Israeli strikes hit Beirut’s southern suburbs on Sunday, targeting alleged Hezbollah infrastructure, as mediators push the United States and Iran toward a deal that Israel says would be unacceptable in its current form. The timing comes after Israel’s previous
Smoke rose over Beirut on Sunday as Israeli strikes hit the city’s southern suburbs, targeting what Israel described as Hezbollah infrastructure, even as mediators pressed the United States and Iran toward a ceasefire framework.
The Israeli military said the strikes were launched despite ongoing efforts to negotiate an end to the U.S.-Iran war. The operation immediately sharpened the stakes for diplomacy, with Israel’s government warning that such attacks would interfere with any agreement.
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz said the strikes were a response to Hezbollah attacks on the north of the country. In an earlier statement Sunday. Israel’s military said Hezbollah had launched three projectiles into northern Israel. releasing footage that showed an audible boom followed by a column of smoke rising above the tree line.
In Beirut. an Associated Press photographer reported that the building hit was a five-story apartment structure with shops on the bottom floor. The two lower floors were the most heavily damaged. Residents of the southern suburbs—many of whom had returned home after weeks of relative calm—were seen fleeing the area.
The latest strike came a week after Israel hit Beirut suburbs again, an attack that set off what Israel described as the most serious escalation of fighting between Iran and Israel since a tenuous ceasefire took hold on April 7.
Israel’s broader campaign in Lebanon has pushed deeper than it has in more than a quarter century. Hezbollah’s attacks have continued alongside that pressure. including a set of missile strikes into Israel on March 2—two days after the United States and Israel attacked Iran. sparking a wider war across the region.
For the negotiators trying to stop the wider conflict. the immediate danger isn’t only what happens in the air—it’s what happens to momentum. Iran has said it wants a ceasefire deal that includes fighting in Lebanon. along with the release of billions of dollars in frozen funds. But as talks continued, Israel said it had been sidelined in negotiations led by Pakistan and others.
Netanyahu’s office said the strikes were intended to respond to Hezbollah’s actions, but the timing landed squarely in the middle of a diplomatic sprint. Qatari mediators traveled to Tehran on Sunday to finalize the agreement, according to two regional officials.
Those officials—who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media—expressed cautious optimism that the United States and Iran were approaching an agreement that could halt hostilities that have killed thousands of people and reopen the Strait of Hormuz. whose closure has thrown world markets into disarray.
The push for a fast signing is also part of the pressure. U.S. President Donald Trump and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said Saturday that the deal would be signed on Sunday. while Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said it could happen in the coming days. Trump said the Strait of Hormuz would open immediately after the signing.
The framework being discussed is expected to be signed electronically, without an in-person ceremony, though it remains unclear when and how the signing would occur.
Even if a deal is reached, it does not settle the hardest issues between Washington and Tehran. The agreement under discussion does not resolve disputes over Iran’s nuclear program or frozen assets. but it does provide a 60-day framework for technical discussions on those topics. according to Pakistani and regional officials familiar with the negotiations.
Those same officials described Pakistan’s months-long effort to keep both sides from walking out and said the talks had faced repeated near-collapse.
Under the current framework, U.S. and Israel appear to have fallen short of original goals that included destroying Iran’s missile and nuclear programs and ending support for proxies. It remains unclear how the deal will address those points—or whether they will be part of the final agreement.
Back in the United States. critics inside Trump’s Republican Party have been uneasy about the terms. especially with an unpopular war looming over the midterm elections. Some argued the proposed arrangement does not improve on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal that Trump withdrew from during his first term and still calls “bad.”.
Trump, meanwhile, was expected to discuss demining the Strait of Hormuz during the Group of Seven summit that begins Monday. The waterway is vital for oil and natural gas shipments, as well as related products such as fertilizer, and the effective closure has destabilized the global economy.
Uranium remains at the center of long-running tensions. Iran’s nuclear program and highly enriched uranium have long been a focus of concern for the United States and Israel. The International Atomic Energy Agency has said Iran has 440.9 kilograms (972 pounds) of uranium enriched up to 60% purity. a short technical step from weapons-grade levels of 90%. Iran has maintained that its nuclear program is peaceful and has not publicly committed to giving up its enriched uranium. It is believed to be buried under three nuclear sites badly damaged by U.S. strikes last year.
On social media, Trump asserted that once conditions are calm, the U.S. would go in and “downblend and destroy” the enriched uranium in Iran or in the U.S.
In Beirut, the human cost of the timing was immediate. Residents watched their neighborhood change again while mediators tried to close a diplomatic gap—an effort now forced to contend with the reality that strikes, negotiations, and the next rounds of retaliation may be moving on parallel tracks.
Israeli strikes Beirut Hezbollah infrastructure U.S.-Iran deal Trump Pakistan mediators Qatari mediators Strait of Hormuz Iran uranium enrichment