Three months to Israel's election: Why is Netanyahu really going to Washington?

**Allison Kaplan Sommer** (0:06)
Hello, and welcome to the Haaretz Podcast. I'm Allison Kaplan Sommer. Since we launched this election podcast about a month ago, a lot has changed when you consider the race, the political landscape, but a lot has stayed the same. And it seems that week after week, we open the podcast thinking and reflecting about the national mood in which we are sure that perhaps any moment now, you're going to be dragged into the continually escalating and then relaxing and then escalating one more time conflict between the US and Iran. For 13 nights in a row, the US attacked Iran. Iran responded by hitting US bases in the Gulf and in Jordan, right next door to Israel. And this past Saturday night, all of a sudden, it stopped. Why? US President Donald Trump said for the umpteenth time, it's because Iran is really interested in negotiations. And so we're going to stop the hostilities. And now we're going to come to the table and work everything out regarding the Straits of Hormuz and their nuclear capabilities. The media is telling a different story. The New York Times reported that Trump did not push the button on escalation in the conflict with Iran on Saturday because he was told by senior officials that renewed major combat operations could dangerously deplete his interceptor missiles, the Patriots, and other munitions that are needed to protect the US troops and bases across the Middle East.
Then in the middle of all this, the White House confirms that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is ready to leave all of this behind and visit Washington DC to meet Trump and to attend the late Senator Lindsey Graham's funeral. Here with me to discuss everything that's going on and most importantly, to discuss the latest developments in the election campaign, which is, guys, 93 days away. That doesn't sound very far. Esther Solomon and Joshua Leifer, our top-notch columnists here for Haaretz.
So, how do we feel about our prime minister flying off when this is all happening, Iran and the United States on tenterhooks? Plus, we've got a renewed conflagration in the West Bank. There's still active fire both on the Lebanese fronts and now also on the Syrian fronts. And day after day, Israeli missile airstrikes are of course taking lives in the Gaza Strip. Why go to Washington now?

**Joshua Leifer** (2:39)
The first most cynical explanation would be that Netanyahu is also looking at the polls, and he knows that Likud continues to lose projected seats in the latest polling. The party is in a bad situation. One recent poll showed that they were hovering at 20, which is low for where Likud usually is.
But I also think that if we try to stitch together all the various headlines over the last couple of weeks, there are developments that suggest a certain kind of out of stepness between Netanyahu and Trump, and I think that Netanyahu wants to try to hash out some of those differences. So what I'm thinking of is just from the recent headlines, there was the announcement by Trump that the United States was going to sell F35s to Turkey, and then just this morning Trump said actually that's not going to happen. Then there was the announcement that the Trump administration was going to work with Saudi Arabia on a civilian nuclear program, and then seemingly without consulting any other member of his administration, Trump announced that actually that initiative is contingent on Saudi normalization with Israel. This morning, then again, the Syrian president, Ahmed Al-Shara says, we're actually ready to make peace with Israel. That requires resolving the dispute over the Golan Heights in favor of Israel. We know that that's something that actually like there is some kind of security agreement deal that was written and waiting for Netanyahu to be signed and that he refused to sign it. And then there is this question of Iran.
And usually when Netanyahu flies to the United States, it's to convince President Trump to jump back into the war. And I think that that's probably what he wants to do under the pretense of going to mourn the late Lindsey Graham. But the Iranian issue is just one part of a much broader kind of lack of coherence that's developed in their relationship.

**Allison Kaplan Sommer** (4:39)
Looping it back to politics though, Esther, how do you think it will look at home for Netanyahu to be sort of pulling this old trick out of his head, oh, I'm going to go to Washington and look important, and that's going to boost my political standing versus that he's kind of, you know, leaving the house when it's on fire?

**Esther Solomon** (4:54)