Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said he will discuss “victory over Hamas”, countering Iran and expanding diplomatic relations with Arab countries in his meeting with US President Donald Trump.
The meeting at the White House on Tuesday will be Mr Trump’s first with a foreign leader since returning to office.
It comes as US and Arab mediators begin the daunting work of brokering the next phase of an agreement to wind down the war in the Gaza Strip and release dozens of militant-held hostages.
Hamas, which has quickly reasserted its control over Gaza since the ceasefire took hold last month, has said it will not release the hostages due to go free in the second phase without an end to the war and the full withdrawal of Israeli forces.
Mr Netanyahu, who is under mounting pressure from some of his governing partners to resume the war after the first phase ends in early March, has said Israel is still committed to victory over Hamas and the return of all the hostages captured in the militants’ October 7, 2023 attack that triggered the war.
It is unclear where Mr Trump stands.
He has been a staunch supporter of Israel, but has also pledged to end wars in the Middle East and took credit for helping to broker the ceasefire agreement. The deal has halted the fighting and led to the release of 18 hostages so far who had been held for more than 15 months, as well as hundreds of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel.
On Sunday morning, an Israeli air strike on a vehicle in central Gaza injured five people, including a child.
The Israeli military said it fired on the vehicle because it was bypassing a checkpoint while heading north in violation of the ceasefire agreement. The military said it remains committed to the deal.
In a statement released ahead of his departure for Washington on Sunday, Mr Netanyahu said the two men will discuss “victory over Hamas, achieving the release of all our hostages, and dealing with the Iranian terror axis in all its components” – referring to Iran’s alliance of militant groups across the region, including Hamas.
He said by working together, they can “strengthen security, broaden the circle of peace and achieve a remarkable era of peace through strength”.
The war began when thousands of Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking around 250 hostage. More than 100 hostages were freed during a week-long ceasefire in November 2023, eight have been rescued alive and dozens of bodies have been recovered by Israeli forces.
Israel’s air and ground war has killed more than 47,000 Palestinians, more than half of them women and children, according to local health authorities who do not say how many of the dead were fighters.
The war has left large parts of several cities in Gaza in ruins and displaced around 90% of the population of 2.3 million people.
Under the first phase of the ceasefire agreement, Hamas is to release a total of 33 hostages, eight of whom Hamas says are dead, in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners. Israeli forces have pulled back from most areas and allowed hundreds of thousands of Palestinians to return to devastated northern Gaza.
Negotiations on the second phase, in which the war would end and the remaining 60 or so hostages would be returned, are set to begin on Monday. If the United States, Qatar and Egypt are unable to broker an agreement between Israel and Hamas, the conflict could resume in early March.
While the Gaza ceasefire has now 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 Palestinian Health Ministry said a 73-year-old man was shot dead by Israeli troops in Jenin early on Sunday. There was no immediate comment from the military.
The ministry had earlier reported five killed, including a 16-year-old, in Israeli air strikes overnight.
The military said it killed two militants – one of whom had been freed as part of the week-long Gaza ceasefire in November 2023 – in an air strike on a village near Jenin. It said the two were planning an imminent attack, and that additional strikes targeted two other militant cells.
