CALLING “NETANYAHU A CHICKENSHIT” INDICATES FULL BLOWN CRISIS IN US RELATIONS WITH ISRAEL
DESCRIBING “NETANYAHU AS A CHICKENSHIT” INDICATES FULL BLOWN CRISIS IN US RELATIONS WITH ISRAEL
by Syarif Hidayat*
The US-Israeli relations have sunk to new lows after Obama administration officials were cited calling Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a “chickenshit” and “coward” engaging in political posturing, instead of efforts at Middle-Eastern de-escalation.
A senior Obama administration official has described Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “chickenshit” (coward, afraid), expressing the US president’s frustration with the Israeli leader. “The thing about Bibi [Netanyahu] is, he’s a chickenshit,” the unnamed official told the Atlantic when asked about the foreign leader who seems to frustrate the White House the most.
The official added that the good thing about Netanyahu is that “he’s scared to launch wars,” and the bad thing about him is that “he won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians.” “The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat… He’s got no guts,” the official said.
According to the Atlantic, the statement by the top Obama official indicates that relations between Washington and Tel Aviv have moved toward a “full-blown crisis.” The United States recently criticized Israel’s plan to build more than 1,000 settler units in the occupied Palestinian lands.
US State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said that, “if Israel wants to live in a peaceful society, they need to take steps that will reduce tensions. Moving forward with this sort of action would be incompatible with the pursuit of peace.” However, Netanyahu attacked the State Department for condemning Israeli expansion plans, saying US officials are “disconnected from reality.”
Last week, top American officials rejected requests by Israeli Military Affairs Minister Moshe Ya’alon for meetings with them during his visit to the United States. The White House and State Department refused proposals for meetings with Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Advisor Susan Rice, and Secretary of State John Kerry.
The refusal was an angry response by Washington after Ya’alon mocked Kerry’s efforts to forge a peace deal between Tel Aviv and the Palestinians.
The Israeli minister had called Kerry’s efforts for Israeli-Palestinian peace “messianic and obsessive.” The State Department had called Ya’alon’s remarks “offensive and inappropriate.”
Netanyahu angry at being called a coward
Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu has given an angry response to being called a coward by an unidentified US official. “Our supreme interests, chiefly the security and unity of Jerusalem, are not the main concern of those anonymous officials who attack us and me personally,” said Netanyahu who was addressing the Israeli parliament on Wednesday, October 29, 2014.
I come under attack because I defend the interests of the Israeli regime and its people, he added. Netanyahu’s angry response came in reaction to the recent remarks of a senior US official who described the Israeli premier as a “chickenshit,” expressing US President Barack Obama’s frustration with the Israeli premier. “The thing about Bibi is he’s a chickenshit,” the unnamed official told the Atlantic magazine.
“The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat… He’s got no guts,” the official said, adding that Netanyahu “won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians.” US State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said on Wednesday that Washington will not apologize to Tel Aviv over the controversy since the US statesman’s remark “isn’t the position of the administration.”
Washington and Tel Aviv have recently exchanged heated arguments over the Israeli regime’s plan to build more than 1,000 settler units in the occupied Palestinian lands. Netanyahu had earlier lashed out at Washington for condemning Israeli expansionist plans, saying US officials are “disconnected from reality.”
The faithful servant mad over ‘chickenshit’
Seems to be afraid of the Zionist lobbyists (masters) wrath, US House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner has slammed President Barack Obama over a statement by his administration’s top official which described the Israeli prime minister as “chickenshit”.
An unnamed Obama administration official called Benjamin Netanyahu a “chickenshit” in an interview with The Atlantic’s Jeffrery Goldberg on Tuesday, October 28, 2014. “The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit,” the unnamed official told Goldberg, expressing the Obama administration’s frustration with the Israeli premier.
On Wednesday, the White House tried to do some damage control by calling the remark “inappropriate and counterproductive”. However, it did not satisfy Boehner, the Republican leader of the House, who said, “I am tired of the administration’s apology tour.”
“The president sets the tone for his administration. He either condones the profanity and disrespect used by the most senior members of his administration, or he does not,” Boehner said in a statement on Wednesday. “It is time for him to get his house in order and tell the people that can’t muster professionalism that it is time to move on.”
In response, White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that Boehner himself has made “salty” remarks in the past. “It’s an interesting observation by the speaker of the House who, you all know, has a penchant for using some pretty salty language himself. So, it’s a little rich to have a lecture about profanity from the speaker of the House,” Earnest said.
According to The Atlantic, the statement by the top Obama official indicates that relations between Washington and Tel Aviv have moved toward a “full-blown crisis”. The United States recently criticized Israel’s plan to build more than 1,000 settler units in the occupied Palestinian lands.
US State Department spokesperson Jen Psaki said that, “if Israel wants to live in a peaceful society, they need to take steps that will reduce tensions. Moving forward with this sort of action would be incompatible with the pursuit of peace.” However, Netanyahu attacked the State Department for condemning Israeli expansion plans, saying US officials are “detached from reality”.
Last week, top administration officials rejected requests by the Israeli military affairs minister, Moshe Ya’alon, for meetings with them during his visit to the United States. The White House and State Department refused proposals for meetings with Vice President Joe Biden, National Security Advisor Susan Rice, and Secretary of State John Kerry.
The refusal was an angry response by Washington after Ya’alon mocked Kerry’s efforts to forge a peace deal between Tel Aviv and the Palestinians.
The Israeli minister had called Kerry’s efforts for Israeli-Palestinian peace “messianic and obsessive”. The State Department had called Ya’alon’s remarks “offensive and inappropriate”.
US beginning to ‘disengage’ from Israel
A combination of factors is pushing the United States to “disengage” from Israel, a regime that will not last a month without US support, says an analyst. Mike Harris, an editor of Veterans Today, argues that the American people — particularly the young and college-educated — have an “implicit sense of fairness” which is driving them away from Israel.
Americans are “fed up” with the significant sway that Israel holds on corridors of power in their country, Harris told Press TV on Wednesday. “Israel has been interfering in the US political process for a very, very, very long time.” They are also outraged by “Israel’s unjustified war and slaughter of the Palestinian people in Gaza,” he added. “The unmitigated slaughter that Israel has done to the Palestinians, it creates a sense of outrage.”
The analyst continued that the American people are beginning to see through the “lies” that are being fed to them by the “Zionist-controlled” mainstream media. “Times are changing for Israel, they spend a lot of money to manipulate public opinion, all of Hollywood and mass media is Jewish-controlled (and) Zionist-controlled, and people realize the lies that are being told to them on their Nightly News on a daily basis,” he said.
“But the American people can see through this. The American people, particularly at university level, are smart (and) well-educated and they have this implicit sense of fairness,” he added. “All of this combined” Harris said, “is adding up to what is going to be a perfect storm for Israel where the people of the US are going to reject Israel, and that is the process that we are beginning to see the early stages of.”
Anti-Israeli events on university campuses across the United States have more than doubled in the fall compared to the same period last year, according to new report. The New York-based Anti-Defamation League said in a report Friday that anti-Israeli activism has risen significantly on US campuses following the recent 50-day Israeli onslaught on the besieged Gaza Strip.
“This is going to continue for some time, and everyone knows, without the support of the US, Israel will be gone in 30 days,” Harris said. “There is a groundswell that is developing for the US to disengage from Israel.”
Netanyahu’s settlement remark angers White House
White House press secretary Josh Earnest has criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for questioning Washington’s condemnation of Israeli settlements. The United States recently denounced Israel for planning to build a new housing project on the Palestinian territories, warning that the project could distance Israel from “even its closest allies.”
Netanyahu called the condemnation baffling, and said, “It’s against the American values. And it doesn’t bode well for peace.” “The idea that we’d have this ethnic purification as a condition for peace, I think it’s anti-peace,” the Israeli prime minister said. In response, Earnest said on Monday that it seemed “odd for him [Netanyahu] to try to defend the actions of his government by saying that our response did not reflect American values.”
“The fact is American policy has been clear and unchanged under several administrations, both Democrat and Republican,” Earnest said. The White House spokesman also noted that Netanyahu had ignored questions about plans for the project and reiterated that moving forward is contrary to Israel’s stated goal of negotiating a permanent status agreement with the Palestinians.
Relations between the US and Israel have been strained increasingly following President Obama’s inauguration in 2009. During a bilateral meeting with Netanyahu last week, Obama called for a change in the status quo between Israel and the Palestinians in order to prevent another war in the Gaza Strip.
“We realize we have to find ways to change the status quo, so that both Israelis feel safe in their homes and also you do not have the tragedy of Palestinian children being killed as well,” Obama told visiting Netanyahu on Wednesday. Before his meeting, Obama said they would discuss ways to find a more sustainable peace between Israelis and Palestinians. (T/P3/R01)
Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)
*Senior Editor of Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA) (He can be contacted via emails: [email protected] and [email protected])
Sources:
1.http://www.presstv.ir/
2. http://www.presstv.com/
