More in ‘Benjamin Netanyahu’

Everyone is reporting it: now that President Obama has further postponed his trip to Asia, he will be in Washington, D.C., next week when Prime Minister Netanyahu is visiting for the AIPAC Conference. They will sit down together next Tuesday.
I’d like to pause and note that I called this on Twitter several days ago. So ...

• Prime Minister Netanyahu called Secretary of State Clinton to propose a series of “mutual confidence building” (“building”!) steps that Israel and the Palestinians could stage to “improve the atmosphere” and pave the way to talks. [NYT]
• U.S. envoy George Mitchell will head to the region after all, this Sunday. His trip last Tuesday had ...

• President Obama further postponed a trip to Asia, meaning he’ll be in town early next week, when Prime Minister Netanyahu is as well. Will they break bread? [Laura Rozen]
• Visiting Moscow, Secretary of State Clinton asked Russia to delay finishing a nuclear plant it’s building for Iran. [Haaretz]
• Jeffrey Goldberg points out that if ...

Opinions! Everyone seems to have one. Can you believe, for example, that some people actually prefer vanilla to chocolate? And other people actually liked Avatar? And then there’s that whole whatever-you-want-to-call-it between Israel and the United States right now. People have opinions on that too! Here are some notable ones:
• Tablet Magazine Mideast columnist Lee ...

On March 9, a few hours after Israel’s Shas-controlled Interior Ministry announced that it intended to build 1,600 new housing units in East Jerusalem, about 30 members of Chicago’s Jewish community relations council gathered for a lunchtime meeting on the sixth floor of the city’s Jewish Federation building, in the Loop. Over vegetable soup and ...

According to White House chief-of-staff Rahm Emanuel, Vice President Biden did not, as some had alleged, tell Prime Minister Netanyahu that Israeli settlements endangered U.S. troops. But what about the venerable General David Petraeus, who heads the U.S. military’s Central Command (which is responsible for Central Asia and most of the Middle East)? He reportedly ...

• While describing the East Jerusalem construction announcement as “not helpful,” President Obama denied that U.S.-Israel relations are in crisis. [JPost]
• Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren makes a similar description and the same denial in this op-ed. But he also stands by Israeli building in East Jerusalem. [NYT]
• Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas now says he won’t ...

• The U.S. military transported hundreds of “bunker-buster” bombs, which can burrow underground and destroy (for example) secret Iranian nuclear-weapon facilities, to its Indian Ocean airbase. [Haaretz]
• The Israeli leadership is taking steps to resolve its tensions with America. [NYT]
• Jordanian King Abdullah II accused Israel of trying to cleanse Jerusalem of Arabs. [Haaretz]
• Mazel ...

Last week’s construction announcement in Israel has rippled through a political system halfway across the world. While most Republicans and many Democrats have criticized the administration, some have backed it and turned their criticism toward Israel. Anyway, the Obama administration has its uses for that criticism, too: it may just help buttress its credibility in ...

• There is oodles of U.S.-Israel news, which I’ll deal with in a bigger round-up tomorrow. For now: Netanyahu defended Israel’s track record on peace, saying no further concessions were necessary now; the White House reiterated that it is totally committed to Israeli security. This is still a diplomatic crisis, though. [Haaretz/Laura Rozen]
• Okay, one ...