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The two confronted an array of high-stakes Middle East issues. But first they took a victory lap, including the Israeli leader telling President Trump he had nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize.
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U.S. officials are hoping to link a Gaza cease-fire deal with Israel normalizing relations in the Gulf.
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(Third column, 11th story, link)
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"Netanyahu's purpose was to drag Trump in," Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator, says of the U.S. attack on Iran. Over the weekend, the U.S. directly joined the war between Israel and Iran when it bombed three nuclear facilities at Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan, though it's unclear how far the strikes have set back the Iranian nuclear program. Israel and the United States accuse Iran of developing nuclear weapons, while Iran says its program is for civilian use. United Nations inspectors and U.S. intelligence assessments have said Iran is not building weapons. "The danger now is that, having brought the U.S. into this, Israel will seek to go further up the escalatory ladder," says Levy. "It wants the chaos."
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Israel is intensifying its war on Iran, bombing the headquarters of the country's national TV network on Monday and assassinating another top military leader. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also suggested killing Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Iran has responded with barrages of long-range missiles targeting Israel. Meanwhile, U.S. President Donald Trump has shown little interest in containing Israel's assault, posting on social media that "everyone should immediately evacuate" the capital Tehran.
"How can a city, a metropolis of 10 million people, suddenly evacuate? And to where?" says Iranian American journalist Negar Mortazavi. She notes that while Iran has long insisted its nuclear program is civilian in nature, these attacks could push the leadership into militarizing it and pursuing nuclear weapons.
We also speak with Israeli political analyst Ori Goldberg, who says the war on Iran has allowed Israel's establishment to "draw the world's attention away from Gaza," countering rising domestic and international criticism. "Netanyahu felt the global sentiment shifting … and because of that, he attacked Iran."
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