President Biden is traveling to Israel on Wednesday following the deadly attack in the country by the militant group Hamas and the subsequent war that has left thousands dead.
Biden will travel to Tel Aviv where he will meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli officials and discuss issues including American citizens and others unable to leave Gaza, information about the hostages held by Hamas, civilian causalities, and providing humanitarian assistance.
Biden will then travel from Tel Aviv to Amman, Jordan later on Wednesday to meet with King Abdullah II, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.
The meetings will focus on the humanitarian situation and reiterating that the U.S. believes that Hamas does not represent the majority of the Palestinian people.
“It will be a quick trip over the course of a single day but … it comes at a very critical time and there is an awful lot on the agenda,” national security spokesman John Kirby told reporters on Monday about the visit.
When asked if the expected Israeli ground offensive in Gaza would not begin until after Biden’s trip or if an agreement was made with Israeli along those lines, Kirby said that the U.S. isn’t dictating terms to the Israeli military but feel that proper security perimeters are in place.
“We’re not dictating terms or operational directions to the Israelis. They should speak to their operations, we’re not going to do that. We’re certainly not going to speak to future operations that have or have not been conducted,” Kirby said.
When asked what message Biden will give Netanyahu about the need to protect civilians in Gaza, Kirby said the U.S. has been “consistent” about its concern over civilian causalities.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the president’s trip just before the White House’s official announcement. Blinken is in Tel Aviv and met with Netanyahu on Monday.
Biden’s trip was kept quiet until the news was announced Monday evening.
He previously was scheduled to travel to Colorado on Monday to promote his economic agenda, but scrapped the planned trip early Monday morning “to participate in national security meetings.”
The president was then photographed in the White House during a meeting with his national security team about the latest developments after Hamas’s attack in Israel and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, squashing questions about whether Biden had left for Israel already.
When the president traveled to Ukraine earlier this year, amid the Russian invasion, he traveled in secrecy and the White House did not announce the visit until he arrived in Kyiv.
Kirby was asked about the decision to announce this trip ahead of time and he said “this is a different situation.” “The security situation is certainly tense, of course,” Kirby said. “In this case, taking all of those considerations into account… it was deemed appropriate that we could talk about it beforehand,” he said, noting though that he is not providing that much detail on the Monday night call with reporters.
On Monday, Biden held a call with Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany in advance of Scholz’s travel to Egypt and Israel, as well as calls with Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani of Iraq and Sisi of Egypt.
Kirby said that on the call with Sisi, Biden made the case that the U.S. wants to see security assistance get into Gaza and people to be able to get out.
His visit comes as Gaza has been under heavy bombardment by Israel, and Israel is expected to launch a ground offensive soon. Biden is walking a fine line between his support for Israel and the country’s right to defend itself following the attacks last weekend and the looming humanitarian crisis in Gaza.
Since Hamas’s brutal attack against Israel, the war has claimed more than 3,600 lives across Israel and Gaza. Thirty Americans were killed in the Hamas attack, and 13 Americans are missing, while the White House has said that less than a handful have been taken as hostages by Hamas.
Israel has called for 1 million people in Gaza to evacuate to its southern end.
U.S. officials said Sunday they have been working to assist Americans looking to leave the Gaza Strip and the West Bank but that no Americans have been able get out as far as they know.
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