Benjamin Netanyahu to address joint session of US Congress for fourth time

Benjamin Netanyahu is set to become the first foreign leader to address a joint session of the US Congress four times after it was announced he will come to Washington on 13 June, despite deep differences with the Biden administration.

The date for the address was agreed on Monday three days after a formal invitation was issued to Netanyahu from congressional leaders of both parties.

The invitation came within hours of Joe Biden’s disclosure of the terms of a new peace proposal for Gaza endorsed by Israel. Over the weekend, however, Netanyahu played down the significance of any Israeli concessions in the new plan, and insisted that any proposal for a lasting ceasefire without the destruction of Hamas as a military and governing force would be a “non-starter”.

He also has suggested that Israel is under obligation only to carry out the first of the peace plan’s three phases, which may increase Hamas’s reservations of a deal. The White House says it is waiting for an official response from Hamas on the proposal.

Netanyahu had earlier defied Biden by adamantly opposing any steps towards the creation of a Palestinian state alongside Israel, and by pressing ahead with an offensive on the southernmost Gazan city of Rafah, despite repeated appeals not to from the Biden administration.

Before this month’s scheduled appearance, Netanyahu was the only foreign leader apart from Winston Churchill to be accorded the honour of an address to a joint sitting of Congress three times. With his fourth address on 13 June, will outdo even Churchill in the record books.

The invitation to Congress is a reminder than while Biden is seeking to influence Israeli politics to forge a peace agreement for Gaza and a broader long-term settlement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Netanyahu also has the means to sway US politics – and possibly hurt Biden’s re-election chances if he were to accuse the president of being insufficiently supportive.

Netanyahu used an address to Congress in 2015 to speak out against the efforts of then President Barack Obama to reach an agreement with Tehran on Iran’s nuclear programme. The Israeli prime minister was highly critical of Biden last month when the president stopped a delivery of heavy bombs to Israel forces.

The Israeli prime minister is unlikely to meet the US president on his visit to Washington, as Biden is due to attend the G7 summit in Puglia, Italy, from 13 to 15 June.