Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has conditioned any direct conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on first reaching a security agreement or non-aggression framework that ends hostilities and Israeli strikes, rather than pursuing leader-level contact beforehand. US-mediated talks between the two countries, involving ambassadors and military officials across multiple rounds in Washington and Rome since April 2026, have produced a negotiation framework focused on border security, sovereignty, and Hezbollah disarmament but yielded only limited progress by the seventh round in early August. Aoun and Lebanese officials have described a direct Netanyahu call as premature absent concrete advances, while Netanyahu has signaled openness to engagement tied to lasting arrangements. Upcoming negotiation sessions and any shifts in ceasefire compliance or external diplomatic pressure remain key variables for whether a leader-level exchange occurs by a given deadline.