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Netanyahu and Trump to talk tariffs, Iran and Gaza

Talks on Monday between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump are expected to be dominated by Washington’s shock tariffs on Israel and escalating tensions with Iran.Netanyahu becomes the first foreign leader to meet with Trump in the US capital since the president unveiled sweeping levies on multiple countries in his “Liberation Day” announcement on Wednesday.Arriving in Washington direct from a visit to Hungary, Netanyahu’s chief objective will be to persuade Trump to reverse the decision, or at the very least to reduce the 17 percent levy set to be imposed on Israeli imports before it takes effect.Before leaving Budapest, Netanyahu said his discussions would include a range of issues, including “the tariff regime that has also been imposed on Israel”.”I’m the first international leader, the first foreign leader who will meet with President Trump on a matter so crucial to Israel’s economy,” he said in a statement.”I believe this reflects the special personal relationship and the unique bond between the United States and Israel, which is so vital at this time.”Analysts said Netanyahu will seek to secure an exemption from the tariffs for Israel.”The urgency (of the visit) makes sense in terms of stopping it before it gets institutionalised,” said Jonathan Rynhold, head of political studies at Bar-Ilan University in Tel Aviv.Such an exemption would not only benefit Trump’s closest Middle East ally but also “please Republicans in Congress, whose voters care about Israel, but are unwilling to confront Trump on this at this point,” he said.Israel had attempted to avoid the new levy by moving preemptively a day before Trump’s announcement and lifting all remaining duties on the one percent of American goods still affected by them.But Trump still went ahead with his new policy, saying the United States had a significant trade deficit with Israel, a top beneficiary of US military aid.- Gaza truce, hostages -The Israeli leader’s US trip is “also a way for Netanyahu to play the game and show Trump that Israel is going along with him,” said Yannay Spitzer, a professor of economics at Hebrew University.”I would not be surprised if there is an announcement of some concession for Israel… and this will be an example for other countries.”Netanyahu will also discuss the war in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli hostages still held in the Palestinian territory, and the growing “threat from Iran”, his office said.Israel resumed air strikes on Gaza on March 18, ending nearly two months of ceasefire with Hamas that had been brokered by the United States, Egypt and Qatar.Efforts to restore the truce have since failed, with more than 1,330 people killed in renewed Israeli air and ground operations, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-controlled territory.Palestinian militants there still hold 58 hostages, including 34 the Israeli military says are dead.On Iran, Trump has been pressing for “direct talks” with Tehran on a new deal to curb the Islamic republic’s nuclear programme.Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on Sunday rejected the idea of direct negotiations with the United States as “meaningless”.There has been widespread speculation that Israel, possibly with US help, might attack Iranian facilities if no agreement is reached.

Gaza rescuers say Israeli strikes kill 44

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli strikes killed at least 44 people on Sunday as Israel’s prime minister vowed a “strong response” to a rare salvo of rockets fired from the Hamas-ruled territory.Dozens of Palestinians have been killed almost daily since Israel resumed its military offensive in Gaza on March 18, ending a two-month ceasefire that had brought relative calm to the territory.”The death toll as a result of Israeli air strikes since dawn today is at least 44, including 21 in Khan Yunis,” a city in the southern Gaza Strip, civil defence agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.One strike killed six people on Al-Nakheel Street in the Al-Tuffah neighbourhood of Gaza City, where a group had gathered near a bakery, Bassal said.Three children were among the dead, he said.A Hamas statement called the strike “a deliberate act of child killing” and a “confirmation of the sadistic and barbaric nature of the occupation and its fascist leaders”.AFP footage captured thick plumes of smoke rising from central and northern Gaza as Israeli forces bombarded areas of the besieged Palestinian territory.A ceasefire brokered by the United States, Egypt and Qatar ended on March 18 as Israel resumed its offensive in response to the Hamas attacks of October 7, 2023.Elsewhere Israel said it shot dead “one terrorist” in the West Bank for throwing rocks, with Palestinian officials claiming it was a 14-year-old boy with US citizenship.- ‘Like a nuclear bomb’ -Gaza has since endured a new wave of relentless strikes and artillery fire, with dozens of fatalities reported on a near-daily basis.Efforts to revive the ceasefire and secure the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza have so far failed.The stalled efforts will be on the agenda during a meeting between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump, set for Monday in Washington.Netanyahu ordered a “strong response”, his office said, after the Israeli military reported about 10 “projectiles” had been fired from Gaza within minutes of each other on Sunday. Most were intercepted.The Israeli offensive since 2023 has severely weakened Hamas, but the army has recorded 10 other rockets fired at Israel over the past two weeks.Israeli police said debris fell in Ashkelon, near the Gaza border, and paramedics said one man had been wounded.”The prime minister instructed to deliver a strong response and approved the continuation of the intensified IDF operations in Gaza against Hamas,” Netanyahu’s office said.One Israeli strike on Sunday hit the home of the Abu Issa family in Deir el-Balah, killing women and children, according to witnesses.”There were no wanted individuals in the house — even the men were at the mosque,” said Mohammad al-Azaizeh, a resident.”They were all civilians — children, women and girls. A missile tore through every floor, flattening the house. It felt like a nuclear bomb had hit us.”AFP footage from another strike late on Saturday in Gaza City showed scenes of devastation at a hospital, where men and women mourned bodies wrapped in white shrouds.”We heard the explosion and rushed to check on the children,” said Umm Haytham al-Salakhi through tears, as she grieved a relative at Al-Ahli Hospital.”I kept calling out for all our children.”One sobbing man cradled a relative’s body, as dozens gathered to perform funeral prayers before the victims were taken for burial.”They struck unarmed civilians while they slept,” said another resident, Mohammad Rahmi, who also lost a relative in the bombing.Several men held the bodies of children wrapped in shrouds, while rescuers transported the wounded to the hospital, according to AFP images.Some of the wounded, including children, were treated in the hospital’s corridor as relatives gathered nearby.- More than 50,000 dead -Scenes from a destroyed home revealed collapsed concrete slabs and twisted metal, as children sifted through the rubble in search of salvaged belongings.Since Israel’s military resumed its offensive in Gaza last month, more than 1,330 people have been killed in the territory, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry.The war began after Palestinian militants attacked southern Israel on October 7, 2023, resulting in the deaths of 1,218 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.The overall death toll since the war erupted now stands at 50,695, according to the Gaza health ministry.

Israel targets Hezbollah in south Lebanon as US envoy visits

Israel staged a strike in south Lebanon on Sunday that it said had targeted Hezbollah, and authorities said killed two people, as a US envoy visited for talks on the militant group and economic reforms.The strike came more than four months into a fragile truce between Israel and Hezbollah, and a day after US deputy special envoy for the Middle East, Morgan Ortagus, discussed disarming the Iran-backed with senior figures, according to a Lebanese official.The Lebanese health ministry said two people were killed in an “Israeli enemy” strike on the town of Zibqin in the south of the country near the border.The Israeli military said it targeted two Hezbollah operatives in the area who were “attempting to rebuild Hezbollah terror infrastructure sites”.The Lebanese army said the strike hit “a bulldozer and an excavator”, and that “there was no military equipment at the site”.Israel has continued to launch strikes on Lebanon since the November 27 ceasefire that largely halted more than a year of hostilities, with raids this week in south Lebanon and even on Hezbollah’s south Beirut stronghold.The truce accord was based on a UN Security Council resolution that says Lebanese troops and UN peacekeepers should be the only forces in south Lebanon, and calls for the disarmament of all non-state groups.The Lebanese official, speaking anonymously as they were not authorised to brief the media, said Saturday that Ortagus discussed “intensifying and speeding up” the Lebanese army’s work in “dismantling Hezbollah’s military infrastructure, leading to restricting weapons to state hands, without setting a timetable”.- ‘Free’ -Under the truce, Hezbollah was to redeploy fighters north of the Litani River, about 30 kilometres (20 miles) from Israel, and dismantle remaining military infrastructure in the south.Israel was to withdraw its forces across the UN-demarcated Blue Line, the de facto border. But it has missed two deadlines to do so and continues to hold five positions in south Lebanon that it deems “strategic”.In an interview with Lebanese television channel LBCI, Ortagus said that “we continue to press on this government to fully fulfil the cessation of hostilities, and that includes disarming Hezbollah and all militias”.She said it should happen “as soon as possible”.”The sooner that the LAF (army) is able to meet these goals and to disarm all militias in the state, the sooner the Lebanese people can be free… from foreign influence, free from terrorism.”Hezbollah was the only Lebanese armed group that refused to surrender its weapons following a 1975-1990 civil war.The group has been severely weakened by the latest conflict with Israel however.Ortagus said she has had “fantastic meetings” in Lebanon.President Joseph Aoun and Prime Minister Nawaf Salam — whose appointments  this year ended a more than two-year leadership vacuum — also called their discussions with her on Saturday positive.They said the talks addressed events in the south as well as economic reforms.- Reforms -The Lebanese official said Ortagus had “implied” that the reconstruction of war-ravaged areas “requires first achieving reforms and the expansion of state authority”.International creditors have long demanded reforms to unlock bailout funds that could help ease Lebanon’s five-year economic crisis, which has been widely blamed on mismanagement and corruption.Lebanon’s finance ministry said Ortagus met Sunday with Finance Minister Yassine Jaber, Economy Minister Amer Bisat and new central bank governor Karim Souaid.Discussions included “reforms initiated by the government… and the economic reform programme”, a ministry statement said.It added that the bank chief and the two ministers would attend  International Monetary Fund meetings in Washington later this month.Ali Fayyad, a member of Lebanon’s parliament for Hezbollah, condemned what he called “flagrant interference in reforms and financial, monetary and administrative matters”.”We don’t want reforms tailored to foreign wills and their politics seeking to dominate the country.”Ortagus, during the LBCI interview, said: “If they make the choice to work together and partner with the US government to disarm Hezbollah, to fulfil the cessation of hostilities, to end endemic corruption in this country, we’re going to be a wonderful partner and friend.”burs-str-lg/ami/tw