Netanyahu and Obama. Israel got caught up once again in the political conflict in Washington
Photo: Reuters
Defense establishment paying for leaders' ego issues
Op-ed: Both Netanyahu and Obama are to blame for the complicated negotiations on America's military aid to Israel in the next decade.
That the relations between the White House and the Israeli government are tense is indisputable. There is, however, a dispute over whose fault it is—US President Barack Obama or Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu's supporters say Obama, Obama's supporters say Netanyahu, but here's a surprise: there is one key issue in which both of them are in the same boat and are both guilty.
An article recently published by the Washington Post shed new light on how the negotiations on the American military aid to Israel for the next 10 years became so complicated. Here's a short reminder: the current agreement, which expires in early 2018, gives Israel $3.1 billion a year. In addition, Congress has approved special aid for Israel for the development of missile systems, which raises the total to some $3.5 billion a year, part of it going toward the funding of IDF purchases from Israel's defense industries.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) and US President Barack Obama (Photo: Amit Shabi, MCT)
During the battle over the agreement with Iran, the administration expressed its willingness to raise the annual sum to $4 billion, as long as Israel retrained its attacks on the administration in Congress. Netanyahu refused. He insisted on speaking against the administration at a joint session of the two Houses of Congress.
His gamble did not pay off: after the Iran agreement was approved, the administration reduced the sums and aggravated the conditions. One of the conditions was that the funding of the IDF's purchases in Israel would be gradually stopped. This was very bad news for Israel's defense industries.
Our defense establishment sought an agreement that would continue the current situation. The White House would add several hundred millions of dollars a year in compensation for the deal with Iran, and Congress would continue to allot the money separately, as it does today. Obama and Netanyahu thought differently: they insisted on uniting both channels into one package. The administration would give more, and Israel would pledge not to ask Congress for an additional allocation of funds, no matter what.
This isn’t a technical issue. As the Godfather said, it's all personal. Obama wanted to leave behind an impressively large package, which would position him as the president who was most concerned about Israel's security, more than all of his predecessors. That would be his response to his Republican rivals' criticism. That would be his legacy. Netanyahu wanted to reach an impressively large package in order to establish the claim that his attacks on the administration actually benefitted Israel rather than causing damage, and that he overpowered Obama with his own words.
But it's not that simple. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, chairperson of the Senate's Committee on Appropriations, didn't like the agreement. He didn't want to let Obama present himself as Israel's greatest friend, and marked up a bill of his own that would give Israel $3.4 billion next year, in addition to other sums.
White House officials understood the trick and were furious. According to the American paper, they demanded that Netanyahu call Graham and ask him to drop the bill. Netanyahu made the phone call, but Graham refused. "The Israeli prime minister told me the administration is refusing to sign the MOU (memorandum of understanding) until I agree to change my appropriation markup back to $3.1 billion," Graham said. "I said, 'Tell the administration to go F themselves.'"
Graham made it clear that the demand, which Netanyahu accepted, to avoid lobbying Congress for additional money in the next 10 years, was invalid. "I’m offended that the administration would try to take over the appropriations process," he said. "If they don’t like what I’m doing, they can veto the bill. We can’t have the executive branch dictating what the legislative branch will do for a decade based on an agreement we are not a party to."
And so Israel got caught up once again in the internal political conflict in Washington. Obama, who wanted to gain a headline without paying too much, encountered a stubborn rival, who did everything in his power to embarrass him; Netanyahu, who wanted to turn the agreement into a victory celebration, got caught in the eye of the storm. And most importantly, our defense establishment remains in a state of uncertainty. Government workers on both sides have worked for two weeks to reach—so they hope—understandings that everyone would be able to live with.
With fewer ego issues, the first plan could have been implemented, allowing the administration to allot funds and Congress to add to that. America is very generous towards us; why destroy it?
