Bill Clinton Strays From Hillary’s Israel Script And Knocks Netanyahu
In a conversation with pro-Palestinian activists in Iowa, the former president agrees: the Israeli PM won’t make peace 'unless he’s forced to.'
By Chemi Shalev | Sep. 15, 2014 | 10:18 PM
Former Senator Hillary Clinton has turned into a staunch defender of Israel in recent months, standing up for its military campaign in Gaza and praising Benjamin Netanyahu for his leadership and moderation. Her husband Bill, however, appears to have a different view that he seems willing to share, at least when he thinks the microphone is off. Thus, at a widely publicized political meeting held in Iowa on Sunday, Clinton was overheard clearly agreeing with an interlocutor from the audience who said that the Israeli Prime Minister is “not the man” who would make peace and just as clearly concurring with the statement “If we don’t force him to have peace, we won’t have peace.”
Clinton’s comments were recorded by the American C-Span network at the tail end of its three-hour coverage of the Harkin Steak Fry held on Sunday in Indianola, Iowa. The annual event, organized by retiring Democratic Senator Tom Harkin, received widespread media coverage in America and was largely seen as an opening shot in Hillary Clinton’s as yet unannounced run for the presidency in 2016.
Following the speeches, both Clintons devoted over half an hour to talking and signing autographs for long lines of waiting fans. Towards the end, after Hillary had already left the scene, Bill Clinton was stopped by a group of pro-Palestinian activists who had handed Hillary a copy of the Middle East section of the Iowa Democratic party plank. But while the former senator largely ignored the group’s verbal remarks, pro-Palestinian activist Pat Minor succeeded in baiting the former president. “I know why Yasser Arafat turned you down,” she said, according to her an account she shared with a United Methodist Church discussion group. Clinton then stopped to dispute her assertion that water rights had been the main stumbling block at the failed Camp David talks that Clinton oversaw in 2000, when another participant started talking about Netanyahu’s refusal to make peace, at which point the C-SPAN recording begins.
MORE...
http://www.haaretz.com/blogs/west-of-eden/.premium-1.615970
= new reply since forum marked as read
