Donald Trump has demanded that Israel bring an end to its war with Hamas and that the remaining hostages being held in Gaza are released.
The former president and Republican nominee for the White House is to meet Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, in Florida on Friday.
Speaking to Fox News before the meeting, Trump said that the Gaza war should end fast “because they are getting decimated with this publicity, and you know Israel is not very good at public relations”.
Trump has insisted that the Hamas raid on Israel that killed 1,200 people, and the subsequent war, would not have happened had he been in the White House.
This year, he blamed Netanyahu for allowing the terrorist attacks to take place, saying that intelligence warnings were well known in advance.
Before Netanyahu travels to Florida he will meet President Biden in the Oval Office and have a private meeting with Kamala Harris, the vice-president and likely Democratic Party presidential candidate.
Trump condemned protesters who burnt an American flag in Washington after the Israeli prime minister’s speech to Congress on Wednesday.
“You should get a one year jail sentence if you do anything to desecrate the American flag,” Trump said.
“Now, people will say, ‘Oh it’s unconstitutional.’ Those are stupid people. Those are stupid people that say that,” the former president continued.
“We have to work in Congress to get a one-year jail sentence. When they’re allowed to stomp on the flag and put lighter fluid on the flag and set it afire, when you’re allowed to do that — you get a one-year jail sentence and you’ll never see it again.”
• Netanyahu’s greatest hits set in Congress will not change Israelis’ minds
During the address, which was boycotted by a number of leading Democrats, Netanyahu said that teams of negotiators were working tirelessly to bring home the remaining hostages being held by Hamas.
Out of the 251 people taken hostage on October 7, 111 are still held, according to the Israeli military, but 39 of that number are believed to have died.
At least 39,175 Palestinians have been killed since the war began, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.
On Tuesday, the Israeli military said that it had recovered the bodies of five Israelis taken to Gaza by Hamas.
Hostages and Missing Families Forum, a group supporting Israeli hostages still held in Gaza, demanded an urgent meeting with Israel’s team for negotiating a ceasefire and hostage-release deal, saying that a “crisis of trust” had emerged.
“It has now become apparent that the information provided to the hostages’ families did not accurately reflect the situation’s reality,” the group said. “This foot-dragging is a deliberate sabotage of the chance to bring our loved ones back. It effectively undermines the negotiations and indicates a serious moral failure.”
