Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet Monday with U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff during a visit to Washington focused on Israel’s ceasefire with Hamas and other regional issues.
Netanyahu’s office said he and Witkoff would discuss Israel’s ceasefire positions.
The talks come as negotiations are expected to open this week on the second phase of the ceasefire, with the two sides needing to agree on matter such as the release of the remaining hostages held by Hamas and an end to the conflict that began in October 2023.
Witkoff is due to follow his Netanyahu talks by speaking with officials from Egypt and Qatar, the other two nations that have led the ceasefire negotiations.
Netanyahu is scheduled to meet Tuesday with U.S. President Donald Trump, and said those talks would include the war against Hamas, countering Iranian aggression and expanding diplomatic relations with Arab countries.
Trump has been a staunch supporter of Israel but also pledged to end wars in the Middle East and took credit for helping to broker the ceasefire agreement.
During the first phase of the ceasefire, which lasts six weeks, Hamas has freed 18 hostages in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
Hamas, a U.S. designated terror group, has quickly reasserted its control over Gaza since the ceasefire took hold last month, despite Israel saying it would not allow that to occur. The militants have said they will not release more hostages slated to go free in the second phase of the truce without an end to the war and the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from the narrow territory along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea.
Netanyahu is under mounting pressure from far-right governing partners to resume the war after the first phase of the truce ends in early March.
It’s not clear where Trump stands.
Netanyahu has said Israel is still committed to a full victory over Hamas and the return of all the hostages captured in the militants’ shock Oct. 7, 2023, attack that killed 1,200 people and led to the capture of 250 hostages. Several dozen remain in Hamas hands, both living and dead.
Israel’s counteroffensive during 15 months of warfare has killed more than 47,400 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children. Israel’s military says the death toll includes 17,000 militants it has killed.
Even with the ceasefire, periodic attacks are still occurring.
An Israeli airstrike on a vehicle in central Gaza wounded five people on Sunday, including a child who was in critical condition, according to Al-Awda Hospital, which received the casualties. The Israeli military said it fired upon the vehicle because it was bypassing a checkpoint while heading north in violation of the ceasefire agreement.
Trump brokered normalization agreements between Israel and four Arab countries in his first term. He now is seeking a wider agreement in which Israel would forge ties with Saudi Arabia.
But Riyadh has said it would only agree to such a deal if the war in Gaza ends and there is a credible pathway to a Palestinian state in Gaza, the West Bank and east Jerusalem, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Middle East war.
The U.S. supports Palestinian statehood, but Netanyahu’s government is opposed.
Even as the Gaza ceasefire has mostly held for two weeks, Israel has ramped up operations in the occupied West Bank. On Sunday, the military said it was expanding an operation focused on the volatile city of Jenin, to the town of Tamun.
The West Bank has seen a surge in violence since the start of the war in Gaza, with Israel launching near-daily military arrest raids. There has also been a rise in settler violence against Palestinians and Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
Some material in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuter
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