GNITN - Special Edition

Israel At War – Day 294

Lots And Lots Of Talk

Netanyahu Meets Biden, Harris

The long awaited visit of Prime Minister Netanyahu to America is almost over with him meeting with Biden and Harris yesterday and then Trump today. We learn more about the meetings with Biden and Harris with an article from The Times Of Israel:

US President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris both told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday that it was time to nail down a hostage release and ceasefire deal with Hamas as families of hostages held by the terror group expressed rare optimism that an agreement could finally come together.

The PM was told that it’s time to get a hostage agreement completed:

“There has been hopeful movement” in talks for a deal to end the war in Gaza and release hostages after over nine months,” Harris said following what she said was “a frank and constructive meeting” with Netanyahu.

“As I just told Prime Minister Netanyahu, ‘it is time to get this deal done,’” she added.

This conversation was after Netanyahu met with Biden twice:

Netanyahu met with Harris after sitting down with Biden at the White House for the first time since the president took office in 2021. Netanyahu and Biden later met again together with the families of eight US citizens being held by Hamas.

Hostage families felt better after their meeting:

Relatives of captives said they left that meeting more hopeful than since the last hostage-for-prisoners deal saw 105 civilians freed in November.

“After asking a series of difficult questions and getting answers to all of them… we feel probably more optimistic than we have since the first round of releases in late November,” hostage Sagui Dekel-Chen’s father Jonathan Dekel-Chen told reporters outside the White House, adding that their meeting was “productive and honest.”

“We got absolute commitments from the Biden administration and from Prime Minister Netanyahu that they understand the urgency of this moment now to waste no time in completing this deal as it currently stands with as little change as humanly possible,” he said claiming the US government, Congress and the Israeli leadership were all in lockstep.

The PM told the hostage families that a new deal will be submitted soon:

The families said they had been told Israel would submit an updated deal proposal to Hamas within days.

“As a result of the conversations between the leaders and their staff [before we met them], they are working as we speak to put together an updated Israeli proposal that will be sent back to Hamas. It is all within the framework of that three-stage proposed deal that the President announced at the end of May,” Dekel-Chen told The Times of Israel.

Another Admonition From Biden

We learned from the same report from The Times that Biden also told Netanyahu to get an agreement sooner than later:

During their White House meeting earlier Thursday, Biden told Netanyahu that “we need to get this deal over the line,” according to State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

“We’ve been working on it for some time,” Miller said. “It’s been a tough negotiation. We’ve made progress. We’ve got a framework for an agreement done. We now need to bridge the final differences and get a deal in place so we can all move forward.”

Another spokesperson added these comments:

White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby, wearing a dog tag that he received from one of the American hostage families, told reporters that Biden conveyed to Netanyahu “how deeply and strongly the president feels that we’ve got to get this hostage deal in place and get a ceasefire — at least for phase one for those first six weeks.”

The differences can be managed he said:

Kirby reiterated that gaps remain, but that they’re bridgeable if there’s leadership and willingness to compromise and make the effort.

“Today is the 293rd day that these hostages have been held captive by Hamas and you just have to assume that it is in the most horrific of circumstances,” the White House spokesman lamented.

Notes from the meeting with Biden gives us more details for other concerns:

In a readout of the meeting, the White House said Biden and Netanyahu discussed the hostage talks in detail, and that the president “expressed the need to close the remaining gaps, finalize the deal as soon as possible, bring the hostages home, and reach a durable end to the war in Gaza.”

Biden also pressed Netanyahu on the humanitarian situation in Gaza and the flow of aid into the enclave.

Biden told Netanyahu once again that the United States is firmly behind Israel:

The president “reaffirmed the US ironclad commitment to Israel’s security against all threats from Iran and its proxies, including Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis,” according to the readout.

Harris Meets With The PM

Kamala Harris spoke separately with Netanyahu and talked about the hostages, Gaza, and a two state solution as we see in more from The Times article:

During her remarks, Harris made a point of reading out the names of all eight American-Israel hostages still held captive by Hamas — something no US official has done in this manner.

There are thought to be 111 hostages in Gaza, including the remains of 39 confirmed dead by the IDF, out of the 251 people abducted during the Hamas onslaught nearly 300 days ago.

Why she thought that Netanyahu didn’t know them, we don’t really know. Harris then talked about how the war was hurting the people and the area, again, something the PM is fully aware of. Perhaps she wants to impress him and maybe doing something more:

But Harris also spoke forcefully about the devastation in Gaza after nearly 10 months of war, saying she pressed Netanyahu about the scale of human suffering in Gaza.

Now the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, Harris’s remarks on the war were subject to extra scrutiny, with some sensing in her comments a shift in the administration’s tone toward Israel and Gaza. US officials have dismissed the narrative that Harris’s stance on Israel differs from Biden’s or that she played a “bad cop” role in the administration vis-a-vis Israel.

Harris played the same old humanitarian aid card that really is getting old since it is based on the lies of Hamas and the United Nations who are clearly biased:

“Israel has a right to defend itself. And how it does so matters,” Harris said. “I made clear my serious concern about the dire humanitarian situation there.”

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry has said at least 39,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of Israel’s military offensive’, initiated in the wake of the October 7 massacres in southern Israel. The toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 15,000 combatants in battle and some 1,000 terrorists inside Israel during the October 7 attack.

She brought up the devastation without saying that Hamas started things and fights in a way that makes it impossible to avoid the destruction:

“What has happened in Gaza over the past nine months is devastating,” Harris said. “We cannot look away in the face of these tragedies. We cannot allow ourselves to become numb to the suffering and I will not be silent.”

She then brought up the two-state experiment that Israel has soundly rejected since October 7th:

In her statement after the Netanyahu meeting, Harris stressed that she remains “committed to a path forward that can lead to a two-state solution.

“I know right now, it is hard to conceive of that prospect,” she continued. “But a two-state solution is the only path that ensures Israel remains a secure Jewish and democratic state, and one that ensures Palestinians can finally realize the freedom security and prosperity that they rightly deserve.”

Harris tried to assure the PM that she is a supporter of Israel:

Harris also highlighted her long history with the state of Israel, recalling how she raised money as a child to plant trees in the Jewish state. Earlier in the day, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, whom Netanyahu will meet Friday in Florida, said at a rally in North Carolina the vice president was “totally against the Jewish people.”

No one should believe her even if the stories are true:

“From when I was a young girl, collecting funds to plant trees for Israel, to my time in the United States Senate and now at the White House, I’ve had an unwavering commitment to the existence of the State of Israel, to its security, and to the people of Israel,” Harris said.

She seemed to call out the protestors in the rotunda:

Earlier Thursday, Harris blasted the “despicable acts and dangerous hate-fueled rhetoric” by “unpatriotic” anti-Israel demonstrators who rioted outside the Capitol on Wednesday in protest of Netanyahu’s address to a joint session of Congress.

Her words were just that as it appears the administration won’t treat them like the J6ers.

Trump And Netanyahu Meet

Finishing his American tour, Prime Minister Netanyahu talked with President Donald Trump as we learn from an article from The Jerusalem Post:

During former president Donald Trump’s meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Netanyahu confirmed that a delegation will head to Rome for hostage negotiation talks the last week of July, Kan News reported Friday.

“Time will tell if we are close to a deal,” the prime minister said, adding that he believes there is progress in the hostage negotiation talks, attributing the cause of that progress to military pressure.

Trump isn’t hopeful if he loses the election:

Trump stated in the meeting that if he didn't win, there would be a third world war, and he expressed solidarity with Israel and promised to make every effort to bring peace to the Middle East.

They’ve always gotten along:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited former US President Donald Trump at Trump's Florida resort on Friday for a meeting that could ease tensions between two leaders who forged a close alliance during Trump's years in the White House.

Netanyahu met Trump, the Republican nominee in the 2024 US presidential race, a day after Netanyahu met Democratic President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, who is running against Trump in the Nov. 5 US election.

Trump said he has "always had a very good relationship" with Benjamin Netanyahu, as he spoke at the conclusion of a meeting on Friday with the Israeli prime minister at his Florida resort.

The PM talked about further hostage talks as he rearranged his schedule to meet Trump:

Netanyahu, sitting across from Trump at a table alongside advisers, said Israel would be dispatching a negotiating team to Gaza ceasefire talks in Rome "probably at the beginning of the week."

The longtime Israeli leader rearranged his US travel schedule to meet Trump. He landed in Palm Beach early on Friday.

It was a politically astute move by the PM:

Opinion polls put Harris and Trump in a close race for the White House, prompting world leaders like Netanyahu, traditionally more aligned with Trump's Republicans than Biden's Democrats, to strike a balance in dealings with the US.

Yesterday Trump talked about the war in Israel:

In an interview with Fox News on Thursday, Trump called for a quick end to the war and a return of the hostages Hamas holds in Gaza, adding that Israel has to better manage its "public relations."

"I want him (Netanyahu) to finish up and get it done quickly," Trump said. "They are getting decimated with this publicity."

The meeting of the two politicians most likely went a long way towards alleviating tensions since Netanyahu congratulated Biden for an election Trump thought he won.