Here's how this lovers' triangle came together: on Saturday night, Newt Gingrich delivered a two-minute stemwinder (PDF) that called the Palestinian Authority's leading statesman a terrorist, warned of US-funded textbooks for Arabs that glorify the killing of Jews, and doubled down on his claim that the Palestinians are a "fictional people."
Romney, sensing he had new competition for Netanyahu's graces, attacked that last point: "The United States of America should not jump ahead of Bibi Netanyahu and say something that makes it more difficult for him to do his job…If Bibi Netanyahu wants to say what you said, let him say it."
What to make of this suitors' spat? Sometimes, love can blind you to a person's faults. Neither Gingrich nor Romney seemed especially interested in Israel, the raucous, largely secular nation of 8 million people represented by 31 political parties. Instead, they focused on Bibi, whose hawkish coalition government can hardly be said to represent all Israelis. ("The more Israel's image in the world deteriorates, the more Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is flourishing," Ha'aretz wrote a few months back.)
Romney was so inflamed by pro-Israel passions Saturday night that he basically promised to dial Bibi's digits before even saying something about the Mideast. ("Would it help if I said this? What would you like me to do?") Gingrich, for his part, attacked President Obama. "Every day, rockets are fired into Israel while the United States, the current administration, tries to pressure the Israelis into a peace process," he said, later adding: "We're not making life more difficult [for Israel]. The Obama administration's making life more difficult."
BATR 2020 Election News
