Bibi’s waiting game
Almost all of our Middle East allies see President Obama as a failed leader and their nations suffer the consequences. However, Prime Minister Netanyahu is unique in receiving clear, obvious, and public disrespect from President Obama.
There are several glaring cases of this. The first was when he had the prime minister arrive for a meeting at the White House through a back door. The second was when he left a meeting with Netanyahu and his staff without mentioning he would be gone for almost an hour as he dined with his wife and daughters. The others are less severe.
Netanyahu is wise not to come to Washington this year. It seems Obama would like to get involved again in the Israeli-Palestinian dispute. His plan seems to be to bring in the United Nations Security Council to formulate a solution to hand to Israel and the Palestinians. Pushing for a Security Council resolution would be a significant shift in U.S. policy, one that could further strain relations between Obama and Israel. This is because the Security Council is expected to push Israel almost back to the pre-1967 borders. History has shown those borders left Israel extremely insecure because Israel had a width of only nine miles in the middle of its land.
Based on the past performance of President Obama’s Middle East policies, especially the deals with Iran and his unfulfilled word on Syria, Netanyahu is wise to wait for the next American president.
Arthur Horn
East Windsor
comments