WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Marco Rubio joined Israel and Lebanon’s ambassadors to the U.S. Friday to announce a framework agreement that was described as a first step toward peace following months of conflict between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah.

The agreement does not include Hezbollah and prompted one of the group’s officials in Lebanon to warn of civil war. The U.S. State Department said the framework establishes a process for dismantling Hezbollah and for Lebanon to regain territory that was taken by Israeli forces as they battled the militant group.

The U.S. will facilitate a newly created “Military Coordination Group for Lebanon” to implement the framework, the State Department said, while committing $100 million in humanitarian assistance.

“For Lebanon, this Framework provides a genuine pathway out of a long crisis,” the State Department said. “For Israel, it creates a verifiable path to removing the persistent threat on its northern border.”

Friday’s agreement was signed in front of Rubio in Washington by Yechiel Leiter, the Israeli ambassador to the United States, and Nada Hamadeh Moawad, the Lebanese ambassador to the United States.

Leiter said the final destination of the framework is peace between the two countries.

“Our language is we want to embrace Lebanon,” he said. “Our language is we want to get in our car in Tel Aviv and take a drive up to Beirut, and we want Beirut to come down and take a drive to Tel Aviv. That’s where we’re going. That’s where we want to go.”

Leiter said that will depend on Hezbollah being disarmed and dismantled, which will allow Israel to withdraw and Lebanon to “regain its full sovereignty.”

“So it really depends on the Lebanese army,” Leiter said. “It depends on the support the Lebanese army gets from the U.S. And we think it’s going to be solid.”

Moawad said the framework “is a first step on the road to restoring Lebanese sovereignty and territorial integrity, securing a permanent and final cessation of hostilities, enabling our people to go back to their land and allowing all Lebanese to live in peace, security and prosperity.”

Hezbollah official says group won’t give up weapons

The latest conflict began when Hezbollah fired rockets into Israel days after Israel and the U.S. launched their war on Iran on Feb. 28. Israel invaded Lebanon and has expanded its control.

More than 4,000 people in Lebanon have been killed in Israeli strikes since March. At least 37 Israeli soldiers have been killed in Lebanon or northern Israel during the fighting.

Lebanese officials have said that securing a withdrawal of Israeli forces from southern Lebanon is a top priority for them in the negotiations, while Israeli officials have prioritized the disarmament of the Iran-backed Hezbollah.

The talks between Israel and Lebanon were separate from the interim deal that was signed last week by the leaders of the U.S. and Iran to end the fighting in the Islamic Republic. That agreement set a 60-day period for negotiations on key issues, including the future of Tehran’s nuclear program amid concerns that Iran wants to use it for military purposes, a claim the country denies.

The Lebanese government had been wary of having Iran negotiate on its behalf, and Lebanon launched its own direct negotiations with Israel after the outbreak of the latest Israel-Hezbollah war. Hezbollah was not part of the talks, which resulted in several ceasefire agreements that were never implemented on the ground.

Hezbollah is unlikely to agree to any plan that would include its disarmament throughout the country. The group has maintained that it is only required by previous agreements and U.N. resolutions to disarm in the area south of the Litani River, near Lebanon’s border with Israel.

Hassan Fadlallah, a member of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, reiterated the group’s stance on Beirut-based pan-Arab Al-Mayadeen TV that it rejects Lebanon’s direct negotiations with Israel and that it will not give up its weapons.

Fadlallah said Lebanese authorities “will not be able to enforce the agreement signed in Washington unless they go, with American support, to civil war.” He also called the agreement in Washington “an attempt to derail the Islamabad process,” referring to the U.S.-Iran negotiations.

Israel establishes ‘pilot zones’ for Lebanon

Lebanese Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said in a statement that the agreement “aims to achieve an Israeli withdrawal from all Lebanese territory, restore state sovereignty over it, and facilitate the return of its citizens” and that under it Lebanon is obligated to “extend the authority of the Lebanese state, through its armed forces, over all its territory.”

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun had told a visiting British parliamentary delegation on Wednesday that a proposal for “pilot zones” where the Lebanese army is supposed to take exclusive control of the territory as Israeli troops will withdraw was “under discussion pending approval from the Israeli side.”

Israel’s direct negotiations with Lebanon include discussions about the redeployment of Israeli forces after southern Lebanon is cleared of Hezbollah infrastructure and Hezbollah has disarmed, said an Israeli official who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video on Friday that the framework is a “great achievement” for Israel.

“The most important thing, first and foremost, is that Israel will remain in the security zone in southern Lebanon,” he said. “This is a major achievement, and we will maintain it as long as Hezbollah has not been disarmed and as long as it continues to pose a threat to the State of Israel.”

Netanyahu said that Israel is allowing the Lebanese army to begin preparing to take control of territory, while the Israeli military is establishing two pilot zones.

“A small part of it is within the expanded security zone that we secured over the past two weeks and which, the IDF has made absolutely clear, it does not need,” Netanyahu said. “In other words, we are maintaining the original security zone at all times, outside the range of anti-tank missiles.”

Trump threatens 100% tax on European imports if countries impose tax on digital services

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Friday threatened a 100% tax on imports from any country that imposes a tax on digital services from United States companies.

In a post on social media, Trump took aim at European countries that he said are discussing “imminent” implementation of taxes on American companies. The U.S. president has repeatedly sought to use tariffs as way to deter such taxes, but many countries are looking for revenues as their economies increasingly operate in digital realms that are dominated by American companies.

“Please let this statement serve to represent that any Country that imposes such a Tax will immediately be met with a 100% TARIFF on any and all Goods sent to the United States of America,” Trump wrote.

He added that the new tax would supersede any previously negotiated trade deals. Trump said the penalty would apply to any country that moves forward with such a tax, but he singled out European nations in his post.

The move could lead to a larger showdown that could increase prices and hinder economic growth, possibly setting off a larger trade war if the 27-member European Union was compelled to retaliate.

“Unilateral measures targeting such legitimate policies are unjustified. If pursued, the EU will respond swiftly and decisively to defend its rights and regulatory autonomy,” said Olof Gill, a spokesperson for the European Commission on Friday.

He defended taxation on technology companies as “non-discriminatory” and applied equally to “all large companies, regardless of their origin.”

Trump has repeatedly pushed against foreign efforts to tax or regulate American tech giants. Last year, he threatened new tariffs on any country that moved to do so. A post from last August said that digital taxes and regulation “are all designed to harm, or discriminate against, American Technology.”

The threat comes ahead of Trump’s July 4 deadline for the European Union and the United States to start implementing a tariff deal that caps tariffs on most EU exports at 15%.

The European Union in May finalized a trade deal with the United States that caps most tariffs on EU exports at 15%. The deal followed months of debate within the EU after European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen tentatively struck the deal last year while visiting Trump’s golf course in Scotland.

Digital taxes were not part of the agreement and have remained a sticking point between the U.S. and the European bloc.

The U.S. government has previously conducted tariff investigations into digital services taxes under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974. But it was unclear how Trump would carry out his threat and whether he would apply the tariffs broadly or initially target certain nations.

Britain, which is no longer part of the EU, has since 2020 levied a 2% digital services tax on revenues earned by search engines, social media sites and online marketplaces that “derive value” from U.K. users.

The British government said in a policy document at the time that corporate tax rules for digital businesses had “led to a misalignment between the place where profits are taxed and the place where value is created.”

The U.K. tax includes thresholds, so mainly large international companies will pay it. The tax was designed to “ensure the large multinational businesses in-scope make a fair contribution to supporting vital public services,” the document said.