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Former president Donald Trump confirmed plans to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this Friday at his private Mar-a-lago Club in Palm Beach, Florida.
Netanyahu, who is making a swing through Washington, D.C. to meet with President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and members of Congress this week, requested the in-person meeting with Trump.
“Looking forward to welcoming Bibi Netanyahu at Mar-a-Lago in Palm Beach, Florida,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “During my first term, we had Peace and Stability in the Region, even signing the historic Abraham Accords – And we will have it again.” Trump originally announced the meeting for Thursday but later corrected his statement to say the meeting would take place on Friday.
Netanyahu is delivering an address to Congress on Wednesday.
Relations between Trump and the Israeli leader have grown tense in recent years following the 2020 election. Trump blasted Netanyahu for congratulating Biden on his win, telling Axios in an interview in 2021: “f**k him.”
Trump has also publicly urged the prime minister to move more swiftly to bring the hostages home from Gaza.
“We want our hostages back, and they better be back before I assume office, or you will be paying a very big price,” Trump warned during his Republican National Convention speech last week in Milwaukee.
Trump has criticized Netanyahu over his leadership during the Israel-Hamas war and said earlier this year that the Israeli leader was “absolutely losing the PR war.”
“Get it over with and let’s get back to peace and stop killing people. And that’s a very simple statement,” Trump told Hugh Hewitt in an interview this spring. “They have to get it done. Get it over with and get it over with fast because we have to — you have to get back to normalcy and peace.”
Trump is unlikely to significantly change the trajectory of the Biden administration’s Israel policy — one that allots about $3 billion in military aid to Israel each year — if he is elected in November. Still, the personal relationship between the two leaders is one that needs mending, and Netanyahu is likely to try and convince Trump that the Israel Defense Force’s missions both in Gaza and on Israel’s northern border where it is fighting Hezbollah are operations that will continue to need significant American backing.
This will be the first in-person meeting between Trump and Netanyahu since the former president left the White House.
