After the call, Netanyahu said that he had told Trump that “if Hezbollah doesn’t stop attacking our towns and citizens – Israel will attack terror targets in Beirut.”
The joint US-Israel military strikes on Iran mark more than a tactical military operation. They represent a fundamental realignment – President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have closed a strategic gap that successive American administrations never fully bridged.(photo credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images)ByTZVI JASPER, IDAN KWELLERUpdated:
US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke on Monday about the potential for a ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah.
After the call, Trump announced that Israel had agreed that “there will be no Troops going to Beirut, and any Troops that are on their way, have already been turned back.”
In exchange, he said, Hezbollah had agreed that all shooting will stop – “That Israel will not attack them, and they will not attack Israel.”
Later, Netanyahu announced that he had told Trump that “if Hezbollah doesn’t stop attacking our towns and citizens – Israel will attack terror targets in Beirut.”
He also said that the IDF would continue to operate as planned in southern Lebanon.
The Lebanese Embassy in Washington had earlier confirmed that Hezbollah had accepted the US proposal, saying that the ceasefire framework would be expanded to encompass “all Lebanese territories.”
OPERATIONS CONDUCTED by troops from the 401st Brigade in southern Lebanon. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON UNIT)
The embassy’s statement also claimed that Trump had told Lebanon’s Ambassador to the United States that Netanyahu had also agreed to the arrangement.
The speaker of the Lebanese parliament, Nabih Berri, had earlier informed Trump’s administration of Hezbollah‘s readiness for a ceasefire with Israel and that it has promised to guarantee that it would be implemented, Axios reported on Monday, citing Berri’s top advisor Ali Hamdan. Berri is Shia, and heads Lebanon’s Amal Movement.
The IDF announced on Sunday morning that it had taken control of the Beaufort Ridge outpost and Wadi al-Saluki areas north of the Litani River in southern Lebanon.
Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted an area in Beirut’s southern neighborhoods on March 5, 2026; Illustrative.(photo credit: FADEL ITANI/AFP via Getty Images)ByAMICHAI STEIN, JERUSALEM POST STAFFUpdated: Senior Israeli officials have appealed to senior US officials to allow the IDF to expand the strikes in Beirut, two sources told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday.
According to the sources, Israeli officials are hopeful that, given the lack of progress in both the negotiations between Washington and Tehran and the talks between Israel and Lebanon, the US response will be favorable.
Early Monday morning, UK Foreign Minister Yvette Cooper called on Israel to halt its Lebanon operations, saying, “It must end.”
“Israel’s military escalation in Lebanon has killed and displaced civilians, destroyed infrastructure, and eroded space for diplomacy,” said Cooper.
On Sunday, German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul called for all sides in the conflict to cease hostilities, describing Israel’s push into southern Lebanon as “cause for serious concern.”
IDF soldiers operating in Lebanon’s Beaufort Ridge, shared by the military on May 31, 2026. (credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON UNIT)
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“Any further escalation will exacerbate the already tense situation and trigger new waves of displacement within Lebanon,” Wadephul added.
On Sunday morning, the IDF announced it had taken control of the Beaufort Ridge outpost and Wadi al-Saluki areas north of the Litani River in southern Lebanon. The IAF, artillery, and tanks conducted extensive support strikes against Hezbollah infrastructure in the area to reduce resistance ahead of the advance.
IDF plans Nabatiya advance, would be furthest yet
The military added that it was operating near the Hezbollah stronghold of Nabatiya and is prepared to expand operations.
Nabatiya, around 20 kilometers from the Israel-Lebanon border, would be the farthest that IDF ground forces have advanced.
The military’s ground forces were about 10 kilometers from the border when the ceasefire began on April 17.
The IDF said on Tuesday that it would invade past the ceasefire’s Yellow Line and the Litani River in response to ongoing Hezbollah drone attacks that have killed and wounded an increasing number of soldiers.
Yonah Jeremy Bob and Reuters contributed to this report.
American base in Kuwait targeted after US hits Iranian sites in response to downing of a US drone; Trump says Iran ‘wants to make a good deal’ as Tehran makes amendments to MOU
An F/A-18E Super Hornet, attached to Strike Fighter Squadron (VFA) 14, preparing to make an arrested landing on the flight deck of Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln on May 25, 2026. (AFP PHOTO / US NAVY / NAVCENT PUBLIC AFFAIRS)
The United States bombed Iranian radar and drone control sites in Iran after Tehran shot down an American MQ-1 Predator drone this weekend, the American military said Monday. Iran acknowledged launching a retaliatory strike, while Kuwait said it had intercepted incoming drone and missile fire.
The dueling attacks reflect the fragility of a weekslong ceasefire in the Iran war, which has been marred by repeated strikes even as American and Iranian officials try to negotiate a deal to extend it. Iran has maintained its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz in the meantime, disrupting global energy supplies, as a fifth of all oil and natural gas traded once passed through the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf.
Tehran was, meanwhile, making amendments to a draft Memorandum of Understanding to end the war with the US, after US President Donald Trump reportedly sent back a hardened version of a possible memorandum, even as he insisted that Iran wanted to make a deal, reassuring that “it will all work out well in the end.”
The US military’s Central Command said Monday that it had carried out the strikes in Iran on Saturday and Sunday around the city of Geruk and on Qeshm Island.
“The measured and deliberate strikes occurred … in response to aggressive Iranian actions that included the shootdown of a US MQ-1 drone that was operating over international waters,” Central Command said.
“US fighter aircraft swiftly responded by eliminating Iranian air defenses, a ground control station, and two one-way attack drones that posed clear threats to ships transiting regional waters.”
Illustrative: An MQ-1 Predator remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) flies in front of the moon during a training mission at Creech Air Force Base on November 17, 2015, in Indian Springs, Nevada. (Isaac Brekken/Getty Images/AFP)
The Predator has been phased out of service by the US Air Force, which now flies the MQ-9 Reaper, though the US Army still flies the Predator. The US military said no American troops were hurt in the attacks.
Kuwait meanwhile said its air defenses had opened fire early Monday morning to intercept incoming drone and missile fire. Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said in a statement carried by the state-run IRNA news agency that US forces had targeted a telecommunications tower.
The Guard said it responded with an attack without saying where, likely referring to the attack on Kuwait, which hosts US Army Central, the Mideast forward command for the Army.
Iranian state television later shared footage of the ballistic missile launch, including a close-up showing a sticker on its body depicting a bruised Trump overlaid on a “closed” Strait of Hormuz with the caption: “Until the last American soldier leaves the region.”
Trump has said his key aim in the war is to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon with its highly enriched uranium. While Iran, whose leaders are sworn to Israel’s destruction, denies seeking nuclear arms, it has amassed uranium enriched to levels with no civilian application.
Trump is under pressure to reopen the strait and bring down US gasoline prices ahead of the November congressional elections, as voters grow increasingly frustrated by rising prices. At the same time, he faces a potential backlash from Iran hawks in his own party over any concessions to Tehran.
The two sides remain at odds on several other issues, such as Tehran’s demands for the lifting of sanctions and the release of $12 billion in frozen assets in foreign banks before engaging in substantive talks on its nuclear program.
Ongoing negotiations
Hours after the latest exchange of fire, Trump posted on Truth Social that, “Iran really wants to make a deal, and it will be a good one for the U.S.A. and those that are with us.”
However, Trump also said it was tougher for him to negotiate with Iran with all the domestic political commentary surrounding the conflict.
“… it is MUCH tougher for me to properly do my job and negotiate, when political hacks keep negatively ‘chirping,’ at levels never seen before, over and over again, that I should move faster, or move slower, or go to war, or not go to war, or whatever,” the president wrote on Truth Social.
“Just sit back and relax, it will all work out well in the end – It always does!”
His comments came after Tehran was reported to be making amendments to a draft Memorandum of Understanding to end the war with the US, Iran’s semi-official Tasnim news agency said, citing an unnamed source.
Reports of Iran’s amendments emerged after Trump had sent a tougher MOU proposal back to Iran, and underlined the rift that the parties still need to close.
Appearing to acknowledge the new, tougher proposal that Iran received, Tasnim says that exchanges on the text “are ongoing, with both parties regularly proposing amendments.”
At the same time, Iran’s chief negotiator, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, warned that the US was not to be trusted, saying Tehran will not agree to any deal with Washington unless it fully secures Iranian rights.
Oil prices rose as markets reopened Monday in response to the reports of hardened negotiating points. The increase follows a week where crude prices dropped over 11 percent amid hopes that an imminent peace agreement would lead to the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran was already in talks with the United States about the fate of its nuclear program in February when the US and Israel launched air and missile strikes that wiped out much of the Islamic Republic’s senior leadership.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, meanwhile, said that “until a clear conclusion is reached…everything that is being said now is speculation,” according to state TV.
Iran dismissed earlier comments by Trump that its enriched uranium stockpile would be destroyed as “baseless,” according to Iranian media.
