The White House said Tuesday that US President Barack Obama will play host to Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington at the end of the month.
“The president will welcome Israeli prime minister Netanyahu to the White House on Monday, September 30,” spokesman Jay Carney said.
The US official said the two leaders would discuss progress on final status negotiations with the Palestinians, Iran, Syria and developments in the Middle East.
Earlier, Netanyahu said he would meet Obama ahead of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, with Iran’s nuclear program high on the agenda.
“In another week-and-a-half or so I will travel to the UN General Assembly,” Netanyahu said, in a statement from his office.
“I will first meet with US President Barack Obama,” a statement from Netanyahu’s office quoted him as saying. “I intend to focus on the issue of stopping Iran’s nuclear program.”
Tehran is locked in a diplomatic stand-off with the West and Israel, who accuse the Islamic republic of trying to develop and build nuclear weapons. Iran denies the allegations.
Israel will demand, he said, that Iran halt all uranium enrichment, remove all enriched uranium from its territory, close its underground nuclear facility in Qom and stop building a plutonium reactor.
White House: Obama to host Netanyahu on September 30