Israel’s Netanyahu To Meet With Recovering Biden On Tuesday
It’s the Israeli premier’s first trip outside Israel since its war against Hamas began in October.
(Bloomberg) -- Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said he’ll meet US President Joe Biden in Washington on Tuesday, a day before the Israeli prime minister is due to address a joint session of Congress.
The scheduling takes into account the American leader’s recovery from Covid-19, after he tested positive for the virus on July 17. Biden has been self-isolating at home in Delaware since then.
Netanyahu will depart Israel on Monday morning, his office said in a statement. It’s the Israeli premier’s first trip outside Israel since its war against Hamas began in October.
The White House said in an update on Saturday that Biden’s symptoms — which include “general malaise” as well as a cough and runny nose - “continue to improve steadily.”
Efforts to bring an end to Israel’s nine-month war on Hamas are likely to top the agenda of Netanyahu’s visit.
Biden was briefed by a senior security aide on Saturday about developments in the Middle East, according to a White House official.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Friday that the months-long, US-led effort to negotiate a cease-fire deal between Israel and Hamas militants is close to succeeding, but cautioned there are still some thorny issues to tackle.
Netanyahu’s pending departure comes after Israel on Saturday truck targets around the Houthi-held Red Sea port of Hodeidah in Yemen, retaliating for a drone attack on Tel Aviv on Friday by the Iran-backed militants that killed a man and exposed a vulnerability in Israeli air defenses.
Saturday’s airstrikes targeted a power station and fuel storage sites, the Yemen-based group said. Six people were killed, 83 were wounded and three remain missing, Houthi officials said on Sunday.
Israel’s strike, some 1,800 kilometers (1,120 miles) from its border was among the most complex and longest-distance missions in its air force’s history, said Israel Defense Forces spokesman Daniel Hagari.
“It clarifies to our enemies that there is no place where the long arm of the State of Israel won’t reach,” Netanyahu said in a video statement late on Saturday.
Saudi Arabia’s Defense Ministry said on Sunday that the kingdom had “no relation or involvement” in targeting Hodeidah, adding that the country will not allow any entity to violate its airspace.
The Saudi foreign ministry added later that the military escalation in Yemen harms ongoing efforts to end the war in Gaza.
In other weekend developments, humanitarian groups are considering a mass vaccination campaign for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip after traces of variant poliovirus type 2 were found in water sources in the war-torn territory.
(Updates with background on Yemen strike from eighth paragraph.)
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