Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post wrote yesterday that
At first blush, it might seem that the White House has become unhinged over an appearance by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before a joint session of Congress. After days of whining that Netanyahu’s appearance was not cleared with the White House, U.S. officials have taken to the [New York Times] to anonymously screech and moan, accusing the Israeli ambassador — gasp! — of furthering the prime minister’s interests at the expense of his relations with the administration. (This is rich, considering the president’s hot-mike comment about Netanyahu and a senior official’s recent use of a barnyard epithet to criticize Netanyahu). In a separate New York Times article (one was not enough to assist the White House propaganda machine!), the Netanyahu speech is portrayed as helping the White House round up opposition to the Menendez-Kirk sanctions. The kicker is a quote from the president of the notoriously anti-Israel J Street – which the Times originally falsely labeled as “a Democratic-aligned pro-Israel group” and later changed to “Israeli advocacy group” after a spate of mocking tweets on Wednesday night — piling on the anti-Netanyahu criticism. . . . The complaint from the White House is so disproportionate to the issue and so defensive (is the president so petrified that Congress might hear a compelling speech from the United States’ best ally in the Middle East?) that one wonders what it is up to.
By devoting space to small-minded insults against the Israeli Ambassador, intended obviously to keep this spat between Obama and Netanyahu in the headlines, the New York Times has made itself even more ridiculous than it already was, if that’s possible. All it does with this “article” is offer more proof of its hostility to Israel and its Prime Minister.
As for the source of these epithets, the White House, there is a disturbing pattern of both pettiness and anonymity — an anonymity which allows the White House to hide from its own comments, while still benefitting from their damaging effect. Quite memorably, in October, an anonymous White House staffer called Netanyahu “chickenshit.” Last week, another anonymous source, or perhaps the same one, told the Washington Post that Netanyahu’s audacity in accepting an invitation from the Speaker of the US House of Representatives could have “lasting consequences.” A week later, the administration is still stewing over this perceived slight, with yet another, or perhaps still the same, anonymous source badmouthing Ambassador Dermer.
Will we ever get a big reveal?
Of course, by the time this clip aired, most people had lost interest.
