- A source close to the president told NBC News that Biden feels Netanyahu is “giving him hell” over ceasefire negotiations
President Joe Biden sensationally called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu the “main obstacle” to peace in the Middle East, a shocking new report has found.
The comments come as Israeli airstrikes killed 67 Palestinians and injured dozens of others in Rafah, the southern Gaza city that is the last refuge for about a million displaced civilians.
A source close to the president said this NBC News that Biden feels like Netanyahu is “giving him hell” over the ceasefire negotiations.
‘He just feels like this is enough. It has to stop,” another source told the channel.
On Friday, the White House sought to downplay sharp criticism of Israel by President Joe Biden and a top national security official over the way Netanyahu negotiated his country’s response to Hamas’ brutal Oct. 7 attack.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday evening, Biden called Israel’s military operations in Gaza “overblown” and said the suffering of innocent people “must stop.”
A source close to the president told NBC News that Biden feels Netanyahu is “giving him hell” over ceasefire negotiations
The comments come as Israeli airstrikes killed 67 Palestinians and injured dozens of others in Rafah, the southern Gaza city that is the last refuge of about a million displaced civilians.
While Biden has previously expressed concern about the rising Palestinian civilian toll — more than 27,000 have been killed in Gaza since the conflict broke out — his direct criticism of the Israelis has been muted.
Then the New York Times reported Friday that it had obtained a recording in which the president’s deputy chief national security adviser, Jon Finer, expressed a “lack of confidence” in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s right-wing government.
These comments come from a meeting with Arab American and Muslim community leaders this week. The White House National Security Council confirmed that Finer’s comments, as reported by the Times, were accurate.
A government official told The Associated Press that Finer spoke specifically about the Netanyahu government’s commitment to pursuing a two-state solution — one in which Israel would coexist with an independent Palestinian state — once the war is over.
Netanyahu has consistently opposed the creation of a Palestinian state throughout his political career.