Shortly before Israel’s 2015 elections, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu came to Washington to address a joint session of Congress, going over the heads of the president and the Democratic Party and ignoring criticism from the American and Israeli media and most major Jewish organizations in the United States. He did so for three reasons: A desire to win the elections scheduled for two weeks later, strong hostility toward President Barack Obama and a deep-seated aversion to several world powers’ nuclear deal with Iran. At the time, there were those who claimed he was inflicting severe strategic damage on Israel’s relationship with the Democratic Party. Netanyahu ignored them. He won the election, rid himself of Obama a year later and got Donald Trump instead.
On Aug. 15 this year, Netanyahu did it again, but with the opposite goal in mind. He ignored the Democratic Party, significant chunks of the GOP, the media and almost all US Jewish organizations (including AIPAC and the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations). However, this time he did not do so to spite an incumbent president, but rather to support him.