Vance touts "great progress" in Switzerland

Just one question, Mr. Vance. The main issue-- Let Sheikh Mohammed speak, please. First of all, I would like to welcome you here, Mr. Vice President, Mr. Prime Minister. Your leadership and field marshal leadership actually initiated that process. That's what brought us here today. I think that everyone of you has highlighted how important is this meeting, how historic is that event, and how significant is that agreement, not only on the security of the region, but also for the security of the world and for the global economy. What we have done and what we have achieved, we wouldn't achieve it without the dedication and the hard work that was done by you, Mr. Vice President and Mr. Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Prime Minister, and Field Marshal, and also, on the Iranian side, Dr. Qalibaf and Dr. Araghchi. I would like to thank all of you for your leadership and determination that put us in this room. And this is not really the main celebration. Our celebration is when we reach the ultimate agreement. Hopefully, this is just the beginning. And I wish everyone all the best. Qatar will stay dedicated to this partnership, to support these mediations until the end, until we reach a solution. We will always be a partner in bringing more peace, prosperity, and hopefully, a better future for our region. Thank you very much. Thank you, Sheikh. So, guys, we'll take just a couple of questions, and then we're going to have to kick out the media and get started with the hard work. Go ahead.

Do you have a message for Prime Minister Netanyahu with regards to Israel's military operations in Lebanon? Well, first of all, we've seen great progress over the last couple of days in ensuring that the ceasefire holds in Lebanon. These things are always a little bit messy. If you go back to how much was happening three months ago and compare it to three weeks ago, great progress has been made. If you go back to three weeks ago to three days ago, additional progress has been made. The president has committed us to see a full regional ceasefire. We found great partners in working with the Qataris, the Pakistanis, our friends in Israel. We're all working towards regional peace. There, of course, are going to be sometimes disagreements about precisely how to get there, but I actually feel great about where we are in Lebanon. There's still some additional wood to chop, but we're going to keep on working at it. I think you had a question over here.

How are you thinking to stop genocide in Lebanon? As you know, your alignment, Israel, has something like genocide in Lebanon. The main issue is stopping this. Well, ma'am, I think that the president of the United States and the United States of America have done more to stop the conflict in Lebanon than any government anywhere in the world over the last few months. And we're going to keep on working towards it. As I think a lot of you appreciate, peace is never easy. Peace always requires a little bit of work. It always requires a little bit give and take. But the president of the United States is committed not just to peace between the United States and Iran. The president is committed to a regional peace, which is why we're here working so hard to settle our issues. The one last comment I want to make is, what today really represents is the beginning of a technical negotiation that's not going to solve every disagreement, but it's going to allow us to sit together as teams, for the first time, really, in history to figure out what matters most to the respective parties, to settle those issues, to solve those issues, and get to a better tomorrow. The reason why the political leadership of the respective countries is here is because we wanted to, first of all, set up the structure for these technical negotiations, and second of all, make sure that our teams have our full support and know they can always call on us to break through any barriers. We got a lot of work to do. We're excited to do it. Thank you all for being here.