White House : US 'to reevaluate' backing for Israel at UN

[Sunni Falcon]

The comments by the White House mean Israel's diplomatic cover is under threat as it is revealed President Barack Obama has yet to call Mr Netanyahu

The Obama administration made an unprecedented threat to withdraw United States support for Israel at the United Nations on Thursday night after Benjamin Netanyahu cast doubt over his support for a two state solution.

In a sign of how deeply relations between Barack Obama and Mr Netanyahu have now been ruptured, the White House announced it would “re-evaluate” the American veto that has long blocked international efforts to win UN recognition for a two state solution.

“Steps that the United States has taken at the United Nations had been predicated on this idea that the two-state solution is the best outcome”, said Josh Earnest, the White House spokesman. “Now our ally in these talks has said that they are no longer committed to that solution. That means we need to re-evaluate our position in this matter, and that is what we will do moving forward.”

If the US carried out its threat it would be a grave blow to Mr Netanyahu after his election victory, forcing Israeli diplomats to review their own assumption that they can generally count on the superpower’s backing in the chamber of the Security Council.

The Obama administration’s threat was issued despite efforts by Mr Netanyahu to qualify his eve-of-election promise – made in a successful last-ditch attempt to garner votes on the Israeli Right – that he would block the creation of a Palestinian state.

On Thursday the White House announced Mr Obama had called Mr Netanyahu to congratulate him on the victory noting that they would continue to consult "on a range of regional issues", including the "difficult path forward" to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Mr Obama "reaffirmed the United States’ long-standing commitment to a two state solution".

The White House also said the president repeated the hope for a "comprehensive deal with Iran that prevents Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon".

Mr Netanyahu tried to soften that pledge on Thursday saying in a series of US television interviews that he accepted a two state solution, but that “circumstances have to change” for the idea to be viable.

The White House rejected the overture, saying that Mr Netanyahu had “walked back” from commitments to a two-state solution both while sitting as Israeli prime minister, and on the campaign trail.

Mr Netanyahu had already deeply upset the White House by his decision to go to Washington earlier this month to lobby the US Congress against the Iranian nuclear deal which Mr Obama has championed and is now in its final stages of negotiation.

America’s near automatic support at the Security Council has always been critical for Israeli diplomacy. For decades the US has reliably vetoed any resolution critical of its ally.

When the Security Council considered a resolution to recognise a Palestinian state in 2013, America protected its friend by casting a veto.

The US also blocked every attempt to pass a resolution calling for a ceasefire during the Lebanon war in 2006 – until the moment when such a measure had Israel’s consent.

Last year, Mr Obama publicly warned that it was becoming harder for America to continue to play its traditional role of providing Israel with diplomatic cover at the UN.

 

[ResurgentIran]

Empty words, Im afraid.
US will give unconditional economic, military and diplomatic (UN etc) to Israel for a long time to come.

 

[Solomon2]

Media distorts Bibi’s statements, then claims he’s walking them back
Posted by William A. Jacobson Thursday, March 19, 2015 at 2:00pm
Obama admin threats to teach Israel a lesson based on distortion.

The distortion of Benjamin Netanyahu’s pre-election statements on a two-state solution and Arab voting was a classic Obama and media distortion.

If you take the actual text of Netanyahu said, he never ruled out a two-state solution and never discouraged Arab voting. But those were the headlines and the foaming-at-the mouth hyperbole, fomented by the Obama administration in numerous anonymous statements to the media.

Schmuel Rosner has the analysis, from earlier today, Is Obama getting ready to throw Israel under a UN bus?:

Prime Minister Netanyahu has no “newly declared opposition to a Palestinian state”. If the White House wants to use a badly framed statement by Netanyahu as an excuse for a change in American policy – if it wants, as the WH hinted, to “turn to the U.N. to help force a deal” with the Palestinians on Israel – it should not come as a great surprise. But Netanyahu’s words are the excuse, not the reason, for the change. The reason is Netanyahu’s victory and the administrations’ vindictive mood toward him and toward the country that elected him….

Netanyahu said a couple of regrettable things in the last, desperate days of his brilliant campaign. …

The second statement was just a poor call for action for the right-wing voters. Netanyahu’s record when it comes to policies aimed at integrating Arab Israelis into society is not bad.

The first statement was merely an assessment of the situation. Netanyahu did not say that he opposes the two state solution – he said that under current circumstances he doesn’t see a Palestinian State established in his coming term as Prime Minister. And he is probably right in this assessment.​

The Times of Israel reports on an interview Netanyahu gave today, in which he explained that nothing had changed:

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday walked back statements made during campaigning rejecting the possibility of a two-state solution, telling NBC’s Andrea Mitchell, “I don’t want a one-state solution. I want a sustainable, peaceful two-state solution….

“I haven’t changed my policy,” Netanyahu insisted. “I never retracted my speech at Bar-Ilan University six years ago calling for a demilitarized Palestinian state that recognizes a Jewish state.”

“What has changed is the reality,” he continued. “[Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas] the Palestinian leader refuses to recognize the Jewish state and has made a pact with Hamas that calls for the destruction of the Jewish state, and every territory that is vacated today in the Middle East is taken up by Islamist forces. We want that to change so that we can realize a vision of real, sustained peace. I don’t want a one-state solution. I want a sustainable, peaceful two-state solution, but for that, circumstances have to change.” …

The prime minister also dismissed allegations that he was a racist following comments about high Arab voter turnout during the election, defending his record in reaching out to the Arab community. “I will continue to do that – in my government – to have real integration of Arab citizens of Israel into the Israeli economy, Israeli high-tech, and Israeli society. My commitment is real and it will stay real.”​

Completely consistent with a fair analysis of what Netanyahu actually said pre-election.

Yet the same media that distorted Netanyahu’s pre-election statements is portraying it as backtracking. The NY Times reports, Israel’s Netanyahu, Softening Pre-Election Statement, Reopens Door to Palestinian State. Yet in its article, the Times quotes Bibi’s statement on a two-state solution that is completely consistent with his interview today:

“If you are prime minister, a Palestinian state will not be established?”

“I think that anyone who is going to establish a Palestinian state today and evacuate lands is giving attack grounds to the radical Islam against the State of Israel,” Mr. Netanyahu told the news site, NRG. “Anyone who ignores this is sticking his head in the sand.”

CNN calls it a flip-flop, while Christopher Hayes called it a “disingenuous walk back”:





The only ones walking anything back are those who distorted reality in the first place.

UPDATE: No real surprise here, the Obama admin says no matter what Netanyahu now says, it will reevaluate U.N. position.

The administration upset was fake and contrived all along, just an excuse to bring Israel to its knees to ram through Obama’s vision of a Middle East solution that drives Israel back to the 1949 armistice lines with minor adjustments at best — you know, never let a crisis go to waste.

The Jerusalem Post reports:

Despite attempts by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to clarify comments made during his election campaign that a Palestinian state would not emerge under his tenure, the White House will nevertheless “still evaluate” its policy on the Middle East peace process, Press Secretary Josh Earnest told reporters on Thursday….

The prime minister’s comments, he said, call into question his commitment to the pursuit of peace and have forced the US government to reassess the the government’s stance….

“Certainly, the prime minister’s comments from a few days ago called into question his commitment to that,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Thursday.

“We believe he changed his position,” she continued. “We can’t forget about those comments.”

But somehow, the administration forgets Obama’s own comments on keeping Jerusalem the undivided capital of Israel: