Iran war day 93: Trump won’t ‘rush’ deal; Israel expands Lebanon invasion 

United States President Donald Trump has told Fox News he is in “no hurry” for a deal with Iran as the Israeli army claimed to have captured a strategic castle in southern Lebanon in the deepest incursion into the country in 26 years.

The comments come as US media reported that Trump asked for several amendments to the preliminary agreement with Iran during his meeting at the White House on Friday.

Here is the latest on the US-Iran negotiations as Israel expands its invasion of Lebanon on day 93 of the war on Iran:

In Iran

• A senior Iranian commander warned against any further attacks on his country. “The enemy should know that any aggression against the country’s territory will be met with a response even more forceful than before,” Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari, the deputy army commander for coordination, said, according to Press TV.
• The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) said it shot down a US drone attempting to carry out a “hostile operation” in its territorial waters, according to Iran’s semi-official Fars news agency.
• Fars reported that the military unveiled its newest naval attack craft, 27 Rajab, during a ceremony in Tehran’s Enqelab Square. The agency said the vessel can achieve speeds of up to 100 knots (185km/h) and is equipped to launch long-range cruise missiles.
• The US military said its forces “disabled” a Gambia-flagged ship attempting to sail towards an Iranian port. Iran accused the US of betraying diplomacy by continuing its naval blockade.

War diplomacy

• Trump told Fox News he is in no hurry for a deal with Iran and that the US is getting what it wants “slowly but surely” in the ongoing negotiations. “The one guarantee that I have to have is that there will be no nuclear weapons,” he told his daughter-in-law, Lara Trump, in an interview on Fox News on Saturday night.
• The comments came as US media reported that Trump asked for several amendments to the preliminary agreement with Iran during his meeting in the White House Situation Room on Friday. The New York Times reported that Trump has “toughened the terms” of the potential framework. Axios reported that the president asked for “several amendments” to the preliminary agreement his envoys reached with Iran.
• Iranian state media reported on Saturday that a proposed memorandum of understanding with the US included an agreement to release $12bn in frozen assets. The report cited an “unofficial” draft of the memorandum, and a similar item carried by state TV earlier this week was dismissed by the White House as a “fabrication”.

In Lebanon

• The Associated Press and Reuters news agencies reported that Israeli forces captured the Beaufort Castle, locally also known as Qalaat al-Shaqif, near the city of Nabatieh in southern Lebanon.
• The Israeli military issued a new warning, asking residents to flee south of the Zahrani River in southern Lebanon. It said it was acting forcefully against Hezbollah in the region and told all residents located south of the river to leave their homes immediately.
• Israeli air raids on Sunday morning targeted the southern Lebanese towns of Arnoun, Kfar Tebnit and Kfar Remman, according to our colleagues at Al Jazeera Arabic. Israeli shelling also hit the Kfarjouz area in the Nabatieh district and the town of Dbeibine in the Marjayoun district.
• Israel’s military spokeswoman Ella Waweya said it launched “a large-scale operation” in the Beaufort Ridge and the Wadi al-Salouqi area in southern Lebanon.
• The Israeli military issued a “precautionary directive” following “the identification of launches from Lebanon toward several communities in northern Israel”. The military instructed residents to take shelter, but Israeli media reported shortly afterwards that air raid sirens did not sound in the region.
• Lebanon’s Prime Minister Nawaf Salam accused Israel of pursuing a “scorched-earth policy” as Israeli forces expand their ground invasion and continue to push towards the city of Nabatieh.

In Israel

• Israeli forces said on Sunday they were advancing in Lebanon as part of expanded ground operations to strengthen their military position in the south of the country, where they are fighting Iran-backed Hezbollah.
• A significant number of Israeli ground soldiers “commenced offensive operations aimed at expanding the Forward Defense Line”, the Israeli military said in a statement, adding that the operation was expanding and forces had crossed the Litani River.
• The Israeli military said a 21-year-old soldier had been killed in battle in southern Lebanon on Saturday. It said four others were wounded in the incident.

In the US

• Trump said on Saturday that the US intentionally refrained from targeting Iran’s military, arguing that past wars have shown the dangers of dismantling a country’s institutions and armed forces. He pointed to Iraq as an example of what he described as a failed US approach in past conflicts. “You look at what happened with Iraq; we did so badly, that was such a foolish thing,” he told Fox News.
• Congress advanced a US-Israeli military integration plan that could tie the US and Israeli militaries far more closely together, deepening their cooperation on weapons research, production and technology.