Long before moving to the White House, President Biden compared the relationship between the United States and Israel to that of close friends. “We fell in love,” he said, “and we drove each other crazy.”
The United States and Israel are currently in one of the crazy stages of their 75-year partnership that is often tight but also turbulent.
Duties of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu judicial restraint became the latest point of controversy as he pushed the first part of the package passed the Israeli Parliament on Monday, despite widespread protests and repeated expressions of caution from Mr. Biden.
What makes this moment different is that the rift has nothing to do with foreign policy and national security issues that often cause disagreement, such as arms sales, Iran’s nuclear program, territorial claims or the long-standing effort to forge peace between Israelis and Palestinians. Instead, it concerns a strictly internal matter within Israel, the balance of power and the future of freedom in a single historic bastion of democracy in the Middle East.
The friction between the friends complicates cooperation in other areas where the two allies have common interests. For months, Mr. Biden has refused to invite Mr. Netanyahu to Washington, which has prevented at least some meetings between lower-level officials. President reduced last week and agree to meet at an unspecified time and place in the United States this year. But he later felt compelled to issue two public statements making it clear that he had not changed his mind about Mr. Netanyahu’s attempt to limit the power of the courts even as the prime minister was on trial for corruption.
The debate about the prime minister’s plan, which attracted hundreds of thousands of protesters to the streets over the weekend in the most recent months of protests, has also spread to the Jewish community in the United States, at a time when growing partisanship threatens to undermine American support for Israel.
“Neutralists are more worried or upset about it than neutrals,” said Nathan J. Diament, executive director of public policy for the Orthodox Coalition, one of the largest Orthodox Jewish organizations in the country.
“There are many people in the US Orthodox community who view this substance as either sympathetic or supportive of the reforms,” he added, noting that his community leans towards more conservative politics, “but nonetheless worried about the division the process has caused.”
However, he and other longtime advocates and analysts say they remain confident that the relationship between the United States and Israel will be sustainable. After a Liberal Democrat congresswoman called Israel “a racist state”, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a resolution declare the opposite to be true. Only a handful of Democrats boycotted last week address to a joint meeting of Congress by President Isaac Herzogand most of the rest gave him a standing ovation.
Robert B. Satloff, executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the battle over the judicial plan was the “clash of the century” within Israel, but it did not really affect relations with the United States profoundly. “It was a bit controversial,” he said. “Historically, this does not begin to be seen as a US-Israeli crisis.” Instead, he said, “this is really a family fight.”
The United States and Israel have enjoyed one of the world’s closest partnerships since the Jewish state was founded in 1948 and recognized by President Harry S. Truman just minutes later. But conflict has been in the DNA of the relationship from the start. Every president – even the most outspoken pro-Israel – has argued with Israeli prime ministers at one point or another.
Despite recognizing Israel, Mr. Truman refused to sell the state’s new offensive weapons, as did his two successors. Dwight D. Eisenhower forced the withdrawal of Israeli forces from Egypt after the Suez Crisis of 1956. Ronald Reagan was furious at Israel’s lobbying against the sale of his high-tech aircraft to Saudi Arabia. George HW Bush was so opposed to Israel’s settlement plans that he suspended a $10 billion home loan guarantee.
Mr. Netanyahu has been at the center of many disputes over the past few decades. When he was deputy secretary of state, his public criticism of the United States in 1990 angered Secretary of State James A. Baker III to ban Mr. Netanyahu from the State Department. After Mr. Netanyahu became prime minister, Bill Clinton lost so much interest after their first meeting in 1996 that he later asked aides, “Who is the superpower here?‘ uses an obscene word for emphasis.
Barack Obama and Mr. Netanyahu, never warm, become more and more alien as the Israeli leader addressed a joint session of Congress to lash out at US efforts to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran. Even Donald J. Trump, who bent down to give Israel virtually everything on his geopolitical shopping list, finally broke up with Mr. Netanyahufirst the disagreement over the takeover and then Israel congratulating Mr. Biden on his victory in the 2020 election.
Biden’s relationship with Netanyahu has been strained in recent years. Mr. Biden once said that he was photo gift to Mr. Netanyahu with the inscription using his nickname: “Bibi, I don’t agree with any damn thing you say but I love you.” As vice president, Mr. Biden was mutilated during a visit to Israel with a settlement notice. But Mr Biden later insisted he and Mr Netanyahu “remain friends”.
In one respect, Mr. Biden’s approach to Israel differs from that of his modern predecessors. Despite reaffirming US support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Biden was the first president in decades not to pursue peace talks, a recognition that there is no prospect of near-term success.
That in itself should have been a relief to Mr. Netanyahu, who has long resented American pressure to make concessions to the Palestinians. But Mr. Netanyahu has been outspoken in his criticism of Mr. Biden’s attempt to negotiate a new nuclear deal with Iran, while Mr. Biden called Mr.one of the most extreme“I’ve seen it before.
Judicial changes are the latest sore point. When Vice President Kamala Harris spoke at the 75th anniversary of Israel’s founding at the country’s embassy in Washington last month, only two words in her speech described the shared values - “independent judiciary” — prompting Secretary of State Eli Cohen to reveal that she had not even read the plan. Yair Lapid, the opposition leader, recently lamented that because of Mr.The United States is no longer our closest ally.”
For all that, Mr Satloff said he did not believe Mr Biden was “seeking to go to war” with the Israeli leader – which led to the invitation last week. “In my opinion, the administration has come to the conclusion that this tactic to prevent the presidential meeting is on the right track,” he said.
However, Mr. Biden did not think much about the judicial restructuring package, going so far as to summon Thomas L. Friedman, the New York Times columnist, came to the Oval Office last week to say that Mr. Netanyahu should “seek the broadest possible consensus here.” I suggest another statement for Axios on Sunday, saying that “it appears that the current judicial reform proposal is becoming more divisive, not less.”
Aides insist Biden is not trying to create a particular outcome in an ally’s domestic politics. Jake Sullivan, the national security adviser, said the president was simply giving “right but forthright” advice.
“It’s not about us dictating or presenting,” Mr. Sullivan said in a brief interview after appearing last week at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado. “It’s about us deeply believing that the foundation of our relationship is our shared democratic values.”
Other Democrats also say it’s appropriate to weigh in with a friend. Senator Chris Coons, a Democrat of Delaware and a close ally of Biden, said the massive street protests “should be a note of warning to elected leaders in Israel and I hope to give them pause”.
But some Republicans have blamed Mr. Biden for meddling in a domestic matter. “Maybe he knows more about the justice system and he feels comfortable telling the Israeli people what they should do,” said Sen. James E. Risch of Idaho, a senior Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee. “I don’t think it’s more appropriate that they should tell us how we should vote for the Supreme Court here.”
In the American Jewish community, this issue does not generate the same passion as on the streets of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.
“People who are very attached to the Jewish organized world have certainly been triggered by the judicial reform proposal, but I don’t think this has appealed to the Jewish community in the United States at large,” said Diana Fersko, senior rabbi at Village Temple, a synagogue in Manhattan.
Rabbi Fersko, the author of a book on anti-Semitism due to be released this summer, said the issue was complex and noted the profound differences between Israeli and American society. “I don’t think the Jewish-American community needs to get too involved in this,” she said. “But I think we need to have a deep faith that the state of Israel will find a way forward.”
