Netanyahu ‘meddling in US electoral politics’ – move over Arne, Ben wants to run for US Presidency

Netanyahu too partisan on U.S. poll, warn Israeli critics
18 September, 2012 – By Charly Wegman – Agence France Presse

JERUSALEM: Israeli critics are warning that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has gone too far in what they call his “meddling” in favour of Republican candidate Mitt Romney in the US presidential campaign.

“Will Barack Obama punish Israel, if he is reelected on November 6,” the Yediot Aharonot daily asked.

Like other media, the top-selling tabloid says that Netanyahu has become “Obama’s opponent” and has broken a taboo by seeking to weaken the incumbent Democrat, rather than observing neutrality.

Netanyahu “interfered, grossly, vulgarly and unreservedly in the campaign” accused the left-leaning daily Haaretz.

“Who do you fear more — (Iranian President Mahmoud) Ahmadinejad or Obama? Which regime is more important to overthrow — the one in Washington, or in Tehran,” opposition leader Shaul Mofaz taunted Netanyahu in a parliamentary debate last week.

“That’s nonsense,” Netanyahu told Israeli media, in interview published ahead of this week’s Rosh Hashana Jewish New Year holiday, saying he would continue to demand the United States set clear “red lines” that Iran would not be permitted to cross in its nuclear programme.

Obama does not want to lock the US into such an ultimatum and says there is still time for diplomacy and international sanctions to quash what he and Israel say are Iran’s nuclear arms plans.

Netanyahu says time is fast running out and has warned of a unilateral Israeli strike against Iranian nuclear sites, despite opposition from friendly countries such as the United States, Germany, Britain or France.

“The issue that guides me is not the elections in the United States but the centrifuges in Iran,” he has said.

Defence Minister Ehud Barak is distancing himself from such public washing of dirty linen, saying that such “differences” should be confined to closed-door meetings.

For most analysts, beyond his bellicose rhetoric, Netanyahu, known to friend and foe alike by his nickname “Bibi”, wants to wring as many concessions as possible from Obama before the election, hoping to play on Israel’s support among Jewish, and many conservative Christian, voters.

Any loss of the traditionally Democratic Jewish vote could be crucial if the race is as close as that when George W. Bush won by a wafer-thin margin in 2000 against the Democrat Al Gore.

…more