Israel pounded Lebanon with its heaviest strikes yet on Wednesday, killing hundreds of people and drawing a threat of retaliation from Iran, which suggested it would be “unreasonable” to proceed with talks to forge a permanent peace deal with the United States.
The warning from Iran’s lead negotiator, parliament speaker Mohammed Bager Qalibaf, laid bare the continued volatility in the region following Tuesday’s ceasefire announcement by President Donald Trump. The two sides have laid out sharply contrasting agendas for peace talks set to start on Saturday, but it was unclear whether the two-week ceasefire would hold until then.
Qalibaf said Israel had already violated several conditions of that ceasefire by ramping up its parallel war against the Iran-aligned militia Hezbollah, while the United States had violated the agreement by insisting that Iran abandon its nuclear ambitions.
“In such a situation, a bilateral ceasefire or negotiations were unreasonable,” he said in a statement.
Israel and the United States both said the two-week ceasefire did not cover Lebanon, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the strikes would continue.
In a televised address on Wednesday evening, Netanyahu said Lebanon was not part of the ceasefire with Iran and the Israeli military was continuing to strike Hezbollah with force.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt and Vice President JD Vance also said on Wednesday that Lebanon was not included in the truce.
“I think this comes from a legitimate misunderstanding. I think the Iranians thought that the ceasefire included Lebanon, and it just didn’t,” Vance told reporters in Budapest.
Earlier, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, a key intermediary in the U.S.-Iran ceasefire talks, had said the truce would include Lebanon.
In a statement, Hezbollah condemned what it called Israel’s “barbaric aggression” and said the attacks underscored its right to respond.
Hezbollah had stopped attacking Israeli targets early on Wednesday, three Lebanese sources close to the group told Reuters. The group’s last public statement on its military activity was posted at 1 a.m., saying it had targeted Israeli troops inside Lebanon on Tuesday evening.
“Hezbollah was informed that it is part of the ceasefire – so we abided by it, but Israel as usual has violated it and committed massacres all across Lebanon,” senior Hezbollah lawmaker Ibrahim al-Moussawi told Reuters.
Another Hezbollah lawmaker, Hassan Fadlallah, told Reuters there would be “repercussions for the entire agreement” if Israel’s attacks continued.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards warned the U.S. and Israel it would deliver a “regret-inducing response” if attacks on Lebanon did not stop.
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun condemned Wednesday’s strikes and said French President Emmanuel Macron had told him he was ready to make a diplomatic push for Lebanon to be included in any ceasefire.
A senior Lebanese official had earlier told Reuters that Lebanon had not taken part in correspondence leading up to the ceasefire.
Most of Wednesday’s strikes were in civilian-populated areas, Israel’s military said. Hours before the attacks, the military had issued warnings for some areas of southern Beirut and southern Lebanon. No such warning was given for central Beirut, which was also hit.
Following the strikes, Israeli military spokesperson Avichay Adraee said on X that Hezbollah had moved out of its traditional Shi’ite stronghold in southern Beirut’s Dahiyeh neighborhood to religiously mixed areas elsewhere.
He said Israel’s military would pursue Hezbollah wherever it was.
The Israeli military said it attacked a Hezbollah commander in Beirut, without providing further details.
In a western neighborhood of Beirut that was hit by a strike, Naim Chebbo, 51, swept up shards of glass that had been blown out of the window frames by the force of the blast.
“Tonight I’m not going to sleep because I’m going to be afraid that it’s happening again. I’m living a nightmare,” he told Reuters.
‘LEBANON CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE’
Israel also struck the last remaining bridge linking southern Lebanon to the rest of the country on Wednesday, a senior Lebanese security source said. The bridge ran over the Litani River, which runs about 30 kilometers north of the border with Israel.
An Israeli military spokesperson said the area south of the Litani was “disconnected from Lebanon.”
Israel has said it intends to occupy the area as a “buffer zone.” It has struck hospitals and power stations there, and thousands of Lebanese civilians still living there say they have been struggling with a shortage of food and medicine.
Israel has issued evacuation orders covering around 15% of Lebanese territory, mostly in the south and in suburbs south of Beirut. More than 1.2 million people have been displaced.
Many had hoped a ceasefire could allow them to return. Outside a school sheltering displaced people in the southern Lebanese city of Sidon, people had piled their pillows and blankets onto cars, thinking they could return home.
Before Wednesday’s attacks, more than 1,500 had been killed in Israel’s air and ground campaign across Lebanon, including more than 130 children.
“Hopefully a ceasefire will be reached,” said Ahmed Harm, a 54-year-old man displaced from Beirut’s southern suburbs. “Lebanon can’t take it anymore.”
© Thomson Reuters 2026.
