PALM BEACH: 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.
The longtime Israeli leader rearranged his US travel schedule to meet Trump. He landed in Palm Beach early on Friday.
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.
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Nine months into an Israeli offensive in Gaza, Harris pressed Netanyahu on the suffering of Palestinians in the enclave in talks that were watched for signs of how she might shift American policy if she becomes president.
“I made clear my serious concern about the dire humanitarian situation there,” Harris said on Thursday after the meeting. “I will not be silent.”
“Israel has a right to defend itself. And how it does so matters,” she said.
Israeli officials criticized Harris for saying it was time for the war to end.
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.”
Trump also criticized those who protested a speech Netanyahu gave to the US Congress on Wednesday.
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Dozens of Democrats boycotted the speech, voicing dismay over the thousands of civilian deaths in Gaza and the displacement of most of its 2.3 million people.
Netanyahu, Trump look to ease tensions
The meeting between Trump and Netanyahu signaled that both were looking to ease tensions.
The Israeli leader angered Trump when he congratulated Biden on his victory over Trump in the 2020 election. Trump has falsely claimed the election was stolen from him by voter fraud.
Trump more recently criticized Netanyahu for Israeli security failures around the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel that triggered the Israeli offensive in Gaza.
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In defiant remarks to Congress on Wednesday, Netanyahu defended Israel’s military and dismissed criticism of a campaign which has devastated Gaza and killed more than 39,000 people, according to health officials in the enclave.
Israeli officials estimate that some 14,000 fighters from Hamas and Islamic Jihad have been killed or taken prisoner out of a force they estimated to number more than 25,000 at the start of the war.
In Wednesday’s speech, Netanyahu praised Biden’s support for Israel.
But to cheers from Republicans, he touched on Trump’s pro-Israel record as president. He praised Trump’s decision to move the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a long-held goal of conservatives that infuriated Palestinians.
He also cited the Abraham Accords, landmark US-brokered agreements signed during Trump’s White House years that normalized bilateral relations between Israel and both Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
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Palm Beach County Sheriff Ric Bradshaw encouraged peaceful protests but said he did not expect demonstrations on the scale of what happened during Netanyahu’s speech in Washington when thousands of activists marched - vandalizing some landmarks and confronting police - to protest the war in Gaza.
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