Please Don't Play It Again, Mr. Prime Minister: On the Recent Obama-Netanyahu Meeting By Oded Eran
October 6, 2014
INSS Insight No. 613
Announcements about construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and housing units in the greater Jerusalem area
before, during, or after meetings between Israeli prime ministers and US presidents have become a pattern in the
bilateral relations. The most recent meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama on
October 1, 2014 was no exception and only accelerated the erosion in the relations between the two countries. Presumably
the Prime Minister did not go out of his way to provoke President Obama at this specific time, when Israel clearly the
United States’ political support. In that case, Israel would be wise to present itself as a country capable of
conducting itself more thoughtfully than it did with the behavior evident during Netanyahu’s most recent visit to the
United States. The harsh responses issued by White House and State Department spokespeople leave no room for doubt as to
the cumulative damage of Israel’s pattern of a construction plan for almost every summit.
Topics:
Announcements about construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank and housing units in the greater Jerusalem area
before, during, or after meetings between Israeli prime ministers and US presidents have become a pattern in the
bilateral relations. The most recent meeting between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama on
October 1, 2014 was no exception and only accelerated the erosion in the relations between the two countries.
As US political and military support for Israel is a cornerstone of Israel’s security concept, every encounter between
the two most senior leaders of the two nations is significant and can potentially influence bilateral activity as well
as joint responses to shared regional challenges. In recent years, the agenda of the meetings between President Obama
and Prime Minister Netanyahu has remained fixed, dealing with the Iranian nuclear program, the Israeli-Palestinian
political process, and other developments in the Middle East. Presumably last week’s meeting did not deviate from the
usual course. However, there has been a change in the urgency attributed to the discussion of each of the topics.
The negotiations underway between Iran and the P5+1 are scheduled to conclude in a few weeks. In his speeches at the UN
General Assembly both last year and last week, Prime Minister Netanyahu expressed his firm opinion on the key component
of a possible agreement with Iran, namely uranium enrichment. Of the countries negotiating with Iran, the Prime Minister
can cast his hopes only on the United States to reduce the gap between his demand for zero enrichment and the percentage
of enrichment that will eventually be allowed by the agreement (assuming one is actually signed). If Israel decides to
take action against Iran’s nuclear facilities – either because the agreement seems to represent a high existential
threat to Israel or because Iran violates the agreement without, in Israel’s view, being sufficiently penalized – the
United States will be the only international entity that can prevent anti-Israeli decisions and resolutions in relevant
international forums, first and foremost the UN Security Council, with the ability to cause severe damage to Israel.
So too regarding the Israeli-Palestinian context: senior US officials who were involved in the most recent round of
talks between Israel and the Palestinians conducted by Secretary of State John Kerry over the course of nine months did
little to hide their assessment that Israel was largely responsible for the negotiations’ failure. President Obama has
not expressed himself publicly about the failure of the talks, though in public statements made around the time he met
with Netanyahu he made it clear that the current state of affairs is not sustainable. These statements imply that the
United States will again try to change the status quo in the Israeli-Palestinian arena.
Concurrently, the Palestinians, announcing their old-new strategy, have already submitted requests to join various
international bodies in order to promote acceptance of the Palestinian state as a regular member. Next month a request
will likely be submitted to the Security Council to determine a timetable for Israel’s withdrawal to the 1967 borders.
In most international forums where new members join on the basis of majority votes of current members, Palestinian
membership is nothing more than a potential nuisance. The United States has little influence on the results of those
votes. That, however, is not the case in the Security Council. While it is preferable for Israel that seven of the
fifteen members of the Security Council do not support the Palestinian move, thereby blocking its membership, should the
Palestinians gain the support of nine members, only a veto can prevent the drafting of a resolution. Only one permanent
member of the Security Council – the United States – can be expected to cast that veto.
Following deliberations of more than three years, the United States finally decided to use military force in the Middle
East. One can debate the reasons it took the United States this long to resort to military power, but from the point of
view of many nations in the region it is a positive outcome, one that partly restores their faith in the United States
and its willingness to stand alongside them in times of trouble. Some of these nations share Israel’s concerns about the
spread of militant Islam, whether Shiite or Sunni, through the Middle East. Israel is clearly aware of the risks
stemming from the Islamic State’s ongoing drive to take over regions in Syria and Iraq, on the one hand, and the
deepening hold of organizations such as Hizbollah and Hamas over areas they already control, on the other. Renewed US
willingness to act both independently and as the leader of a coalition is therefore important to Israel, even though it
is capable of confronting the threats posed by those organizations on its own.
Against this background, Israel’s conduct before, during, and after Netanyahu’s recent visit to the United States seems
to conflict with Israel’s best interests when it comes to relations between Jerusalem and Washington. Around the time of
the meeting between Netanyahu and Obama, news of two housing activities in Jerusalem were reported: continued planning
of housing units in a southern portion of the city (in the area known as Givat Hamatos), and the entrance of dozens of
Jewish families into houses bought in the Arab village of Silwan across from the City of David.
The legality of these actions, which is hotly debated between Israel and the international community as well as within
Israeli society, is not the subject of this article. Rather, the specific, and quite troubling question here is whether
the Israeli Prime Minister has the desire and/or willingness to control various Jewish housing activities and adapt the
timing to events on the international arena, so that such activities do not conflict with other Israeli interests and do
not embarrass the Prime Minister as he asks the President to act on issues critical – perhaps even existential – to
Israel’s security. This is the case even if there is no proven linkage between the US position on the Iranian nuclear
program and its position on Jewish building in areas of Jerusalem that came under Israeli control only after 1967. It is
doubtful that Prime Minister Netanyahu knew about the activities of Elad, the NGO responsible for the purchase of the
buildings in Silwan; it is even more doubtful that the minister in Netanyahu’s government who appeared on camera in
Silwan just before the Prime Minister’s meeting with President Obama coordinated his appearance with the Prime Minister.
After a similar incident, when the Israeli government announced construction plans for Ramat Shlomo in north Jerusalem
during Vice President Joseph Biden’s visit to Israel in March 2010, the decision was made to allow the Prime Minister’s
office oversight of the process of issuing building permits in so-called sensitive areas. One may assume that Prime
Minister Netanyahu did not go out of his way to provoke President Obama at this specific time, when Israel needs his and
his country’s political support. If so, Israel would be wise to present itself as a country capable of conducting itself
more thoughtfully than it did with the behavior evident during Netanyahu’s most recent visit to the United States and
his meeting with the President. The harsh responses issued by White House and State Department spokespeople leave no
room for doubt as to the cumulative damage of Israel’s pattern of a construction plan for almost every summit.