Yesterday’s meeting between Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Barack Obama in Washington is covered by the Financial Times, Independent, Telegraph, Independent i and the online edition of the Guardian. All reports say that Netanyahu urged the United States to keep sanctions on Iran in place in order to make any diplomatic progress over Tehran’s nuclear programme. Obama assured Netanyahu that he would enter talks with Iran “clear eyed” and that the option of military action was still on the table. The Telegraph and the Guardian online report that the head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards publicly criticised Iran’s President Rouhani for conducting a telephone conversation with President Obama last week. Meanwhile, the Guardian online says that Rouhani has asked officials to investigate the possibility of resuming direct flights to the United States for the first time in more than thirty years.

Writing in the Times, Roger Boyes doubts the sincerity of Iranian overtures towards the West, arguing that Rouhani’s mission is simply to buy time in order to strengthen Iran’s ailing economy and to shore up the country’s regional influence. However, in the Financial Times, Gideon Rachman argues that there are real reasons for regional optimism, including the potential thaw in Western relations with Iran and the current peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA).

The Financial Times online includes a feature on Israel’s Deputy Defence Minister Danny Danon, considered the most vocal figure on the right of the Likud Party, who opposes the idea of making territorial concessions to the PA and doubts that the two-state solution can ever be achieved. However, the article points out that polls consistently indicate popular Israeli support for the two-state solution and that analysts doubt Danon’s mainstream appeal.

The Guardian online reports that Syria’s Deputy Foreign Minister spoke yesterday at the United Nations General Assembly and accused “Western backed” opposition groups of having used chemical weapons in Syria in August.

The headlines in the Israeli media also focus on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s meeting with US President Obama yesterday in Washington. Haaretz and Makor Rishon focus on Obama’s pledge that Iran will not be allowed to acquire a nuclear weapon. Meanwhile, Yediot Ahronot and Israel Hayom stress Obama’s intention to enter talks with Tehran “clear eyed.” However, Maariv claims that despite yesterday’s show of unity between Netanyahu and Obama, significant gaps remain between the two on how to tackle Iran. Looking ahead, in an opinion piece in Yediot Ahronot, former IDF intelligence chief Amos Yadlin says that Netanyahu must now “present a coherent and logical message” as to what would now constitute a “positive agreement” with Iran and what would comprise a “bad agreement.”

Maariv reports that a coalition crisis is brewing, suggesting that Jewish Home is preparing to withdraw its support for new military draft regulations which have been adopted by the government and would see the large-scale enlistment of ultra-Orthodox students. Such a move, so the report suggests, would cause a significant rift with Yesh Atid, for whom the reform of the military draft was a major campaign issue.

Both Yediot Ahronot and Israel Hayom give prominence to reports that a hospital mistakenly gave milk to a baby from a mother carrying the HIV virus. The woman was previously unaware that she was a carrier and the baby was subsequently given preventative medication.