I firmly believe the Obama administration cannot react strongly enough to right-wing Israelis' recent "insult" against American leadership in the Middle East. I am referring, of course, to Israel's settlements announcement during Biden's visit last week. This is not the first time Netanyahu has pulled something like this:
Right-wing governments in Israel have regularly embarrassed high-level U.S. officials by making announcements about new settlement activity during or just after their visits. But it usually happens to secretaries of state. It infuriated James Baker, confounded Condoleezza Rice, and appalled Madeleine Albright. When I [Martin Indyk, former Ambassador to Israel] served as Albright's ambassador in Israel, during Bibi Netanyahu's first term as Prime Minister, he announced a major extension to an existing West Bank settlement as she departed Israel after one of her efforts to move the peace process forward. When she heard the news, she called me on an open line and shouted: "You tell Bibi that he needs to stop worrying about his right wing and start worrying about the United States."
But this time is more significant than when Albright was Secretary of State during the Clinton years. This announcement directly attacks Obama's basic foreign policy -- that engaging diplomatically is more fruitful than the unilateralism of the Bush years. By undercutting Obama's pending diplomatic achievements and fueling domestic criticism of Obama as a weak leader, Netanyahu's actions are much more damaging to Obama today than they were to Clinton in the 1990s.
The popularity Obama enjoyed in the Middle East after his Cairo speech has now deteriorated. The pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat wrote, "The man who launched his election with such high hopes seems far away today...The Netanyahu government has successfully drained Barack Obama’s momentum and they have successfully tamed him." Netanyahu's settlement announcement and subsequent Arab opinion polls have taken the bite out of Obama's argument (heard repeatedly during the '08 campaign) that more diplomacy improves the World's perception of the US.
Even more importantly, it deprived Obama of a foreign policy win. The Palestinians had finally agreed to proceed with "proximity" talks, which would have restarted peace negotiations, albeit informally. Netanyahu has taken from Obama the extremely valuable ability to bring a specific accomplishment to the American people. As Strobe Talbott, president of the Brookings Institution, told the FT, "While in reality, President Obama has scored quite a few points in foreign policy during his first year-plus in office, he has a problem with the growing perception that every time he shoots for the net, the ball bounces around the rim and doesn’t go in."
Also, it perpetuates the idea domestically that Obama is not a good friend of Israel, which is not true. From Laura Rozen at Politico:
The Obama administration has been a very loyal security ally to Israel, not just in its words, but in its actions; it has not denied them anything even while having a dispute over settlements; on the contrary, it has hugged them close, been extra consultative, extra security-providing, in protecting it diplomatically including at the UN with Goldstone, in maintaining Israel's qualitative strategic advantage vis a vis defense equipment it sells them and doesn't sell other regional allies; in the $3 billion in U.S. mostly military assistance Obama put in his FY 2011 budget, more than to any other country in the world. [for more details, click here]
It's hard to see what game Netanyahu is playing. It makes sense that Netanyahu would announce new settlements to appease his right-wing supporters who oppose peace talks. But Netanyahu must have known what a terrible effect this announcement would have on Obama's domestic political position. Netanyahu understands the difficulty Obama has balancing domestic perceptions of his Iran policy with the Israel-Palestine peace process as well as the political dynamics of a buoyant GOP. Netanyahu's settlement announcement was a political attack on Obama. Obama's only option is a political response -- undercut domestic Israeli support for Netanyahu by questioning Netanyahu's commitment to Israel's strongest ally.
