With Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s White House meeting today with President Barack Obama seen by some as an historic showdown, Jewish settlers are worried. “Bibi!” shouts a huge billboard on the back of commuter buses, a warning from one of the more uncompromising constituencies in Israeli politics. “Protect the Land of Israel… History will remember you as a strong leader who didn’t surrender.”
As Mr. Netanyahu makes his first trip to the US since taking office in April, his challenge is to reconcile two opposite forces at play: the right-wing members of his governing coalition and his need to have a good working relationship with the US—Israel’s strongest ally.
Though the Israeli leader is known the world over as a stubborn security hawk, back home he has a reputation for becoming weak-kneed when the pressure is on—most recently over budget negotiations last week. And the pressure is likely to be on in today’s meeting with Mr. Obama, whose administration has endorsed Palestinian statehood and a freeze on the expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank. …
Elyakim Haetzni, a former Israeli Knesset member who lives in the settlement of Kiryat Araba, says, “We have a bad experience with Netanyahu.” During his first tenure as prime minister in the late 1990s, Netanyahu criticized the Oslo Accords but eventually bowed to US urging, agreeing to relinquish control over parts of the West Bank and sealing the deal by shaking Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat’s hand. Settlers are afraid of a repeat. “What we say to Netanyahu is don’t cave in again,” says Mr. Haetzni. “We are afraid that he will try to avoid the problem, to go around it, to look for a formulation.” Access the full article>>
