Today’s Top Stories
1. Already strained US-Israel ties became even more frayed when an anonymous “senior Obama administration official” launched unusual and undiplomatic attack on Benjamin Netanyahu. Here’s what he told Jeffrey Goldberg:
“The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit,” this official said, referring to the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, by his nickname.
“The good thing about Netanyahu is that he’s scared to launch wars,” the official said, expanding the definition of what a chickenshit Israeli prime minister looks like. “The bad thing about him is that he won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states. The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat. He’s not [Yitzhak] Rabin, he’s not [Ariel] Sharon, he’s certainly no [Menachem] Begin. He’s got no guts.”
I ran this notion by another senior official who deals with the Israel file regularly. This official agreed that Netanyahu is a “chickenshit” on matters related to the comatose peace process, but added that he’s also a “coward” on the issue of Iran’s nuclear threat
Netanyahu rebuffed the comments; a White House spokesperson said the comment was, as you’d expect, “inappropriate and counter-productive,” though no apology was made. Roger Cohen and Ari Fleischer had the most interesting tweets.
2. The UN Security Council will hold an emergency session tomorrow to discuss Israeli settlements and Jerusalem tensions.
3. Hamas and Fatah are exploiting (even paying) children to throw stones and firebombs at Israeli police and civilians in eastern Jerusalem. At least it’s all after school, reports Khaled Abu Toameh.
This strategy works out well for Palestinian groups such as Hamas and Fatah. At the end of the day, they can always blame Israel for “deliberately” targeting Palestinian children and women — an allegation that the mainstream media in the West often endorses without asking questions.
Moreover, the Palestinian groups know that the children who are being sent to confront Israeli soldiers and policemen will not be held accountable . . .
The adult activists who send and encourage children to take part in violence should be held accountable, not only by Israeli authorities, but also by their own people and international human rights organizations. If these adults want an intifada, they should be the first to go out and confront Israeli policemen and soldiers.
4. Vote for the Dishonest Reporter of 2014: It’s that time of the year. Nominate this year’s worst news service or journalist and make your voice heard.
Israel and the Palestinians
• I can’t help but wonder if this Times of Israel scoop reflects a new Israel-fixation in the EU:
The European Union’s incoming foreign policy chief’s first trip in her new capacity will be to Israel, The Times of Israel has learned.
On November 1, Federica Mogherini will succeed Catherine Ashton as the union’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy. Less than a week later, she is scheduled to arrive in Israel for her first official visit, sources in Jerusalem confirmed Tuesday.
• Here’s a nice glimmer of hope. The Washington Post looks at the excellent state of cooperation and trust between the Israeli and Palestinian police commissioners, Maj. Gen. Hazim Attalah and Inspector General Yohanan Danino.
• AFP hands down its own legal opinion on settlements.
All settlements built on occupied territory are illegal under international law.
No throwaway line at least acknowledging there’s a legal dispute? For a sense of what the legal beagles have to say, take your pick of Eugene Kontorovich, Mitchell Bard, Eugene Rostow, Jeffrey Helmreich, and Moshe Dann, among others.
• Palestinian civil servants employed by Hamas received overdue paychecks, thanks to the largesse of — who else? — Qatar. More on this story at Reuters and the New York Times.
• Is Hamas running torture camps in the Sinai?
• Heads up if you’re following the legal battle to get “Jerusalem, Israel” entered into the US passports of American citizens born in the Israeli capital. On Monday, the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments in the case of Zivotofsky vs. Kerry. Lots of good background at CNN and USA Today on the now 11-year fight to get “Jerusalem, Israel” entered into Menachem Zivotofsky’s passport.
• Has Hezbollah tunneled into Israel? Sleep better.
• According to the Wall St. Journal (via Google News), US-Iran relations have already moved into a state of detente. The ripple of effects are already being felt, and they’re not in Israel’s interests:
The Obama administration also has markedly softened its confrontational stance toward Iran’s most important nonstate allies, the Palestinian militant group Hamas and the Lebanese militant and political organization, Hezbollah.
• New York Times correspondent Isabel Kershner has a son serving in the IDF and Mondoweiss wants to make hay because she’s the third person at the paper with an alleged “conflict of interest.”
In the past, Palestinian activists raised the same issues about columnist David Brooks and former bureau chief Ethan Bronner; journalists with kids in the Israeli military don’t bother me, but if Mondoweiss and friends really want to pierce the veil on the personal lives of reporters, let’s talk about all the Palestinian journalists, photographers, and fixers employed by the mainstream media who are undisclosed members of Fatah or Hamas.
Commentary/Analysis
• Weighing in on the crumbling Bibi-Obama relationship, see David Horovitz and Jonathan Tobin. But Daniel Drezner suspects that trashing Netanyahu is really a message to Iran.
The one thing this kind of trash-talking does is send a signal to Iran about the U.S. commitment to a nuclear deal. Bear in mind that in recent weeks the administration has made it cleat that it won’t be going to Congress to get approval for the permanent lifting of any Iran sanctions. But this raises the question for both Iranian negotiators and Iranian hardliners of just how much they can trust their American interlocutors to implement such a deal. Furthermore, Netanyahu’s persistent and bellicose rhetoric towards Tehran would also have to be a source of concern for the Iranians. If they cut a nuclear deal, they want it to be implemented and they want the shadow of military action lifted.
Calling out Netanyahu serves both functions for the Obama administration. The way one signals credibility in a world of uncertainty is to take a costly action. Since congressional approval is now off the table, dissing America’s closest ally in the region serves as an imperfect substitute. It’s costly, so it sends a signal of serious intent.
• Looking eastward, Emmanuel Navon is encouraged by Israel’s rising ties with China, Japan and India.
• For more commentary/analysis, see Jennifer Rubin (Forget the peace process, Palestinians need reform), and a staff-ed in The Republican of Springfield, Mass. (Jerusalem’s status won’t be settled by the US Supreme Court).
Rest O’ the Roundup
• Egypt began work on a buffer zone along the Gaza border. Some 800 homes are slated for demolition.
• Lebanon’s legacy of entrenched, radicalized Palestinian refugees haunts efforts to respond to the influx of Syrian refugees, reports the Christian Science Monitor.
• Is the US already moving towards detente
Featured image: CC BY-SA flickr/Wolfgang Lonien, passports CC BY-SA flickr/Tim Sackton, China CC BY flickr/Alias 0591
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