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Pakistan’s interior minister also heads to Tehran for meetings on Iran-US talks as five killed in Lebanon in Israeli strikes
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US president Donald Trump has sent his envoy Steve Witkoff to join Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araqchi for peace talks in Switzerland today as ceasefire looks threatened once again with five killed in Israeli strikes on Lebanon.
The shuttling of Trump’s envoys signals that both sides intend to begin technical negotiations, after being initially cancelled, aimed at securing a permanent truce but the White House did not respond to questions about Witkoff’s travel.
Donald Trump reportedly told Israel to agree to a ceasefire with Hezbollah in Lebanon, as reports suggest US intelligence is concerned about prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu undermining his deal with Iran.
The US president instructed Israel to accept the ceasefire on Friday, he told NBC News in a call with a reporter, adding: “You just gotta calm down sometimes and use your head”.
It comes as Washington Post reports suggest US intelligence officials are concerned Netanyahu will try to undermine the US peace deal with Iran in a bid to continue its own conflict in Lebanon.
The officials, who spoke anonymously, said Netanyahu’s political survival is linked to showing his domestic audience that he will not withdraw troops from Lebanon.
A senior Hezbollah official has told Reuters on Saturday that the group will not allow Israel to operate freely in Lebanon.
Fighting between Israel and Hezbollah has continued as Israel insists it will not leave. An Israeli military official said that it has continued to attack southern Lebanon.
Hezbollah said it would not allow Israel “freedom of movement” in Lebanon.
Israeli strikes on southern Lebanon on Saturday killed at least seven people, including two children, hours after reports emerged of a ceasefire agreement. The persistent fighting threatened an interim agreement between the United States and Iran to end the war in the Middle East.
Lebanon’s National News Agency said the strikes hit the southern town of Nabatiyeh and nearby villages. At least seven people remained trapped under the rubble, it said.
Mediators were scrambling to halt the fighting between Israel and the militant Lebanese Hezbollah group, after a heavy exchange on Friday killed at least 47 people in Lebanon and four Israeli soldiers.
Hezbollah has warned that it will not allow Israel “freedom of movement” in what it calls occupied Lebanese territory, according to a senior official speaking to Reuters.
The comments come after an Israeli military official said Hezbollah fired more than 50 projectiles at Israeli forces in southern Lebanon overnight, prompting Israeli strikes on what it described as Hezbollah targets.
Israel said stability for both countries could be achieved if Hezbollah stops violating ceasefire agreements.
The US department of defence needs $80bn to cover costs from the Iran war as well as other non-war-related bills, deputy defence secretary Stephen Feinberg told lawmakers in phone calls this week, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.
A full US supplemental request, which will include money for the Pentagon as well as non-defence priorities such as farm and disaster relief, could be sent to lawmakers in the coming days, the newspaper added.
The Iran war has cost around $25bn, a Pentagon official told Reuters in April providing the first official estimate of war costs.
However, the full cost of the conflict, which Trump began alongside Israel on 28 February, has remained an open question on Capitol Hill and an initial $200 billion request for additional funding met stiff opposition from lawmakers.
White House budget director Russell Vought told a hearing in April of the House of Representatives Budget Committee that he had no estimate for the cost of the war, as he defended Trump’s request for a $1.5 trillion annual military budget.
The proposed budget reflects Republican priorities ahead of November’s midterm elections, where the party is trying to keep control of Congress but is facing growing voter anxiety over rising living costs, high energy prices and the financial burden of the Iran war.
President Donald Trump will make a rare trip to Camp David this weekend, returning to the presidential retreat for only the second time since retaking office last year.
Trump will hold policy and political meetings during his visit, a White House official said. His family will travel with him for the weekend, which includes Father’s Day on Sunday.
The trip comes as Trump works to secure a final agreement to end the war with Iran and faces scrutiny over a provisional peace deal that critics say grants Tehran too many concessions.
On Friday, Trump continued to defend the deal with Iran, saying Tehran had come to the negotiating table from a position of weakness.
Vice president JD Vance will not be joining the senior officials from the US and Iran gathering in Switzerland today to hammer out the final points on peace deal.
The announcement came after Wednesday’s signing of the memorandum of understanding, when preparations for technical talks at the Swiss mountaintop resort of Buergenstock were well advanced.
The broad interim deal requires the United States, Iran and their allies to declare an immediate and permanent termination of military operations on all fronts, including in Lebanon. Israel, left out of the talks, says it is not party to the deal.
Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araqchi in a telephone call with his Pakistani counterpart on Friday, said the United States would be responsible for any violation of its commitments under the deal, including ending the fighting in Lebanon, his ministry said.
US envoy Steve Witkoff and Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araqchi were both headed to Switzerland for talks, Axios reported, as a ceasefire in Lebanon appeared to revive efforts to turn an interim Iran war pact into a lasting regional deal.
US vice president JD Vance canceled plans on Thursday to travel to Switzerland for the talks, however, amid rising tension in Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah, a militant group backed by Iran.
With the ceasefire in place, Witkoff is heading to Switzerland to join Jared Kushner, president Donald Trump’s son-in-law, who is already there, Axios said. Araqchi plans to travel there on Saturday, it added.
The development may signal that both sides intend to begin technical negotiations aimed at securing a permanent truce. The White House did not respond to questions about Witkoff’s travel.
Diplomatic niceties broke down at the United Nations on Friday when Israel’s ambassador and the UN secretary-general’s special representative for children and armed conflict became embroiled in a furious shouting match at a public hearing.
At a meeting in New York to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, the Israeli envoy, Danny Danon, demanded the resignation of Pramila Patten, who produced a report that blacklisted Israel for such alleged abuses for the first time, accusing her of bias.
“You caved to the secretary-general’s obsession with targeting Israel,” Danon said, referring to UN chief Antonio Guterres.
Another UN official, Vanessa Frazier, Guterres’ representative for children and armed conflict and compiler of a separate report that also blacklists Israel, interjected by shouting a point of order.
She demanded that Danon refrain from “personal attacks” and added that she had “verified evidence.”
Danon said Frazier should be quiet. “We are a member state, and you work for the UN, and you will be quiet now. You will be quiet… you and your shameful report,” he said.
Frazier, Malta’s former UN ambassador, issued her report this week on behalf of Guterres warning that Israeli settler groups could be added to a global blacklist for violations against children as the UN chief voiced alarm at what he called a “staggering” rise in violations against Palestinian children.
Israel itself already features in that report’s so-called list of shame annexes for alleged violations. When Patten’s report was issued last month, Danon called it “a new low” and Israel’s foreign ministry vowed to sever all ties with Guterres, who leaves office after 10 years at the year-end.
Pakistan’s interior minister Mohsin Naqvi has departed for Tehran today for meetings with senior Iranian officials, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported.
IRNA said Naqvi would discuss the progress of negotiations between Iran and the United States during his visit, without providing further details.
Working at sea was a dream for 28-year-old Rex Pereira. But after witnessing the outbreak of the US-Iran war from the deck of his stranded ship in southern Iraq, he tells Maroosha Muzaffar he is a changed man:
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