Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama will meet Monday with an agenda that includes little more than publicly showing they have put aside the animosity generated by the U.S.-brokered nuclear deal with Iran.
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Obama himself stressed the importance of Israel’s security, noting that he has “repeatedly” said that protecting Israel was one of his top foreign policy priorities.
“It’s very important that, in an uncertain security environment, we are signaling our long-term commitment to Israel and its security, and are designing a [military aid] package that is tailored to the threats and challenges that Israel will be facing over the course of the next decade”, said Ben Rhodes, deputy national security adviser to the president.
The current 10-year military assistance program, valued at about $3-billion (U.S.) a year, is set to expire in 2018.
The aides said the president has discounted the prospect of renewed negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority in 2016.
The attacker also wounded two Americans and three Jordanians, said spokesman Mohammed Momani.
But more significant were the things that weren’t addressed in his statement.
“Netanyahu senses that Obama is going to have to compensate him on the Iran deal, regardless of his opposition to it”, Alpher said. The embassy said it wasn’t changing its security posture.
Also absent in Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks was any reference to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that appears to be dead.
“We take this very seriously and will be working closely with the Jordanians to determine exactly what happened”, Obama said during a previously scheduled meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. “The president anticipates examining with the leader territorial security issues, including execution of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action to calmly and certainly keep Iran from procuring an atomic weapon, and countering Tehran’s destabilizing exercises”, the White House says, including the president “looks forward” to talking about “the requirement for the certifiable headway of a two-state arrangement”.
Israeli officials say Mr. Netanyahu is coming to the meeting with a number of confidence-building measures meant to try to quell recent Palestinian violence.
Before arriving in Washington, Mr. Netanyahu tried to tamp down a controversy at home about his appointment of a new communications director, Ran Baratz, who had accused Mr. Obama of anti-Semitism and suggested that Secretary of State John F. Kerry had the brain of a 12-year-old.
U.S.-sponsored peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians collapsed in 2014.
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Netanyahu is sure to be looking for guarantees that Israel will maintain its qualitative military edge over other countries in the region.
