Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has postponed the date of his speech in the United Nations General Assembly to from September 30 to October 1, so that he can meet with US President Barack Obama in the White House, reports Israeli daily Maariv.
Netanyahu is scheduled to fly to New York shortly after the Sukkot holiday, on September 29, to to take part in the annual United Nation's General Assembly.
He had asked to speak on September 30, and the request was accepted, according to Maariv's Eli Berdenstein. Netanyahu also asked the White House to schedule a meeting between him and President Obama. The White House said that the only day on which Obama could meet Netanyahu is Monday the 30th, because debates on healthcare have filled his schedule on other days.
The Prime Minister therefore decided to postpone his UN speech and fly first to Washington, DC, where he will meet Obama and then fly directly back to New York to speak one day later than originally planned.
Netanyahu and Obama failed to meet last year when both were in New York City for the UN General Assembly. At the time, there was great tension between the two over the matter of the Iranian nuclear threat. Netanyahu made his famous “red line” speech at the UN, highlighting the immediate danger posed by Iran's nuclear weapons program. Obama, who was in the middle of his reelection campaign, did not find time in his schedule to meet Netanyahu despite being in NYC at the same time, choosing instead to appear on TV talk show "The View."