Daily Briefing Sept. 21 – Potential Saudi-US defense pact: Performative politics?

Welcome to The Times of Israel’s Daily Briefing, your 15-minute audio update on what’s happening in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world, from Sunday through Thursday.

Senior analyst Haviv Rettig Gur and health reporter Renee Ghert Zand join host Amanda Borschel-Dan in today’s episode.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held a long-awaited face-to-face with US President Joe Biden yesterday. We begin the program with a report from diplomatic correspondent Lazar Berman, who is traveling with the prime minister.

Rettig Gur looks at the Saudi-US defense pact aspect of the normalization process that was highlighted in the Biden-Netanyahu meeting, including the intriguing question of whether this would mean the partner nations’ militaries would aid each other in any armed struggle.

Ghert-Zand recently reminded readers, “As in the US, one in eight Israeli women will develop breast cancer in their lifetime.” How have Israeli mammogram recommendations shifted in line with this statistic?

With the upswing in new COVID cases, are we any closer to understanding long COVID? We hear about the grab bag of symptoms and the few options for treatment.

And finally, the first Israeli team to compete at the Invictus Games came home Monday from Dusseldorf, Germany, having won 14 medals, including three golds in table tennis.

Discussed articles include:

Meeting Netanyahu, Biden calls to uphold democratic values, talks up Saudi deal hopes

Health officials remind Israeli women of new mammogram guidelines

As patients suffer, long COVID remains a collection of symptoms with no single cure

IDF disabled veteran athletes bring home 14 medals from their first Invictus Games

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Check out yesterday’s Daily Briefing episode: