By Alexander Cornwell, Tala Ramadan and Jana Choukeir
TEL AVIV/DUBAI June 24 (Reuters) - Israel's defence minister said on Wednesday Israeli troops will not withdraw from southern Lebanon, highlighting a hurdle to Iran-U.S. peace talks, as the top U.S. diplomat tours the Middle East to win over allies sceptical about a proposed deal.
By Samia Nakhoul
BEIRUT, June 24 (Reuters) - The biggest casualty of the U.S.-Iran deal may not be Israel's Iran strategy, but the political brand Benjamin Netanyahu spent decades constructing as the Israeli leader who could uniquely bend Washington to his will on Iran, analysts, former U.S. officials and diplomats say.
ROME, June 24 (Reuters) - Italy on Wednesday pushed back against remarks by NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte that hundreds of U.S. aircraft had taken off from American bases in Italy to support military operations against Iran, saying Rome had authorised only technical and logistical flights.
Rutte, speaking to Fox News television, cited Italy as an example of European support for the U.S. and said 500 U.S. planes had taken off from U.S. bases in Italy "to support Epic Fury", Washington's name for the war it launched alongside Israel.
ZURICH, June 24 (Reuters) - Switzerland has started contract negotiations with manufacturers from France, Israel and South Korea for a second air defence system following delays to its order of U.S. Patriot missile systems, the government said on Wednesday.
Switzerland in 2022 ordered Patriot missile defence systems made by Raytheon and Lockheed Martin for expected delivery by 2026-2028, but the timeline was pushed back four to five years due to the war in Ukraine.
ANKARA, June 24 (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that he would "most likely" hold bilateral talks with U.S. President Donald Trump when the U.S. leader comes to Ankara for a NATO summit next month.
Turkey will host 32 NATO leaders, as well as officials from the alliance's partners in the Gulf and Asia-Pacific region, on July 7-8 amid tensions within the alliance over burden-sharing, defence spending, and U.S. complaints over allies' involvement on re-opening the Strait of Hormuz during the U.S.-Iran war.
Heavy equipment operator Bassam Khalil's bulldozers and excavators are in high demand in south Lebanon's Tyre these days, as the seaside city tries to pick up the pieces from the latest Israel-Hezbollah war.
Residents of destroyed buildings are anxious to comb through the rubble in search of their belongings, the 45-year-old told AFP, next to a pile of shattered concrete and mangled metal that was once a multi-storey apartment block, brought down by an Israeli strike last month.
WASHINGTON, June 24 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that Iran has told the United States that no tolls were being sought from ships traveling through the Strait of Hormuz.
The two countries, which ended a first round of negotiations in Switzerland on Monday, have offered conflicting accounts about financial incentives for Iran, control of the Strait of Hormuz and Israel's parallel war in Lebanon - all major aspects of their framework deal signed last week aiming to end the war.
CAIRO, June 24 (Reuters) - Al-Nazir Al-Sadig sought safety in Egypt from the civil war in Sudan. Instead, the 18-year-old died of pneumonia after more than three weeks in a squalid Cairo jail, where he had suffered beatings and extortion at the hands of other inmates, his friends and relatives said.
A high-school student, Al-Sadig was detained as part of what lawyers and human rights groups describe as a sweeping crackdown on refugees that contrasts sharply with Egypt's stated role as a safe haven.
ANKARA, June 24 (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that work was underway on a legal framework that will speed up the disbandment of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, and that it would be put on parliament's agenda without delay.
Speaking to lawmakers from his ruling AK Party in parliament, Erdogan did not elaborate on what the legal measures would include, but said Ankara was determined to successfully conclude the peace process with the PKK and end its more than 40-year insurgency against the Turkish state.
An Australian citizen living in Iran who was a senior member of its Revolutionary Guards orchestrated a major antisemitic firebomb attack in Sydney, Australia's spy chief said Wednesday.
Giving an annual threat assessment, Mike Burgess, director-general of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), said he was also concerned that an Iranian group active in Europe could conduct further attacks or an assassination in Australia.
