Live updates: US and Iran agree to conditional ceasefire
Israelis awoke in shock on Wednesday to learn that Washington and Tehran had agreed to a ceasefire, hours after US President Donald Trump had threatened to end Iranian “civilisation” if it did not surrender on his terms.
The announcement of the sudden halt to a campaign that was broadly supported among Israelis has raised fears that an Iranian regime that has not been fully defeated may soon pose even more of a threat to Israel than it did before.
Early on Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said that Israel supported Mr Trump’s decision to accept the truce, as well as the “US effort to ensure that Iran no longer poses a nuclear, missile and terror threat to America, Israel, Iran's Arab neighbours and the world”.
Meanwhile, a senior Israeli official was quoted widely in local media as saying that the ceasefire had been co-ordinated with Israel in advance.
However, the move prompted widespread anger among Israelis, which is only expected to increase given that large parts of the population, including many supporters of the government, are offline during the Passover holiday.
In a post on social media, opposition leader Yair Lapid wrote that “there has never been such a political disaster in all of our history”. Mr Lapid, along with most of Israel’s opposition, was a vocal supporter of the war.
“Israel wasn't even at the table when decisions were made concerning the core of our national security,” he added.
“It will take us years to repair the political and strategic damage that Netanyahu wrought due to arrogance, negligence, and a lack of strategic planning.”
Senior right-wing politician Avigdor Liberman said the ceasefire “gives the ayatollahs' regime a breather and an opportunity to regroup”.
“Any agreement with Iran, without forgoing the destruction of Israel, uranium enrichment, production of ballistic missiles and support for terrorist organisations in the region, means we'll have to return to another campaign under harsher conditions and pay a heavier price,” he added.
Yair Golan, leader of the left-wing The Democrats party, said Mr Netanyahu had lied to the country. “He promised a ‘historic victory’ and security for generations, and in practice, we got one of the most severe strategic failures Israel has ever known,” he wrote on social media.
Palestinian-Israeli politician Ayman Odeh said Israel should learn three main lessons from the war. “1: To recognise the limitations of power. 2: There is no stability in the region without Israeli-Palestinian peace. 3: Netanyahu is a liar and an international pyromaniac,” he wrote.
The Israeli military on Wednesday said it had ceased attacks on Iran in accordance with directives from the political leadership, after carrying out strikes overnight against Tehran's ballistic missile capabilities and “key production infrastructure”.
The truce does not appear to have halted Israel’s military campaign in Lebanon, despite reports that the 10-point plan accepted by the Iran and US includes a cessation of attacks against Iran-linked proxy groups, including Hezbollah.
The group indicated that it would halt its operations against Israel before officially deciding whether “to adhere to the truce or not,” a Lebanese political source close to Hezbollah said.
The Israeli military later announced that it would indeed be continuing its operations in its northern neighbour, despite the ceasefire. “The battle in Lebanon continues, and the ceasefire does not include Lebanon,” the military's Arabic-language spokesman Col Avichay Adraee wrote on social media.
He also issued an “urgent” warning to residents south of the Zahrani River in southern Lebanon that Israeli troops would continue to operate in the area.
