More diplomatic surprises were revealed Monday as U.S. President Donald Trump visited Israel to mark the release of the Israeli hostages and the end of the war.
Egypt unexpectedly invited Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to attend a peace summit with some 20 other countries in Sinai on Tuesday; and the president of Indonesia, Prabowo Subianto, the world’s largest Muslim nation, announced plans to visit Israel on Tuesday.
The invitation from Egypt came about at the behest of Trump, who listened in as Netanyahu spoke with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi from the prime minister’s office in the Knesset on Monday.
The Times of Israel noted:
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has just spoken by phone with Egyptian President Abdel Fatah El-Sissi, as US President Donald Trump listens in, Channel 12 news reports. In the call, apparently brokered by Trump at the Knesset, Netanyahu accepted an invitation by the Egyptian leader to join the international summit on Trump’s Gaza peace plan in Sharm El-Sheikh today, according to the report.
Sissi has avoided speaking to Netanyahu throughout the war, and did not initially invite the prime minister to today’s summit.
Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will also be among the 30 world leaders at the summit, along with the leaders of Qatar and Indonesia.
The summit is expected to hammer out details for postwar Gaza.
Subianto’s visit was also a surprise, though he gave a remarkably pro-Israel speech at the United Nations General Assembly last month, calling for security for Israel and ending with the Hebrew greeting: “Shalom.”
In other sudden changes, President Trump’s whirlwind schedule was reportedly adjusted to allow him to meet two freed hostages — brothers Gali and Ziv Berman, who are free and waiting at a Tel Aviv hospital.
Update: Netanyahu declined the invitation to Egypt because of the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah, which begins in Israel on Monday evening and runs through Tuesday. It is also the anniversary of October 7 on the Hebrew calendar.
Second Update: Indonesia, too, is now denying plans for a visit, suggesting it will happen at a later date.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Zionist Conspiracy Wants You, now available on Amazon. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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