- US President Joe Biden will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.
- Washington does not support an invasion of Rafah without a comprehensive strategy to assist civilians seeking safety there.
- To protect the lives of the hostages and prevent an invasion of Rafah, a hostage bargain is thought to be the best option.
Following an order from Israel’s military for Palestinians to leave eastern Rafah in advance of an offensive in the southern Gaza city, US President Joe Biden will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday.
According to the White House, despite current negotiations for a ceasefire with Hamas, Washington does not support an invasion of Rafah without a comprehensive strategy to assist civilians seeking safety there.
Biden and Netanyahu
To protect the lives of the hostages and prevent an invasion of Rafah, where over a million people are seeking refuge, a hostage bargain is thought to be the best option.
On Monday, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog will travel to Iran, where his organization will find it increasingly difficult to keep an eye on the Islamic Republic of Iran’s quickly developing nuclear program while maintaining high levels of tension in the Middle East as a result of the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Rafael Mariano Grossi has forewarned Tehran that, should it so choose, it possesses nearly weapon-grade uranium enrichment, sufficient to produce “several” nuclear bombs.
On Monday, President Joe Biden will visit King Abdullah II of Jordan, a Middle East ally, at the White House. The meeting comes as chances of a Gaza ceasefire seem remote and as Israeli officials and the Palestinian Islamist organization Hamas place the blame on one another for the standoff.
Since the start of the Israel-Hamas conflict on October 7, the chairman of UNRWA said that he had been prevented from entering Gaza twice by Israeli officials.