The Trump administration is defending this week’s agreement to extend an Israel-Lebanon ceasefire and create Hezbollah-free zones in southern Lebanon as the best chance for peace between the two countries in years.

Samira Bou Saab had hoped to see the execution of the man who was sentenced to death for killing her son. Instead, he eventually could be released under a sweeping draft amnesty law in Lebanon that is revealing the country's complex history of loyalties and conflict.

Lebanon's largest amnesty since the end of its devastating 1975-90 civil war is expected to occur in the coming weeks, once parliament approves it and the president signs it.

Agence France-Presse has demanded an explanation from Israel's ambassador to France after he admitted on French TV that his country was behind a 2023 attack on reporters in Lebanon.

When former Palestinian fighter Moin Al-Taher heard the Israeli flag was once again flying over Lebanon's Beaufort castle, he cast his mind back more than 40 years, recalling its historic walls "blazing" under heavy shelling as his comrades fought to defend it.

Lebanon's leaders issued pointed calls for Iran to stop interfering in their country's affairs on Friday, as Israel and Tehran-backed Hezbollah traded attacks after a new truce deal was flatly rejected by the group.

Israeli airstrikes on southern Lebanon on Saturday killed nine people including three members of the Lebanese military, the Lebanese army and state media said, days after the two sides reached a new ceasefire deal.

An airstrike on a vehicle on a road linking the city of Nabatiyeh with the town of Marjayoun killed a brigadier general, a captain and another soldier, the army said, without immediately releasing their names. Another airstrike on the southern village of Saksakiyah killed six people and wounded four, state-run National News Agency said.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun told CNN on Friday that the Lebanese people are fed up with the war with Israel.

He said Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem does not represent the Lebanese people. "These people are not yours," Aoun told Qassem, as he accused Iran of using Lebanon as a "bargaining chip" in its conflict with the U.S. and Israel.

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam on Friday urged Iran to stop treating his country, where Israel and the Tehran-backed Hezbollah are at war, as a "bargaining chip" in its negotiations with Washington on the Middle East conflict.

"If I may address a word to Iran, it is this: have mercy on our south, stop treating it and its people as merely a bargaining chip to improve the terms of your negotiations," Salam told a press conference for a U.N. aid appeal for Lebanon.

U.N. peacekeepers and Lebanese troops were seen Friday at an entrance of the village of Dibbine, near the town of Marjayoun, after Israeli forces withdrew following intense clashes with Hezbollah fighters.

The ceasefire agreement calls for Lebanon's armed forces to take control of security zones in Lebanon from which the militants would be banned.

U.S. President Donald Trump told journalists in a press conference that he thinks "progress is made" in the Lebanese-Israeli conflict.

"It would be really nice if Lebanon could have some peace," Trump said. "Lebanon has been under attack for so many years and always like an underdog, and it would be really nice if it could end," he added.