Netanyahu has yet to be received at the White House despite winning an unprecedented sixth term in November…reports Asian Lite News
President Joe Biden will meet Israeli President Isaac Herzog at the White House on Tuesday when they will discuss Israel’s regional integration and Russia’s military ties with Iran, the White House said on Thursday.
“Biden will stress the importance of our shared democratic values, and discuss ways to advance equal measures of freedom, prosperity, and security for Palestinians and Israelis,” White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement.
The visit by Herzog, whose role is largely ceremonial, will mark the 75th anniversary of Israel’s 1948 founding. Herzog has also been invited to address a joint meeting of the US House of Representatives and Senate, a top Washington honor.
His trip follows a period of increased violence in the occupied West Bank, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s religious-nationalist government has drawn Biden administration criticism over renewed Jewish settlement construction.
Netanyahu has yet to be received at the White House despite winning an unprecedented sixth term in November.
Biden, during a CNN interview on Sunday, declined to say whether an invitation would be extended to Netanyahu.
“I think (Netanyahu) is trying to … work through his existing problems in terms of his coalition,” Biden said during the interview, describing Netanyahu’s government as “one of the most extremist members of cabinets that I’ve seen.”
Following Biden’s remarks on Sunday, Israel’s hard-right security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, asked on Twitter: “What exactly about me is extreme?“
Ben-Gvir added: “President Biden needs to realize that we are no longer a star on the American flag.”
Meanwhile, The Wall Street Journal published an exit interview with President Joe Biden’s outgoing ambassador to Israel, Tom Nides, in which he called on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to slow the extremist Israeli government’s judicial overhaul plan and trumpeted efforts to improve conditions in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Nides said that the US role in Israel remains indispensable. “I think most Israelis want the United States to be in their business,” he told the Journal.
But, with the ambassador’s planned departure coming just after the Israeli military’s siege of the West Bank city of Jenin, the comments revealed something more candid about the Biden administration’s emphasis there. The focus: relatively minor economic development initiatives for Palestinians without a bigger plan, or even a stronger stance on how to protect Palestinian rights.
“No, I’m not getting a Nobel Peace Prize in the next seven days,” Nides said in the interview. “But I do think I can look back and say that I’ve done things that have made life just a little bit easier and better for the average Palestinian.” His only mention of Jenin appeared to be about a power plant he had worked on getting for the city.
The interview shows how unambitious Biden’s approach is to a conflict that previous US administrations have invested significant diplomatic capital in resolving.
Nides, who is active on social media and has a big personality in media encounters, offers a remarkable snapshot of how the Biden administration sees Israel and Palestine. As he put it, “I think the important thing for the security state of Israel is to keep things calm in the West Bank.”’
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