President Obama Tuesday stood by his earlier remarks that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had damaged the prospects of a Mideast peace process by saying in the closing days of his re-election campaign that there would be no Palestinian state during his tenure as Israel’s leader.
Netanyahu has since partially walked back his comments about the dim prospects for a two-state solution in the current environment, arguing that he wants a “sustainable, peaceful two-state solution” and offering several high-hurdle conditions that must be met before such a goal could take place.
In the days leading up to the election, Netanyahu said he didn’t expect to see the formation of a Palestinian state during his tenure as prime minister because any attempt to force Israel or others to give up land for its creation would be giving “radical Islam” more area to launch assaults against Israel.
“I think that anyone who intends to create a Palestinian state today and to give up land is giving radical Islam a launching ground against Israel,” he told Israeli’s conservative NRG publication. “This is the reality that was created here in recent years. Anyone who ignores this has his head buried in the ground.”
After Netanyahu’s initial pre-election comments, which appeared aimed at winning over right-wing voters, Obama told him that the United States would “reassess” aspects of its relationship with Israel.
On Tuesday, Obama clarified his statement to say that any reassessment of the relationship with Israel would not impact U.S. support for maintaining Israel’s military edge in the region.
“Our intelligence cooperation, our military cooperation – that continues unabated,” he told reporters at a press conference with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. “I will continue what I need to do to ensure that our friends in Israel are safe. But I am required to evaluate honestly how we manage Israeli-Palestinian relations over the next several years.”
Obama also said the U.S. “cannot pretend that there’s a possibility of something that’s not there, and we can’t continue to promise our public diplomacy based on something that everybody knows is not going to happen in the next few years.”
“For the sake of our credibility, we have to be honest about that,” he added.
He also rejected a “tendency” in the reporting to frame the conflict over the two-state solution as a personal fight between himself and Netanyahu.
“We have a very business-like relationship,” Obama said. “He is representing his country’s interest in the way he thinks he needs to do and I am doing the same. The issue is not a matter of a relationship between two leaders – it’s very substantive.”
“This can’t be reduced to a matter of somehow let’s all hold hands and sing kumbaya…it’s how can we get through a really knotty policy dispute,” he added.
