Lebanon’s President Joseph Aoun has pushed back against critics of the Lebanon-Israel framework signed last week in Washington, emphasising the text is “not an agreement”, Al Jazeera reports.

“Lebanon’s problem is with Israel, and it is a sovereign state that decided to negotiate on its own behalf,” Lebanon’s National News Agency quotes the president as saying. “It has not relinquished its legal, political, or field principles in the framework agreement, as some are claiming.”

Speaking to delegations from the Lebanese bar association and economic bodies, the president warns that “discord is forbidden” and discourages people from “[taking] to the streets”.