Lebanon’s president sought to normalize fledgling talks with Israel on Monday by rejecting Hezbollah’s claim that engagement with the Israeli side is an act of concession.
According to Lebanon’s National News Agency, Lebanese President Joseph Aoun said during a meeting with a delegation from south Lebanon that Lebanon rejects any suggestion that it is making concessions and insisted Israel has no reason for continued military action on Lebanese territory.
His comments came shortly after Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem described the Lebanon-Israel talks on Monday as a “humiliating and unnecessary concession.”
Aoun appeared to push back against Qassem’s remarks, saying, “I will not accept a humiliating agreement.” Referring to Hezbollah’s attacks on Israel that drew Lebanon into the wider Iran war in early March, he asked, “Was there national consensus when you chose war?”
Aoun said that negotiating with Israel is not treason. “Treason is the one who takes his country to war for external interests,” he said. “My goal is to reach an end to the war with Israel in accordance with a ceasefire agreement, an agreement that stipulates that Israel will not carry out any offensive military action against Lebanese targets.”
Hezbollah rejects disarmament push
Hezbollah has rejected the negotiations and demands that it disarm. Lebanon’s cabinet tasked the military in August 2025 with bringing all armed groups’ weapons under state control, a move primarily aimed at Hezbollah following its 2024 war with Israel. In September, the cabinet formally endorsed the army’s disarmament plan but did not set a clear timeline.
While the plan’s first phase, focused on southern Lebanon, has seen progress, the second phase, which involves disarmament nationwide, has largely stalled amid Hezbollah’s continued refusal to cooperate.
“Let it be known clearly: These direct negotiations and their outcomes are as if they do not exist for us, and they do not concern us in the slightest,” Qassem said in his statement on Monday, adding, “We will not give up weapons and defense.”
A second round of talks between Israel and Lebanon last Thursday at the White House produced an extension of the ceasefire by three weeks, setting a new expiry date of May 17. US President Donald Trump, who participated in the meeting, called it “very successful” in a post on Truth Social. He said the United States would work with Lebanon “to help it protect itself from Hezbollah” and added that he looked forward to hosting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Aoun “in the near future.”
The White House session followed an earlier round of talks at the State Department between Lebanese Ambassador to the United States Nada Hamadeh and her Israeli counterpart, Yechiel Leiter.
Ceasefire strains as strikes intensify
Meanwhile, on the ground, the Israeli military escalated its campaign in Lebanon on Monday, striking southern areas and the eastern Bekaa Valley for the first time since a US-brokered ceasefire took effect on April 16.
Despite the truce, Israel has continued strikes across southern Lebanon, where its forces remain deployed. In a statement in the early hours of Monday, the military said it had destroyed “more than 50 terror infrastructures” in Lebanon in recent days. Hezbollah has continued drone and rocket fire toward Israeli positions in Lebanon and northern Israel.
On Monday, the group said it attacked an Israeli position in the south with a drone. The Israeli military said a drone launched by Hezbollah exploded near its troops, but no casualties were reported.
Earlier in the day, the Israeli military posted on X that its air force intercepted a “hostile aircraft” heading toward areas where its forces are operating in southern Lebanon, adding that it did not cross into Israeli territory and no alerts were triggered, in line with policy.