U.S. diplomatic chief Marco Rubio welcomed the Ambassadors of Israel and Lebanon today as part of the first direct peace negotiations between the two countries in decades.
The meeting, held at the State Department, was attended by Israeli Ambassador Yechiel Leiter and his Lebanese counterpart Nanda Hamadi Mowadh, as well as US Ambassador to Lebanon Michel Aisha.
Marko Rubio spoke of a “historic opportunity” referring to the talks in Washington, adding that we understand that we are working against “decades of history and complications”. According to him, the goal is a permanent end to Hezbollah’s influence over the past 20-30 years in this region of the world, and he stressed that not every difficult issue will be resolved in the next six hours, but we can begin to move forward and create the framework.
Even before the meeting, pro-Iranian Hezbollah, which is not involved, rejected holding these talks.
