In rare direct talks, Israeli and Lebanese officials seek way forward

With Israel’s bombardment of Lebanon and widened ground invasion leaving the ceasefire with Iran on shaky ground, Israeli and Lebanese officials were expected to hold rare talks Tuesday in Washington to try to find a way forward.

The meeting would be the first direct, in-person talks in decades between Israel and Lebanon, which do not have diplomatic relations. Israel’s and Lebanon’s ambassadors to Washington were expected to participate. Secretary of State Marco Rubio will also take part, according to the State Department.

But the talks will be largely preparatory, according to a Lebanese official and another person briefed on them, who both requested anonymity to discuss sensitive diplomacy. They are not expected to immediately produce a deal to end the war between Israel and Hezbollah, the Iran-backed Lebanese militia that Israel says its attacks are targeting. Hours before the meeting was to begin, Israel launched airstrikes on southern Lebanon, including one near the main hospital in the town of Tibnin that caused “significant damage” and injured several people, according to Lebanon’s state-run news agency. Other Israeli attacks in southern Lebanon, as well as in the West Bekaa region, killed at least 10 people, the news agency said.

Israel and Lebanon remain sharply divided in their aims for the talks. President Joseph Aoun of Lebanon told Italy’s foreign minister, Antonio Tajani, that Lebanon was hoping that a ceasefire would be reached, after which direct negotiations could begin, according to a statement shared by the Lebanese presidency Monday. Aoun said that any long-term solution must entail Israel heeding the growing international calls for it to stop attacking Lebanon.

But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has ruled out a ceasefire and said that Israel would not stop its attacks on Lebanon. The aim of the discussions in Washington would be disarming Hezbollah and establishing a lasting peace deal with Lebanon, he has said.

Netanyahu agreed last week to engage in the talks as Iran warned that it could withdraw from the ceasefire unless Israel stopped attacking Lebanon.

The meeting will include Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Yechiel Leiter; his Lebanese counterpart, Nada Hamadeh Moawad; and the U.S. ambassador to Lebanon, Michel Issa.

The war between Hezbollah and Israel reignited last month after Hezbollah fired on Israel in solidarity with Iran. Hezbollah has since launched more than 6,500 rockets, missiles and drones toward Israel, according to the Israeli military. Israel has bombarded Lebanon for weeks in response, displacing more than 1 million people and, according to the Lebanese health ministry, killing more than 2,000 people, including more than 160 children.

Israeli attacks on Lebanon have become a flashpoint in the fragile ceasefire between Iran and the United States. Iran insists that Lebanon is covered by the agreement. Israel and the United States say it isn’t.

Israel sharply escalated its attacks in the hours after the ceasefire was reached last week, killing at least 357 people in Lebanon on Wednesday, according to Lebanese authorities.

Hezbollah’s leader, Naim Kassem, said in a televised speech Monday that Hezbollah categorically rejected Lebanon’s planned talks with Israel. He called on Lebanese authorities to cancel the talks, urging them not to become “a tool of Israel.”

Proceeding with the talks would represent “capitulation and surrender” to a country intent on occupying Lebanon, Kassem said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Copyright 2026 The New York Times Company