“I am happy to have the privilege to represent Israel before both houses of Congress and tell them the truth about our just war against those who seek to kill us,” Netanyahu said in a brief statement.
Netanyahu, according to his office, is the first foreign leader to address both houses of the US Congress for a fourth term.
The US Congress on Friday invited Netanyahu to address both chambers to discuss the “defense of democracy” and the “fight against terrorism”.
In a letter, Republican and Democratic leaders in the Senate and House of Representatives invited the Israeli president to address Congress to present his government’s vision on “how to establish a just and lasting peace in the region.”
The call came on the same day that US President Joe Biden unveiled an Israeli proposal to the Palestinian group Hamas, which he presented as a road map to end the war in the Gaza Strip and free the remaining hostages in the enclave.
Biden explained that the first phase of the agreement would last six weeks and would include a “complete and total ceasefire”, the withdrawal of Israeli forces from populated areas of the Gaza Strip and the release of hostages held by Hamas, including Americans and women. , elderly and wounded, in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners.
Humanitarian aid will be increased, with 600 trucks allowed to enter the Palestinian territories each day.
The second phase involves the release of all remaining hostages and the abandonment of Israeli forces positions throughout the Gaza Strip.
Finally, the third phase requires the initiation of a major reconstruction of the Gaza Strip, which has faced decades of work due to the devastation caused by the war.
The Israeli government believed that its new proposal for a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip announced by Biden would allow it to achieve all of its military objectives, including eliminating the capabilities of the Palestinian group Hamas.
Israel launched an offensive in the Gaza Strip following a Hamas attack on October 7, in which Palestinian militants entered southern Israeli territory, killing nearly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 250 hostages.
Israel’s large-scale retaliation in the Palestinian territory has already killed more than 36,000 people, most of them civilians, who have fled the territory amid a severe humanitarian crisis, according to the local Hamas government.
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