It’s hard to know how they will react to seeing it reported in Haaretz that Bibi Netanyahu thinks they are ‘self-hating Jews.’ My guess is that David Axelrod will have hurt feelings and Rahm Emanuel will resolve to crush Bibi’s nuts. I find Haaretz to be generally reliable, but the piece carrying the ‘self-hating’ report is a pretty straightforward hit piece. I can’t say that I am certain that Netanyahu made the comment at all. I hope not. On the other hand, I kind of hope that Rahm believes he did say it because it will probably make the administration more determined to take a hard-line on the issue of settlements. I believe only a very hard-line on settlements has any chance of moving the peace process forward.
On another note, if Netanyahu actually thought Obama would or could make his speech at Bar-Ilan University compulsory reading at US schools he must be suffering from some kind of syphilitic brain-fever. He went to Cheltenham High School in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. He ought to know that the president of the United States can’t issue edicts about what speeches are taught in our schools.
Check out this post at Mondoweiss.
pretty amazing that his 100-year old dad ratted him out and now he’s forced to call his dad delusional.
So, what is new about that? Netanyahu is no different from any other Israeli PM in lacking interest in a Palestinian state. Every single PM in Israel’s history has taken steps intended to obviate a Palestinian state, including the saintly Yitzhak “Bone Breaker” Rabin. A close look at Oslo and the period during and after the negotiations makes that absolutely clear.
Colonization (aka “settlement” building) is by design and intent the single greatest impediment to the creation of a viable Palestinian state. Oslo contained no provisions limiting colony building or “expansion” or land confiscation by Israel, and in fact colonization, including massive land confiscation, continued during the negotiations and escalated to a frantic pace after the accords had been signed. That alone speaks volumes about Rabin’s true intentions.
As for the talks Clinton presided over, that “generous offer” was carefully designed to be unacceptable, and it was. Therefore, Arafat rejected it, as he should have rejected Oslo.
Hanan Ashrawi’s book This Side of Peace provides some good insights into some of the virtually unknown events and circumstances around the Oslo negotiations.
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(Haaretz) – Kadima´s Knesset faction called a press conference yesterday to attack Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu´s government for what the faction termed its lack of achievements after 100 days in power.
MK Dalia Itzik, the faction chairwoman, attacked the prime minister´s political, social and economic policies and charged that “Netanyahu can be pressured, blackmailed and crushed.”
“After Israel pulled out of the Gaza Strip and paid a very heavy price, we suddenly find ourselves in a street fight with the Americans over the Palestinians,” the former Knesset speaker said. “Instead of making it clear that the Palestinians reject peace, we have emerged as the ones who refuse to participate in a [peace] process with them, and the prime minister has not prevented this development. How has Mr. Media turned into Mr. Apologist? Why has he given the Palestinians this gift?”
Itzik and her Knesset colleagues also presented a new campaign that the party will launch in the coming days via protests at key intersections. The campaign goes by the title “100 days, zero gains. It´s the same old Bibi.”
“This is the largest government in the world, but its bill on cinemas fell in the Knesset this week because it did not have enough MKs backing it,” Itzik said. “All of this government´s moves only bolster our feeling that we were correct in our decision not to join the coalition.”
MK Meir Sheetrit criticized the government´s proposed two-year budget, saying that since his earliest days in the Knesset, “I have never seen a budget that was prepared so amateurishly. This [behavior] continued when the prime minister erased the finance minister and gave in completely to the Histadrut labor federation, which is an unparalleled scandal. Bibi once said he was a concerned citizen. I say today that I am a concerned MK.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Almost certainly Bibi has been on the phone with his neo-con pals, and took what they say seriously.
He must be the most inept politician in Israel if he thinks calling the POTUS names will improve Israeli standing in America.
nalbar
Actually, it’s a good sign. If enough of the Zionists become unhinged and lose control of what they’re saying in public — a mistake Ehud Barak famously made already — they’ll alienate a lot of Americans who are still under the delusion that Israel is our ally.
May their investment in the Bush administration’s excesses reap the rewards it deserves.
not just crazy policies – they’re crazy. and they’re upset that Obama isn’t holding to Bush’s blabbering !!!??? didn’t they notice that we didn’t elect McCain?
More than that… didn’t they notice Bush was a MORON?
nalbar
I don’t think they cared.
Wow — read the whole article. Israel is headed by a genuine nutcase. Maybe Palin quit to accept the post of Netanyahu’s chief advisor. Just until the Red Cow is found and Jesus sweeps her up, of course.
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Was renamed Operation Yonathan in honour of Netanyahu – elder brother of Binyamin Netanyahu. Bibi has lived in the shadow of Yonathan ever since.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Yonatan was considered a big hero, but Benjamin has always been the racist, right wing wack job he is.