been operating in areas up to around 15 kilometers (nine miles) inside Syria, aiming to capture weapons that Israel says could pose a threat to the country if they fall into the hands of “hostile forces.”
Channel 12 news reported Monday that US officials repeatedly expressed frustrations to their Israeli counterparts over the weekend about the escalation in Syria in the wake of Friday’s incident.
A senior US official told the TV network that Syria “doesn’t want problems with Israel. This isn’t Lebanon,” drawing a distinction between Israel’s recent strikes in the two countries, but that “Bibi is seeing ghosts everywhere.”
“We are trying to tell Bibi he has to stop this, because if it continues, he will self-destruct, miss a huge diplomatic opportunity and turn the new Syrian government into an enemy,” the official reportedly added.
Meanwhile, US envoy Tom Barrack visited Syria on Monday and met with Sharaa in Damascus.
According to the official Syrian news agency SANA, the meeting “addressed recent developments in the region and issues of mutual interest.”
Barrack, the US ambassador to Turkey, also serves as its special envoy on Syria and has been particularly involved as well in tamping down tensions between Israel and Lebanon.
A day earlier, Barrack visited Iraq and reportedly warned Baghdad that Israel is likely to strike Iraqi militias if they attempt to militarily back Hezbollah in any fighting with Israel.
US President Donald Trump talks with Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the Knesset, Oct. 13, 2025, in Jerusalem. Photo: Evan Vucci/Pool via REUTERS
US President Donald Trump has invited Israel‘s Benjamin Netanyahu to the White House in the “near future,” the prime minister’s office said on Monday, shortly after Trump said Israel should maintain a strong and true dialogue with Syria.
A visit to the White House would mark the Israeli prime minister’s fifth since Trump returned to office in January. The two leaders have publicly projected a close relationship, though US and Israeli sources have said Trump has at times expressed frustration with Netanyahu.
The prime minister’s office said Netanyahu and Trump discussed disarming Hamas and demilitarizing Gaza. Trump in September announced a plan to end the Gaza war and a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas has been in place since October.
TRUMP PUSHES ISRAEL-SYRIA DIALOGUE
Trump earlier said in a statement that it was very important that Israel maintained a “strong and true dialogue” with neighboring Syria, and that “nothing takes place that will interfere with Syria’s evolution into a prosperous state.”
“Syria and Israel will have a long and prosperous relationship together,” said Trump, whose administration is trying to broker a non-aggression pact between the two states.
Syria does not formally recognize Israel, which following the fall of longtime Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in December moved troops into a buffer zone along the Syrian border to secure a military position to prevent terrorists from launching attacks against the Jewish state.
The previously demilitarized zone in the Golan Heights, a strategic region on Israel’s northern border previously controlled by Syria and later annexed by Israel, was established under the 1974 Disengagement of Forces Agreement between Damascus and Jerusalem that ended the Yom Kippur War. However, Israel considered the agreement void after the collapse of Assad’s regime.
Trump has backed Syria’s new leader, Ahmed al-Sharaa, while Israel voiced hostility over his past links to Islamist militancy and has lobbied Washington to keep Syria weak.
An Israeli raid in southern Syria on Friday killed 13 Syrians, Syrian state media reported. The Israeli military said it had targeted a Lebanese Islamist terror group there.
The call with Trump also came a day after Netanyahu asked Israel‘s president for a pardon in his long-running corruption trial. Trump has publicly voiced support for pardoning Netanyahu and sent a letter last month urging President Isaac Herzog to consider it.
The prime minister’s readout of the call made no mention of the pardon. Israeli opposition politicians have come out against the request and called on Netanyahu to instead resign.
