Team Trump says Biden-brokered Israel-Hezbollah ceasefire deal is actually Trump's victory

The Biden administration’s reported coordination with the Trump team in its efforts to forge a ceasefire in Lebanon is perhaps the highest-profile example of cooperation in what has been a sometimes turbulent transition period .

Trump’s transition team reached an agreement with President Joe Biden’s White House on Tuesday that will allow transition staff to coordinate with existing federal staff before Trump takes office on Jan. 20. The Trump teams, including talks between Biden national security adviser Jake Sullivan and Waltz.

In his Rose Garden remarks Tuesday, Biden hailed the ceasefire agreement as a crucial step that he hoped could be the catalyst for broader peace in the Middle East, which has been shaken by almost 14 months of war after the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7. , 2023.

“This is a permanent cessation of hostilities,” Biden said. “What remains of Hezbollah and other terrorist organizations will not be allowed – I emphasize, will not be allowed – to threaten the security of Israel again.”

White House officials now hope that a calm in Lebanon will revive multi-country efforts to find an end to the devastating war in Gaza, where Hamas still holds dozens of hostages and the conflict is more intractable.

Biden said the United States, along with Israel, would engage in talks in the coming days with Egyptian, Qatari and Turkish officials to try to get Gaza negotiations back on track.

But during Biden’s moment of success in a conflict that has tarnished his reputation at home and abroad, the specter of the new Trump administration loomed.

Trump’s national security team was briefed by the Biden administration as negotiations unfolded and ultimately reached a conclusion on Tuesday, according to a senior Biden administration official. The official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity on a call arranged by the White House, added that the new Trump administration officials were not directly involved in the talks, but that he was important that they know “what we negotiated and what we negotiated”. the commitments were.”

Trump’s team and its allies, for their part, said there was no doubt that the prospect of the Republican president returning to power was pushing both sides to reach a deal.

Waltz, in addition to giving Trump credit for the ceasefire agreement, added a warning to Iran, Hezbollah’s main backer.

“But let’s be clear: the Iranian regime is the root cause of the chaos and terror that has been unleashed in the region. We will not tolerate the status quo of their support for terrorism,” Waltz said in his message.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Trump ally, also praised the new administration, while giving a nod to Biden’s team.

“I appreciate the hard work of the Biden administration, supported by President Trump, to make this ceasefire a reality,” Graham said in a statement.

Richard Goldberg, senior adviser to the Washington Group’s Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the moment amplifies the fact that Iran – which he said should have approved the US’s acceptance of the ceasefire Hezbollah – carefully assesses what awaits it with Trump.

“There is no question that Iran is moving backwards to regroup before Trump takes office,” said Goldberg, a National Security Council official in the first Trump administration. “It’s a combination of Israeli military success and the election of Trump: the ayatollah is not dressed and he knows that we know it.”

The Biden White House is also holding out some hope that the Lebanon ceasefire deal could help reinvigorate a long-sought Israeli-Saudi normalization deal.

The official said “a lot of work has been done” to reach such an agreement, “but it is clear that the current situation in Gaza is holding us back.”

Biden said his administration was close to reaching an agreement between the Middle East’s two most important powers shortly before the Hamas attack sent tremors across the region. He speculated that the emerging normalization deal was part of Hamas’ motivations for carrying out its attack on Israel when it did so.

Just weeks before the attack, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sat alongside Biden on the sidelines of the annual UN General Assembly and expressed surprise that a “historic peace between Israel and the Saudi Arabia” appears within reach – a diplomatic breakthrough that the Israeli leader believes could succeed. to lasting peace between Israelis and Palestinians.

The so-called normalization push, which began under the first Trump administration and was dubbed the Abraham Accords, is an ambitious effort aimed at reshaping the region and strengthening Israel’s position.

The Biden White House plans to keep the new Trump administration in the loop on its efforts and “whatever we do about it…we won’t do it unless they know what we’re doing,” the official said. Biden administration.

Associated Press writers Fatima Hussein in West Palm Beach, Fla., and Zeke Miller and Chris Megerian contributed to this report.