There The White House has canceled a high-level meeting between the United States and Israel on Iran, scheduled for tomorrow Thursday 20 June, after the release yesterday of a video in which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking in English, defined “inconceivable the fact that in recent months the administration has denied weapons and ammunition to Israel”. This was reported by two US officials quoted by Axios.
President Biden’s advisors, Barak Ravid reports on Axios, reacted to the video with a message that the American envoy Amos Hochstein personally delivered to Netanyahu in a meeting held a few hours after the video was disclosed, according to US and Israeli sources. The White House then decided to take a further step, canceling Thursday’s meeting.
“This decision makes it clear that there are consequences for those who carry out such stunts“said a US official. “The Americans are furious. Bibi’s video did a lot of damage,” a senior Israeli official said. Some Israeli officials were already on their way to Washington when the meeting was canceled. Two U.S. officials told Axios that the meeting was canceled to send a message on the video. A third said the meeting was postponed rather than cancelled, due to an agenda issue.
In public, the White House expressed shock. There spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre noted that only one weapons shipment has been suspended since the start of the war, while billions of dollars of weapons arrived unhindered. “We don’t really know what he’s talking about,” she said. Privately, Biden’s team reacted with anger and shock at Netanyahu’s ingratitude, a U.S. official said.
Hochstein had already scheduled a meeting with Netanyahu on Tuesday, during a stop in Israel on his way back from Beirut, where he was trying to defuse tensions on the Israel-Lebanon border. Once reunited with him, he told Netanyahu that the allegations in the video were inaccurate and uncalled for, two Israeli officials briefed on the meeting told Axios.
What Netanyahu said
“It is inconceivable that in recent months the “US” administration has blocked weapons and ammunition for Israel,” Netanyahu said in an English-language video released on X. When US Secretary of State Antony “Blinken was here recently in Israel – he began – we had a frank conversation” and “I said that I greatly appreciated the United States’ support for Israel since the beginning of the war”.
“Israel, America’s closest ally, is fighting for its existence, against Iran and our other common enemies,” says Netanyahu, evoking World War II and Churchill: “Give us the tools and we will finish the job much more quickly”, concludes the Israeli prime minister.
