If a photograph is worth a thousand words, a sharp newspaper cartoon is often worth the book. One Israeli cartoonist depicts Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the missus arriving at the White House to meet with Barack Obama. Mrs. Netanyahu knocks at the front door with the explanation, "We just happened to be in the neighborhood." Another cartoon depicts the prime minister pulling up at the White House, and telling the driver to wait: "I'm not sure they're at home."
With a few strokes of pen and brush, the cartoonists capture the prevailing Israeli dismay, frustration and controlled fury at President Obama's reluctance to meet the prime minister, who was in Washington this week. The administration wanted to punish Israel by setting "pre-conditions" for talks and for not having a more "conciliatory" attitude toward those who vow to "wipe the Jewish nation off the map."
On the street and at higher levels, Israelis look back in anger, observing that the president set no "pre-conditions" before meeting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, who is on the way to building a nuclear weapon to put Israel in mortal danger. The Israelis say Obama wants to extract an opening promise to freeze settlements on the West Bank and East Jerusalem, something that's never been a pre-condition for starting talks.
The prime minister was eventually invited into the Oval Office for a brief "low-key" exchange, but without the customary photo op afterward. This president does not offer the strong handshake of friendship that Bill Clinton and George W. extended to previous Israeli prime ministers. President Obama says "America's bond with our Israeli allies is unbreakable," but it sounds more like the lip service paid by Jimmy Carter.
President Obama shows none of the instinctive affection for Israel or understanding of the history of the Jewish state. This is not lost on the Israelis, who have to cultivate long memories as a survival strategy. They're not as sanguine as American Jews who voted in enormous numbers for Obama despite his long associations with those who wish Israel only ill.
They remember how Obama apparently slept through two decades of Sunday morning rants by the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, citing chapter and verse of his accusations that Israel committed "genocide" against the Palestinians. They remember that the president once cited as his "mentor" Rashid Khalidi, the professor at Columbia University who frequently denounces Israel as "a racist state" and defends Palestinian suicide bombers.