Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is still moving forward with his and Republican House Speaker John Boehner's
war against the Obama White House, with his upcoming speech before a joint session of Congress that a growing list of Democrats have announced they will skip. Those Democrats requested a separate meeting with Netanyahu, which he has rejected because—and this is rich—he
doesn't want to appear partisan.
Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., on Monday invited Netanyahu to meet in a closed-door session with Democrats during his visit. He declined the invitation on Tuesday and expressed regret about the politically fraught tone of his trip.
"I regret that the invitation to address the special joint session of Congress has been perceived by some to be political or partisan," Netanyahu wrote. "I can assure you that my sole intention in accepting it was to voice Israel's grave concerns about a potential nuclear agreement with Iran that could threaten the survival of my country."
Since, in a flagrant breach of protocol, Boehner extended this invitation to Netanyahu without even consulting the White House, there really isn't any way to view this upcoming speech as anything but political and partisan. And that's how a
large majority of American voters view it.
The White House is also ratcheting up its criticism. On Tuesday, Obama’s national security adviser Susan Rice voiced the sharpest criticism yet from the administration. Rice said that the planned speech has:
"... injected a degree of partisanship, which is not only unfortunate, I think it's destructive of the fabric of the relationship."
That's an understatement, now that Bibi is refusing to even talk to Democratic lawmakers. It's gone way beyond just a "degree" of partisanship.
