US, Iran Prepare For Ceasefire Talks As Netanyahu Authorizes Negotiations With Lebanon

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

52% : Negotiations between Israel and Lebanon, meanwhile, are expected to begin next week in Washington, according to a U.S. official and a person familiar with the plans, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the delicacy of the matter.
47% : Two days after Israel's intense barrage, people sifted through the wreckage of their homes, trying to salvage whatever furniture and personal mementos they could find in the rubble.
44% : " Netanyahu, meanwhile, said that he authorized the negotiations with Lebanon "as soon as possible" with the aim of disarming Hezbollah militants and establishing relations between the neighbors, which have technically been at war since Israel was established in 1948.
42% : The day the truce was announced, Israel pounded Beirut with airstrikes, killing more than 300 people, according to Lebanon's Health Ministry.
42% : In a first statement since Israel announced direct negotiations with Lebanon, Hezbollah chief Naim Kassem urged Lebanese officials to stop offering "free concessions" but did not take a clear stance on the talks.
40% : Israel's insistence that the ceasefire in Iran does not include a pause in its fighting with Hezbollah, which joined the war in support of its backer, Iran, has threatened to scupper the deal.
37% : Early Friday, Israel's military said it hit approximately 10 launchers in Lebanon that had fired rockets toward northern Israel a day earlier.
36% : Over a dozen people have died in Gulf Arab states and the occupied West Bank, while 23 civilians were killed in Israel.
34% : Iran's semiofficial Tasnim news agency, close to the Revolutionary Guard, claimed that talks set for Saturday wouldn't happen unless Israel stopped its attacks in Lebanon.
34% : Questions also remain over the fate of Iran's missile and nuclear programs, which the U.S. and Israel sought to eliminate in going to war.
33% : Iran's semiofficial Tasnim news agency claimed that talks set for Saturday wouldn't happen unless Israel stopped its attacks in Lebanon. Negotiators from Iran and the U.S. prepared for high-level talks with their ceasefire still shaky Friday, as Israel and Hezbollah traded fire and Tehran maintained its stranglehold on the Strait of Hormuz.

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