Biden Still Trying To Bully Netanyahu, Says He Won’t Invite Him ‘Near-Term’

 President Joe Biden snubbed Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday when asked if he would invite him to the White House.

Biden, speaking of Netanyahu, the political Right in Israel, and their attempt at reforming Israel’s one-sided judiciary by getting Israel to more clearly resemble the United States, said the developments in Israel were concerning to him. When a reporter asked him if he would be inviting Netanyahu to the White House, Biden retorted, “No. Not in the near-term.”

On Tuesday, Netanyahu made clear that he would not be bullied by Biden or anyone else, tweeting, “My administration is committed to strengthening democracy by restoring the proper balance between the three branches of government, which we are striving to achieve via a broad consensus. 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.”

“We’re not interfering,” Biden responded. “They know my position. They know America’s position. They know the American Jewish position,” as The Jerusalem Post reported.

Most religious Jews in America, unlike their non-religious co-religionists, are politically to the right, and support the right-wing effort to reform Israel’s judiciary.

Israel Culture and Sports Minister Miki Zohar tweeted, “It breaks my heart to see how much damage has been done to Israel from all the fake news that has been spread in connection with our justified legal reform.”

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides defended Biden, saying, “I would bet you the prime minister has been to Washington more than any single foreign leader combined. He probably knows the White House better than I do. He has no lack of invitations to the White House. He and Joe Biden go back close to 40 years. I have no doubt they will spend time together.”

Although Biden immediately called Brazilian left-wing president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva when he won the election last October, when Netanyahu won election as prime minister in November, Biden waited days before congratulating him.

Biden’s hostility to Israeli politicians on the Right dates back to 1982. Biden, then a senator, banged a desk with his fist at a Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting to warn Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin to stop establishing new Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria.

“Don’t threaten us with cutting off your aid. It will not work. I am not a Jew with trembling knees. I am a proud Jew with 3,700 years of civilized history,” Begin told Biden. “Nobody came to our aid when we were dying in the gas chambers and ovens. Nobody came to our aid when we were striving to create our country. We paid for it.”

In 2020, columnist John Perazzo reported that the Obama administration often leaked information about Israel between 2010 and 2015. For example, they leaked information in 2010 about a secret deal between Israel and Saudi Arabia in which the Saudis agreed to let Israel use their airspace in the event of an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.

On March 22, 2012, the Obama administration was accused of leaking the results of a classified war game to The New York Times. Institute for National Security Studies analyst Yoel Guzansky said of the leak at the time, “It seems like a big campaign to prevent Israel from attacking.”