Israel Matzav

Fooling most of the 'Jewish leaders' most of the time

Late Friday night Israel time, Laura Rozen reported on a Friday conference call between Dan Shapiro of the National Security Council and American 'Jewish leaders' in a bid to calm the storm that the White House created over the Ramat Shlomo announcement three weeks ago.

What was the message?

“Not much,” one source, who declined to be identified, said. “No crisis. Media reports are wrong. More agreement than disagreement” inside the administration, regarding how to advance the Middle East peace process. [The administration’s] “hand was forced [with regard to] Jerusalem by circumstances during Biden’s trip,” the source said, referring to the Israeli government’s announcement last month during Vice President Joe Biden's good-will trip to Israel that it had approved construction of another 1,600 homes to be built in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood.

[In other words, big internal debate some hack reported on last weekend? Overblown. All is harmony inside the administration on its approach, how hard to push, who to push, what to push for, etc. To which another source who'd been on the call Friday said, Oh that report? "It is so obviously true.”]

...

The content of the call was “just a reiteration of administration's policies/statements from the last few weeks,” another source who declined to be identified said. “Shapiro was asked about cutting aid, which he assured was not even on table."

So was the 'Jewish leadership' really taken in? Apparently, not entirely.

Those on the call also said he spent a considerable amount of time pushing back against media reports calling the recent tensions a crisis or characterizing Netanyahu’s White House visit – conducted under a media blackout without even an official photograph released – as a snub.

He faulted the “fog” of press reports for portraying the meeting as negative, which he pointed out was arranged hastily after the president canceled an overseas trip to work on health care legislation and made for the fourth visit of Obama with Netanyahu in the US, the most of any foreign leader.

Shapiro also referred to the media’s bias toward the more “sexy” news story of US criticism of Israel over American criticism of the Palestinians to claim that the Obama administration has been equally demanding of both sides.

One caller later asked that he produce a compendium detailing American censure of the Palestinian Authority alongside Israel to provide documentation to the wider Jewish community, which has been critical of the US administration for coming down more heavily on Israel than on the PA.

The National Security Council hand also noted that Netanyahu’s meeting with Obama dealt significantly with Iran, on which he said there is close coordination between the two countries and that there is no foreign policy issue the US is working harder on, according to call participants.

...

Yet he questioned the White House take on the recent tensions. “They created the storm. Why are they surprised?”

Another participant also expressed skepticism at what he heard, particularly the effort to blame the media for blowing things out of proportion.

“It wasn’t incredibly reassuring, but it was unclear whether the White House was downplaying the crisis because they erroneously think there isn’t a crisis, or they’re downplaying the crisis as means of ending the crisis,” he said. “If it’s the latter it’s a positive thing, but if they really are clueless and have their heads in the sand, that’s bad.”

One Jewish official on the call, though, expressed more criticism at his colleagues than at the White House, taking them to task for not speaking more forcefully during the call against what had happened.

“They didn’t challenge the administration on this,” he said. “It was very disappointing, really very disappointing.”

The JPost also notes a White House claim that much of the 'meeting' between Netanyahu and Obama dealt with Iran. If so, you can bet it was Obama threatening Bibi with all the terrible things that would happen to Israel if we dare to strike Iran without His Lordship's approval.

Paul Mirengoff notes that one reason why there may have been so little pushback from the 'Jewish leaders' is that they don't expect much pushback from Netanyahu against the President.

Unfortunately, according to one participant in the conference, the Jewish leaders did not push back very much while the call was taking place. Then again, it's far from clear that Netanyahu himself is going to push back.

It's not clear yet that he won't either. The country has been pretty much shut down all week for Pesach (Passover) and my guess is that we'll start to see a lot more activity come Tuesday morning.

I would bet that Netanyahu will offer some sort of package: a terrorist release, and some suspension of Jewish building in the predominantly Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem in exchange for scrapping the proximity talks and moving to direct talks. Maybe they'll take down a few more roadblocks and endanger some more Jewish lives. Whether that will satisfy Obama or the 'Palestinians' remains to be seen. But I don't think he can get a whole lot more than that through his cabinet even if he wanted to try.

This much is for sure: Sometime between Tuesday and when Netanyahu departs for that nuclear disarmament conference in Washington next week, some kind of offer will be made.

What could go wrong?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 5:08 PM