Israel reportedly prepared a large-scale strike on Beirut’s southern Dahieh suburb on Monday but postponed it at the last minute following American intervention, according to Israel’s public broadcaster Kan 11, citing Israeli and Egyptian officials.
Kan’s report says the advance warning Israel issued to residents of Dahieh before the Beirut strike was intended to pressure Hezbollah to halt rocket and missile fire toward northern Israeli communities, while U.S. and Israeli officials have held intensive talks in recent hours to prevent the collapse of indirect negotiations between Israel and Lebanon.
Egyptian officials told Kan that Cairo appealed to the Trump administration to block an Israeli strike on Dahieh in order to avert a wider regional escalation, and that Egyptian mediation now also focuses on advising the Lebanese leadership on how to conduct the talks with Israel.
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The U.S.-Israel war on Iran lurched toward its most dangerous phase in months on Monday, as Tehran abruptly suspended negotiations with Washington in protest of Israel's expanding offensive in Lebanon and warned it would move to close the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency, which is close to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), reported that the Iranian negotiating team would halt "talks and the exchange of texts through mediators," citing the "continuation of the Zionist regime's crimes in Lebanon." Tehran insisted the U.S.-Iran ceasefire covered all fronts, declaring that its violation in Lebanon amounted to a violation everywhere.
The trigger came earlier in the day, when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the military to strike Hezbollah's "terror headquarters" in Beirut's southern Dahieh suburb, a stronghold of the Iran-backed group. The Israeli military ordered residents of Dahieh to evacuate, and footage showed traffic clogging roads as families fled the capital. An Israeli source told CNN the plans were coordinated with Washington.
The Lebanese front has escalated sharply. On Sunday, Israeli troops captured the Crusader-era Beaufort castle in southern Lebanon, roughly nine miles from the border, in their deepest incursion into the country in 26 years. Lebanese President Joseph Aoun accused Israel of continuing "its military operations and the shelling of villages under the pretext of self-defense," while pleading for diplomacy. More than 3,400 people have been killed and over 1.2 million displaced in Lebanon, according to its Health Ministry.
On the Iranian front, U.S. Central Command said it carried out "self-defense strikes" on Iranian military infrastructure over the weekend. The IRGC, in turn, claimed to have struck a U.S. air base, and Iran's Khatam al-Anbiya headquarters warned residents of northern Israel to leave if attacks on Beirut proceeded. Kuwait said its air defenses intercepted missile and drone attacks, blaming Iran.
Tasnim warned that Iran and its "Axis of Resistance" had resolved to pursue "the complete closure of the Strait of Hormuz" and to activate other fronts, including the Bab al-Mandab Strait via Yemen's Houthis — a dual-blockade threat to two of the world's most vital maritime corridors. Roughly 20% of global petroleum transits Hormuz.
In Washington, President Donald Trump said he had not been informed of Iran's decision, telling NBC News it "doesn't mean we're going to go and start dropping bombs all over there." Vice President JD Vance called it "dumb" for Iran to let talks collapse over Lebanon, which he said "the United States never once said was part of the ceasefire." The U.N. Security Council scheduled an emergency meeting on Lebanon for Monday.