by Gilad Atzmon

While in LA I picked up Israel’s Week, a local ultra Zionist Hebrew paper. On page seven I found an extraordinary Judeo-centric article titled ‘Bibi’s Week.’ The subtitle read “Winning the Eurovision and moving the (USA) Embassy were the cream on top of one of the best weeks in the PM’s career. How did the right wing leader who was defamed by the Israeli, European and American elite end up as one of the most respected in the world?”

The article was published on 16 May but as you can imagine, there was no mention of the Gaza border massacre that took place two days earlier. Not a word.

Gal Shor, the author of the triumphant rant, wrote: “Nowadays, Netanyahu is perceived by American Republicans as the greatest foreign world leader in history, the only foreign leader who exceeded Netanyahu in terms of world peace was Winston Churchill. And while the Republicans admire Netanyahu, Democrats and other world leaders see him as the most important statesman in the current generation and this is how he is seen even by leaders who do not like him.”

I guess that Shor knows little about British history and Churchill in particular. Churchill, was a man with many blunders attached to his name.

But Shor’s argumentative style is varnished with a rationale. “Netanyahu’s policies didn’t lead toward just hollow peace agreements, but led instead to Egypt, the Saudis and the Emirates taking the Israeli side against Hamas and Obama’s administration at the time of the 2014 Gaza conflict. It was Netanyahu’s policy that planted the seeds for a new regional alliance that opposed the Iran deal.”

There is certainly an element of truth in this. According to Shor, Netanyahu realised that for the sake of Israel’s survival he better seek “new potential partners within American politics in the Congress and the public so he could minimise the damage caused by Obama.”

You may not like what Shor is saying, but this is how many Israelis and Jews interpret Netanyahu’s policies. In the eyes of many Israel-supporting Jews, Bibi is the puppet master. President Trump, the Congress, Theresa May and Macron follow the path cleverly laid for them by the Israeli PM.

According to Shor, it was Netanyahu that made Republicans and their supporters see the Iran deal as a catastrophe. ‘”At the time of the primaries for the presidential election, all Republican candidates without exception committed to cancel the Iran deal. Could this have happened without Netanyahu’s Washington visit? Hard to believe.”

Shor sees Trump as a mere pawn in an Israeli game, “the one who stands behind the USA move to Jerusalem, the withdrawal from the Iran deal and the support of IDF operations is Trump, but the one who created these opportunities is Netanyahu. The Israel PM is enjoying the fruit he has been planting for the last 30 years. This is how we see it here (in Israel) and there (the USA). Netanyahu has justly earned the title of the ‘best Israeli Statesman ever.’”

I guess that self love is a serious form of blindness and it is that blindness that has made Jewish history look like an on going disaster.