Protesters converge outside White House as Obama meets Israeli PM Protesters hold banners outside the White House in Washington D.C., capi...

Protesters converge outside White House as Obama meets Israeli PM

Protesters hold banners outside the White House in Washington D.C., capital of the United States, March 5, 2012. As U.S. President Barack Obama met with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington Monday, over 100 protesters converged at a park in front the White House, urging the United States not to support a potential Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. (Xinhua/Wang Yiou)

Protesters hold banners outside the White House in Washington D.C., capital of the United States, March 5, 2012. As U.S. President Barack Obama met with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington Monday, over 100 protesters converged at a park in front the White House, urging the United States not to support a potential Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. (Xinhua/Wang Yiou)

Protesters demonstrate Jewish settlements and a checkpoint outside the White House in Washington D.C., capital of the United States, March 5, 2012. As U.S. President Barack Obama met with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington Monday, over 100 protesters converged at a park in front the White House, urging the United States not to support a potential Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. (Xinhua/Wang Yiou)

Protesters hold banners outside the White House in Washington D.C., capital of the United States, March 5, 2012. As U.S. President Barack Obama met with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington Monday, over 100 protesters converged at a park in front the White House, urging the United States not to support a potential Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities. (Xinhua/Wang Yiou)

WASHINGTON, March 5 (Xinhua) -- As U.S. President Barack Obama met with visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington Monday, over 100 protesters converged at a park in front the White House, urging the United States not to support a potential Israeli military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

The protests started at around noon, as Obama and Netanyahu finished their morning session of talks and headed to a working lunch. The protesters carried signs that read "Peace with Iran" and shouted slogans such as "U.S. out of the Middle East" in unison, opposing a potential Israeli military strike on Iran, which Israel believes is developing nuclear weapons.

The protesters carried giant letters spelt out as "NO WAR ON IRAN." They also erected Obama and Netanyahu puppets, mock checkpoints and Jewish settlements made out of cardboards. The police at the scene kept pushing the protesters further away from the White House.

Members of the Jewish community also participated in the protest. Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss of the Neturei Karta International, an anti-Zionism orthodox Jewish organization, told Xinhua that a military strike on Iran is "abhorrent," and called for people of all faiths in the Middle East to live in peace.

At a press briefing prior to the protest, National Iranian American Council representative Jamal Adbi said the United States hasn't exhausted the diplomatic efforts to the nuclear issue, noting for the past three years, the Obama administration had discussions with the Iranian government for only 45 minutes.

Medea Benjamin, co-founder of anti-war group Code Pink, said she believes war with Iran would be disastrous for the people of the United States, Iran as well as Israel, pleading Obama to " listen to the cries of American people to live in peace with the people of Iran," as well as other peoples of the world. Benjamin said as a Jewish American, her "Pink Line" on the Iran issue is that "we do not believe war is the answer," and will do everything in her power to stop another war from happening.

Iran tops the agenda of Netanyahu's visit. Israeli officials have been clamoring for a preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear facilities before the country obtains the ability to make nuclear bombs. Netanyahu is also scheduled to speak in the evening at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), a powerful pro- Israel lobby.

Ari Briggs, an Israeli who traveled to the United States to attend the AIPAC annual political conference, carried an Israeli flag to the White House as he saw the anti-war protests. Briggs, director of the international department of Regavim, an organization that promotes the Zionist agenda, said that it would be "a disaster" to let Iran obtain a nuclear weapon, and he believes Obama should, with Netanyahu standing beside him, set the red lines, and say that "if Iran crosses these red lines, America will make sure to destroy its nuclear program." Otherwise, "Israel has to protect it self," said Briggs.

Briggs was not alone. Several pro-Israel protesters were also present and one even carried a sign that says "Bomb Iran."