As talks begin, Lebanon’s president says Beirut will accept ‘nothing less’ than IDF withdrawal

By AFP 23 June 2026, 5:15 pm

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A photograph released by the Lebanese Presidency on April 17, 2026, shows Lebanon's President Joseph Aoun delivering a televised address to the Lebanese people from the Baabda Presidential Palace, east of the capital Beirut. (Lebanese Presidency)

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun rejects Israel’s presence in south Lebanon and other foreign interference — an allusion to Iran — as a fifth round of Israel-Lebanon talks begins in Washington.

“We accept nothing less than an end to the Israeli occupation and at the same time, the fall of foreign tutelage, because our only option is our national sovereignty and our sole wager is on the Lebanese state,” Aoun says, according to his office.

He also expresses hope that the new round of talks will be “decisive along the path of achieving what we seek for the good of our nation and people,” namely “the full restoration of Lebanon’s sovereignty over every grain of its soil.”