Nigeria: Israel, Lebanon extend fragile ceasefire as Iran talks stall

By Zuleihat Owuiye, Mamos Nigeria

Israel and Lebanon have extended their ceasefire by three weeks, US President Donald Trump said Thursday, even as negotiations with Iran remain stalled and tensions flare in the Strait of Hormuz.

Trump announced the extension after meeting ambassadors from both countries in Washington. The move comes despite recent Israeli strikes in Lebanon and fresh rocket fire from Iran-backed Hezbollah, which was not part of the talks.

“I think there’s a very good chance of having peace. I think it should be an easy one,” Trump told reporters. The initial truce had been set to expire Sunday.

While the Israel-Lebanon truce holds, the US remains at an impasse with Iran. Trump said he is in no rush to end hostilities but warned that “the clock is ticking” for Tehran as a third American aircraft carrier, the USS George H.W. Bush, arrived in the Middle East.

Iranian media reported explosions over Tehran on Thursday, the first since the broader Middle East ceasefire took effect two weeks ago. The cause was unclear. An Israeli security source told AFP that Israel was not currently striking Iran.

Iran’s IRNA news agency said the “sound of air defence firing” was heard in western Tehran, while Mehr reported air defence systems were activated against “hostile targets.”

Prospective peace talks in Pakistan remain uncertain, with no delegations confirmed to be traveling to Islamabad.

Since the ceasefire, attention has shifted to the Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil and LNG exports normally pass. Iran has effectively closed the waterway in retaliation for the war.

“I have all the time in the World, but Iran doesn’t — The clock is ticking!” Trump posted on social media. He previously ordered the US Navy to destroy any Iranian boat laying mines in the strait.

Trump, who on Thursday ruled out using a nuclear weapon against Iran, added: “I ordered the United States Navy to shoot and kill any boat, small boats though they may be… that is putting mines in the waters of the Strait of Hormuz.”

Israel’s Defence Minister Israel Katz said his country is “awaiting a green light from the United States — first and foremost to complete the elimination of the Khamenei dynasty… and additionally to return Iran to the Dark Age and the Stone Age.”

Iran has vowed to keep the strait closed to all but a few approved vessels as long as the US Navy blockades its ports. It has rejected Trump’s demands to reopen Hormuz and surrender enriched uranium.

The Pentagon said Thursday that US forces “carried out a maritime interdiction and right-of-visit boarding of the sanctioned stateless vessel M/T Majestic X transporting oil from Iran, in the Indian Ocean.” US Central Command said it has “redirected 33 vessels since the start of the blockade against Iran.”

Three US aircraft carriers are now in the region: the USS George H.W. Bush, a second carrier in the Red Sea, and a third operating nearby, according to CENTCOM.

Iran’s deputy parliament speaker Hamidreza Hajibabaei said the country received its first revenue from tolls imposed on ships seeking to cross Hormuz. Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Wednesday they forced two ships to Iranian shores from the strait.

In response to Trump’s claim that Iranian leadership was “seriously fractured,” Iran’s president, parliament speaker, and chief justice posted nearly identical messages on social media Thursday: “One God, one nation, one leader, and one path; that path being the path to the victory of our dearer-than-life Iran.”

A post on supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei’s X account criticized “the enemy’s media operations” that “seek to undermine unity and national security,” after the New York Times reported he was seriously wounded in a strike that killed his father and predecessor but remains mentally sharp.

Trump told the New York Post on Wednesday that talks could resume in Pakistan within two to three days, though no delegations were en route. Blanket security remains in place in Islamabad for a fourth day.

European leaders will meet Friday with counterparts from Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, and Jordan for what a senior EU official called “intensive dialogue” as Europe deals with the strait’s closure.