melania trump, sara netanyahu. it support to point out, there is a legal investigation, he has been investigated by legal authorities there. allegations of corruption. there are some clouds shadowing him on this visit. as peter, you were talking, as we watch them walk in to the south entrance, there are different emphasis here. you have the trump white house wanting to negotiate middle east peace without a separate palestinian state. and the prime minister's concerns are all about iran, iran, iran. >> he wants to discuss the iran deal, and the fact that president trump may reconsider it. there has been no bigger opponent of that deal than benjamin netanyahu. as you say, melania trump is here alongside her husband. the fact that even as they arrive, very limited opportunity to visit together before they come out to the news conference. flipping the deal a bit. normally, they have those conversations as president trump did last week. today, a lot of the news that will be made it will made in real time. which is to sa

last week, first lady melania trump hosted sara netanyahu on a visit to the museum. and also a major milestone for the new museum. one million people have now visited - and it's only been open for four months! and those visitors aren't in a hurry. the average weekend visitor spends six hours there. people spend less than two hours, on average, at other smithsonian museums you'll want to bring that jacket back out this morning. after days of spring - a little bit of a cool down today. but the warm weather won't be gone for long. meteorologist eileen whelan is tracking it all - next. boneless chicken! yeah. we love low prices. no bones about it. [ laughter ] thousands of blue tags. thousands of low prices. my giant. extended bonus buys only at my giant.nt. wed. thru sat. - rain/storms saturday with cold front - cooler (seasonable) sunday today: partly sunny to mostly cloudy. cooler. highs: 56-61 winds: sse 5 mph tonight: mostly cloudy. cool, but mild for february. lows: 43-46 winds: s 5 mph wednesday: am clouds. pm sun. warmer. highs:

the sara netanyahu coming with the prime minister, unusual for the first and melania trump will be ining a foreign leader, joining the president as well. the choreography of this is unusual. chris matthews, and the host of "hardball." they will be holding this joint news conference, before they hold their first meeting. it is backwards in all the time i have been covering washington, the news conference follows the meeting. they can answer questions saying, i haven't discussed that yet. you can see the formal arrival area for state visits, 9 pomp and ceremony of a state visit. this is not that. it is a working visit. usually, it is the front door, donnal trump has been coming out, and personally welcoming his visitors. this is a much grander welcome to this personality ally, israel. >> check with jared, he is very strong. the thing that makes me intrigued by him. he say hawk. part of the right, in middle east politics, he talks about a deal. in trump style. what is the deal, if it is not a two-state solution? tiremember being in israel in 1971, how do you reconcile a jewish state with

netanyahu. >> nice article. i said, was that sara? >> any comment there was senior advisor. [ inaudible ] >> thank you. >> president trump was asked about precisely what we were just talking about. this idea that hisa campaign at the time had a number of conversations with suspected russian operatives, that was the question. not sure if folks at home could hear the question. president trump choosing to ignore that question in the oval office. you were saying the reports, some of these reports, they may be a bit overheated. is that a fair adjective? based on your sources? >> they are midway through this t several months to go. no indication that there was any collusion, the number of these contacts was not a large number, they were not constant. they were not contacts, as far as the u.s. knows with russian intelligence people. one official told me today, you never know with the russians, there is no confirmed connection between the trump associates and intelligence figures. >> casy, talk to us about the democratic, national divide as t

sara. despite all the political hub ub going on over the white house the last couple of days, president trump hosted a high-profile guest. israeli prime minister, benjamin netanyahu is hoping for a better relationship with president trump than he had with president obama. >> reporter: describing themselves as old friends, president trump asked the israeli prime minister to slow down on expanding the jewish settlements that are a stumbling block to progress with peace toward the palestinians. >> as far as settlements i would like to see you hold back for a little bit. i would like to see a deal be made. >> any solution, one state or two is fine with him. >> but netanyahu says that the palestinians are to blame for the ongoing conflict. >> this is the source. the persistent refusal to recognition the jewish state that is the reason we don't have peace. the first news conference in the white house triggered this rebuke. >> there is no mention of the extraordinary oppression of the palestinians and of the daily and constant theft of palestinian home and heritage and history and land. >> for many supporters of israel this was a fresh new beginning of relations at 1600

wednesday she greeted israeli prime minister benjamin netanyahu visiting the national museum of african-american history and culture with his wife sarand earlier she welcomed japanese prime minister abe to her mar-a-lago estate where she spent more time than the white house as first lady. the two women touring the museum where she tweeted this photo from its japanese gardens. president trump saying melania will align herself with charities that champion women's causes. >> very, very strong advocate. i think she's a great representative for this country. >> reporter: melania echoing that sentiment on saturday. >> i'm committed to creating and supporting initiatives dear to my heart which will have impact on women and children all around the world. >> while she has also indicated in the past she would like to take on cyberbullying, so far mrs. trump has not outlined specific issues she might pursue as first lady. robin, we will have to wait and see. >> that's true but we'll bring in anita mcbride, former chief of staff for laura bush. always great to see you. and get your perspective. your take on what melania was able to do at the ral

netanyahu. day two of testimony on capitol hill for fed chair janet yellen. good wednesday morning. welcome back to "squawk on the street." i'm carl quintanilla with saravid faber at post nine of the stock exchange. dollar near a five-week high on some of this economic data. >> yeah, it has been a big morning. so far so good. let's get straight to rick santelli who has business inventories, rick, how do those look? >> yeah. last litany of data points december, this is an old read, last quarter on business inventories up 0.4, exactly as expected following a 0.1 increase from 0.7 to 0.8. next, february read on nationalization of home builders price index and for that we go east to diana olick. diana. >> rick, it's actually sentiment index and the sentiment was down two points to 65 on the national association of home builders monthly survey. that's the second month of declines after a sharp spike in builder confidence following the presidential election. anything above 50 is considered positive, so still well in that range. the survey stood at 58 one year ago. nahb said builders are optimistic but settling back to a, quote, normal range. of the index's t