Israel and Hezbollah agree ceasefire, as more Lebanon strikes reported

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1:04Hello, I'm Celia Hatton, coming to you live from our studio in central London. Welcome to NewsHour from the BBC World Service. Two leaders signed the framework agreement between the US and Iran this week, Donald Trump and Iran's Masoud Pazeshkin. But it's increasingly clear that two other entities are a key to the success of that deal, Israel and Hezbollah. It's outlined as point one of the U.S.-Iran agreement, Tehran's demand that Israel end its war against the Hezbollah militia group in Lebanon. Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, though, was in no mood for a ceasefire after Hezbollah killed four Israeli soldiers, vowing to extract a very heavy price from the Iranian-backed group.

1:48On Friday, Lebanon's health ministry said Israeli airstrikes killed at least 47 people, including two children. As the fighting continued, talks between the United States and Iran, scheduled to start in Switzerland, were postponed. Though just a few hours ago, a U.S. official said Israel and Hezbollah had agreed to another ceasefire. How long will this iteration of a ceasefire last? Every Defran, an army spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces, the IDF, said Israel would keep a military presence in Lebanon and strike again if thought necessary. During the night and until now, the IDF has attacked more than 100 Hezbollah targets.

2:34We have eliminated dozens of terrorists. The strikes will continue as needed. Our fighters in southern Lebanon continue to destroy terrorist infrastructure. I want to make it clear, our forces on the ground have full operational freedom to deal with any threats in the area. We are there and we will act to protect the citizens of Israel. We are a buffer. That's the purpose. Dr. Ahmad Zarek is an emergency care doctor in Nabatea Governmental Hospital. He told us what the night had been like under Israeli bombardment. So last night it was like a disaster. The amount of bombs that were thrown on us, the amount of rockets, the amount of patient warriors that were wounded, the amount of dead bodies that came to us, it feels like the first days of the war.

3:17We have now a patient. She's making also scans, total body and making x-rays for extremities. And when she comes back, we'll have to know what is happening and surgeon will complete the work. And her small daughter, she's about 13 years, she's also murdered by the rockets. Dr. Zarek told us the majority of those injured are civilians. Maybe like more than 90 % of them are like civilians. If there's injuries about in the head, this woman, she'll have amputation maybe for three toes in her right leg. We didn't see the head, but there is a big wound in there. A lot of these cases we are having now, like there are civilians.

3:59They don't have guns, they don't have nothing. They're just sitting in their houses. Our Middle East correspondent Hugo Bashega spent the day in the southern city of Nabatea. Yeah, we spent part of the day at a hospital in the city of Nabatea in the south of the country, which has been a key target in this war, and it was very, very active. We were there for about three hours, and those attacks didn't really stop. We were at a hospital at the top of a hill, so with a very good view of not only Nabatia, but also of nearby villages. And I think there was a moment where I could see plumes of smoke, very dense plumes of smoke, rising from about half a dozen places.

4:39And to give you an idea of how intense it was, The rescuers based there were not being deployed. They told us that so many of their colleagues had been killed by Israeli attacks that they thought it was too dangerous for them to head out. And the morgue was full with more than 40 bodies, and the bodies that were arriving were being put on the floor because the morgue was full. So it was a very violent day. There's a new ceasefire. I've lost track of how many ceasefire deals have been announced in this war. So people are obviously hoping that this time there will finally be some quiet here. Hugo, you mentioned the ceasefire, but Israel says it has no intention of pulling its troops out of Lebanon.

5:20So what does that mean for this latest announcement? This is very important because attacks have continued even after the announcement of this new ceasefire. And obviously, this doesn't mean that the war in Lebanon is over because a huge chunk of Lebanese territory in the south of the country is under Israeli occupation. And the Israeli authorities are saying that they have no plans for now to pull out from Lebanon. They say that they will continue there in those areas along the border. They will continue to dismantle infrastructure being used by Hezbollah. and they say that they want to create a security zone along the border to protect those communities in the north of the country from Hezbollah's rockets and drones.

6:08So even though I think there is the hope here that the ceasefire will finally bring some respite to the people of Lebanon, this is by no means a permanent truce and it doesn't mean that the war has finally come to an end. And how active has Hezbollah been in returning the strikes by Israel? The escalation that happened today was the Israeli response to the killing of four Israeli soldiers in southern Lebanon overnight by Hezbollah. So Hezbollah continues to have the ability to attack those Israeli soldiers that remain in southern Lebanon. It was also attacking some parts of Israel a few weeks ago.

6:48So it means that the group has been weakened, but it continues to have the ability to carry out these attacks. Our Middle East correspondent Hugo Boshaga. Staying with this, Yezid Saig is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Centre in Beirut. Dr. Saig was also an advisor, negotiator and policy planner in the Palestinian delegation to the peace talks with Israel from 1991 to 2002. I asked him what he thought of the ceasefire that was announced today in Lebanon. I think that any ceasefire is going to be fragile for quite a while, in part because the entire U.S.-Iran negotiating process itself is only currently regulated by a temporary memorandum of understanding.

7:33Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may attempt by striking Lebanon to sabotage the U.S.-Iran deal yet again, as he's done in the past. And of course, after the 60 days, it all depends on how U.S.-Iran talks go. So the ceasefire is very vulnerable. And of course, Iran itself has used Hezbollah at times to sort of respond to Israel and to the United States to raise the pressure at times. So what we can hope for is that this ceasefire or a ceasefire that will be, let's say, the current U.S.-Iran ceasefire, if it is enforced for Lebanon as well, then at least it will hold for a while. In the longer term, there's going to be the very serious issue of the Israeli continuing occupation of parts of South Lebanon.

8:25And then there is the question of Hezbollah's weapons and whether it will finally agree to start disarming and reintegrating in different ways into the Lebanese state civil service and armed forces. So that is going to be a tricky process. And that's where things might come apart once more. There have been discussions recently about how to strengthen the Lebanese state. You just outlined some of its weaknesses. A lot of regional states have been involved in those discussions, including Egypt and Saudi Arabia. What do you make of the chances of that strategy working? Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey and Qatar, if I'm not mistaken, have produced a new draft framework agreement that builds on the so-called Ta 'if agreement, which ended the Lebanese civil war, but which in significant ways was never fully implemented.

9:18And so what they've done, and I think this is very astute, is to build on that existing document and to try and revive this with some modifications as a way of offering everyone things that they want, such as administrative decentralization, financial decentralization, which gives more power to local communities. This could placate the Christian Maronites, for instance. It could also reassure the Shia Muslims, who are the bedrock of Hezbollah's rank and file. It could reassure them all that they're not going to be excluded or discriminated against in a new Lebanon, in which Hezbollah finally agrees to forego its autonomy as a military actor.

10:01The critical question is whether Israel, Iran and Hezbollah itself will try and make this work. And I think one issue here, which is important on the Hezbollah and Iranian side, is that Iran has seen that its true deterrence wasn't its nuclear program, nor was Hezbollah the deterrent factor. It was Iran's ballistic missiles and drones and its ability to close the Strait of Hormuz. Given that, it might be more willing to prod Hezbollah towards reintegrating into the Lebanese state to give up its weapons, at least its heavy weapons, and thereby to reassure Israel. And the real question then we're left with is that Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has, I think, demonstrated very clearly that he's following a forever war strategy.

10:53This is something that suits him in terms of his domestic political standing. It makes him a sort of a war prime minister. And he might not actually like a deal that removes the Hezbollah threat, that it removes the Iranian nuclear threat, such as it is, and leaves him basically with peace on all fronts as a prospect. And that might not actually suit his political strategy. Just to circle back to Iran for a moment and its role in all of this. I mean, you said that Iran might be more willing now than before to rein in Hezbollah, but is it able to do so? How dependent is Hezbollah on Tehran, both for financial backing, but also political backing?

11:35I think Hezbollah is highly dependent on Iran now, and much more so than two years ago, when it was still led by its Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah. The assassination of Nasrallah, the decapitation of much of the Hezbollah command, brought Iranian leadership and command and control far more extensively into Hezbollah than ever before. Previously, Hezbollah was much more a partner to Iran, whereas in the last two years or so, Hezbollah has become far more closely tied to Iranian command. And in that sense, I don't think Hezbollah can easily buck any Iranian policy pressure to go in a new direction.

12:16So if Iran wants this, and I think, again, for once, a pragmatic Iranian leadership, which may be what we have now, which increasingly thinks in ways that seek some sort of compromise and coexistence with its neighboring states, but also the United States, this kind of Iran might well see that its own advantage lies in resolving the internal Lebanese relations vis -à-vis Hezbollah and vis -à-vis its weapons. So I think this is actually a very interesting moment where there's a lot of potential. And I suspect, frankly, at the end of this, that Netanyahu is the one joker in the pack who has a particular interest in sabotaging where things are going.

12:58and in also, I think, preempting the rise of this axis of Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Pakistan, Qatar, Egypt, who are actually offering a regional security approach to all issues, including normalizing with Israel, but on a different basis than the one Netanyahu wants, which includes, of course, denying completely any chance of Palestinian statehood and freedom. Dr. Yezid Sayek, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut. And there's more on this story in Lebanon and the wider U.S.-Iran deal available on the BBC website. As I mentioned, a new round of direct talks between the U.S. and Iran have been postponed.

13:37The White House announced that the Vice President, J.D. Vance, would not be traveling to the talks and said the logistics had not been simple or predictable. No word yet on when those talks might happen. Stay with us on NewsHour on the BBC World Service.

14:02Coming up, how the resident organist for the Boston Red Sox baseball team has been entertaining visiting Scottish football fans. So there's a song by the Proclaimers. It's called I'm Gonna Be, parentheses, 500 Miles. It's a wonderful song, very catchy. And I played it, and sure enough, everyone just went nuts.

14:26And some stories we're covering in the BBC newsroom. British emergency services are responding to a collision between two passenger trains in an area north of London. And the US government has confirmed it will end funding for South Africa's HIV programmes, linking the decision to unevidenced claims that white South Africans are being persecuted. Stay with us.

15:01You're listening to NewsHour. Now to a diplomatic spat between President Trump and his former close ally, Italy's Prime Minister, Giorgio Maloney. The reason? President Trump's comments to an Italian TV channel describing an encounter that he says took place at the G7 summit in France this week. Mr Trump told the channel that the Italian premier had begged him for a photo of them together and that he'd agreed because he said he felt sorry for her. Well, Ms Maloney gave her reaction on social media today.

15:37So some things deserve an immediate reply. Donald Trump's comments are completely made up. I'm frankly appalled. I don't know why the President of the United States behaves that way with his own allies, not that it's the first time it's happened. I can only say that it's a pity he doesn't have the same resolve when dealing with the enemies of the West, with the enemies of the United States and with their leaders, with whom instead he shows himself to be much more amenable. But he needs to bear one thing in mind. I never beg, and nor does Italy. More reaction, too, from the Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani.

16:11He was due to begin an official visit to the United States this weekend. But he's cancelled his trip because of Donald Trump's comments, which he called grave and offensive. Yelena Ielucaselli is an MP in Georgia Maloney's Brothers of Italy party. What did she make of Mr. Trump's comments? I think that Trump is not really able to understand that alliance. That doesn't mean to have people that just say yes, but alliance means to have someone that respects you and is able to say no. So I think that what made him nervous was the fact that he had in front a woman that was strong, capable to talk to him face to face, looking him in the eyes.

16:55She's very strong and very determined. And she's capable to say no, even if he's the president of the United States. Were you surprised at the strength of the response across the political landscape in Italy? No, I know Giordano Meloni pretty well. I was expecting something like that because there's no way that someone can say to her, first of all, lies, because he said that she was praying to have a picture with him. And who knows Georgia Meloni very well? And I can say I do. Knows perfectly that she will never ask for anything or praying for anything. That is a normal picture that in the meetings like this, we always saw on news, but it's not her character to ask for something like that.

17:49You know, it was saying a lie. So I was expecting that reaction. And I'm actually I really think it was the right one. We are in an Atlantic alliance and we want to be there. And the relationship between Italy and the United States are pretty old. We just had the 160 years anniversary of our diplomatic relationship. But if it's such a strong relationship, isn't it then an overreaction for the Italian foreign minister to cancel his trip to Washington? Well, I mean, I think that was more a reaction that was made without thinking. It was a reaction. So it could be another way to let everybody understand that we are proud to be Italian.

18:43We are where important things happen no matter what. And, you know, if you wake up in the morning and the first things on the news is that President Trump say something, lie about your president and say something that was pretty bad about the nation. Because when you say, you know, I feel sorry for her and you don't feel sorry for Italy. We don't have anything to feel sorry about from the United States, from President Trump. But the U.S. is one of Italy's top trading partners. If you could speak to Georgia Meloni, you say you're close with her. Isn't it important for her to get over this quickly in order to maintain a good relationship with the Trump administration?

19:24Yes, yes. As always, you know, it was this was not the first time that Trump said something about Georgia Meloni. And this is already done for us. This is done. He said something. We answered. That's it. And we are over already. We have a lot of things to think about. Yelena Lucasilli, an MP in Georgia Maloney's Brothers of Italy party.

19:52The Cuban dancer Carlos Acosta is one of the most influential figures in contemporary ballet. He's danced with some of the world's best companies. Several years ago, he moved beyond starring roles in ballets to become a choreographer and artistic director. and he's now created a training program for young dancers as part of his Acosta Danza Academy in the Cuban capital, Havana, the aim to promote the next generation of Cuban performers. Despite the increasing economic and political turmoil in Cuba, the youth group are currently touring a new show in the UK, which touches on some of those themes.

20:30Isabella Jewell went to meet them.

20:35there has been throughout the recent history a lot of exodus from the island and even recently as well we have experienced exodus massive exodus from cuba so i think susana pones the choreography wanted to tackle that theme that was always has been at the heart of the Cuban diaspora. Carlos Acosta's young dancers are putting in some last-minute practice before a week of dance performances at Sadler's Wells East in London.

21:07This dance is called Fua and touches upon a difficult reality for many Cubans, emigration. While official figures on this haven't been released by the government, Cuban economist Juan Carlos Albuzu Campos estimates that the island's population fell by 18 % between 2022 and 2023. And the situation on the island is getting worse. A fuel crisis due to the US blockade is causing regular blackouts and the collapse of Cuba's tourism industry. So how does Acosta Danza keep going? That's a major operation, but we try to do absolutely the best we can so that still these dancers can carry on having a future in dance in general and don't be distracted by what's going on in Cuba at the moment.

22:01I think we are very resilient and we also see our artistry as a refuge. So long as there is a place to dance and there is a sort of like a family vibe where we protect each other, we keep them motivated and keep their careers going. Heidi Nunez is one of the principal dancers in the Next Generation Showcase. In between rehearsals, she tells me why she connects so deeply with the choreography of the performance. I imagine the outside of the island as opportunities or dreams or maybe just someone that I miss so much. I have a duet, which is like a goodbye. So I try to picture someone that I miss and remember that specific time when I had to let that person go.

22:58All of the dancers are between 18 and 21 years old. There are several dancers on the bill, all exploring different themes and styles. Carlos Acosta explains his vision behind the performance. The entire evening, it has so many pathways, and so it offers what Acosta Danza is all about, which is a melting pot of dances, a fusion, a syncretism, as the symbol of the Cuban race, which, as we all know, is a sort of a melting pot of races.

23:37Acosta dancer Jornier are bringing the energy of youth and the colour of Cuba to the stage. A far cry from recent headlines about their island. Cuban ballet superstar Carlos Acosta, ending that report by the BBC's Isabella Jewell. Stay with us.

24:03Is the American dream still possible? I'm Asma Khalid, one of the hosts of the Global Story podcast from the BBC. One of the most successful exports the United States has ever sold the world is the American dream, that tantalizing promise of a better, freer, richer life. But is it still attainable? I feel like the American dream is alive, but not well. For more, listen to the Global Story on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Decisions made in Washington can affect your portfolio every day. But what policy changes should investors be watching? Listen to Washington Wise, an original podcast for investors from Charles Schwab, to hear the stories making news in Washington right now.

24:47Host Mike Townsend, Charles Schwab's Managing Director for Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, takes a non-partisan look at the stories that matter most to investors, including policy initiatives for retirement savings, taxes and trade, inflation concerns, the Federal Reserve, and how regulatory developments can affect companies, sectors, and even the entire market. Mike and his guests offer their perspective on how policy changes could affect what you do with your portfolio. Download the latest episode and follow at schwab.com slash Washington Wise or wherever you listen.

25:26Welcome back to NewsHour. The mother of Cap Verde's celebrated goalkeeper, Vozinha, has travelled to the US to watch the tiny country's next World Cup match in Miami. The veteran keeper's epic save helped Cap Verde hold European champion Spain to a draw in their first match in the tournament. The BBC's Paul Njie has travelled to Vozinha's home island, Sal Vicente to try and find out more about the keeper and met Vozinha's mother, who received a U.S. visa after fees were waived. We've traveled all the way because the island has been making global headlines. Not for music or art, but for Vozinha, the man who's making the country proud.

26:10We've just left the airport and are heading to the city center. From there, we'll go to the family home of Vozinha. South Ascent is a very small island, so we are eager to see what the mood and ambience would be like outside this family residence. It used to be crowded with excited residents, but not today, just robust canine surveillance. Hello, ma 'am. I meet Vozinha's mother, Anna Evora, and his siblings, who are still overjoyed by the recognition he's getting for his performance at the World Cup. Anna shows me pictures of the now veteran gold keeper in his youth. She was unable to travel to the US for his first ever World Cup match, leaving her 40-year-old son and millions of his newly gained followers emotional.