Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s cancellation of a meeting with US President Barack Obama underlines the growing differences between the two leaders, says a political commentator in Los Angeles.
Netanyahu has declined an offer to meet Obama at the White House later this month and canceled his trip to Washington, the White House said on Monday.
The Israeli premier’s decision to nix his US visit was likely prompted by last year’s international nuclear accord with Iran and the Obama administration’s renewed push for a “Palestinian-Israeli peace agreement,” James Morris, editor of America-hijacked.com, told Press TV on Tuesday.
President Obama is planning to go directly to the Middle East Quartet – the US, the United Nations, the European Union and Russia – in an attempt to “impose a settlement on the Israelis and the Palestinians,” he added.
Obama is also considering a UN Security Council resolution for the Israeli-Palestinian talks, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.
“Of course Israel has flouted international law for decades and would probably not respect any kind of international law that would come down in that regard,” Morris said.
“But that’s supposedly what’s in the works and Netanyahu doesn’t want to deal with that apparently, and that is really the main thrust of why he is not going to meet with President Obama,” he noted.
In addition, Morris said that Netanyahu is avoiding Obama in the hope of getting a better aid package from the next US president.
Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of US foreign assistance since World War II.
US military aid to Israel has amounted to more than $124.3 billion since it began in 1962, according to a US congressional report, released late last year.