Does Biden Believe Netanyahu Actually Wants A Hostage Deal?: Reporter Grills John Kirby

2 months ago

During Thursday’s White House press briefing, National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby was asked about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s push toward a hostage deal and President Biden’s priority for the rest of his second term.

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Transcript

00:00First, while the President is speaking with Prime Minister Netanyahu right now, does the

00:04President believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu wants to get a hostage deal that, given his

00:08political consideration at home in Israel, that he is actually capable and willing to

00:14bridge those gaps that you say remain?

00:16Yes, yes, and yes.

00:18He has said so publicly himself that he wants to get the hostages home.

00:22And the Israelis, the government, Prime Minister Netanyahu has been working with us to try

00:31to get that deal over the finish line.

00:34That said, as I mentioned at the top, there's still some gaps that remain, and we're going

00:38to be talking to the Prime Minister today about closing those gaps.

00:40I just, on a broader note, the President mentioned last night that he plans to spend the next

00:45six months of his time in office focused on some foreign policy issues.

00:50How does the President's announcement change what the White House, what the NSC has planned

00:54for the balance of the year for January 20th in terms of the issue of whether the President

00:59will travel by the President when we get to Africa, you know, or the to-do list of things

01:03that maybe had been planned for the second term that he now has less than six months

01:07to get done?

01:08Well, look, now that he's not running for re-election, certainly you can expect that

01:12there will be opportunities on the calendar that may not have been before, and so we're

01:17all exploring what those opportunities can look like in terms of advancing his foreign

01:21policy agenda and national security opportunities here and around the world.

01:26But I don't have anything on the schedule to speak to now, but I mean, you know, stay

01:29tuned.

01:30I think there'll be some opportunities that the President is going to want to explore.

01:32Look, I mean, still got a war in Ukraine, still got a war in Gaza, still got climate

01:38change to deal with, still got a very restless Indo-Pacific.

01:41I mean, I could go on and on.

01:42There's plenty of things for the national security team to try to continue to get done.

Does Biden Believe Netanyahu Actually Wants A Hostage Deal?: Reporter Grills John Kirby

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