I don’t doubt that Prime Minister Netanyahu will have a major challenge next week when he meets with President Obama. But the chances for his success are not insurmountable.
The problems he goes in with are that the President has previously explicitly derided the Likud, Netanyahu’s political party and that the President is allied with J-Street, a group that believes that the United States knows better than Israel what is good for Israel and that, therefore, the United States should pressure Israel to give in to all demands made by the Palestinians.
(Seraphic Secret has a good roundup of the relevant background.)
Netanyahu will have to be careful how he approaches Obama, but it’s still possible for him to make the case that while the United States and Israel have different priorities, they can still work together successfully.
Elliott Abrams writes about what Netanyau needs to do:
Mr. Netanyahu has to care about forging a personal relationship with Mr. Obama, but Mr. Obama may feel he doesn’t need Mr. Netanyahu as a pal. Mr. Obama appears to have enormous faith in his own personal charm (and why not? Look where it’s gotten him) but we do not yet know when he pours it on. Just how much do personal relations with foreign leaders matter to him? For George W. Bush, they mattered a lot: His negative view of Gerhard Schroeder and Jacques Chirac and his trust in Ariel Sharon changed U.S. foreign policy.
Of course there’s baggage both will be bringing to the meeting:
… both Messrs. Obama and Netanyahu will come to the meeting half poisoned against the other. Mr. Netanyahu will have been told that Mr. Obama is weak and naive, won’t act against Iran and doesn’t understand the way the world works. Mr. Obama will have been told that Mr. Netanyahu is a “right winger” (and therefore bad by definition) who is tricky and untrustworthy and needs to be pushed hard if there’s to be “progress toward peace.” U.S. Middle East Envoy George Mitchell has already met Mr. Netanyahu several times and will offer the president his private opinion on their sessions in Jerusalem, which one can just imagine: Both smiling, both seeking to appear totally sincere, each doing all he can to maneuver the other into a narrow corner.
And after the meeting what will we need to look for:
It’s unlikely that we’ll know quickly whether they hit it off. The Israelis will almost certainly make this claim within seconds after the meeting ends, and will adduce every possible piece of evidence. Mr. Obama smiled; he put his arm on Mr. Netanyahu’s shoulder; his body language was friendly; his tie had positive colors.
The White House leaks will be more interesting, for the staff may want to keep Mr. Netanyahu nervous; we’ll have to watch what favored journalists are told about the chemistry in the days after the visit. We should not expect to hear the kind of crack that French President Nicolas Sarkozy apparently made to journalists after meeting the president (that Mr. Obama was “not always at his best when it comes to decisions and efficiency”), as that does not appear to be the Obama style. If he makes an exception for Mr. Netanyahu and has the staff trash the prime minister to the media, we’ll know the two men decided to loathe each other.
I don’t think that the meeting between President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu necessarily will go badly next week. Still Netanyahu has a big challenge ahead of him to change the President’s mind.
Crossposted on Soccer Dad.
