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Commends President Aoun for his determined effort to reclaim Lebanon’s sovereignty and move towards peace
Reuters
July 19, 2026
1 min read
President Joseph Aoun with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, September 22, 2025—L'ORIENT
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio met with Lebanese President Joseph Aoun on Sunday to discuss the implementation of a US-brokered framework agreement signed by Israel and Lebanon on June 26 aimed at ending their conflict, the State Department said. "The Secretary commended the courage of the Government of Lebanon, under President Aoun’s leadership, for their determined effort to reclaim Lebanon’s sovereignty, disarm (Hezbollah) and move towards peace," State Department spokesperson Tommy Pigott said in a statement. Met with Lebanese President Aoun today. I commended his courage and his government’s work to reclaim their country and advance towards peace. We discussed implementing the Trilateral Framework. The United States remains committed to supporting this effort and Lebanon’s efforts to… pic.twitter.com/mnt7MgGts5 US-led diplomacy has emerged since Hezbollah and Israel returned to war on March 2 amid the wider regional conflict, moving forward despite strong objections from the Iran-backed group, which believes only Iranian pressure on Washington can secure an end to the war and Israeli withdrawal. Iran demanded an end to the war in Lebanon as part of its interim deal with Washington signed last month, but the agreement has been shaken over the last week by renewed US-Iranian hostilities in the Gulf. Israel's military is occupying what it describes as a "buffer zone" about 10 km (6 miles) into Lebanon along the entire length of the Israeli border. Israeli officials say the zone is necessary to protect northern Israeli communities from attacks launched by Hezbollah. More than 4,000 Lebanese have been killed and more than a million displaced by Israel's campaign in Lebanon since March, according to Lebanon's health ministry. The toll does not say how many combatants may be among the dead, and Hezbollah has not disclosed figures on its war dead. Reuters reported on May 3 that several thousand Hezbollah fighters had been killed. At least 32 Israeli soldiers and four Israeli civilians have been killed by Hezbollah, most of them in southern Lebanon since the latest fighting erupted.
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