Israeli strikes reported in Lebanon, despite Hezbollah ceasefire

**Keith Adams** (0:00)
This is The Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.
I'm Keith Adams, and in the early hours of Saturday 20 June, these are our main stories. Israeli strikes are reported in Lebanon, despite a ceasefire with Hezbollah. The US government confirms its ending funding for South Africa's HIV programmes, and Afghanistan says it's launched strikes on two provinces in Pakistan, targeting suspected Islamic State militants.

**SPEAKER_2** (0:30)
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**Keith Adams** (0:46)
We say goodbye to the man who made countless US sitcoms, and a roundup from the Football World Cup as another host country makes it to the knockout stage.
There have been Israeli strikes reported in southern Lebanon after a ceasefire with Hezbollah came into effect. An Israeli military spokesman said its forces would continue to remove immediate threats. Hezbollah is yet to confirm the ceasefire, but the Iranian-backed group said the project to eliminate Hezbollah has failed. Our correspondent in Jerusalem, Charlotte Gallagher, has been following the conflict. She spoke to Valerie Sanderson.

**Charlotte Gallagher** (1:25)
No one said it's over, but it does seem slightly ridiculous to call it a ceasefire when you have Lebanese state media and also an ambulance service in southern Lebanon saying there have been 12 Israeli strikes in the minutes after the ceasefire was announced. We're also hearing from Lebanese state media that two people were killed in a drone strike in southern Lebanon after that ceasefire agreement came into effect.
I think the reason why it's not working, it's faltering is because essentially Israel has said it will not withdraw its troops from southern Lebanon. It calls it a security strip until Hezbollah disarm. Hezbollah have said they will not disarm until the IDF go. So it's kind of a stalemate situation. And I think that's why this ceasefire and the ceasefires before just don't work.

**Valerie Sanderson** (2:15)
This week has seen fierce criticism of the Israeli government from the Trump administration. How worried do you think is the Israeli government that the road could get worse?

**Charlotte Gallagher** (2:24)
I think for Benjamin Netanyahu, he's in a really difficult position because he's facing a lot of criticism, as you said, from President Trump and also JD Vance saying, essentially, be grateful. We are your most powerful ally. You need us. JD Vance was saying yesterday, we supply a lot of your weapons. So I think a bit of a warning, essentially, to, in Donald Trump's words, behave. But then he's facing the internal pressure. Politicians inside the country and also a lot of the public want the offensive push into southern Lebanon to continue. They want Hezbollah to be dismantled. And they feel like they have been sold out with this deal between Iran and the US. And it's actually made Israelis a lot less safe. So he's facing a very difficult decision. And I think it's almost impossible at this point to keep those two sides happy.

**Keith Adams** (3:11)
Charlotte Gallagher in Jerusalem.
The ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah came after concerns that the conflict in Lebanon would undermine the deal between the US and Iran. Peace talks to end their war were postponed on Friday due to the fighting. But there are reports US officials are now heading to Switzerland. So when might these negotiations resume? And will the truce between Washington and Tehran hold? Darren Selnick is the former chief of staff to the US defence secretary Pete Hegseth. He gave this assessment to Paul Henley.

**Darren Selnick** (3:45)
Well, it looks like everything is very fragile. Strait of Hormuz, it looks like Iran is playing games, trying to tie things again to Lebanon, trying to cut deals about insurance needed to go through the strait. This is a very bad start, to say the least.

**Paul Henley** (4:06)
And it's not a ceasefire, is it? Attacks continue in the south of Lebanon. Israel says it has no intention of pulling troops out.

**Darren Selnick** (4:14)
Right, right. And so the whole situation is very tenuous in terms of what Iran is trying to do and say and push. I also don't think it's very wise to be saying negative things in the press about the president Trump and saying he signed out of desperation.
The president is serious. If they're not serious during these 60 days, it will end and he will do military strikes again. So they're playing a very dangerous game in terms of signing that document and at this point not looking like they're very serious about actually doing these talks the way they promised.