After Israel's political system was thrown into upheaval on Monday with the collapse of the coalition, US President Joe Biden still intends to visit the country next month, US Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides confirmed. The US president will be greeted by caretaker Prime Minister Yair Lapid.
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Biden will arrive in Israel on July 13, on what will be the first leg of a broader three-day Middle East tour that will include visits to the Palestinian Authority and Saudi Arabia.
Lapid, who currently serves as foreign minister, will be taking over for current Prime Minister Naftali Bennett, who met Biden at the White House in August of last year.
"President Biden's trip to Israel will happen as planned," Nides said.
The US National Security Council spokesperson also assured that Biden's trip was still on, saying that "we have a strategic relationship with Israel that goes beyond any one government. The president looks forward to the visit next month."
Lapid last week said that the president would be visiting Israel "no matter what."
"The president's relationship with Israel is way more important, significant, and long-lasting than any political event," Lapid said. "The US is our greatest ally and the most important partnership and friendship we have."
According to some assessments, during the visit, Biden will announce that Israel and Saudi Arabia are moving toward normalization. The kingdom is expected to open its airspace to Israeli flights and in exchange, Israel will give the green light to transfer sovereignty of Tiran and Sanafir islands in the Red Sea to Saudi Arabia.
Biden could also declare the establishment of a regional air defense system to protect against Iranian missiles and drones. The alliance is expected to include the US along with Israel and Abraham Accord countries, but also Arab countries such as Qatar and Iraq.
The American president will likely also discuss his administration's nuclear negotiations with Iran with Lapid, who by then will have been appointed to head the transition government. Despite reports from the past 24 hours that Tehran was now less insistent that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps be removed from the United States' list of terrorist organizations, officials in Jerusalem believe the Islamic republic has no intention of bending on the matter. The Israeli assessment, therefore, remains that the odds of a nuclear agreement with Iran are exceedingly low.
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