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In meeting with Obama, Netanyahu says Israel wants peace

U.S. President Barack Obama and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will get together Monday for their first meeting since Obama and Netanyahu met regarding the prime minister’s statements against the Iran nuclear deal.

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020-a-09-(Josh Earnest, White House press secretary, at news conference)-“a Palestinian state”-White House press secretary Josh Earnest says the president has reluctantly concluded a two-state peace deal can not be concluded before he leaves office”. “It will be expiring in a couple of years, but we want to get a head start on that to make sure that both the United States and Israel can plan effectively for our defense needs going forward”, he said.

Also on the agenda: a 10-year framework for military and intelligence cooperation, the Syrian Civil War, the rise of the Islamic State and the implementation of an worldwide agreement with Iran over its nuclear program.

Netanyahu said talks would focus on “strengthening the security of the state of Israel, which the USA has always been committed to, while maintaining the state of Israel’s comparative advantage in the face of a changing Middle East”.

“It’s no secret that the Prime Minister and I have had a strong disagreement on this narrow issue”, said Obama at the top of the meeting.

“Even as they can have a difference on an issue as consequential as the Iranian nuclear deal, they can direct their governments to co-operate at an unprecedented level”, Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes said ahead of the meeting.

Last week, Obama administration officials, laying out their hoped-for outcomes of Monday’s meeting, said they accepted there would be no peace agreement in the near term. Israel receives more than $3 billion a year in USA military aid. But the U.S. will take heart from Mr Netanyahu restating his support for a two-state solution, which has been the bedrock of the USA approach to ending the conflict.

“I want to make it clear we haven’t given up on our hope for peace”, he said, telling the Obama that “our friendship is strong and our alliance is strong with shared interests and values”.

APPHOTO DCAH110: President Barack Obama shakes hands with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Monday, November 9, 2015. He emphasized that his preference was for a two-state solution.

Tensions over the U.S.-backed nuclear deal with Iran continue to strain ties between the longtime allies. Netanyahu was an outspoken critic of the deal, and in March he angered the White House by delivering a speech to the Republican-led Congress to rail against the impending agreement.

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While White House officials, including Vice President Joe Biden, have expressed displeasure over the appointment, Obama was not expected to have brought the matter up in the meeting.

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