Obama: Netanyahu remains at odds with US Mideast policy

President Barack Obama on Tuesday reiterated his administration's conclusion that Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remains on the wrong side of U.S. Middle East policy and that the White House plans to reassess its approach to dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But Obama left unclear what new policy he might pursue to end what his Chief of Staff Denis McDonough on Monday referred to as "Israel's military control of another people" that had "lasted for almost 50 years."

Longstanding tensions between Obama and Netanyahu reached new heights in recent weeks over the Israeli leader's efforts to block an emerging nuclear deal with Iran — in part by making an end run around the White House to appeal directly to the U.S. Congress. But in his successful election campaign for a historic third term in office, Netanyahu served a reminder that his stonewalling of the peace process with the Palestinians by freezing illegal Israeli settlement construction was guided by an underlying logic: Netanyahu promised Israeli voters that there would be no Palestinian state created on his watch. 

That statement was consistent with Netanyahu's 2009 speech committing to a two state solution only under conditions that were unlikely ever to be realized, but it left the White House no longer able to credibly claim to be overseeing a peace process that would end the occupation by achieving for "the Palestinian people ... the right to live in and govern themselves in their own sovereign state."

Obama has refused to let the matter rest despite Netanyahu's efforts at damage control by restating that supports a two-state solution although not in the foreseeable future given regional conditions. And the febrile atmosphere between the two governments will not have been eased by Tuesday's Wall Street Journal report that Israel had spied on U.S. negotiations with Iran and leaked details to U.S. lawmakers in an effort to rally them against their government's diplomatic effort with Tehran.

Speaking to reporters during a press conference Tuesday alongside Afghan president Ashraf Ghani, Obama confirmed recent statements by members of his administration that the U.S. was reassessing its handling of the Israeli-Palestinian file.

“The evaluation that is taking place is specific to what happens between Israelis and Palestinians going forward,” he said, while emphasizing that there would be no change in U.S. security cooperation with and economic assistance to Israel.

"Netanyahu, in the election run-up, stated that a Palestinian state would not occur while he was prime minister," Obama said. "And I took him at his word that that's what he meant. Afterwards, he [Netanyahu] pointed out that he didn't say 'never,' but that there would be a series of conditions in which a Palestinian state could potentially be created," Obama said. "But, of course, the conditions were such that they would be impossible to meet any time soon."

“The issue is a very clear, substantive challenge,” Obama concluded. “We believe that two states is the best path forward for Israel’s security, Palestinian aspirations and regional stability. And Prime Minister Netanyahu has a different approach.”

How that difference will be translated into policy is unclear.

“There are some things that have moved away from auto-pilot,” said Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator currently with the European Council on Foreign Relations, on the Obama administration’s view of its relationship with Israel. “Over the short-term, and the duration of this presidency, will all those add up to things that could have a dramatic impact on Israel-Palestinian dynamics? Probably not.”

But he said the “combination of the bluntness and the manner in which Netanyahu was seen as playing politics in America’s back yard" could “lock in some things that have a longer term implication for the relationship.”

One area in which U.S. policy could change is in international forums.

Administration officials have suggested that U.S. cover for Israel at the United Nations — where it’s veto power has been a reliable trump card stopping resolutions critical of Israel — may not be sacrosanct.

“Steps that the United States has taken at the United Nations had been predicated on this idea that the two-state solution is the best outcome,” said White House Spokesman Josh Earnest last Thursday. “Now our ally in these talks has said that they are no longer committed to that solution.”

Washington Post columnist David Ignatius, who has close ties to the administration, suggested last week that policy changes could come in the form of the U.S. seeking to codify the parameters of a two-state solution in the form of a U.N. Security Council resolution, which would effectively mean the international community prescribing the terms for a solution to Israelis and Palestinians. Washington could also withhold its veto on resolutions condemn Israeli settlements or other activities related to the occupation.

“I don’t know that this points to a major shift in U.S. policy toward Israel,” said Khaled Elgindy, a fellow with the Center for Middle East Policy at the Brookings Institution. “It’s kind of in the tactical margins so far.”

Elgindy said though that the public airing of policy differences, however minimal, could be seen in a larger political context witnessing a “grassroots shift” for both parties.

For the political right in the U.S., he said, Israel has become an issue of American identity; on the left, the Israel-Palestinian conflict is increasingly being viewed through a social justice lens.

“The president may finally have calculated, ‘If I’m going to get attacked regardless, I might as well as get some mileage out of it,’” Elgindy said.