Ally

by Michael B. Oren

  The dustup with Debbie was troubling for me, but far less than the debate that erupted on the convention floor over the question of Jerusalem. Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a great friend of Israel, tried to reinsert into his party’s platform the phrase “Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel,” which the administration had ordered removed. Villaraigosa’s move sparked bitter choruses of nos and required three contentious votes to pass. AIPAC praised the restoration but Romney denounced it as a further sign of Obama’s perfidy toward Israel. “The Democrats have accused Republicans of making Israel a political football by painting Mr. Obama as an unreliable partner,” observed the Times’s Mark Landler. “But it is the Democrats who have tripped up on Israel at their convention this week.”

  And the electoral tensions around Israel continued to climb. During one of the presidential debates, Obama compared his trip to Israel in 2008 to his rival’s more recent visit. “I didn’t take donors. I didn’t attend fund-raisers. I went to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum there, to remind myself the nature of evil and why our bond with Israel will be unbreakable.” The Iranian nuclear program also crept into the contest. “Let’s look at this from the view of the ayatollahs,” said Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan. “They see this administration trying to water down sanctions in Congress….They’re moving faster toward a nuclear weapon; they’re spinning the centrifuges faster. They see us saying…we need more space with our ally Israel.” In response, Vice President Biden derided Ryan’s position as “malarkey,” cited Netanyahu’s bomb drawing as proof that Iran did not yet have a weapon, and reminded voters that “the president does not bluff.” When, only days before the election, The Sunday Times of London reported that Israeli jets bombed a missile factory in the Sudan, anonymous sources described the raid as a “dry run for a forthcoming attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities.” The possibility of a preelection Israeli strike was once again thrust into the race.

  Frequently at first, then almost daily, I received phone calls from Democratic leaders angry over alleged Israeli canvasing for Romney. Barbara Boxer, the veteran California senator and cosponsor of the U.S.-Israel Enhanced Security Cooperation Act, railed at me so furiously that I literally had to hold the phone from my ear. New York’s Chuck Schumer similarly hollered, “The elections are in six weeks, for chrissakes, can’t you guys just stop criticizing Obama?” All my reassurances that Israel was not interfering in the elections, not campaigning for any candidate, and not criticizing Obama, failed to persuade the senators.

  The bleak situation grew darkest on September 11, when the White House announced that the president would not meet with Netanyahu during the coming UN General Assembly session. The reason, according to spokesman Tommy Vietor, was that the two leaders would be in New York on different days. But Netanyahu’s offer to travel to Washington was also spurned. Republican senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham quickly jumped on the snub, saying, “the White House’s decision sends a troubling signal to our ally Israel about America’s commitment at this dangerous and challenging time.” Paul Ryan lashed out at Obama for having sufficient time to interview with Barbara Walters on morning television but not enough to meet Netanyahu.

  Leaping into my cleanup mode, I ascribed the entire affair to scheduling problems. “The president is very busy and the prime minister’s time is very narrow,” I told CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “Nobody was out to snub anybody.” But this argument, too, proved unconvincing. Later that month, after Netanyahu’s arrival in New York, I left the hotel for an exclusive interview on Fox. Just outside the studio, though, I learned that I would appear on a split screen with America’s former ambassador to the UN John Bolton, a virulent decrier of Obama. Interviewed alongside me, he would have attacked the president and placed me in the partisan position of defending him. “Either take me off the split screen or forget the interview,” I told the producers. They relented and I interviewed alone, harmlessly. But walking out of the building, I was accosted by Bolton. With a bushy mustache and bookish spectacles, he cast a refined, even academic image. Yet he physically lunged at me—so fiercely that my security detail stepped in to restrain him—and jeered, “You’re afraid to go on a split screen! You know what you are? You’re a weenie!”

  “How’d it go?” Netanyahu inquired when I returned to his hotel suite.

  “I don’t know,” I numbly replied. “I’ve just been called a weenie.”

  I had, in fact, been called many things during the previous contentious months, and only wanted these elections to be over. The night at last arrived—a typical night for America’s democracy, bright with celebrations. After interviewing with Araleh Barnea—Israel’s Walter Cronkite—I went party hopping, all the while keeping my eye on the screens as the voting results came in. Between announcements, I phoned Netanyahu and prepared him for what looked like a certain Obama victory. Finally, at a hip Microsoft/Bloomberg reception, I stood with veteran political pollster Mark Penn and watched the Florida count. “That’s it,” Mark said. “It’s over.” I excused myself to make one last call. “Congratulate him, publicly and personally,” I recommended. “As quickly as possible.”

  —

  Far more than those of 2008, the 2012 elections were transformative. The seismic event of four years earlier might have been a one-time tremor, but this outcome showed that the “tectonic shifts” I once described were permanent. The race, I remarked to David Rothkopf, was essentially a contest between the 1960s and the 1980s. Obama, though only a child in the sixties, nevertheless represented the multicultural, egalitarian, and Great Society ideas of that revolutionary decade. Romney was a college student in France at the time of the 1968 revolt, but spent it handing out Bibles. He stood for the traditional values and free enterprise of the Reagan era. The sixties won. If soured on hope, the country was unready for another change. It had yet to recover from the economic crisis, to overcome traumatic Middle Eastern wars, or to extricate its politics from polarization. An irreversibly altered America once again chose Obama.

  Obama, too, remained unchanged. “We will…try and resolve our differences with other nations peacefully,” he declared in his second inaugural address, “not because we are naïve about the dangers we face, but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear.” While respecting overseas alliances, he said, “We will renew those institutions that extend our capacity to manage crisis abroad.” In other words, the United States would continue to reach out to Iran and other Middle Eastern adversaries and work collaboratively through the UN. “We will support democracy from Asia to Africa, from the Americas to the Middle East,” pledged the reelected president, irrespective of the leaders that democracy produced.

  Listening to these words, I thought, perhaps only I was different. In contrast to four years ago, when I stood shoulder-to-shivering-shoulder with millions of well-wishers on the Washington Monument lawn, now I gazed out at that crowd from the Capitol steps, where I sat, under official inauguration blankets, among diplomats and Congress members. That night, instead of preparing college lectures, I danced with Sally at Rahm Emanuel’s Chicago party, to the blues of Buddy Guy, whom she first heard perform forty years earlier at the Fillmore. There were receptions with Obama confidants David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, and with Ambassador Susan Rice and Senator John Kerry, both of them in line to be named the next secretary of state. I felt better placed to preserve and, if possible, strengthen the alliance, to help America and Israel meet the challenges of a still-roiling Middle East. While Americans celebrated their democracy, the peoples of that region failed to achieve theirs. Rather, they descended further into revolution, anarchy, atrocities, and war.

  Sandstorms

  At 9:40 on the night of September 11, 2012, a wave of some 150 black-clad terrorists attacked the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Hurling grenades and firing RPGs and machine guns, the jihadis penetrated the compound and set it ablaze. Two Americans, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens
, died from smoke inhalation. An additional two—former Navy SEALs—were killed and several were wounded at a nearby CIA annex. The Libyan Spring, once hailed by the White House as a “powerful reminder of…renewed American leadership in the world,” became an epitaph to America’s vulnerability.

  News of the assault reached Washington that afternoon. I had met Chris Stevens in his previous postings in Jerusalem and at the State Department’s Bureau of Near East Affairs, and his violent death shocked me. But, grappling with the combined tensions generated by Iran and the presidential elections, I barely had time to dwell on the loss. My main concern was the administration’s initial reaction to the attack, which, Press Secretary Jay Carney claimed was a spontaneous response to a rabidly anti-Islamic movie, The Innocence of Muslims, that portrayed the Prophet as a homosexual pedophile, a womanizer, and a thug. Media sources immediately claimed that the film’s producer was Israeli. Though the allegation soon proved false, I prepared for the possibility that Israel would be blamed for four American deaths.

  That Sunday, Susan Rice appeared on the morning talk shows. Though evidence mounted that Libya’s branch of al-Qaeda staged the attacks, the ambassador still denied that the protest was premeditated. Like an earlier disturbance outside the U.S. embassy in Cairo, the Benghazi bloodshed resulted from “this hateful video.”

  Convening my staff in our special “Cohen of Silence” room, I explained the logic behind the administration’s response. The attack had to be described as spontaneous, I said, because Obama had succeeded in Libya and defeated al-Qaeda. And Muslim rage invariably rose from some earlier Western offense. When in doubt, I concluded, always refer back to the president’s Cairo speech of 2009, which ascribed such anger to colonialism, the Cold War, globalization, and Western-style modernity.

  Nevertheless, as she came under fire for her explanations of Benghazi, I empathized with Rice. “It’s not fair,” I commiserated with her; “none of us write our talking points and we shouldn’t be personally blamed for them.” And yet, the administration’s handling of Benghazi was symptomatic of its difficulty in dealing with the upheaval now sweeping the entire Middle East. From its first uniform flowering, the Arab Spring had devolved into multiple sandstorms.

  America’s inability to cope with these siroccos perplexed many observers, above all the Arabs. One of the peculiar privileges of Israel’s ambassador in Washington is the ability to meet with Arab personages and diplomats off the record and, for the most part, far from public view. With the notable exception of the Saudi ambassador, virtually all of my Arab counterparts were willing to speak. These were exceptional people, appointed solely for their ability to excel in American circles. Counterintuitively, a disproportionate number of them were women, including one—the Bahraini—who was Jewish. Also unusual given the moribund state of the peace process, I became especially close to Palestinian figures in town, hosting them at the Residence, maintaining warm relations with them even when some were cold to one another. In all cases, their conversations with me were frank and quite friendly, and characterized by acute disappointment.

  The letdown followed the Cairo speech, with its promise of a new age of amity between America and Islam. Thereafter, it surprised me to learn, Obama disenchanted many Arabs by—of all things—demanding an Israeli settlement freeze. “You don’t turn on your allies, even if they’re my enemies,” one Palestinian activist explained to me. The president next appeared to back down on the settlement moratorium demand, rendering him even less dependable in Arab eyes. But the deepest disillusionment arose from Obama’s handling of the Arab Spring. The president at first coddled Gaddafi and then aided his killers, cosseted Assad and then applauded the insurgency against him, and courted Mubarak only to cast him out. Such a leader could not be esteemed. And the eagerness with which Washington sought a nuclear deal with Iran—a regime actively working to undermine Middle Eastern governments while brazenly provoking America—only deepened Arab mistrust.

  I often wondered if Arab ambassadors shared my difficulty in explaining America to their countrymen back home. At my Residence, I threw a dinner party for Israeli National Security Advisor Yaakov Amidror and Washington’s foremost strategic analysts, among them former senior officials. Though not given to emotion, Israel’s pokerfaced national security advisor visibly blanched on hearing my guests still insisting that “Arab parents want the same thing for their children as we do,” and that the “Libyan people will always remain grateful for the freedom they received from America.” But such bromides were not confined to the capital. In his New York Times column, Thomas Friedman praised Yemen for promoting “the most unique post-revolutionary political process” and making “a stable transition to democracy.” Obama, too, touted the country’s success. Yemen would eventually be overrun by an Iranian-backed Shi’ite insurgency, forcing U.S. diplomatic and military personnel to evacuate. “Why won’t Americans face the truth?” one frustrated Israeli ex-general exclaimed to me. “To defend Western freedom, they must preserve Middle Eastern tyranny.”

  Most challenging to explain to Israelis was Obama’s support for Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood. Contrary to the assurances I had received that the administration would not engage the Islamist movement, the State Department formally initiated ties with Brotherhood leaders in January 2012. Six months later, after the election of the movement’s leader, Mohammed Morsi, to the presidency—by just over 51 percent of the vote—those contacts became an embrace. Deputy Secretary of State Tom Nides led a delegation of one hundred American businessman to Cairo to shore up the new government financially. Jay Carney, meanwhile, labored to cover up for Morsi’s statements denouncing Obama as a Zionist and vilifying Jews as warmongers, apes, and pigs. “U.S. policy is focused on actions, not words,” the press secretary said. The fact that Morsi rejected any contacts with Israel’s government and openly supported the Brotherhood’s Palestinian wing, Hamas, did not prevent the White House from inviting him for an official visit.

  To Israelis left incredulous by these events, I recalled America’s regard for any government—even of Islamic extremists—elected democratically. I noted Morsi’s background as a Ph.D. student and lecturer at California universities, his idiomatic English, and familiarity with the United States. I cited the Cairo speech and how Morsi, like Turkey’s Erdoğan, fulfilled Obama’s vision of American backing for freely chosen and authentically Muslim leaders.

  None of these explanations were compelling, I knew, and became less so as the Arab whirlwind further swirled out of America’s control. In Syria, where the civilian death toll topped one hundred thousand, reports emerged of Assad’s use of chemical weapons. On August 20, President Obama for the first time articulated what would come to be seen as his red line with regard to such armaments. If it noticed “a whole bunch of chemical weapons moving around or being utilized,” he said, America might consider a military response. Evidence of chemical attacks continued to surface, though, and Obama duly responded with threats. “The world is watching,” he warned Assad on December 3. “If you make the tragic mistake of using these weapons, there will be consequences, and you will be held accountable.”

  Yet Assad remained impervious and Obama refrained from taking significant action to depose him. The Syria opposition was divided between radical groups close to al-Qaeda and pro-Western moderates. Secretary of State Clinton, Defense Secretary Panetta, and CIA Director David Petraeus all supported U.S. efforts to arm and train the moderates. Israel warned that thousands of foreigners were joining the radicals and might soon return as homegrown terrorists to the United States. Obama nevertheless remained adamant. “This idea that we could provide…arms to…an opposition made up of former doctors, farmers, pharmacists…to battle…a well-armed state backed by Russia, Iran, [and] Hezbollah, that was never in the cards,” he told the Times. Though U.S. intelligence officials had originally given Assad two months to survive the insurgency, two years later he was still in power and pushing back the rebels. Instead of ousting t
he Syrian dictator, the United States withdrew its diplomatic personnel from Damascus. Assad responded by declaring U.S. ambassador Robert Ford persona non grata.

  The situation in Egypt was no less disappointing. Morsi repaid the administration’s support for him with a trial of ninety foreign democracy advocates—among them a number of Americans—and by assigning himself absolute powers. In doing so, he showed scant interest in, or even understanding of, Washington’s attempts to rescue Egypt’s economy. “To us real democracy means that every citizen has the right to live, work and worship as they choose,” Hillary Clinton said after her first meeting with the Egyptian president. “Real democracy means that no group or faction or leader can impose their will…on anyone else.” Yet, while she departed Alexandria, Egyptian Christians cursed the secretary for backing the Brotherhood and pelted her motorcade with tomatoes and shoes.

  Landing in Israel, she promptly met with Avigdor Liberman. For several years, during which its representatives sat with Assad and Gaddafi, the administration boycotted Israel’s democratically elected foreign minister, recoiling from his right-wing views. My insistence that Liberman was powerful and pragmatic and, if engaged, potentially helpful in the peace process, was ignored. Eventually, though, Clinton came to understand Liberman’s worth and seemed to enjoy interacting with this blunt former Moldavian. Following her Egyptian ordeal, in particular, the secretary seemed relieved to see him. She even laughed when Liberman quipped, “The Brotherhood is to democracy what cannibals are to vegetarianism.” Clinton, in turn, told him of rumors circulating in Cairo that the United States was plotting to detach Sinai from Egypt and give it to the Palestinians. The minister grinned and chuckled. “Not a bad idea.”