The symbolic visit by Israel’s President Isaac Herzog to Washington DC yesterday was full of winks and half-truths.
Herzog uttered paeans of praise for Israeli democracy, which is standing up wonderfully in these testing times; US President Joe Biden mentioned his telephone conversation with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the most prominent US ally not invited to his White House (perhaps alongside Hungarian premier Viktor Orban); Herzog also deigned to mention the president’s conversation with the prime minister; Biden did not mention Israeli democracy at all, even though that is part of the standard repertoire whenever an Israeli leader visits Washington.
The Israeli president declaimed his entire opening remarks, a minute and a half, flawlessly, from memory; the US president was aided by a card index, and it wasn’t always easy to decipher what he was saying. The president’s remarks are usually cited verbatim on the White House website within a short time. Not this time, at least not by the time of writing (Wednesday morning).
Biden stressed the "ironclad commitment" of the US to Israel. He did so a few hours after the House of Representatives voted by a huge majority in favor of an enthusiastically pro-Israeli resolution. The resolution has no practical validity; it was an expression of sentiment only, but supporters of Israel recorded an exceptional symbolic achievement, with 412 of the 435 representatives voting in favor, just nine against, and the rest absent.
Such things don’t often happen in the divided and polarized US Congress. It’s not for me to say whether the expression of support reflected the sincere feelings of those voting, but for the moment that’s less important than the vote itself. Even if some of them would have preferred not to be numbered among those implicitly supporting the Netanyahu government, they saw themselves compelled to vote for the resolution, because Israel’s weight in US politics is very heavy.
That’s something worth understanding and repeating, especially after the fuss and noise in the Israeli media last week over the revelation by "The New York Times" commentator Thomas Friedman of an approaching "reassessment" of US-Israel relations. Friedman saw what he wanted to see, and a host of columnists and political activists in Israel rushed to adopt his musings without considering their context and plausibility.
Today, Friedman reports a conversation lasting "an hour and a quarter" with Biden shortly after the Biden-Herzog meeting. Lo and behold, in the course of their 75-minute conversation, the word "reassessment" never passed the president’s lips, or at least wasn’t quoted. The Israeli press quotes Friedman today as well, without wondering what happened to the Friedman of last week.
The Friedman of today describes Biden as "a pro-Israeli of the old school", and advises Israelis to extract as much benefit from that school as they can, before it vanishes from the world.
Biden’s political handcuffs
I have expressed the view more than once in the past that Israel-US relations are entering a crisis zone. They aren’t in crisis yet, but the Israeli ship is heading for the crisis rocks, if I may use that maritime metaphor.
Israel is losing prestige and regard, certainly on the American left, but in the US political center as well. It would be foolish to ignore the gradual erosion of its standing, or to deny it. But it would be just as foolish to talk of an immediate crisis. The Democratic Party has not been a fan of Benjamin Netanyahu since the days of Bill Clinton, certainly since Barack Obama. A substantial number of Democrats can’t stand him. The vast majority of them, however, only whisper it, and that behind closed doors.
The vote in the House of Representatives was a reminder to the White House of its political handcuffs. Even if he wanted to be especially severe on Israel - and one may presume that from time to time he does - President Biden knows that he has no political basis of support. A very large majority of the members of his party in Congress does not think that the time has come to punish Israel.
The initiative for the pro-Israel resolution came from the Republicans, who have a slim majority in the House of Representatives. It was challenged in a strongly-worded speech by Pramila Jayapal, a Democratic representative from Washington State. Jayapal heads the progressive faction of her party, which has 103 members. There are altogether 212 Democratic members of the House of Representatives. In other words, almost half the party’s members in the House of Representatives consider themselves progressives on socio-economic issues.
"The racist government is not Israel itself"
Jayapal, an American of Indian heritage, spoke last week at a conference of activists in Chicago. Palestinian protesters chanted intermittently. "Could I say something as someone who was on the street and participated in demonstrations most of the time?" said Jayapal. "I want you to know that we are fighters, to make it clear that Israel is a racist state, that the Palestinian people deserve self-determination and autonomy, that the dream of two states eludes us."
When a fractious voice emanated from the right, Jayapal explained that she did not intend to uproot Israel, but only its government. This government has adopted a racist policy, she says, and "extreme racists" run it.
That was enough for the Republicans to try and squeeze every drop of political capital. They try to portray the Democratic Party as being held captive by the radical left wing, as seeking evil for the US and evil for Israel.
If that was the intention, it did not work. The Democrats were quick to come to their senses. They voted in favor of a proposed resolution, which exempted Israel from being labelled as "racist" and "apartheid", and condemned anti-Semitism.
Not only the Democratic Party was horrified by the Republican tactic, but Jayapal herself. To the dismay of some of her colleagues, and certainly of the Palestinian protesters in Chicago, she herself voted in favor of the Republican proposal. Even among progressives, only a small minority opposed the decision.
Congress will always come to the rescue
The national leadership of the Republican Party had hoped it could publish a blacklist of Democrats who would refuse to support the proposal but had to settle for nine names of ultra-radicals, including six members of the "Squad", the left-wing commando of American politics, which includes staunch anti-Israel figures. The presence of the "Squad" in the list does not surprise anyone. Indeed, the Republicans gave the Democrats a chance to shake off their extremists.
Israel has always been able to trust Congress more than the White House. The pro-Israel lobby in Washington has historically drawn its power from Congress. There are many reasons for this, both sentimental and electoral. Much has been made of the considerable weight of contributions from Jews to the election campaigns of members of Congress, although in its formative Israel also enjoyed a large reservoir of goodwill and romantic support.
Congress came to Israel's rescue in at least three moments of dramatic conflict between Israel and the White House. In 1992 when President George Bush Sr. refused to guarantee massive loans to Israel for housing Soviet immigrants and in 2010 and 2015 during Netanyahu's confrontations with Obama. Both Bush and Obama foresaw the results of their confrontations with Israel. Biden was of course Obama's deputy, and before that he was a senator for 35 years. He doesn't need a lesson in diplomacy or congressional politics.
In short, the crisis that a large number of Israelis volunteered to announce was coming, has not yet come. On the other hand, Benjamin Netanyahu is aware that the bridge to Washington has never been narrower.
Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on July 19, 2023.
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2023.