Why Biden-Bibi friction won't end with a White House visit
Nothing at all personal against Herzog, who, since becoming president, has leveraged his mediation skills and his likability to help reset relations with Turkey and shape a compromise solution for judicial reform against prohibitive odds.
But it is Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, and not Herzog, who should have been meeting with President Joe Biden, Secretary of State Tony Blinken, and addressing Congress. Biden’s belated invitation to Netanyahu to meet sometime in the near future — after Herzog had already taken off for the US — is only a first step in making amends for having snubbed Bibi and other members of his democratically elected coalition in favor of Herzog — who is respected, but essentially powerless.
Until now, the administration has shown contempt for the choice of Israeli voters. The daily lectures from a rotating chorus of officials about how judicial reform will erode Israel’s shared democratic bonds with America is an intrusion into an ally’s internal affairs and reeks of hypocrisy.
In a parting shot before leaving his post, Thomas Nides, who will go down in history as one of America’s most forgettable and shallow ambassadors to Israel, admitted in a patronizing fashion that the Biden administration aims to stop Israel from “going off the rails” and that “Israelis want the US to be in their business.”
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