The White House is informing Israel that there will be consequences for the rhetoric Benjamin Netanyahu used to secure re-election this week, and suggested that the US veto against pro-Palestinian statehood UN resolutions isn’t as reliable as it used to be.
“Steps that the United States has taken at the United Nations have been predicated on this idea that the two-state solution is the best outcome. Now our ally in these talks has said they’re no longer committed to that solution,” spokesperson Josh Earnest told reporters on Wednesday.
“That means that we need to reevaluate our position on this matter and that is what we’ll do moving forward,” he added.
Ahead of Israel’s election on Tuesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke out against establishing an independent state of Palestine—a reversal from a position he had sometimes publicly taken in recent years to curry support from the United States, but not contrary to rhetoric Netanyahu has repeatedly used in the past in refusing to recognize any kind of Palestinian state.
In an interview with MSNBC on Thursday, Netanyahu walked back those comments, saying he hasn’t changed his policy.
“I don’t want a one-state solution. I want a sustainable, peaceful, two-state solution. But for that, circumstances have to change,” the Prime Minister said.
Earnest, however, suggested that the White House isn’t ready to forgive and forget.
“Words do matter,” he said. “I think every world leader, everybody who’s in a position to speak on behalf of their government understands that that’s the case—particularly when we’re talking about a matter as serious as this one.”
The US has long served Israel’s interests at the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), routinely voting down measures calling for the creation of a Palestinian state. As recently as last December, the US joined Australia as one of only two nations to vote down the measure before the UNSC.
Earnest suggested, however, that the US would adopt “new thinking” on future matters before the UNSC. He said that the US believes the decades-old conflict “is best resolved between the Israeli and Palestinian people by the two sides sitting down and brokering a two-state solution” and that it would be “difficult” for the White House to calculate its actions in multilateral settings “on a policy that [their] closest ally in these talks doesn’t support.“
The administration also took exception with race baiting employed by the Prime Minister on Election Day—particularly with a warning Netanyahu lodged that “Arab voters are heading to the polling stations in droves.”
Earnest characterized the comments as “cynical” and “divisive” and said they were a “pretty transparent attempt to marginalize Arab Israelis as citizens and their right to participate in the election.”
When asked if President Obama will use a scheduled congratulatory call with the Prime Minister to raise the issue of electioneering rhetoric, Earnest responded that he “wouldn’t rule it out.”
Despite Earnest’s lamentations, the problem of attempts “to marginalize Arab Israelis as citizens” can hardly be attributed to Netanyahu alone. Civil rights are apportioned systematically, in Israel itself, based on religion and ethnicity. In the occupied territories, Israeli settlers are subject to Israeli civil law, while Palestinians are subject to Israeli military law.
