The United States supports efforts to mediate a deal between Lebanon and Israel, President Donald Trump said in a meeting with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun on Tuesday, amid shaky efforts to restore Lebanese control over its southern territory following an Israeli military incursion.
“Lebanon has been a very mistreated country for a long period of time,” Trump said, as he sat down for the first Oval Office meeting with a Lebanese president since 2009.
The meeting came amid clashes in southern Lebanon involving Israeli forces, who this year stepped up what they called an assault on Hezbollah forces that has also killed and injured many civilians. Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militia and political movement, has its stronghold in southern Lebanon.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio has been involved in an effort to mediate between Israeli and Lebanese leaders to help bring about a pullback of both Hezbollah and Israeli forces. The diplomacy has been lower-profile than the White House engagement with Iranian leaders to discuss a deal that would restrict Tehran’s nuclear program. But it has also faced challenges amid long-standing hostility between Israel and Hezbollah.
Aoun has backed a framework deal with Israel.
“We are committed to it,” said Aoun, sitting alongside Trump. He added that he believed that his country’s speaker of parliament, Nabih Berri, a Shiite Muslim who talks with international mediators on behalf of Hezbollah, also wants “to see the end of this war. … He knows he did his best to rebuild the south, but unfortunately, the south’s being destroyed in front of his eyes.”
Trump said he would be willing to speak to Hezbollah or to anybody whom Aoun wanted him to — an offer that drew a laugh from the Lebanese leader.
On Monday, Israeli soldiers barred a Catholic aid group accompanied by a Washington Post reporter from entering parts of southern Lebanon that the Israeli military controls, despite the group’s having required authorization from United Nations peacekeepers. The Israeli restrictions highlight the difficulties Lebanese have faced with moving freely in the south since the war between Israel and Hezbollah erupted in March, and underscore the difficulties in securing a full withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon.
Trump has pushed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop bombing Beirut, sometimes in sharper terms in recent weeks than is typical for a U.S. leader to use against Israel.
Mohamad El Chamaa in Beirut contributed to this report.