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Lebanese President Joseph Aoun urged US President Donald Trump on Thursday to help secure a ceasefire for his country in the first call ever between the two leaders, as Pakistan said peace in Lebanon was vital to ending the Iran war.”Peace in Lebanon is essential for (Iran) peace talks,” Tahir Andrabi, spokesperson for Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry, said.An Israeli source told Reuters that a ceasefire in Lebanon could be announced as soon as on Thursday night. There was no immediate comment from Lebanese officials.In a Truth Social post published late on Wednesday in Washington, Trump said he was seeking to create “a little breathing room” between Israel and Lebanon.Aoun’s office said he spoke to Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio separately on Thursday afternoon and thanked them for their efforts to reach a ceasefire in Lebanon. There was no immediate comment from the White House.Trump had also said the two leaders of Lebanon and Israel had not spoken for some 34 years and “it will happen tomorrow.” But three Lebanese officials told Reuters on Thursday that Aoun would not hold a call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the near future.Two of the Lebanese officials said the Lebanese embassy in Washington had informed the US administration of the position before Aoun’s call with Rubio.LEBANON SEEKS CEASEFIRE BEFORE TALKSThe Lebanese government has been sharply at odds with Hizbollah over its decision to enter the war, having spent the last year seeking to secure the peaceful disarmament of the group founded by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards in 1982.Beirut banned Hizbollah’s military activities on March 2. Israeli and Lebanese ambassadors held rare talks in Washington on Tuesday but contact between Netanyahu and Aoun would be a major milestone in ties between the two countries, which have remained in a state of war since Israel was established in 1948.Hizbollah opposes contacts between Lebanon and Israel. Aoun had said early in the war he would be open to direct talks but Lebanon’s position is that a ceasefire should precede negotiations.In a statement on Thursday, he said a ceasefire would be the “natural entry point for direct negotiations” with Israel and that the withdrawal of Israeli troops in southern Lebanon would be “a fundamental step.”FIGHTING CONTINUES IN SOUTH LEBANONFighting continued to rage in south Lebanon, notably in the Lebanese border town of Bint Jbeil, a Hezbollah stronghold and strategic prize. A senior Lebanese official said Lebanon believed Israel wanted to secure a victory in Bint Jbeil before diplomatic progress could be made.An Israeli strike destroyed the last bridge over the Litani River into the south, a senior Lebanese security source said, fully severing almost a tenth of Lebanon from the rest of the country after Israel destroyed other crossings during the war.Israeli attacks have killed more than 2,100 people in Lebanon since March 2 and forced more than 1.2 million to flee, Lebanese authorities say.Reuters
