Netanyahu Seeks Support in U.S. Visit, but Will Find a Nation Distracted

 

NEWS ANALYSIS

Netanyahu Seeks Support in U.S. Visit, but Will Find a Nation Distracted

 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel is to meet President Biden and address Congress this week, swapping one political maelstrom at home for another in Washington.

 

Isabel Kershner

By Isabel Kershner

Reporting from Jerusalem

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/23/world/middleeast/netanyahu-biden-congress.html

July 23, 2024

Updated 7:55 a.m. ET

 

With his visit to Washington this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel will step away from one political maelstrom and into another.

 

He is facing anger at home over the prolonged war in Gaza and failure to bring home the hostages held in the enclave. Washington is divided over Israel’s conduct of the war and treatment of the Palestinians.

 

But now, the U.S. government and the entire country is preoccupied by the political upheaval surrounding President Biden’s withdrawal over the weekend from the presidential race.

 

This was not at all what Mr. Netanyahu had in mind when he planned his first visit to Washington in almost four years. He is supposed to meet face to face with Mr. Biden, though it is unclear when. He is also expected to meet Vice President Kamala Harris, who looks set to become the Democratic Party’s nominee for president. And the Israeli leader is set to address Congress on Wednesday, hoping to shore up support in the face of increasing international censure over the war in Gaza.

 

“I will seek to anchor the bipartisan support that is so important for Israel,” Mr. Netanyahu said shortly before departing Israel on Monday. “In this time of war and uncertainty, it’s important that Israel’s enemies know that America and Israel stand together today, tomorrow and always.”

 

The timing may be complicated for the Israeli prime minister. But it is also critical that he secure Mr. Biden’s support for the months remaining in the president’s term, even as their relationship has grown testier recently as their goals in the Middle East diverge somewhat.

 

Mr. Netanyahu is also aiming to rehabilitate his image on the world stage — at least for his audience back home, where he is in a constant battle for his political survival. But some political analysts suggested that he was about the only person still attaching any importance to his U.S. visit.

 

“Nobody is focused on this,” said Mitchell Barak, an Israeli pollster and analyst who worked as an aide to Mr. Netanyahu in the 1990s. “In less than 10 days, there’s been an assassination attempt on one president and another dropping out of the race,” he added of the turmoil in the United States.

 

“This is not the right time — for America or for Israel.”

 

Former President Donald J. Trump, who was wounded but survived a shooting on July 13, was in office when Mr. Netanyahu last came to Washington, in September 2020. Now, he is running again as the Republican candidate. Mr. Netanyahu and Mr. Trump may also meet this week.

 

When Mr. Netanyahu addresses a joint session of Congress on Wednesday, some of his staunchest allies will be sitting alongside fierce critics.

 

The invitation for the address was issued jointly by the top four congressional leaders in a show of bipartisan unity that belied a tense debate behind-the-scenes about receiving him. Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the Senate majority leader, has been sharply critical of Mr. Netanyahu and called for him to step down this year. But in joining the leaders’ request for the address to Congress, he said that America’s relationship with Israel “transcends one person or prime minister.”

 

As a result, this address is expected to be less contentious than Mr. Netanyahu’s last one, in 2015, when the Republican House speaker at the time invited him without informing the White House and infuriated President Barack Obama.

 

Mr. Netanyahu then used the platform to rail against the Obama administration’s negotiating of a nuclear pact between world powers and Iran, driving a partisan wedge into the traditionally bipartisan support that Israel had long counted on.

 

Mr. Netanyahu’s speech on Wednesday is expected to be more conciliatory.

 

Still, coming at a time when Ms. Harris has pledged to do everything in her power to unite her party and the nation, Mr. Netanyahu’s visit may only serve to expose more of the cracks and divisions as some Democrats could boycott or try to disrupt his speech.

 

Ms. Harris has been more critical of Israel than Mr. Biden at times since Israel began its military offensive in Gaza in response to the Oct. 7 Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel.

 

The vice president has declined to preside over the joint session of Congress on Wednesday. An aide cited a scheduling conflict, adding that her absence should not be construed as a change in her commitment to Israel’s security, and that she would meet Mr. Netanyahu this week in the White House.

 

The high civilian toll from the war in Gaza, where more than 39,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to local health authorities, has created animus in the United States even among some of Israel’s traditionally ardent supporters.

 

In a severe battering of his reputation abroad, Mr. Netanyahu is under threat of being served an arrest warrant by the International Criminal Court in The Hague on war crimes charges, along with his defense minister, Yoav Gallant, as well as three Hamas leaders.

 

Israel is also fighting a genocide case brought by South Africa in the International Court of Justice, the world’s top court. Israel vehemently denies the accusations.

 

Mr. Biden has been pushing for a cease-fire deal with Hamas that would see hostages in Gaza exchanged for Palestinian prisoners in Israel. But many Israelis accuse Mr. Netanyahu of holding up such a deal out of fear that it would lead to the collapse of his right-wing government. Far-right parties he relies on for his governing coalition have threatened to pull out should he agree to terms that they would consider a surrender.

 

Before leaving for Washington, Mr. Netanyahu authorized Israel’s negotiating team to travel to Qatar on Thursday to continue talks with mediators on a truce.

 

Israel’s settlement activity in the occupied West Bank and the issue of support for an independent Palestinian state are perennial points of contention between Israeli governments and Democratic administrations.

 

Last week, a majority of Israel’s Parliament voted to reject the establishment of a Palestinian state. The far-right parties on whose support Mr. Netanyahu depends want to annex the entire West Bank.

 

Mr. Netanyahu’s visit to Washington has also riled many Israelis, who said he should not be leaving the country as it is battles foes on multiple fronts and before he has secured the release of the remaining hostages held in Gaza.

 

He has articulated no clear vision for Gaza after the war. Tens of thousands of Israelis evacuated from the northern and southern border areas are still displaced from their homes, with little idea of when they can return.

 

“He has no business going to Washington,” said Mr. Barak, the pollster, “because he has unfinished business in Israel.”

 

While Israel continues to fight Hamas in Gaza and is trading blows daily with Hezbollah over its northern border, it also had to contend last week with a drone strike claimed by the Houthi militia in Yemen that killed a man in the heart of Tel Aviv. Israel retaliated with an airstrike against a Yemeni port controlled by the Houthis.

 

For Mr. Netanyahu, the most significant event will be his speech in Congress. His main target audience will most likely be the one in Israel.

 

“This is a Congress that authorized everything that Israel and the president asked for, even if it took some time and had to overcome some legislative hurdles,” said Alon Pinkas, Israel’s former consul general in New York. “So he’s going to achieve what?” he added. “To thank them? You do that in a Zoom call.”

 

Mr. Pinkas described the entire visit as a “vanity tour.”

 

He and other analysts said that Mr. Netanyahu was most likely thinking that a powerful speech might resuscitate his flagging base of Israeli supporters at home, who have been impressed in the past by his oratory skills abroad.

 

But when it comes to international stature, some analysts say Mr. Netanyahu has lost his luster.

 

“The visit is meant to illustrate to the home front that Netanyahu is a statesman, in stark contrast to his political contenders,” said Shira Efron, a fellow with the RAND Corporation and senior fellow at the Institute for National Security Studies at Tel Aviv University.

 

Ms. Efron said Mr. Netanyahu was likely “to emphasize the fact that he surpassed even Winston Churchill, being the first foreign leader to address a joint session of Congress four times,” and that he would most likely “count the number of standing ovations.”

 

“From Netanyahu’s perspective,” she said, “the importance of the visit is its mere existence.”

 

Isabel Kershner, a Times correspondent in Jerusalem, has been reporting on Israeli and Palestinian affairs since 1990. More about Isabel Kershne