By Maya Gebeily and Tom Perry
BEIRUT, July 21 (Reuters) - Lebanese President Joseph Aoun will meet U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House on Tuesday to present a plan on how to disarm Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah and secure Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon.
Aoun, who served as the commander of Lebanon's U.S.-backed army before being elected president last year, is the first Lebanese head of state in nearly 20 years to visit the White House, where he will meet Trump face-to-face for the first time.
The meeting comes at a crucial moment for Lebanon: Israeli troops are occupying a swathe of the country's south, hundreds of thousands of Lebanese remain displaced following Israeli strikes and Hezbollah has firmly rejected the government's direct talks with Israel -- and efforts by the state to strip it of its arms.
Aoun arrived in Washington at the weekend and met with U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Sunday, telling him that Israel should begin withdrawing from southern Lebanon in line with a U.S.-brokered June 26 agreement between Lebanon and Israel.
That deal aims to disarm Hezbollah, see a progressive Israeli troop withdrawal and set the stage for peaceful ties between the two countries.
Hours ahead of Aoun's meeting with Trump, Lebanese army troops began taking control of territory vacated by Israeli forces in southern Lebanon — the first test of the plan.
A Lebanese official said Aoun believes only Trump possesses the leverage needed to pressure Israel to withdraw its troops and help Lebanon restore its sovereignty. The official said that Aoun, in addition to asking the U.S. president to press Israel to withdraw, would also present Trump with a written proposal on how to decommission Hezbollah's massive arsenal.
SEEKING HEZBOLLAH'S DISARMAMENT
Aoun, 62, became president just before Trump began his second term in the White House. The U.S. welcomed Aoun's election.
Aoun is a Maronite Christian, as required by Lebanon's sectarian power-sharing system which stipulates the prime minister must be Sunni Muslim and the speaker of parliament must be Shi'ite Muslim. A career soldier, Aoun was wounded twice and still carries a shrapnel wound.
His rise reflected a major shift in the power balance in Lebanon, following a devastating Israeli offensive against Hezbollah in 2024 and the ousting of Hezbollah's Syrian ally President Bashar al-Assad — seismic events that weakened the group and its long-decisive hold over the state.
At his swearing-in ceremony, Aoun vowed to affirm "the state's right to a monopoly on arms".
His presidency's first year was defined by a government bid to secure the disarmament of Hezbollah, which was founded by Iran's Revolutionary Guards in 1982 and has fought numerous wars with Israel.
Lebanese troops deployed in southern Lebanon to collect Hezbollah weapons caches, in line with a ceasefire after the 2024 war and without opposition from a weakened Hezbollah.
A NEW WAR ERUPTS
But early into his term's second year, a new war erupted when Hezbollah fired at Israel on March 2 in support of Iran, which was under U.S. and Israeli attack.
Hezbollah's attack triggered a fierce Israeli air and ground campaign that has killed more than 4,300 people, according to Lebanon's health ministry, including nearly 800 children, women and medics.
The toll does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. Hezbollah has not announced a toll for its fighters.
After the war began, Aoun swiftly called for direct talks with Israel, a historic departure for a state repeatedly invaded by Israel since 1978. It led to the highest-level face-to-face contacts in decades between the two countries.
It also made him the focus of fierce criticism by Hezbollah and its supporters.
Aoun has stood firm, criticising Hezbollah for starting the war and saying Lebanon was being destroyed for the sake of Iran.
Still, he has stopped short of agreeing to Trump's call for him to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
A MILITARY VETERAN
Aoun was born in Sin al-Fil, a suburb of eastern Beirut. His family originally hails from south Lebanon. His first army assignment was as a platoon commander in the army rangers in 1985, during Lebanon's 1975 to 1990 civil war.
Shortly after his promotion to commander, he oversaw a campaign to rout Islamic State militants at the Syrian-Lebanese border.
He led the army through the crisis that followed Lebanon's financial implosion of 2019, which devastated the Lebanese currency after decades of state corruption and bad governance.
At the time, Aoun warned that the crisis would lead to the collapse of the Lebanese army, "the backbone of the country".
In an unusually political statement for an army commander, he criticised ruling politicians over the collapse, saying soldiers were going hungry along with the rest of the population and asking politicians, "what do you intend to do?"
Aoun's election ended a two-year presidential vacuum following the 2022 end of the term of Hezbollah ally Michel Aoun, who is no relation.
He has pledged to work on long-delayed economic reforms and vowed justice for victims of the Beirut port explosion of 2020.
(Editing by Gareth Jones, William Maclean)
