Editor’s Note: Aaron David Miller is a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and author of “The End of Greatness: Why America Can’t Have (and Doesn’t Want) Another Great President.” Miller was a Middle East negotiator in Democratic and Republican administrations. The opinions expressed in this commentary are his own. Read more opinion on CNN.
CNN
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Barely a week into the most extreme government in Israel’s history, its controversial national security minister, Itamar Ben Gvir, is already demonstrating its right-wing religious and nationalist credentials.
On Tuesday, Ben Gvir visited the Jerusalem compound known as the Temple Mount by Jews and the Haram al-Sharif by Muslims – an action that threatens to upset an already precarious status quo and trigger violence.
Ben Gvir, who has previously been convicted of racist incitement, has vowed to institutionalize Jewish prayer and presence in perhaps the most volatile flashpoint in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. His stated intention for the visit was to mark one of the Jewish fast days.
The visit prompted a string of international condemnations, including from the US Embassy in Jerusalem, which indicated in a short statement that such actions were “unacceptable.”
Ben Gvir – a long time provocateur and heir to the party of the extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane – is now in charge of Israel’s police, putting him in an influential position to stir up trouble in Jerusalem and between Israel’s Arab and Jewish citizens.
But if you think the Biden administration is gearing up for a sustained campaign to aggressively oppose the direction the new Netanyahu government is heading, you should lay down and wait quietly until the feeling passes.
Governing is about choosing. And while a fight might yet come, US President Joe Biden will go to great lengths to avoid a confrontation with a newly elected Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Here’s five reasons why.
First, Biden is preternaturally pro-Israel.
The US President may have once told Netanyahu: “Bibi, I don’t agree with a damn thing you say, but I love you.” But it’s not the Prime Minister with whom he’s enthralled, it’s the state of Israel.
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