Bibi Pressured From All Sides

When Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer recently led a delegation of Democratic senators on a trip to Israel, the group implored Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to stop the expansion of West Bank settlements and told the Israeli leader that further growth could imperil a future two-state solution that provided for a Palestinian state. The group also made it clear to Netanyahu that they felt he should cease his efforts to overhaul the nation’s judicial system, reinforcing their belief that such a move would harm Israel’s relationship with the U.S.

 The delegation did not publicize the trip in advance nor do any press events during their time in Israel, but Schumer’s office issued the following statement after the meeting:

 “We had a productive, wide-ranging conversation and a number of senators raised important issues directly with Prime Minister Netanyahu.”

 It was not reported whether Netanyahu managed to avoid laughing in the faces of his visitors.

Schumer is smart enough to know that his group’s requests were going to be non-starters with Netanyahu, and so the entire charade may have been for the benefit of left-leaning U.S. audiences that have increasingly soured on the direction of Israel’s government. (That’s also the most likely explanation for the unusually low-key nature of the meeting, so as to avoid the appearance of pressuring Netanyahu before his own voters.) But it also underscored the growing divergence between public and political attitudes in the two countries – and the futility of efforts such as those by Schumer and his colleagues to influence Israel’s national leaders.

But it’s even more important to understand why Netanyahu felt so little pressure to listen to the pleas of his American guests. Because several days after Schumer’s delegation left Israel, an even quieter and far more important binational meeting was taking place in Washington between Israeli Minister for Strategic Affairs Ron Dermer and some of President Biden’s top national security advisors. The topic of this conversation was Iran’s unprecedented progress toward full nuclear capability, and both Biden and Netanyahu know full well that Iran’s ability to mount a full-on nuclear attack is far more critical to both Israel’s and the U.S.’s future than the amount of housing in the West Bank or the balance of power between Israel’s legislative and judicial branches.

Biden administration officials believe that it would now only take 12 days to enrich enough weapons-grade uranium for Iran to build one nuclear bomb (although it will still need another one to two years to build a warhead for a ballistic missile.) They also believe that Russia is preparing to send military aircraft to Iran in exchange for the missiles they have received for the war in Ukraine, which would make an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities much more difficult. And they know that the American people are in no mood for a second military conflict as the Russia-Ukraine war continues with no end in sight.

Add onto all this the precarious state of U.S. relations with key regional influencer Saudi Arabia, and it is clear how much the White House needs Israel to cooperate in any potential confrontation with Iran. Netanyahu has far more political capital than Biden to aggressively push back on the mullahs – both domestically and internationally – and both men understand that geopolitical reality. That’s why when Israel announced its new settlement plans last month, the U.S State Department carefully chose to use measured language such as “concern” and “troubled” (rather than “condemn” or “outraged”) to express their disapproval.

Netanyahu understands that he cannot claim the regional leadership role to which he aspires until he has settled – or at least calmed – the battles he faces internally. 

In the long run, Netanyahu understands that he cannot claim the regional leadership role to which he aspires until he has settled – or at least calmed – the battles he faces internally. But for now, he also knows that when it comes to Iran, Biden needs him more than he needs Biden. So at a time when Netanyahu is facing immense opposition to much of his domestic agenda, he can be secure in the knowledge that Israel’s most valuable international partner is not going to push him too hard. That lack of U.S. pressure is buying him valuable time.

Dan Schnur is a Professor at the University of California – Berkeley, USC and Pepperdine. Join Dan for his weekly webinar “Politics in the Time of Coronavirus” (www.lawac.org) on Tuesdays at 5 PM.