Here are the latest updates in the fast-moving schedule changes being made to the itinerary for the historic state visit to Israel on Monday, May 21, 2017 by U.S. President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump.
Monday, 12:15 pm – President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump will be welcomed with full State honors at an official ceremony at Ben Gurion International Airport. What originally was planned as a streamlined welcome has now become an elaborate affair with full ceremonial trappings, complete with military band, flower girls, a hora dance and speeches by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Reuven Rivlin and President Trump himself as well.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also produced a welcome video for the president:
Israel welcomes @POTUS in – Israel’s capital, the spiritual & geographical center of the Jewish ppl for 3,000 yrs. pic.twitter.com/RYrMyii9ao
— Israel Foreign Min. (@IsraelMFA) May 18, 2017
Monday, 13:00 pm – President Rivlin meets with President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump (who fly by presidential helicopter to Jerusalem) at the presidential residence on HaNasi Street in the capital.
Monday, 16:45 pm — First Lady Melania Trump joins Sara Netanyahu for a visit to Hadassah Ein Kerem Medical Center in Jerusalem. According to the itinerary, “They will tour the medical center, talk with the medical staff and meet with children in the play area for a joint artistic activity.”
Monday, 18:00 pm – Private meeting between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump at the King David Hotel.
Monday, 18:45 pm – Expanded meeting between Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Trump at the King David Hotel
Monday, 19:30 pm — Prime Minister Netanyahu and his wife Sara host President Trump and his wife, First Lady Melania, for dinner at the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem.
Tuesday, 13:00 pm – Visit to Yad Vashem to lay a wreath in the Hall of Remembrance.
Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev will accompany President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump while at Yad Vashem. Prime Minister Netanyahu and his wife Sara Netanyahu, and Chairman of the Yad Vashem Council Rabbi Israel Meir Lau will also join the President during his visit to Yad Vashem. President Trump has chosen to commemorate the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust by participating in a memorial ceremony in the Hall of Remembrance, during which he will rekindle the eternal flame and lay a wreath on a stone slab under which ashes from extermination camps are buried. El Maleh Rachamim, a Jewish prayer for the souls of the martyrs of the Holocaust, will be sung by a cantor. President Trump will also be invited to sign the Yad Vashem guest book and Yad Vashem Chairman Avner Shalev will present the President with a token of remembrance.
Tuesday, 14:00 pm – President Trump delivers remarks at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem
Tuesday, 16:00 pm – Farewell ceremony at Ben Gurion International Airport
(President Trump’s visit to the Western Wall remains off the schedule as it is classified as a “private” affair, but media has been told the President will be accompanied at the site by the Rabbi of the Wall, Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitch, as is customary.)
Again — “Tentative schedule, subject to change!“