Netanyahu, Trump to hold talks on Gaza cease-fire and wider Middle-East strategy
Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. WASHINGTON : The future of the precarious Gaza cease-fire is expected to dominate much of the closed-door discussion when President Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meet in the Oval Office Tuesday.
A commitment from Netanyahu to negotiate an extension and potentially a long-term cessation of hostilities would give Trump a diplomatic win, and could secure the release of remaining hostages, including some Americans. But ending the 16-month-old war poses a challenge for Netanyahu, whose government is divided over whether the Israeli military operation in Gaza should be drawn to a close with Hamas badly weakened but not destroyed.
With such high stakes, the talks could provide an early indication of the state of the sometimes wary Trump-Netanyahu relationship. Indirect talks on extending the 42-day fighting pause were supposed to begin Monday in Qatar, but Netanyahu was in Washington, delaying a decision on engaging with Hamas until after his meeting with Trump.
Trump himself seemed uncertain about the prospects for the cease-fire, telling reporters in the Oval Office Monday: “I have no guarantees that the peace is going to hold." But he has also seemed intent on not letting the Gaza war drag on, bogging down his presidency in prolonged negotiations the way the Biden administration was—a message Trump is likely to make clear Tuesday, analysts said. “Fundamentally, this is about laying down a marker for Netanyahu that he is going to have to be much more accommodating to Trump’s preferences than he was to Biden’s," said Jonathan Panikoff, a former senior intelligence official who is at the Atlantic Council think tank.
Read more on livemint.com
