National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir told The Times of Israel that he met on Monday with four Republican US lawmakers on Capitol Hill, including one who heads the powerful House Foreign Affairs Committee.

The meetings indicated that the far-right Israeli lawmaker, whom former US president Joe Biden’s administration considered sanctioning last year, is making inroads in American politics — at least on the Republican side of the aisle.

Rep. Brian Mast was the most senior lawmaker to meet with Ben Gvir. Mast is a major backer of Israel’s settlement movement who directs staff on the Foreign Affairs Committee to refer to the West Bank only by its biblical name, Judea and Samaria. Ben Gvir is a resident of the Kiryat Arba settlement outside of Hebron.

The minister held meetings with two of the more conservative members of the Republican caucus in Reps. Jim Jordan and Claudia Tenney, but he also sat down with the more moderate Rep. Mike Lawler.

Mast, Lawler, Jordan and Tenney were among the first US lawmakers to ever meet with Ben Gvir, joining House Majority Whip Tom Emmer, who sat with the national security minister at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida last week.

Ben Gvir said he didn’t come to the Hill with a particular agenda, other than to give those who agreed an opportunity to get to know him.

He said the US lawmakers he met........

© The Times of Israel