Saturday, June 27, 2026

06/26 Links Pt1: US-Israel-Lebanon sign trilateral framework agreement aimed at dismantling Hezbollah; The UN’s ‘War Crimes’ Recycling Op; US strikes Iranian military sites after drone attack on commercial vessel

From Ian:

US-Israel-Lebanon sign trilateral framework agreement aimed at dismantling Hezbollah
The United States, Israel, and Lebanon signed a trilateral framework agreement aimed at combating Iran-backed Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah on Friday, after days of US-mediated talks in Washington.

According to a US State Department statement, the agreement outlines a structured process for disarming Hezbollah, dismantling terrorist infrastructure, and enabling the IDF to withdraw from Lebanon once the threat posed by Hezbollah is removed.

The agreement also established a US-facilitated trilateral Military Coordination Group for Lebanon (MCG4L) to ensure the implementation of the framework.

The US, according to the statement, will also take steps to improve the capabilities of the Lebanese Armed Forces and support Lebanese military efforts against Hezbollah.

In addition, the US pledged to contribute $100 million for humanitarian assistance to be coordinated with the United Nations.

A first step towards peace, prosperity, and mutual coexistence
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio commended Israeli and Lebanese leadership and delegations for their participation in the talks and for signing the agreement.

While Rubio noted that there is still much work ahead, he highlighted the importance of the framework and stated that the US is “honored to have played a part in bringing this together.”

“Today is the first step. This first step sometimes is the hardest one, but it’s an important one and the one we’ve taken together,” Rubio stated, adding that he hopes the agreement will bring about “a future of peace, a future of prosperity, a future of mutual coexistence.”

During the signing of the agreements, Israeli Ambassador to the US Yechiel Leiter praised the trilateral cooperation as a “historical” move towards peace between Israel and Lebanon.

“In my opening remarks four days ago, I expressed concern that this train was running off the tracks, that Iran and its proxies wanted a trainwreck,” Leiter recounted.
Full text of Israel-Lebanon ‘framework’ deal that includes slight IDF pullback

Ron Arad remains talks spark skepticism, ex Mossad official says negotiations could help search
Following a Lebanese report that contacts are underway to bring back the remains of Israeli navigator Ron Arad, who was captured in Lebanon in 1986, his friend Ronen Meir told 103FM on Wednesday that listeners should keep the matter in perspective: "We are overwhelmed with attempts and disappointments."

Meir, a friend of Arad who graduated with him from the flight course during their time in the IDF, spoke on 103FM with Prof. Aryeh Eldad and Ron Kaufman about the report.

In light of the report from Al Jadeed, according to which the political negotiations between Lebanon and Israel are expected to include the possibility of a deal in which Arad's remains would be exchanged for Lebanese prisoners, Meir dampened expectations.

"That sounds to me somewhat absurd, if not delusional," he said. "We are saturated with previous attempts of this kind. From my familiarity with our enemies and neighbors, this tune always plays, and we are saturated with disappointments on this matter."

"Let's assume that the Lebanese do indeed have information about Ron and want to bargain with it. The best and simplest thing they could do is send a sample so we can see whether there is someone to talk to. To refute it through a journalist does not seem to me like a serious channel for anyone who wants to deal with such a complicated issue."

Meir referred to Israel's past and present efforts: "It is worth noting that only a few weeks ago, the Israeli government sent a commando force with four Yas'ur helicopters into Lebanon in an attempt to recover Ron's body, and we almost left a great many dead there. With all the pain and my personal desire to solve the mystery of my friend, we need to be careful about fantasies and fleeing into unrealistic areas."

"The ethos of not abandoning a soldier should not go back to Ron. One can look two and a half years back and see what happened to that ethos when we had living civilians and soldiers in captivity, and some of them returned in body bags. The question is what price we are prepared to pay for that ethos. It is legitimate to use judgment," he continued.

To conclude, Meir recalled the family's position over the years: "In Ron's case, his mother Batia Arad gave her testament while she was still alive and said she did not want any soldier to risk his life if it is known that Ron is no longer alive."

"Tami Arad, my friend, said immediately that same night of the commando operation that 'we said from the outset that for Ron's body, not even one soldier should be put at risk.' If there were really anything to the reports, the first thing they would do is give a sample. How many samples have we already received that we have discovered were donkey bones? It simply does not seem serious to me."


Vance, Rubio split on Iran war, Israel in Lebanon, as White House denies divergence
US President Donald Trump's administration has pushed hard to present a united front on the Iran war, but statements by his vice president and secretary of state have at times diverged over the past week, especially on the subject of Israel.

Vice President JD Vance, speaking at the White House last week, lashed out against Israeli critics of the preliminary US-Iran deal. He suggested that Israeli bombings of civilian infrastructure in Beirut - intended to weaken Hezbollah, which has been attacking Israel - were undermining US-led peace efforts.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who traveled through the Gulf this week, defended Israel's military campaign in Lebanon, repeatedly describing its actions as a justified response to Hezbollah attacks. Pressed on Vance's criticism, Rubio deflected before recounting an assault by the Lebanon-based terror group on an Israeli checkpoint earlier in the week.

The contrast suggests that, even as the administration has emphasized unity, differing worldviews are at times rising to the surface - a challenge for a White House whose political coalition is deeply divided on foreign policy matters. It also offers an early glimpse of the Republican Party’s future, with Rubio and Vance both seen as potential 2028 presidential contenders.

Both Vance and Rubio were dispatched on high-profile trips abroad over the past week to defend the preliminary peace accord inked between Washington and Tehran on June 17.

Vance traveled to Switzerland for a round of talks with Iranian officials. Speaking to reporters on Sunday, he struck a decidedly optimistic tone on the state of talks with Iran. He has also said repeatedly in recent weeks that Gulf states could fund Iran's reconstruction.

He has also frequently mentioned the possibility of a new, more cooperative relationship between Iran and the US, revealing in an interview released on Thursday that the US had invited an Iranian intelligence official to serve as a deconfliction liaison with the Pentagon in Qatar.

Rubio, meanwhile, visited the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Bahrain to reassure allies, some of whom are concerned that the interim US-Iran accord is too generous to Tehran, that their interests will be protected.

On Tuesday, Rubio said he would not ask Gulf allies during his trip to fund Iran's reconstruction, saying such a possibility was "far down the road." During a meeting with regional officials on Thursday, he emphasized that any deal has to be ironclad as it relates to US interests and those of its allies.

"While we want a deal, we don't want a deal at any price," he said.


US, Israel, Lebanon agreement as ‘first step to restoring Lebanon’s sovereignty,' Aoun says
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun praised the signing of a trilateral agreement between the US, Lebanon, and Israel as “the first step on the path to restoring Lebanon's sovereignty” in a post on X/Twitter on Friday after the framework was signed in Washington.

The agreement is aimed at disarming and dismantling the Iran-backed terrorist organization Hezbollah, in addition to enabling the IDF to withdraw from Lebanon once the threat posed by Hezbollah is removed.

Aoun thanked US President Donald Trump and American officials for hosting the Israel-Lebanon talks and for their support in reaching the agreement. Aoun also extended his gratitude to Lebanon’s delegation for their efforts in the negotiations.

Aoun described the agreement as the beginning of a road to bring about freedom and dignity to the people of Lebanon, “who sacrificed, endured, and confronted the harshest conditions.”

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam responded to the agreement signed between Israel and Lebanon in Washington on Friday, saying that the framework required a full Israeli withdrawal from all Lebanese territory.

Salam added that the agreement obligates Lebanon to extend state authority over the country's territory through its armed forces. Hezbollah reacts to agreement

Hezbollah lawmaker Hassan Fadlallah said Lebanese authorities would not be able to enforce a framework agreement signed with Israel in Washington on Friday unless, with US support, "they go to civil war," Al Mayadeen reported on Friday, after talks aimed at ending fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed group.

Fadlallah said Hezbollah would confront any measure taken by Lebanese authorities and would hold on to its weapons even more, adding that the group's opposition was "serious" and would not allow authorities to implement their commitments on the ground.


Seth Mandel: The UN’s ‘War Crimes’ Recycling Op
About a third of the way through the latest UN-associated report accusing Israel of genocide, I realized why it felt like I’d read this before. It wasn’t just because of the subject, though such reports are by now a dime a dozen. It was because I was reading an already-debunked accusation from a prior report.

In other words, I had already read this.

The report was a lazy remix presented to the UN as an independent document by experts. Sure, they added a new unfounded accusation here and there, but the conclusion was predetermined and based to a large degree on other people’s previous lies about Israel.

I’ll explain. The report is focused on “Israel’s deliberate targeting of Palestinian children” as proof that the Jewish state is committing the “crime of genocide.”

Which means it sets out to do two things: to show that Israel deliberately targets Palestinian children because they are children, and to argue that this targeting itself amounts to genocide.

Now, because genocide requires intent, the conclusion of the report never gets off the ground. So even by its own “standards” (to use that term very, very loosely) it unintentionally absolves Israel of genocide while merely claiming to do otherwise.

What we’re left with, then, is a list of unsubstantiated Israeli crimes. A representative case: Parents of an injured girl inside a tent claimed she was shot by a quadcopter outside the tent, and to substantiate the accusation, the commission looked at “images” of what they were told was the bullet. The shooting and the victim were intentional because, they said, no one else was shot.

The great risk faced by the authors, then, was that someone might actually read the report and realize just how flimsy the methodology was. As long as absolutely no one read beyond the headline, the commission members’ reputations could plausibly survive it.

What’s even the point of putting out a report like this? When I saw the Washington Post story about the new genocide claim, I understood why the report was issued: headlines that generate other headlines for the public to ingest and then move on. We are living in a time of Idiocracy-style institutional embarrassment. Democracy, as you may have heard, dies in darkness.


Benjamin Weinthal: Iran nuclear deal hinges on IAEA access to long-blocked atomic weapon sites, experts say
Having crushed Iran's nuclear capabilities during two wars in joint attacks with the Israelis, the latest and most significant chapter of whether there will be peace is whether the regime will allow inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to its nuclear weapons facilities.

Conflicting statements and reports from President Trump and Iran's Foreign Ministry suggest the U.N.’s IAEA will face the same recalcitrant policy from Tehran it has experienced for two decades in blocking its inspectors from conducting robust verification of the clerical regime’s vast nuclear facilities, including underground compounds. The IAEA sticking point might be a deal-breaker for President Trump.

David Albright, who is widely viewed as one of the world’s leading experts on Iran’s nuclear weapons program, told Fox News Digital the "IAEA comes up short" in its efforts to secure information and verification about Iran’s nuclear weapons program because "Iran has not cooperated for twenty years."

IAEA inspectors in Iran
Unidentified International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors at the nuclear research center of Natanz on Jan. 20, 2014. (Kazem Ghane /IRNA/AFP via Getty Images)

Albright, a physicist and president of the Institute for Science and International Security said, "Iran loves to generate plans of action that can be extended" and the process becomes a "pointless exercise."

For Iran experts like Albright, Iran’s skill in the art of procrastination has allowed it to stretch out talks over the decades while working to advance its work on a nuclear weapons device and a missile system to deliver it.

As a result, Albright said "it colors my view of the MOU [Memorandum of Understanding]" agreed to between the U.S. and Iran that codifies IAEA inspections of Iran’s atomic weapons program.

Albright sees the IAEA as a key test for the success of U.S.-Iran talks. "The way Iran treats the IAEA will tell us if the negotiations are meaningful," adding that Tehran’s regime has treated the IAEA terribly in the past.

The website of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs declared in a statement that "Foreign Ministry Spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei, speaking to reporters, denied reports published by certain media outlets claiming that the Islamic Republic of Iran has invited the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to inspect its nuclear facilities."


Rubio says Iran’s compliance will be judged by actions in Strait of Hormuz, not Tehran’s promises
Washington will judge Iran’s compliance with the recent Memorandum of Understanding by its actions, not its rhetoric, particularly whether commercial shipping continues to move freely through the Strait of Hormuz, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Thursday.

“What we’re interested in is not their press conferences,” he told reporters at the Sheraton Hotel in Manama, Bahrain, during a Middle East trip to meet with U.S. allies amid ongoing negotiations with Iran. “What we’re interested in is whether or not ships are moving.”

Rubio reiterated that the United States opposes any fees or tolls on vessels transiting the strategic waterway.

“If you’re paying someone to go, I don’t care if you call it a fee or a toll or a donation, it’s a toll,” he said. “That’s how we’re going to define it. That’s an international waterway. There isn’t a nation on earth that supports having to pay money to go through the straits.”

Asked about his previous description of Iran’s leaders as “religious, theocratic lunatics,” Rubio stood by the characterization.

“Well, it’s not that I believe it, it’s the fact of the matter,” he said. “The Iranian system is led by clerics, radical clerics. That’s what it’s always been led by, and that’s what it continues to be led by.”
US strikes Iranian military sites after drone attack on commercial vessel
U.S. forces have renewed strikes against Iran on Friday in response to the Islamic Republic’s attack on a commercial ship in the Strait of Hormuz, according to U.S. Central Command.

“U.S. aircraft struck Iranian missile and drone storage locations and coastal radar sites after Iran hit M/V Ever Lovely on June 25 with a one-way attack drone,” CENTCOM stated. “The Singapore-flagged cargo ship was exiting the Strait of Hormuz along the Omani coast at the time of Iran’s attack.”

CENTCOM called the attack an “unwarranted aggression” that “clearly violated the ceasefire,” echoing remarks by U.S. President Donald Trump hours earlier.

“Furthermore, Iran’s dangerous behavior undermined freedom of navigation as commerce increasingly flows through the vital international trade corridor,” the command stated.

CENTCOM added that U.S. forces will “continue to provide safe passage coordination and support to commercial vessels transiting the strait” and remain “present and vigilant to ensure all aspects of the agreement with Iran are adhered to, obeyed, and in full force and effect.”


Four IDF soldiers wounded in Hezbollah grenade attack in Lebanon
Four Israel Defense Forces officers and soldiers were wounded on Thursday in a close-quarters encounter with a Hezbollah terrorist in Southern Lebanon, the military said in a statement.

One officer was moderately wounded and the rest sustained light injuries. They were evacuated to the hospital to receive medical treatment and their families were notified about their condition, the IDF added.

The incident took place in the Beit Yahoun area north of Bint Jbeil in the central part of the IDF-established Security Zone, according to Ynet.

The terrorist approached the Israeli force of the Hiram Brigade and hurled a grenade at the soldiers from a nearby building, the report said, quoting military sources.

In response, the 91st Division fired at Hezbollah positions in the area with artillery and air forces.

In a separate statement, the IDF said that Golani Brigade combat team forces under the command of the 36th Division operating in the Zawtar El Charqiyeh area near the Beaufort Castle identified earlier in the day five Hezbollah terrorists who posed a threat to the troops.


Gazans plan ‘Day of Rage’ protests against Hamas
Mass demonstrations against Hamas are scheduled to take place across the Gaza Strip on Friday in what organizers are calling a “Day of Rage,” part of a broader campaign also referred to as the “June 26 Revolution.”

Organizers say rally locations will be announced shortly before the protests begin to reduce the risk of Hamas disrupting the demonstrations or identifying participants.

Ahed Al Hendi, a senior fellow at the Center for Peace Communications, told JNS that the primary objective of the demonstrations is “simple.”

“Gazans are demanding an end to Hamas rule and an end to the cycle of war and destruction that Hamas brought upon them,” he said. “This is not something that appeared suddenly. It is part of a longer social current inside Gaza that has existed for years.”

He also pointed to the involvement of the “We Want to Live” movement, a grassroots campaign that emerged during anti-Hamas protests in 2019. Abdullah Hwaihi, co-founder of the movement and an anti-Hamas activist living in Gaza, has said he was repeatedly arrested and tortured by the terror group.

Al Hendi told JNS that “We Want to Live” began “as a cry from ordinary Gazans against poverty, corruption, taxation, repression and Hamas’s control over every aspect of life,” noting that anti-Hamas protests also took place in July 2023, months before the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel.

The Center for Peace Communications, which works to empower civilians in the Arab world to counter extremism, has documented how Hamas placed Palestinians in Gaza “under a communications blockade.”

Al Hendi called Friday’s planned demonstrations a “continuation of a Gazan phenomenon: people inside Gaza saying clearly that Hamas does not represent them, that they want to live and that they want the nightmare of Hamas rule and endless war to end.”
Bucking threats, hundreds in Gaza seen protesting Hamas for first time in a year
Hundreds of Palestinians took to the streets in the Gaza Strip on Friday to protest the Hamas terror group, footage shared on social media appeared to show.

The demonstrations against Hamas – which functions as the de facto government in the parts of the Strip not controlled by the Israeli military – were planned several weeks in advance, with activists pledging a major turnout on July 26.

But as the date approached, Hamas operatives began issuing threats against Gazans considering taking part in the protests, which may well have impacted turnout.

Footage appeared to show protesters carrying signs reading, “God willing, Hamas out,” “We are not pawns,” and “We want to live.” In one video, chants of “Enough with the destruction” (of Gaza) could be heard.

It was unclear where exactly in the Strip the protests were taking place.

Other footage appeared to show armed Hamas operatives deployed in the streets to prevent demonstrations.


Jake Wallis Simons: The Sky News interview with Tucker Carlson is a horseshoe of betrayal
What lies behind this Carlson interview? According to former Sky presenter Colin Brazier, whom I interviewed alongside former BBC executive Danny Cohen on my podcast, The Brink, it begins with declining audiences.

Part of the reason why viewers are abandoning mainstream television in such numbers is a lack of trust, as channels demonstrate time and time again that they are more interested in projecting a liberal worldview than reporting the facts.

Falling numbers has meant that ratings are no longer a measure of success for broadcasters, causing journalists to try to win industry awards instead. The way to do this is to conform to the prevailing ideological orthodoxy of the profession, which is shot through with antipathy towards the West and Israelophobia.

More recently, however, as the numbers have continued to slip south, Sky News and other broadcasters have taken a fresh approach towards halting their decline. Here lies the true irony.

As a result of mainstream outlets abandoning standards of impartiality, alternative media figures like Carlson, who have no obligation to play by any semblance of the rules, have attracted massive audiences.

Rather than fixing their reputation for objectivity, however, outfits like Sky News are now desperately courting the monsters of their own creation to bask in their reflected glory.

That is how Hakim’s interview with Carlson can be understood: as a horseshoe of betrayal. The more desperate legacy outlets get for audiences, the more closely they are aping the figures whose main contribution to our culture is to contaminate our lives with falsehood and debase the public conversation.

So we arrive at an overlap between Sky News and the most dangerous demagogue in America. They are both as bad as each other.





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