Vice President JD Vance said on Wednesday that the US applied “leverage” to Israel to get it to agree to a Gaza ceasefire deal, marking the first public suggestion from a US official that it was necessary to put pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to reach an agreement.

Al Jazeera investigates the shocking truth behind a deadly Israeli attack on a US naval vessel. In 1967, at the height of the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War, the Israeli Air Force launched an unprovoked attack on the USS Liberty, a US Navy spy ship that was monitoring the conflict from the safety of international waters in the Mediterranean. Israeli jet fighters hit the vessel with rockets, cannon fire and napalm, before three Israeli torpedo boats moved in to launch a second more devastating attack.

Speaking alongside Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said that a diplomatic solution for Gaza may not be possible, comments that came as Israel’s genocidal war in the Strip continues to rage with full US backing.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will meet with President Trump at the White House next week, making him the first foreign leader invited to visit Washington by the new Trump administration.