Netanyahu uses last speech to attack Biden
Hours before a vote to oust him, outgoing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused US President Joseph Biden of endangering Israel’s security by taking a soft line on Iran and claimed his successor, Naftali Bennett, would be too weak to stand up to Washington.
Netanyahu waged a desperate but unsuccessful campaign to stop a “change coalition” from joining together to replace him after an inconclusive election in March.
Facing an imminent demotion to opposition leader, he foreshadowed a willingness to damage the US-Israel relationship to put his rival under pressure.
Bennett, a right-wing former tech entrepreneur, will lead the most ideologically diverse coalition in Israel’s history, with its members united by little more than a desire to remove Netanyahu, who is on trial for corruption and battled through what seemed like a never ending cycle of elections over the past two years.
A senior Israeli diplomat said of Netanyahu: “He decided to damage the US-Israeli relationship for his own personal interests and is trying to leave scorched earth for the incoming government.”
Bennett spoke before Netanyahu, but as he was trying to present his platform, allies of Netanyahu continuously interrupted him with shouts of “liar” and “fraud.”
Bennett’s coalition partner, centrist Yair Lapid, forewent his opportunity to speak next, citing the interruptions during Bennett’s speech, which he said were a disgrace.
Then Netanyahu rose to speak. He said that Bennett had broken a campaign pledge by forming a government with Lapid and said his protégé-turned-rival would refuse to stand up to Biden on Iran.
Netanyahu claimed that the Biden administration had asked him to keep their disagreements on Iran private, but he had refused to do so, valuing his hard line on Iran over smooth relations with the United States.
He positioned himself as the only man standing between Iran and an arsenal of nuclear weapons and claimed Iranians were celebrating his departure.
He compared Biden’s Iran policy to the refusal of the US to bomb the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1944.
He also said he’d rejected US demands to freeze settlement construction and opposed Biden’s plan to reopen the US consulate in Jerusalem, which handled relations with the Palestinians before being shut down by Donald Trump.
Again, he claimed Bennett lacked the stature or credibility to take similar stands.
It was reported that despite Bennett’s right-wing politics and hard-line positions on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, many senior officials in the Biden administration will be happy to see the end of Netanyahu’s tenure.