Israeli envoy to Washington says next Israel-Lebanon talks set for next week

Israeli Ambassador to the US Yechiel Leiter indicates that the next round of talks between Israel and Lebanon will take place next week in Rome.

“Next week, we’re going to be sitting in Rome on the 14th and 15th, bringing teams for each issue,” Leiter says during an onstage interview in Washington.

Leiter’s attendance at such talks would indicate that a separately planned meeting between US President Donald Trump and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not be taking place.

The Israeli envoy reveals that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun will be meeting with Trump at the White House on July 21 — a date that has not yet been publicly confirmed.

The US has sought to organize a trilateral meeting between Aoun, Netanyahu, and Trump, but Beirut has pushed back on the idea so long as Israel maintains forces in southern Lebanon.

Leiter insists that Israel does not have territorial ambitions in Lebanon, but will remain there until the Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) can verifiably prove that they have begun disarming Hezbollah.

The Israeli envoy argues that one of the obstacles in the way of that goal is the presence of Hezbollah activists and sympathizers inside LAF units. Accordingly, Israel has submitted a proposal to have the US vet existing LAF units to weed out such Hezbollah sympathizers.

While Trump suggested during a May Oval Office meeting that Israel be the one to vet and train Lebanese soldiers, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio “came to the rescue and said, ‘Well Mr. President, they hate Hezbollah, but they’re not ready to love the Israelis yet.”

Pressed for additional details on this plan to vet LAF units, Leiter admits that it is still in the works. However, he says that some LAF units are not “saturated” with Hezbollah operatives and therefore can already begin operating against the terror group.

Leiter says that Israel is prepared to strengthen the current, anti-Hezbollah Lebanese government by providing intelligence on anyone seeking to harm its leaders.

He adds that Jerusalem is also prepared to lobby Washington to increase its financial assistance to the LAF if the latter proves that it is willing to take on Hezbollah.

Leiter praises the Lebanese government for refusing to reinstate direct flights between Beirut and Tehran, which the Israeli envoy says were being used to funnel Iranian funds to Hezbollah.

Leiter is asked about the deconfliction mechanism that was announced last month by US Vice President JD Vance, where representatives from the US Army’s Central Command and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps sit together in Doha in order to prevent escalations in Lebanon and the Strait of Hormuz. Israel, and Lebanon reportedly fumed at the establishment of the channel, insisting that Iran should not be given a say regarding developments in Beirut, while US officials are said to believe that Tehran is the only entity currently capable of reining in Hezbollah.

The Israeli envoy admits that he does not know if the mechanism described by Vance is actually operating. However, he says a separate deconfliction mechanism that includes representatives from the IDF’s Northern Command, the LAF’s Southern Command and CENTCOM is “working very closely… and directly and not with anybody else involved from the region.”