Karin Jean-Pierre: 'Biden and Netanyahu are talking honestly with each other'
(Video: The White House)
In her latest briefing, White House Press Secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, was non-committal on the issue of a possible White House meeting between President Joe Biden and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, saying that talks about such meeting are "continuing."
"The president and prime minister have a decades-long relationship," she said. "They've always been very candid with each other and discussed shared interests and have shared their concerns as well, just like they did last week. There's nothing new in that relationship."
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Benjamin Netanyahu and Joe Biden have had a decades-long relationship
( Photo: EPA, Jonathan Zindel)
Jean-Pierre noted the White House's displeasure with the vote in the Knesset on the annulment of the reasonableness clause, saying: "It is unfortunate that the vote today took place with the slimmest possible majority. Talks are ongoing in the coming weeks and months to forge a broader compromise, which is what the president has been calling for, even when the Knesset is in recess."
For several months, President Biden has been clear about his dismay regarding the process of a narrow and forceful legislation, consistently calling for broad agreement with any change to Israel's judicial system and its infrastructure for checks and balances, even to the extent of calling Netanyahu's coalition "the most extreme" he's ever seen.
On Sunday, as the Knesset began voting, Biden implored Israel to avoid forging a "divisive" road ahead regarding the judicial overhaul, especially given other challenges Israel has been coping with, saying that Israeli leaders shouldn't rush this issue, but rather focus on finding broad agreement.
Following his first conversation with Netanyahu in four months, Biden spoke to New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, telling him that his message to Netanyahu is to halt any and all proceedings to advance the judicial overhaul.
Friedman had recently released a column, in which he mentioned President Nixon's role in ordering the massive airlift of weaponry during the 1973 Yom Kippur war to save Israel from external destruction. However, in the context of the current situation, he focuses on the need for President Biden to provide a "resupply of hard truths" to prevent the internal destruction of Israel's democracy.