According to Reports: Israeli Media Judge Housing Announcement Harshly
Posted on: March 19, 2010

In his weekly Canadian Jewish News media analysis column “According to Reports,” Paul Michaels, CIC Director of Communications, looks at media reaction to the Israeli/US diplomatic spat over the announcement of housing starts in Jerusalem.

U.S. Vice-President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel last week was met with controversy when Israel’s Interior Ministry announced plans for 1,600 new homes in east Jerusalem, prompting Biden and the U.S. administration in Washington to strongly criticize the announcement.  The controversy arose just as Israel and the Palestinian Authority were set to resume indirect peace talks.

Headlines in Canadian  media on March 10 were almost uniform: “Biden condemns Israel over new homes” (National Post); “Biden condemns Israel’s latest settlement plan” (Ottawa Citizen); “Biden condemns Israeli settlement expansion move” (Edmonton Journal); “U.S. hits Israeli east Jerusalem plan” (Winnipeg Free Press); “Biden slams new Israeli settlements” (Toronto Sun).

The Toronto Star carried two reports by Olivia Ward. Her lead story, “Middle East talks stumble,” dealt with Biden’s reaction to the housing issue.  Ward’s second story, “Washington ‘committed’ to ensuring Israel secure,” described the main thrust of Biden’s visit – to assure Israeli leaders that the United States will do everything necessary to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and, thereby, also to  convince Israel not to attack Iran’s nuclear facilities.

The Globe and Mail was alone in placing Biden’s comments on Iran front and centre.  In Paul Koring’s story, “Biden aims harsh words at Iran on visit to Israel,” he confined Biden’s reaction to the housing announcement to the latter part of the report.

In Israel, media analysis and comment was harshly critical of the Interior Ministry’s move, especially its timing while Biden had just begun his visit and, as some commentators noted, was blindsided.

The March 10 Jerusalem Post editorial “Dysfunctional government” called the Interior Ministry’s announcement “a staggering example of diplomatic obtuseness” and added that “the timing of the announcement immediately threatened the ‘proximity talks’ in which Netanyahu has stressed Israel has a profound interest. It united the Palestinians, the Arab world and much of the international community in a chorus of anti-Israel condemnation.”

In his Ha’aretz column “Broken glass,”  Ari Shavit wrote that “The [Iranian] threat against Israel is unprecedented. Our need for the United States is unprecedented. At this critical juncture, any national interest should be subservient to the supreme interest of strengthening this alliance.”

In “Visiting Biden slams E. J’lem housing plan” (March 10) Ha’aretz reporters noted that Netanyahu told Biden  that he did not know in advance about the decision to authorize the additional construction.

They added: “Netanyahu also told Biden that the planning and building councils are not under the government’s direct authority, and that his administration tries not to interfere with their work. ‘No one was seeking to embarrass you or undermine your visit,’ the prime minister reportedly said. ‘On the contrary – you are a true friend to Israel.’

“Nevertheless, a high-ranking official in Jerusalem said, Netanyahu has ‘no problem’ with construction in Jerusalem and has no intention of apologizing for building there.”

On March 10,  CBC News Network’s News Now host Carole MacNeil interviewed Mark Regev, Netanyahu’s spokeperson.

MacNeil: “Is your prime minister embarrassed that he didn’t know about this [housing announcement]“?

Regev:  “Well let’s say it wasn’t our finest hour.  But anyone who works in a democratic system [knows that] only in totalitarian countries does the central government control every aspect of society.  When you have local governments, when you have different ministries, these things are bound to happen.  Obviously you want to try to keep it to a minimum…The most important thing is that…we want to move forward in the peace process, we want to deal with the issue of Iran to make sure they don’t go nuclear – there’s a whole series of issues where Israel and the United States – and also Canada – are working together to try to deal with these challenges.”

This column recently argued that housing and settlements, though an important final status issue, are not “the” key impediment to progress as much of the world claims, and that other more critical final status subjects need to be examined.

However, with incidents like the controversy described above, “settlements” is all the international community is likely to remain fixated on in the foreseeable future.