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U.S.-Israel crisis: This time, it's serious
By Ron Kampeas . March 15, 2010
WASHINGTON (JTA) -- Last summer, when the relationship between the
Obama and Netanyahu administrations was getting off to what appeared
to be a rocky start, Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren was at pains --
twice -- to deny that he had been "summoned" to the State Department
for a dressing down.
One such "meeting" was actually a friendly phone call, he said, and
the other was a routine getting-to-know-you meeting. The distinction
was key, he told journalists: When the State Department actually
"summons" an envoy, "That's serious."
Welcome to the serious zone: Oren's spokesman, Jonathan Peled,
confirmed to JTA that the ambassador indeed had been "summoned" for a
meeting last Friday with James Steinberg, the deputy secretary of
state. The summons came as the controversy engendered by Israel's
announcement of new construction in eastern Jerusalem during last
week's visit by U.S. Vice President Joe Biden showed no sign of
abating.
"It wasn't a meeting," Oren told the Washington Jewish Week in an
interview at a fund-raiser for a Washington-area school on Sunday
night. "It was a summoning. I was told it was the first time that any
ambassador had been summoned at that level."
Oren said he is "working hard to avert an escalation. We're working
very hard to get back to what we need to do to make peace and stop
Iran from making the bomb. We have apologized publicly and privately
profusely."
Israeli media reported Monday that in a conference call Saturday night
with other Israeli diplomats, Oren -- a New Jersey-born historian who
has gone out of his way to talk up the U.S.-Israel relationship --
said that ties were at a 35-year nadir. The previous low presumably
was the Ford administration's threat to "reassess" the relationship
with Israel because of perceived Israeli reluctance to make the
necessary concessions to achieve peace with Egypt.
The controversy erupted last week with what both sides agreed was a
humiliation for the U.S. vice president, considered to be Netanyahu's
best friend in the Obama administration. Biden had come to allay
Israeli concerns that Obama's outreach to Muslims would come at
Israel's expense; just as he was getting ready to meet with
Palestinian officials as part of the administration's push to restart
peace talks, Israel announced plans to build 1,600 housing units in
Ramat Shlomo, part of disputed eastern Jerusalem.
Biden, furious, condemned the announcement -- several times -- but
went ahead with a speech that affirmed the unshakeable U.S.-Israel
bond. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized for the
timing and said he would probe how the announcement was made without
his knowledge.
"There was a regrettable incident, that was done in all innocence and
was hurtful, and which certainly should not have occurred," Netanyahu
said in his statement. "We appointed a team of directors-general to
examine the chain of events and to ensure procedures that will prevent
such occurrences in the future."
Israeli officials and leaders of pro-Israel organizations are asking
the Obama administration to dial down the tension, in tones ranging
from the pleading to the berating.
"The Obama administration's recent statements regarding the U.S.
relationship with Israel are a matter of serious concern," the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee said in a statement Sunday
night, a rare direct broadside from an organization that generally
operates behind the scenes. "AIPAC calls on the administration to take
immediate steps to defuse the tension with the Jewish state."
The statement comes just a week before the start of AIPAC's annual
policy conference, widely seen as the most important pro-Israel event
in Washington.
Like an array of other Jewish groups, AIPAC wants the matter kept
quiet: "We strongly urge the administration to work closely and
privately with our partner Israel, in a manner befitting strategic
allies, to address any issues between the two governments."
That echoed a plea Sunday morning from Netanyahu, to his Cabinet as
much as to the Obama administration.
"I suggest that we not get carried away -- and that we calm down," he
said. "We know how to deal with these situations -- with equanimity,
responsibly and seriously."
But Obama administration officials, who accepted Netanyahu's
explanation that he had been blindsided by the announcement of new
housing units for Jews in eastern Jerusalem, nonetheless were not
ready to let the matter go.
In addition to Friday's summons of Oren, State Department spokesman
P.J. Crowley described a conversation the same day between Netanyahu
and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in exceptionally blunt
terms. Clinton objected to the announcement "not just in terms of
timing, but also in its substance," Crowley said.
The Netanyahu-Clinton phone call reportedly lasted 45 minutes -- and
by most accounts sounded less like the "conversation" Oren says he had
with Steinberg and more like a lecture.
Haaretz reported that Clinton, who is scheduled to speak at the AIPAC
conference next week, wants three demands met beyond Netanyahu's offer
to check into how the announcement was made. In order to defuse the
U.S.-Israel tensions, Clinton wants Israel to reverse the decision to
add housing in eastern Jerusalem, make a substantive gesture to the
Palestinians, such as a prisoner release, and agree to peace talks
that encompass not only borders but final-status issues such as
refugees and Jerusalem.
On Monday, Netanyahu told a Likud Party meeting that construction in
Jerusalem would not stop. However, his defense minister and Labor
Party leader Ehud Barak said more needed to be done to assuage the
Americans. Barak hinted at a Labor Party meeting that failure to do so
could lead his party to withdraw from the government. "Peace talks are
a first priority for Israel and for the entire region," Haaretz quoted
Barak as saying. "The political process is in the interest of the
state and it is a subject in which the Labor party believes. It is one
of the things that anchors us in the government and drives us to work
within it."
In the past, the pro-Israel community has been able to rally push back
against demands like those of Clinton. The Ford administration backed
down from its threat of "reassessment" in 1975 after AIPAC garnered
more than 70 signatures from the Senate signaling that Congress would
override any presidential attempt to cut back funds. That was the
lobby's first signal victory, accruing to it the "don't mess with us"
reputation it maintains until now.
Now, however, the president can count on a Democratic Congress less
likely to break ranks with him in a Washington that has become much
more partisan. Notably, Republicans -- including Rep. John Boehner
(R-Ohio), the minority leader in the U.S. House of Representatives --
have sided with Israel in the matter, but as of Monday the only
Democrat to speak out for Israel has been Rep. Shelley Berkley
(D-Nev.), perhaps the most-pro-Israel stalwart in her caucus. Other
more powerful pro-Israel reliables -- like Rep. Howard Berman
(D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs committee --
have been silent.
It's unclear, however, what impact they would have if they did speak
out. Unlike President Ford in 1975 or President George H.W. Bush in
1991, Obama is not threatening any cut in assistance to Israel,
rendering Congress' "purse strings" powers superfluous. By holding
back on such threats, the Obama administration can ignore Congress and
continue to reproach Israel.
In fact, it is Obama's stated commitment to "tachles" -- increased
assistance to Israel in the realm of military cooperation, such as
missile defense, and ramped up pressure on Iran to make its nuclear
intentions transparent -- that has made the latest flap particularly
upsetting to members of the president's circle who are close to Israel
and have been pushing Obama on these issues.
In a posting on the Daily Beast Web site, Martin Indyk, a Clinton
confidante and former ambassador to Jerusalem who maintains an
informal advisory role to the administration, recalled that the last
time Netanyahu led Israel in the late 1990s, his boss, Madeleine
Albright, then the secretary of state, was similarly embarrassed
during a visit. She called Indyk, then the ambassador to Israel, and
shouted: "You tell Bibi that he needs to stop worrying about his right
wing and start worrying about the United States."
It's time to heed that advice, Indyk said. "There is one way to repair
the damage to U.S.-Israel relations and to his own standing with the
Israeli public," he wrote of Netanyahu. "He could immediately declare
that in order to boost the chances for negotiations, he is calling a
halt to all provocative acts in Jerusalem -- including announcements
of new building activity in east Jerusalem, housing demolitions, and
evictions. He should also establish a mechanism in the Prime
Minister's Office to ensure that his decision is implemented."
The State Department sounded an Albright-sounding note on Friday, when
Crowley stated that Clinton wanted to make clear to Netanyahu that
"the United States considers the announcement a deeply negative signal
about Israel's approach to the bilateral relationship -- and counter
to the spirit of the vice president's trip; and to reinforce that this
action had undermined trust and confidence in the peace process, and
in America's interests."
"The secretary said she could not understand how this happened,
particularly in light of the United States' strong commitment to
Israel's security," Crowley said. "And she made clear that the Israeli
government needed to demonstrate not just through words but through
specific actions that they are committed to this relationship and to
the peace process."
There are signs of a push-back strategy among Israel and its
Washington supporters: Frame Palestinian provocations as more damaging
than the announcement of building in Jerusalem.
Headlines in Israel on Monday focused on calls by the Palestinian
leadership to protest the rededication of the Hurva, an ancient Old
City synagogue destroyed by Jordanian forces. P.A. officials
reportedly have said that the building threatens the integrity of the
Al Aksa mosque, although the synagogue is nowhere near the compound.
"If the Obama administration is pressing Israel these days over an
untimely, but at bottom bureaucratic, step toward construction in
Jerusalem, they must press the Palestinians harder over inciting their
people with an inflammatory, but false, threat to their mosque on the
Temple Mount," the Orthodox Union said on its Web site. "This is a
present call to violence and danger."
Berkley listed Palestinian violations in her statement: "Where, I ask,
was the administration's outrage over the arrest and monthlong
incarceration by Hamas of a British journalist who was investigating
arms smuggling into Gaza? Where was the outrage when the Palestinian
Authority this week named a town square after a woman who helped carry
out a massive terror attack against Israel? It has been the P.A. who
has refused to participate in talks for over a year, not the
government of Israel. Yet once again, no concern was lodged by the
administration."
The Obama administration routinely condemns Hamas terrorism and has
chided the Palestinian Authority for dragging its feet on talks; the
State Department's most recent human rights roundup cited Palestinian
incitement as an ongoing problem. However, Obama officials have not
condemned the naming of the square after Dalal Mughrabi, a woman who
died leading a 1978 terrorist attack that killed 38 Israeli civilians,
including 13 children. The Palestinian Authority postponed the
official dedication until after Biden left to avoid embarrassing him,
though less formal ceremonies reportedly did take place.
Meanwhile, the Israeli Cabinet appeared to get Netanyahu's message
about the need to avoid future embarrassments of U.S. officials (and,
for that matter, of the prime minister himself); the poorly timed
announcement of the Ramat Shlomo building was believed to be part of a
"more right wing than thou" contest of wills between two ministers of
the religious Shas Party, Interior Minister Eli Yishai and Housing
Minister Ariel Attias. For his part, Attias was cowed, pleading on
Israel Radio on Monday morning to "look forward" and asking
"experienced and wise people" in the United States and Israel not to
let matters further deteriorate.
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Ron Kampeas is JTA's Washington bureau chief.
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