US may be seeking Israel 'regime change'By Lachlan Carmichael (AFP)
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration's row with Israel over settlements has prompted some analysts to wonder whether it seeks "regime change," a new government that can make peace with the Palestinians.
...In unusually harsh words, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday that his right-wing government's plans to build new settler homes in east Jerusalem sent a "deeply negative signal" about Israel's ties to its top ally.
"Is this about regime change, or is it about (Israeli) behavior modification?" asked Aaron David Miller, a Middle East peace negotiator in past Republican and Democratic administrations.
..."If it's the former, then I think we're naive in the extreme in thinking that we will be able to produce and somehow manage that," said Miller, now at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.
Miller said Obama and Clinton may be trying to create the impression Netanyahu is "mismanaging the relationship" with Washington in order to shake up Israeli politics.
After all, he said, former president George H.W. Bush and his top diplomat James Baker did much the same thing with then Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Shamir and helped pave the way for Yitzhak Rabin to become prime minister.
"But there are no more Rabins," Miller said.
...The previous George W. Bush administration embraced "regime change" for Iraq, Iran and North Korea, although the term referred to the violent overthrow of dictatorships.
"In people's heart of hearts, they probably want somebody other than Netanyahu but I can't imagine that anybody really believes that they have a strategy or a real chance of effecting it," the former ambassador said.
To be sure, he said, Netanyahu might be able to drop a right-wing party and bring in Tzipi Livni, a former foreign minister and candidate for premier who once mulled joining his government, and her centrist Kadima....
WASHINGTON — The Obama administration's row with Israel over settlements has prompted some analysts to wonder whether it seeks "regime change," a new government that can make peace with the Palestinians.
...In unusually harsh words, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Friday that his right-wing government's plans to build new settler homes in east Jerusalem sent a "deeply negative signal" about Israel's ties to its top ally.
"Is this about regime change, or is it about (Israeli) behavior modification?" asked Aaron David Miller, a Middle East peace negotiator in past Republican and Democratic administrations.
..."If it's the former, then I think we're naive in the extreme in thinking that we will be able to produce and somehow manage that," said Miller, now at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.
Miller said Obama and Clinton may be trying to create the impression Netanyahu is "mismanaging the relationship" with Washington in order to shake up Israeli politics.
After all, he said, former president George H.W. Bush and his top diplomat James Baker did much the same thing with then Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Shamir and helped pave the way for Yitzhak Rabin to become prime minister.
"But there are no more Rabins," Miller said.
...The previous George W. Bush administration embraced "regime change" for Iraq, Iran and North Korea, although the term referred to the violent overthrow of dictatorships.
"In people's heart of hearts, they probably want somebody other than Netanyahu but I can't imagine that anybody really believes that they have a strategy or a real chance of effecting it," the former ambassador said.
To be sure, he said, Netanyahu might be able to drop a right-wing party and bring in Tzipi Livni, a former foreign minister and candidate for premier who once mulled joining his government, and her centrist Kadima....
HEY! WE WANT "REGIME CHANGE" TOO!! WE WANT MASHIACH!!! RIGHT NOW!!!!
Yep - it feels so close too. Please Hashem, bring us out of this already! We're ready for this to happen.
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