Donald Trump has invited Binyamin Netanyahu to be the first foreign leader to visit the White House, in a major concession to a US ally who is wanted by the International Criminal Court for war crimes.
The invitation was made in a letter from the US president, which invited the Israeli prime minister to come to the White House on February 4th to “discuss how we can bring peace to Israel and its neighbours, and efforts to counter our shared adversaries”.
“It will be my honour to host you as my first foreign leader during my second term,” the letter read.
Mr Trump has said he is “not confident” that the ceasefire in Gaza will hold. Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israel and Hamas should soon commence negotiating a longer-term peace that many fear will fail and lead to a return to bloodshed following more than 15 months of fighting.
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Mr Trump and Mr Netanyahu have had a difficult personal relationship, but Israel remains the US’s closest ally in the region. Steve Witkoff, Mr Trump’s Middle East envoy, is said to have had a tense conversation with Mr Netanyahu in the days before a hostages-for-ceasefire deal was negotiated between Hamas and Israel, on the day before Mr Trump’s inauguration.
Since then, Mr Trump has lifted a ban on supplying Israel with bombs that had been held back by the Biden administration in opposition to Israel’s overwhelming use of force against Gaza.
Mr Trump late last week suggested that the Gaza Strip could be “just cleaned out” and that more than 1.5 million people be sent to other Arab countries, in offhand remarks that appeared to reflect plans for an ethnic cleansing of the region.
Mr Netanyahu has been accused by the International Criminal Court (ICC) of bearing responsibility for targeting civilian populations and using “starvation as a method of warfare” during the Israeli military’s campaign in Gaza, which followed the October 7th, 2023, raid by Hamas that killed roughly 1,200 Israelis and saw hundreds more taken hostage.
More than 120 member countries of the ICC should arrest Mr Netanyahu if he sets foot on their territory, including most of Europe. The US is not a party to the agreement and Republicans have introduced legislation to sanction the ICC for the warrants against Mr Netanyahu and the former Israeli minister for defence, Yoav Gallant. Democrats on Tuesday blocked that legislation.
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It comes as the Trump administration said on Tuesday it is offering financial incentives to two million civilian full-time federal workers to quit as part of plans to drastically shrink the size of the US government.
The “deferred resignation programme” would allow federal employees to remain on the payroll through September 30th but without having to work in person and possibly having their duties reduced or eliminated in the meantime, according to an email sent to federal employees and seen by Reuters.
The email gives federal employees until February 6th to decide whether to take part. It instructed interested employees to reply to the email from a government account and type the word “resign”.
The offer covers civilian employees except those in immigration and national security-related positions and people working for the US postal service.
The unprecedented move comes as Mr Trump has used his early days in office to shrink, purge and remake the US federal government to conform to his political priorities.
There are about 2.3 million US civilian employees, excluding the postal service. Security related agencies account for the bulk of the federal workforce, but hundreds of thousands of people work across the country in jobs overseeing veterans' healthcare, inspecting agriculture and paying the government’s bills, among other jobs.
The email said the administration expects to see a “more streamlined and flexible workforce”.
While the military and some agencies are likely to increase the size of their staff, the majority of agencies are likely to be downsized through restructurings and lay-offs, the email said, and warned that federal employees could not be guaranteed of their jobs.
The White House did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents about 150,000 federal workers, warned its members that “the email is designed to entice or scare you into resigning” and said “we strongly urge you not to resign in response”.
Mr Trump also signed an executive order that would make it easier to fire thousands of federal workers by reclassifying their job status.
“Between the flurry of anti-worker executive orders and policies, it is clear that the Trump administration’s goal is to turn the federal government into a toxic environment where workers cannot stay even if they want to,” American Federation of Government Employees president Everett Kelley said in a statement, urging federal workers not to make a hasty decision. – Guardian/Reuters
