Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu appears to be caught in a bind with regard to the current American Presidential contest, according to AL Monitor columnist Ben Caspit. Israel does not want a UN Security Council Resolution, or anything like it, in which external forces would try to force a resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Obama still has time to introduce such a maneuver if he wishes. But what about his successor? If it’s Clinton ….
In his meeting with Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in New York Sept. 25, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu managed to get out of her what he failed to extract from the serving president, Barack Obama. He got her to promise that she would oppose any attempt by “external forces” to force a solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, including any resolution by the United Nations Security Council.
And Trump is considered a good friend of Israel. But Ben sees Netanyahu as now being in a bind:
Netanyahu is caught in an amusing conflict of interests.
On one hand, it is obvious that he would prefer to see Trump win the election. The meeting he had with Trump at his home in New York lasted almost twice as long as his meeting with Clinton (close to 1½ hours with the Republican candidate, compared to just 50 minutes with the Democratic candidate). The two men were more intimate; they both remember well the video clip in support of Netanyahu that Trump released before the 2013 Israeli election.
Right now, Netanyahu would love to release a similar clip in support of the Republican candidate, but he can’t. He would love to release it even though no one has any idea what a Trump presidency would be like in terms of Israel.
On the other hand, Netanyahu knows that a Trump victory would only push Obama closer to a UN Security Council resolution and a diplomatic catastrophe for his own policy.
If he did show support for Trump, Obama might unleash just such a maneuver on Israel as retaliation; if Clinton wins, he’s actually off the hook. But his detestation for her is reportedly such that … well, I wonder how he sleeps at night.
Or how much longer he’ll be Prime Minister.
