US struggles to reason with Israel as anti-American sentiments grow

Washington: The two-week-old dispute between Israel and the US over housing construction in occupied East Jerusalem has exposed the limits of American power to pressure Israeli leaders to make decisions they consider politically untenable.

But the blow-up also shows that the relationship between the two allies is changing, in ways that are unsettling for Israel's supporters. President Barack Obama and his aides have cast the settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, not just the relationship with Israel, as a core US national security interest.

General David Petraeus, the head of the military's Central Command, put it starkly in a recent testimony on Capitol Hill: "The conflict foments anti-American sentiment due to a perception of US favouritism toward Israel."

His comments raised eyebrows in official Washington — and overseas — because they suggested that US military officials were embracing the idea that failure to resolve the conflict had begun to imperil American lives.

"Israeli policies have transcended personal affront or embarrassment to American officials and are causing the United States real pain beyond the Arab-Israeli arena.

"This is something new, and therefore the US is reacting with unusually strong, public and repeated criticisms of Israel's settlement policies and its general peace-negotiating posture," Rami Khouri, editor at large of Beirut's Daily Star, wrote this week.

"At the same time Washington repeats its ironclad commitment to Israel's basic security in its 1967 borders, suggesting that the US is finally clarifying that its support for Israel does not include unconditional support for Israel's colonisation policies."

Putting pressure

The Obama administration has struggled from the start to find its footing with Israel and the Palestinians.

Obama appointed a special envoy, former Senator George Mitchell, on his second day in office.

But then the administration attempted to pressure Israel to freeze all colony expansion — and failed.

The US further lost credibility when Clinton embraced Benjamin Netanyahu's compromise proposal, which fell short of Palestinian expectations, as "unprecedented".

US pressure at the time also backfired because it appeared to let the Palestinians off the hook. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas refused to enter into direct talks before a colony freeze, even though he had done so before.

Administration officials have been careful to turn down the heat in their latest exchanges with Netanyahu over occupied Jerusalem, even as they continue to express their displeasure.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley spoke in clipped sentences on Tuesday when asked to describe the hours of private conversations with Netanyahu this week: "We have outlined some concerns to the Israeli government. They have responded to our concerns. That conversation continues ... There's a lot of give-and-take involved in these conversations."

Crowley argued that "the only way to ultimately resolve competing claims, on the future of occupied Jerusalem, is to get to direct negotiations".

He said the administration faces a series of "pass/fail" tests: Can it get the two parties to join direct talks? Can it persuade them to address the vexing issues surrounding the final status of [occupied] Jerusalem? And ultimately, "do we get to an agreement that is in the Israeli interest, in the Palestinian interest, in the interest of the rest of the region and clearly in the interest of the United States?"

In the case of occupied East Jerusalem, Netanyahu believes a halt to construction represents political suicide for his coalition, so no amount of US pressure will lead him to impose a freeze — at least until he is in the final throes of peace talks.

"US pressure can work, but it needs to be at the right time, on the right issue and in the right political context," said Robert Malley, a peace negotiator in the Clinton White House.

Increasing isolation

Visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu received warm applause at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) on Monday night when he bluntly dismissed US demands to end housing construction in the disputed part of occupied Jerusalem. He was greeted as a hero when he visited Capitol Hill on Tuesday.

But the administration has been strikingly muted in its reception. No reporters, or even photographers, were invited when Netanyahu met with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Vice President Joe Biden on Monday or when he met with Obama on Tuesday night.

There was no grand Rose Garden ceremony. Official spokesmen issued only the blandest of statements.

The cooling in the US-Israel relationship coincides with an apparent deepening of Israel's diplomatic isolation.

Anger has grown in Europe in the wake of Israel's suspected misuse of European passports to kill a Hamas official in Dubai.