Netanyahu Tries to Pull a Trump Criticized by Biden
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| Amid tensions with Israel, President Biden told reporters that he was “very concerned” about the events there. Credit...Al Drago for The New York Times | Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday. When asked whether he would be invited to the White House, Mr. Biden replied: “No. Not in the near term.”Credit...Abir Sultan/EPA, via Shutterstock |
*The Donald Trump of Israel who has been under investigation for two years decided he is not going to jail/ This is like Donald Trump running on the coming presidential elections so he won't get arrested and dump where his big_______mouth belongs. Biden has been a best friend to Israel along with every U.S. President. Benjamin had a mental discharge. He thought What with my bud in the U.S. Would do in this case. Well, Trump will do something underhanded regardless of how badly it affects the nation. So why not make the Prime Minister (Him) Control the Judges. He is not going to send himself to jail. But this idea which he thought he could pull off make the nation indignant and what was going to happen was his government was going to come down for new elections.
Below you have the details from NYTimes. This is Adam Gonzalez
Reporting from Jerusalem
New York Times
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel responded defiantly on Wednesday to sharp criticism from President Biden over his government’s contentious judicial overhaul plan, declaring that Israel was “a sovereign country” that would make its own decisions.
As weeks of quiet diplomatic pressure burst into a rare open dispute between the allies, Mr. Netanyahu’s opponents in Israel accused him of endangering the longstanding and critical relationship with the United States that could harm the country’s ability to face daunting security challenges, including Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
“I have known President Biden for over 40 years, and I appreciate his longstanding commitment to Israel,” Mr. Netanyahu said in a statement posted in English on Twitter. But, he added, “Israel is a sovereign country which makes its decisions by the will of its people and not based on pressures from abroad, including from the best of friends.”
Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks, first issued by his office at the unusual time of about 1 a.m. in Israel, came after Mr. Biden told reporters that he was “very concerned” about the events in Israel. The president’s comments came after suggestions on Tuesday by the U.S. ambassador to Israel that Mr. Netanyahu would be welcome in Washington sometime soon.
But Mr. Biden made it clear that a much-coveted invitation was not about to be issued. When asked whether Mr. Netanyahu would be invited to the White House, the president replied bluntly: “No. Not in the near term.”
Protesters in Jerusalem waving Israeli flags this week.
Proposed changes to Israel’s judiciary have ignited huge protests in recent weeks.Credit...Avishag Shaar-Yashuv for The New York Times
The hard-right coalition led by Mr. Netanyahu has sought to exert more political control over Israel’s Supreme Court, setting off the worst domestic crisis in decades.
“They cannot continue down this road — I’ve sort of made that clear,” Mr. Biden said. “Hopefully the prime minister will act in a way that he can try to work out some genuine compromise, but that remains to be seen.”
The extraordinary exchange came after Mr. Netanyahu on Monday delayed his effort to push the judicial plan through Parliament to allow for dialogue, and hours after negotiating teams for the government coalition and the opposition held a preliminary meeting hosted by Israel’s mostly ceremonial president, Isaac Herzog.
The judicial overhaul has divided the country between those who see it as a power grab by the ruling majority that will destroy Israeli democracy and those mainly on the right who have long viewed the Supreme Court as overactive and want to give more power to the elected legislature.
The Judicial Crisis in Israel
U.S. Relations: The situation has increased tensions with Washington and was volatile enough that the Biden administration appeared uncertain of how to respond to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to delay a plan to weaken the judiciary.
Pressure Campaign: Before Netanyahu changed course, the Biden administration warned the Israeli government that its image as the sole democracy in the Middle East was at stake.
Netanyahu’s Balancing Act: The Israeli leader, who has a reputation as a magician who can escape any political straitjacket, is caught between his far-right coalition and public anger over the plan.
A Win for Protesters: The opposition to the judicial overhaul plan is succeeding by uniting some of Israel’s most influential institutions.
The plan set off weeks of mass protests and turmoil, culminating in a nationwide work stoppage that brought many services to a halt and snarled air traffic on Monday after Mr. Netanyahu summarily dismissed his defense minister, who had called for a delay in the legislation to allow for talks and compromise.
Mr. Netanyahu’s announcement of the delay largely calmed the stormy atmosphere in Israel.
But opponents of the judicial overhaul plan remain wary of Mr. Netanyahu’s motives, not least because the prime minister is standing trial on corruption charges. Critics say he could ultimately use the planned judicial changes to extricate himself from his legal troubles. Mr. Netanyahu insists that he has no such intention and denies wrongdoing.
Organizers of the main weekly anti-government protests have urged people not to give up and warned that the announcement of a delay was a tactic only meant to quell the civil unrest.
Experts say that the most contentious part of the bill — which gives the governing coalition more influence over the selection of Supreme Court judges and allows it to choose the next president of the top court — could be brought any time for quick final approval in Parliament.
“We are one afternoon away” from the completion of “the most important part of the judicial overhaul,” said Yohanan Plesner, the president of the Israel Democracy Institute, a nonpartisan research group that opposes the coalition’s plan and is involved in the efforts to find a broader consensus and compromise.
The delay of the plan had also been expected to ease tensions with Washington. But Mr. Biden’s blunt remarks indicated that the United States remained guarded about Mr. Netanyahu’s plans and would wait to see the outcome of the negotiations in Israel in the coming weeks.
Benjamin Netanyahu with colleagues in Parliament.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Monday. When asked whether he would be invited to the White House, Mr. Biden replied: “No. Not in the near term.”Credit...Abir Sultan/EPA, via Shutterstock
In a round of interviews with Israeli news media outlets on Tuesday, the U.S. ambassador to Israel, Thomas R. Nides, had seemed to signal the Biden administration’s approval of Mr. Netanyahu’s decision to delay the judicial legislation, telling Israeli television that it was “something that we welcome and we appreciate.”
Asked if Mr. Netanyahu would be invited to the White House, Mr. Nides said he believed such a visit would take place “soon,” or “relatively soon.”
In an accidental twist of timing, Mr. Netanyahu on Wednesday participated virtually in a Summit for Democracy.
Describing Israel as “a beacon of liberty and shared prosperity in the heart of the Middle East,” he said: “You may have noticed Israel is undergoing, in its robust democracy, a very intensive public debate, and the debate is how do we ensure a proper democracy? Democracy means the will of the people as expressed by a majority, and it also means the protection of civil rights, and individual rights. It’s the balance between the two.”
He added that he thought “that balance can be achieved,” referring to the negotiations underway in Israel, and insisted that “Israel was, is, and will always remain a proud, strong and vibrant democracy.”
Mr. Biden’s criticism and Mr. Netanyahu’s response have set off a political uproar in Israel, even as Mr. Herzog, the president, continued meetings on Wednesday morning with representatives of some of the smaller opposition parties not directly involved in the negotiations.
Members of Mr. Netanyahu’s governing coalition denounced Mr. Biden’s remarks, asserting that the American president had been taken in by “fake news.”
Miki Zohar, the minister of culture and sport from Mr. Netanyahu’s conservative Likud party, wrote on Twitter, “It’s sad that President Biden has also fallen victim to the fake news that gets disseminated in Israel against our justified judicial reform.”
Mr. Zohar soon deleted that tweet and posted a new one, saying he had removed his earlier message “out of respect for our important relations with our greatest ally, the United States.” But he continued, “It is heartbreaking to see how much damage is caused to Israel by all the fake news that has been spread about our justified judicial reform.”
A man, his arms outstretched and his mouth open, stands in a crowd with Israeli flags.
Those in support of the proposed judicial overhaul also gathered in Jerusalem on Monday. Many of them have long viewed the Supreme Court as overactive and want to give more power to the elected legislature.Credit...Avishag Shaar-Yashuv for The New York Times
Itamar Ben-Gvir, the far-right minister of national security, told Israel’s Army Radio on Wednesday that Mr. Biden and his administration needed “to understand that Israel is an independent country. It is not just another star on the American flag.”
Opposition leaders warned that Mr. Netanyahu had caused unparalleled damage to relations with the administration in the three months since he returned to power.
Benny Gantz, the centrist leader of the opposition National Unity party and a former minister of defense and military chief, excoriated Mr. Netanyahu for mishandling Israel’s relationship with the United States.
“President Biden sent an urgent wake-up call to the Israeli government tonight,” Mr. Gantz wrote on Twitter. “Damaging relations with the United States, our best friend and our most important ally, is a strategic attack. The prime minister must guide his negotiating teams regarding the judicial legislation, act quickly to repair the situation and preserve the Israeli democracy that is at the basis of these values.”
Mr. Gantz added that Mr. Netanyahu must display “political and security responsibility” and announce that the defense minister he fired, but whose dismissal has not yet taken effect, will remain in his post.
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