Israel and the United States have said they had made progress toward resolving a rift over US weapons shipments after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu publicly accused President Joe Biden’s administration of slowing down deliveries, AFP reports.

Defence Minister Yoav Gallant met top officials over three days in Washington as he voiced hope for quietly working through disagreements with Israel’s vital ally, drawing an implicit contrast to Netanyahu’s more confrontational approach.

“During the meetings we made significant progress, obstacles were removed and bottlenecks were addressed,” Gallant said after meeting with Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security advisor.

Gallant said the progress was on “a variety of issues” including “the topic of force build-up and munition supply that we must bring to the state of Israel”. “I would like to thank the US administration and the American public for their enduring support for the state of Israel,” he said.

The United States in early May froze a shipment that included 2,000-pound bombs and Biden warned of a further halt as he pressed Israel not to carry out a wide-scale military assault of Rafah, the southern Gaza city where more than one million displaced Palestinians had sought shelter.