JERUSALEM // Apprehension is mounting in Israel over the damage
that its “special relationship” with Washington will suffer if, as expected, the
Likud leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, puts together a far-right government in the
coming weeks.
A rift with US officials is already opening over the kingmaker
role of Avigdor Lieberman, who leads Yisrael Beiteinu, an anti-Arab party, and
is being widely touted as a senior cabinet minister in the incoming government.
His demand for loyalty legislation that threatens to strip the
country’s Arab population of citizenship would, US officials note, put Israel’s
government publicly at odds with the new, more inclusive era being promised by
Barack Obama.
Israeli officials are worried that a US backlash could strengthen
the hand of the president’s Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, whose task it is
to revive the moribund peace process with the Palestinians.
Last week, Maariv, an Israeli daily newspaper, reported on
concerns that Mr Mitchell might recommend economic sanctions against Israel,
including cuts to the billions of dollars of annual aid, if a Netanyahu
government allowed further expansion of West Bank settlements.
On Friday, as Mr Netanyahu was asked to form a government, the
Obama administration publicly denied that it was seeking to interfere in the
outcome of the coalition negotiations.
However, behind the scenes, according to the Israeli media, Mr
Netanyahu is facing stiff pressure to abandon a government with the far-right
parties.
Only hours after Mr Netanyahu was given his mandate, the US
ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, stressed that Washington would be
pushing for a two-state solution with the Palestinians. Mr Netanyahu favours
what he calls “economic peace” rather than a territorial agreement with the
Palestinians.
Equally, the US administration is believed to be concerned about
allegations that Mr Netanyahu’s key partner in government, Mr Lieberman, once
belonged to the Kach movement, outlawed as a terrorist group in 1994. Michael
Ben-Ari, of the National Union, a right-wing party, and a self-declared former
Kach member, would also be included in any far-right coalition.
The White House is said to prefer that Mr Netanyahu instead join
forces with his chief rival, Tzipi Livni of the centrist party Kadima.
So far Ms Livni has insisted she will not serve under Mr
Netanyahu, but has hinted she may accept a “rotation” that would see both
leaders alternating as prime minister. The two are due to meet today.
Not-so-veiled warnings to the Likud leader were issued last week
by two former US ambassadors to Israel. Daniel Kurtzer, who served under George
W Bush, advised that the inclusion of Mr Lieberman in the incoming government
would be a “bad combination for American interests”.
In comments reported by the Israeli media, he told an audience at
Georgetown University: “There will be an image problem for an American
administration to support a government that includes a politician who was
defined as racist.”
In a separate speech, Martin Indyk, Bill Clinton’s ambassador to
Israel, recalled Mr Netanyahu’s “considerable trouble” with Washington when he
was prime minister in the late 1990s.
Israel’s shift rightward has aggravated press coverage in the
United States. One leading US newspaper has even gone as far as to break a taboo
by questioning Israel’s democratic credentials.
An editorial in the Los Angeles Times asked: “Can a nation
founded as a Jewish homeland – with a ‘right of return’ for diaspora Jews but no
one else, a Star of David on the flag and a national anthem that evokes the
‘yearning’ of Jews for Zion – ever treat non-Jews as true, equal citizens?”
Visits by three US Democratic politicians to Gaza late last week
were also seen as a possible harbinger of souring relations with Israel. All
three voiced shock at the destruction wrought on Gaza.
These developments have added to the concern of leading US Jews
that the special relationship is under threat.
Morton Klein, the president of the Zionist Organisation of
America, told The Jerusalem Post newspaper that Mr Lieberman’s “image is so
tarnished, it wouldn’t be good for Israel” if he held a prominent cabinet
position.
According to Mike Prashker, the director of Merchavim, an
organisation in Jerusalem promoting shared Israeli citizenship, “when it comes
to core democratic values, American and Israeli Jews are headed in diametrically
opposite directions. These elections have revealed Israeli democracy as
dangerously hollow.”
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