Furthermore, the Saudis will be keenly aware of last year’s Israeli strikes on Doha, targeting senior Hamas officials. According to a report last year by the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, external, “across the Gulf, states recalibrated their defence strategies”. This pact is one of Saudi Arabia’s responses.

For Pakistan, the pact offers different but complementary benefits. In May 2025 its long-standing tensions with India boiled over into open conflict.

While an all-out war was avoided, having the economic muscle of Saudi Arabia and the military and industrial might of Turkey in their corner will be seen as increasingly valuable.

It also comes at a time when Pakistan has been taking on a far more significant role in global diplomacy.

It has acted as an intermediary between Iran and the US and hosted ceasefire negotiations, significantly increasing its status in the region – something this pact further cements.

As for Turkey, the benefits are different. According to Burcu Ozcelik from the London-based Royal United Services Institute (Rusi), the deal offers opportunities for the country’s significant defence industries through “joint production, technology partnerships, procurement and greater military interoperability”.

While, on the surface, the concept of a mutual defence agreement seems straightforward, in practice the circumstances in which they would come into play are both complex and uncertain.

Would, for example, Turkey be obliged to join in strikes on Yemen if Saudi Arabia’s full-scale war with the Houthis were to restart?

Would Saudi Arabia have to declare war on India were there to be a re-emergence of conflict with Pakistan?

Each instance would require complex calculations and careful diplomacy, often in an attempt to avoid escalation. It is, in short, uncertain.

The one consequence of a mutual defence agreement that sides involved will be banking on, however, is deterrence.

The very fact that they each now have two other regional powers standing behind them may not make aggression impossible, but it will make its potential cost significantly higher.

The US president said Israel would withdraw from Gaza “as disarmament is completed” and called the agreement “a critical step towards Gaza finally being governed by a new Palestinian government”.

“The International Stabilization Force will work with a new Palestinian police force to take responsibility for Gaza being safe for its residents and its neighbors,” he said in a post on Truth Social.

Trump said the agreement marked a “major milestone in the implementation of the Trump 20-Point Plan”, and he thanked mediators Egypt, Qatar and Turkey.

A US official, asked on a call with reporters about how hopeful the US is that Israel will agree to withdraw from Gaza once Hamas has disarmed, said, “We’re not asking Israel to do anything other than agree to the 20-point plan that they agreed to, initially. And so we’re very confident they will adhere to it.”

If Israel decides not to withdraw, Trump would be “very disappointed”, the official said. The official said the US believes Israel would continue to be a good partner.

The BBC has seen the agreement, which provides for the inventorying and storage of Hamas’s remaining heavy weapons under Palestinian supervision. This potentially removes the most significant obstacle to advancing the Trump-backed peace initiative for Gaza.

US officials said smaller groups in Gaza would be disarmed first, before Hamas begins dismantling what they described as its state-like military infrastructure of tunnels, weapons depots and production facilities – a process they acknowledged would take considerably longer.

The officials said the plan was deliberately built on “zero trust” and with verification, with neither Hamas nor Israel moving to the next phase until the other has fulfilled its commitments.

According to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, at least 1,168 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli attacks since a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas took effect last October.

Four Israeli soldiers have been killed in Palestinian attacks in Gaza over the same period.

Cairo is set to host a meeting “soon” of the Gaza truce mediators, which also include the United States, Qatar and Turkey, state-linked Al-Qahera News reported early Friday.

Earlier in the day, unnamed sources who spoke to Reuters reported that talks between the mediators and Hamas leaders in Cairo on implementing the US-brokered Gaza peace plan had made rare progress, but an Israeli official said the proposed terms were not satisfactory.

Israel and Lebanon have signed a framework agreement in Washington after days of negotiations brokered by the US.

The deal, details of which remain unclear, is something of a victory for the Trump administration, which is itself embroiled in complex negotiations with Iran following the extension of a ceasefire between the two.

Iran – Hezbollah’s primary foreign backer – has repeatedly called for Lebanon to form part of any negotiations with the US.

The agreement “begins to put in place a framework for lasting peace and security,” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Friday. “That’s what these two nations deserve,” he said, calling it a “first step”.

Previous ceasefires between Israel and Hezbollah have still seen near-daily cross-border strikes, with both sides accusing each other of violating the agreement.

Washington has feared that continuing tensions between Israel and Lebanon could undermine the US peace deal with Iran, which holds a commitment to end fighting on “all fronts”, including Lebanon.

Over the course of several months, repeated Israeli strikes on targets in southern Lebanon threatened to derail efforts to settle the conflict in the Middle East.

US President Donald Trump on one occasion held a terse phone call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in which he reportedly uttered an expletive. He also publicly criticized Netanyahu and Israeli conduct in the conflict on several occasions.

The Israel-Lebanon deal, however, could be tenuous. Hezbollah is not a party to Friday’s agreement, and it is unclear whether it will agree to withdraw its fighters from the South Litani area in southern Lebanon.

While Trump has insisted that Israel has a right to defend itself from Hezbollah rocket strikes on its territories, he has also claimed he can “control Israel from attacking Lebanon.”

“They have a lot of respect for me,” Trump told Axios in an interview last week. “They do as I say.”

Lebanon was drawn into the war between the US and Israel and Iran on 2 March, when Hezbollah launched rockets into Israel in retaliation for an Israeli strike that killed Iran’s supreme leader. Israel responded with an air campaign across Lebanon and a ground invasion in the south.

A US-brokered ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon on 16 April failed to stop the fighting.

Israel and Lebanon also agreed in June to renew their fragile ceasefire and create a number of “pilot” security zones inside Lebanon in which Hezbollah operatives would be banned. But fighting has since continued.

At least 20 people have reportedly been killed by Israeli airstrikes on southern Lebanon, less than 24 hours after a new ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah was announced.

Local officials said 16 people had been killed in the Nabatieh district and seven in neighbouring Saida, with others injured, after Israeli warplanes, drones, and artillery targeted several areas.

A family of four – a father, a mother and their two children – was killed in the town of Barich in southern Lebanon, state media reported.

The Israeli military said it had struck “dozens” of Hezbollah targets after the group fired over 50 projectiles at Israeli forces in the region.

It also reported that an Israeli soldier was killed in battle in southern Lebanon on Saturday.

The US government has criticised Israel’s ongoing operations in Lebanon, which was drawn into the US-Iran war when Hezbollah launched rockets into Israel in retaliation for a strike that killed Iran’s supreme leader.

Washington also fears that the continuing tensions between Israel and Lebanon could undermine the US peace deal with Iran, which includes a commitment to end fighting on “all fronts” including Lebanon.

US envoy, Steve Witkoff, is reported to be heading to Switzerland for initial talks with Iran to help cement the agreement.

While it may have helped prevent a wider regional escalation for the time being, the deal leaves unresolved the central disputes at the heart of the conflict, including Israel’s military presence in southern Lebanon and the future of Hezbollah’s weapons.

Hezbollah in a statement has accused Israel of repeatedly violating the ceasefire, and said the group has the right to “defend their land and sovereignty” in the face of ongoing Israeli attacks.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it had “struck dozens of Hezbollah terrorist infrastructure sites and terrorists in southern Lebanon”.

The IDF said its strikes were in response to Hezbollah launching “more than 50 projectiles toward IDF soldiers in southern Lebanon”.

“These attacks constitute repeated and ongoing violations of the ceasefire agreement,” it added in the statement.

US President Donald Trump has signed an agreement to extend the ceasefire with Iran in France’s Palace of Versailles, just outside Paris.

The 14-point agreement, called a Memorandum of Understanding, was signed at a post-G7 dinner in Versailles, where Trump was joined by French President Emmanuel Macron and First Lady Brigitte Macron.

Read more on this story.

US President Donald Trump has signed an agreement to extend the ceasefire with Iran in France’s Palace of Versailles, just outside Paris.

The 14-point agreement, called a Memorandum of Understanding, was signed at a post-G7 dinner in Versailles, where Trump was joined by French President Emmanuel Macron and First Lady Brigitte Macron.

Read more on this story.

Criticism has been swift, including within Trump’s own political party. Lawmakers in Congress are demanding briefings and information from the Trump administration about the deal and the uncertainties it carries.

Some Republicans said they were skeptical of the agreement, with one prominent Republican senator denouncing it and arguing Trump gave up too much to Iran and didn’t get enough in return.

“Iran’s nuclear ambitions were not curbed, and they have learned that threatening the Strait of Hormuz works and will undoubtedly leverage it in the future,” outgoing Sen Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, who lost a primary challenge to a Trump-backed opponent, said in a post on X.

“This is the worst foreign policy blunder in decades,” the Republican added.

Other key issues also get short shrift in the page-and-a-half deal.

When the war started Trump said a top priority was preventing Iran from funding proxy groups in the region, like Hezbollah. That was a priority for Israel, as well, which joined the US in launching the war and has waged a separate conflict with the Iranian-backed militia group in Lebanon.

The cessation of hostilities under this initial agreement extends to Hezbollah. But the group barely received any other mention in the deal, and it is unclear if Iran will be pressured to drop its support for the group and other regional proxies in the next round of talks.

Senior US officials have shared the details of the deal with Iran in a briefing call with journalists. The full text of a memorandum of understanding between the two countries was read aloud, verbatim, on the call.

The 14-paragraph document covers a range of subjects, from reopening the Strait of Hormuz to the creation of a reconstruction fund for Iran.

Fresh from the briefing, the BBC’s Gary O’Donoghue shares his key takeaways.