Obama's Squeeze Play On Bibi

With the recent diplomatic spat between Israel and the US now having gotten somewhat serious, Obama's next stage of the plan may be to strike now with his major Middle East peace initiative.  But what's Obama's real game here?  McClatchy's Warren Strobel (emphasis mine):

Obama, fresh from his legislative victory on health care, is planning an attempt to turn the current disaster into a diplomatic opportunity, according to U.S. officials, former officials and diplomats.

The administration is said to be preparing a major peace initiative that would be Obama's most direct involvement in the conflict to date, and would go far beyond the tentative, indirect Israeli-Palestinian talks that were torpedoed earlier in the month.

"It is crystallizing that we have to do something now. That this can't go on this way," said one of the officials who, like the others, wouldn't speak for the record because of the issue's sensitivity.

Because of the U.S. political calendar, Obama has limited time to press Israel before it becomes a major domestic political issue during midterm elections. Netanyahu, who this weekend confers with his closest allies, has limited political space in which to operate, if he wants to stay in power.

His coalition at home is populated with Israeli politicians who support Jewish settlements in the West Bank, oppose any concessions on Jerusalem and are skeptical of an independent Palestinian state next door.

One irony of the current confrontation is that the administration, which had laboriously organized indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinians, had planned to use Biden's visit to provide "strategic reassurance" to Israel, in hopes of improving relations with the closest U.S. ally in the Middle East after a year of strains.

Now, trust between the two sides seems to be at a very low ebb.

"There's not a great deal of trust that he believes deeply in the two-state solution," a former senior U.S. official in touch with the White House said of Netanyahu. "There's a belief that he's a reluctant peacemaker here."

The Obama administration is said to believe that Netanyahu has more control over Jewish settlements than he admits, and political flexibility to dump his right-wing partners and form a government with the moderate Kadima party if he chose.

"Fundamentally, he's going to have to decide between his coalition and his relationship with the United States," the former official said.

My distaste for unnamed sources aside,  there's a clear play here.  Obama's trying to squeeze Bibi out.

That's right.  Regime change in Israel.  Let that soak in for a moment.  Let's explore what that means:  it means the Obama administration sees Israel's refusal to come to the table and stop with settlement expansion as a direct threat to US national security.  So much so, that Obama's looking to put Bibi in an untenable situation where he has to decide between the US or his job.

The idea here is that the current government collapses and Netanyahu is forced to form a more moderate one.  The chaos would also prevent Israel from going after the Palestinians or Iran for a while.

BooMan has the right of things.

Given that, there is no way forward until not only Netanyahu goes, but the far-right lunatics he needs to form a majority go, too. Consider:

The Arab League is scheduled to meet this weekend in Libya and is likely to repeat demands for a freeze on Israeli building in occupied areas before giving a final endorsement to the return of the Palestinian Authority to peace talks with Israel. Mr. Abbas, the Palestinian president, has sought pan-Arab cover for his decision to return to the talks.

With Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak recovering from surgery and unable to attend the Arab League talks, and with our Gulf allies (and Britain) still furious about the Mossad assassination team unleashed on Dubai, the administration must show naked resolve and displeasure with Israel in order to have any credibility whatsoever. Not to mention, humiliating Joe Biden when he traveled to Israel was bound to be returned in kind two-fold by a president who knows how to watch his number two's back. 

Obama's running the old squeeze play here and he's doing a pretty brilliant job of it.  We'll see how it turns out.  Either way, make no mistake:  Obama is out of patience with the Netanyahu government, and they are about to get a stark reminder about who really does run this relationship.