In a broadcast interview to be aired today on MSNBC Secretary Clinton blasted recent Israeli moves deliberately intended to undermine indirect talks between the U.S. and the other parties involved in the conflict, to seek its peaceful resolution.
Clinton says Israel announcement 'insulting to the United States'
WASHINGTON — In a tense, 43-minute phone call on Friday morning, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel’s plan for new housing units for Jews in East Jerusalem sent a "deeply negative signal" about Israeli-American relations, and not just because it spoiled a visit by Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.
"It was insulting," Clinton told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell in an interview airing today. "And it was insulting not just to the vice president, who certainly didn't deserve that. He was there with a very clear message of commitment to the peace process solidarity with the Israeli people. But it was an insult to the United States."
The sheer clumsiness of this Israeli government's effrontery in announcing major new settlement construction in the occupied West Bank during the Biden visit demonstrates the degree to which Netanyahu's extremest ruling coalition's hubris knows no limits. I don't buy for a second the Netanyahu was blindsided by his coalition partner Eli Yishai Israel's Interior Minister, and head of the racist Shas Party. Yishai has made stepping up the pace of the slow motion ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from occupied East Jerusalem into his pet project, and as Interior Minister his portfolio includes expanding Israel's illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank.
When the Israeli government takes unconditional U.S. support for granted to such an extent that it can greet our Vice President with a slap in the face, embarrass the United States before the world, and increase the risks to U.S. service members involved in two conflicts in Islamic countries, then the time has come to reassess the whole basis of the relationship between the two countries IMHO.
UPDATE
Watch the video of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton here:
U.S. scrambles to save Mideast talks
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For a little background on what's been happening in occupied East Jerusalem read the New York Times article below:
An Eviction Stirs Old Ghosts in a Contested City
By ISABEL KERSHNER
Published: March 9, 2010
JERUSALEM — Having been removed in favor of Israeli nationalist Jews, members of the Palestinian Ghawi family have been sheltering this winter in a tent on the sidewalk opposite their home of more than five decades in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah.
Also see: Clinton Rebukes Israel on Housing Announcement