“Tired from the trip, but very happy to be in Israel and keep my promise.”
When El AL Airlines flight LY-386 landed minutes after 2:28 p.m. (local time, 9:28 a.m. in Argentina) at the David Ben Gurion airport in Tel Aviv, President
Javier Milei left behind the 16-hour trip
-aside from the four-hour stopover in Rome- and changed his mind to quickly focus on the first day of his Middle East tour, where he seeks to
reaffirm his alignment with this country
that welcomes him with great expectations as it is his first visit. State that it has received since October 7 when the brutal terrorist attack by the Hamas organization unleashed the war.
Accompanied by a limited delegation, made up of Foreign Minister Diana Mondino, the Secretary General of the Presidency, Karina Milei;
and the designated ambassador to Israel, Rabbi Shimon Axel Wahnish;
The head of state arrived in Tel Aviv and
immediately headed to the iconic King David Hotel in Jerusalem
, where he will stay until next Friday, when
he will continue his tour of Italy and the Vatican
.
With little time to rest, Milei will be at 4:45 p.m. (11:45 a.m. in Argentina)
at the Wailing Wall
(Western Wall), where he will be received by Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz.
In addition to signing the book on the way to the Wall,
Milei will also go there to fulfill his promise to visit him
if he is elected President.
It is an oath that he took almost two years ago, when his presidential ambition was still resisted even within La Libertad Avanza, where a sector wanted him to run as a candidate for head of Government.
A little while later, at 6 p.m., in what will be his last activity of this first day,
Milei will be received by his Israeli counterpart, Isaac Herzog
, to whom - as Clarín said -
he will confirm his decision to move the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem
, as soon as the geopolitical situation allows it (“The decision has already been made, but the date has not yet been set,” they say in the delegation);
and he will also tell you that he already has the decree ready to declare Hamas a terrorist organization.
These are two very important gestures for Israel: Installing the embassy in Jerusalem implies recognizing it as its capital and, at the same time, ignoring it as part of another State.
On Wednesday, on his second day in Israel,
Milei will meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and visit the Holocaust Museum
, in memory of the six million Jews who were murdered by Nazism.
Then, she will go to the tree in the Forest of Nations, where leaders visiting Israel are invited to plant a tree as a gesture of brotherhood between peoples.
And then you will tour
the Old City of Jerusalem
.
In the afternoon of his most intense day, Milei will hold meetings with two businessmen - the Mexican Isaac Assa and the Israeli Simon Falic - and with the chief rabbis of Israel, Itzjak Yosef and David Lau.
On Thursday, at the close of his passage through Israel,
Milei plans to reach Kibbutz Nir Oz
, one of the villages in the south of Israel - meters from Gaza - that was
brutally attacked by Hamas extremists
.
More than 400 people lived there: many of them are still missing and many others are estimated to be kidnapped in Gaza.
Milei plans to give a speech in tribute to the victims of terrorism.