Author: Spencer Ackerman

After Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s address to AIPAC, I caught up with two representatives of J Street, the younger and more progressive pro-Israel/pro-peace lobby, to find out what they made of both the speech and its reception.

“The speech was very good overall,” said Hadar Susskind, J Street’s policy and strategy director. “She’s good on content, and she obviously knows and understands intimately the room she’s in.” Susskind gave Clinton high marks for the speech’s forceful challenge to Iranian nuclear ambitions and Palestinian incitement ahead of “the issue at hand, and the real substantive disagreement the U.S. administration and the Israeli administration have. She did a nice job of saying we’re all coming at this with the same goals.”

On Clinton’s brief reminder that the perpetuation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict damages U.S. interests in the Middle East — a notion that Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League called “dangerous and counterproductive” last week in rebuking, of all people, Gen. David Petraeus — Susskind said, “It’s unquestionably a true fact that this issue has an impact on U.S. issues with the rest of the world. You can argue that shouldn’t be the case, but you can’t really argue that it doesn’t, and I think she was merely stating the fact.”

Susskind and J Street spokeswoman Amy Spitalnick were generally pleased with the reaction Clinton got from AIPAC’s delegates, although expectations were pretty low. “I was happy she didn’t get booed,” Susskind said. “Our interest is in having a safe, secure, Jewish democratic Israel, and that’s what the U.S. is working toward.”

I asked them how they’ve been received, as AIPAC has tended to look upon J Street as something between an annoying lefty younger cousin and the insufferable kid who threatens the harmony of the family seder. Spitalnick said she walked into the conference yesterday and overheard an older couple “saying, you know, ‘How can an entire group of Jews be against AIPAC, be against Israel?’ And the wife goes, ‘Oh, you mean J Street?’ and the husband goes, ‘Of course.’

“So I go, ‘Hey, I’m J Street, and I’m here, and I am enjoying this conference and I don’t think I’m against Israel because I love Israel, and I don’t think I’m against AIPAC either, and by no means are we here to oppose AIPAC.’ And we had a nice conversation. We were waiting to get into the evening plenary, and by the end she took my card and said she was going to read our literature, learn more and hope she’s able to understand a little bit more.”

In closing her remarks to America’s largest pro-Israel lobby, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton referenced the arduous struggles of Israel’s founding generations to establish the Jewish state’s existence. Those generations “understood that the strongest among us is often the one who turned an enemy into a friend.” And she challenged “this generation of Israelis” to “take up the tradition and do what seems too hard, too dangerous and too risky.” She pledged U.S. support to “share the risks” and “shoulder the burden.”

She walked off stage to a standing ovation and hugs and kisses from AIPAC’s leadership. Late this afternoon, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will address the crowd. The ball is in his court now.

Here’s Hillary Rodham Clinton at her diplomatic best. After getting tepid applause at AIPAC for her call for a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict to ensure Israel’s future as a “democratic state” and her remark that the the “status quo” had failed, she called on all sides to “refrain from unilateral statements” and actions that “undermine the process.” That sounded first — aha! — like a reference to the “insult” Clinton said Vice President Biden got in Israel on additional Jerusalem settlement construction. But then, her voice rising in approbation, she blasted Hamas for naming a public area in Gaza after a terrorist, for “it insults the families on both sides who have loved ones.” Soon after, she praised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

When it came time to discuss the sensitive Jerusalem settlement issue, she said ”this was not about wounded pride, nor is it a judgment about the final status of Jerusalem. … This is about getting to the table … and staying there until the job is finally done.” Clinton reversed the typical framing of the dispute, saying that the diplomatic difficulty “exposes daylight between Israel and the United States that others in the region hope to exploit.”

While Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton mentioned the “longstanding American policy that does not accept continued settlements” and the obligation to tell Israel “hard truths,” her speech to the largest pro-Israel lobby group is clearly a speech about unbreakable ties between the U.S. and Israel.

In her speech to The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), she offered a strong defense of the Obama administration’s warm feelings toward Israel and even tied him to the Jewish experience by saying, “President Obama and his family have lived the diaspora experience.” Most importantly, she devoted a long section of her speech to discussing what AIPAC considers its top priority: ”The United States is determined to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons,” Clinton. “The world has seen it is Iran, not the United States, responsible for the impasse… More and more nations are finally expressing deep concerns about Iran’s intentions, and there is a growing international consensus on pressuring Iran’s leaders to change course.” Clinton held out hope for U.N. Security Council-backed “sanctions that will bite” on an intransigent Iran.

Beyond Iran, Clinton reminded AIPAC’s delegates that “we repeatedly voted against the deeply flawed Goldstone report” that blamed Israel and Hamas for human rights abuses in Gaza and Israel. “This administration will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself.”

After nearly two weeks worth of diplomatic tension, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told a room packed with thousands of American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) delegates that the U.S.-Israel bond is “rock solid” and that “it is our responsibility to give credit when it is due and to tell the truth when it is needed.” No contradiction, no tension — the U.S.-Israel bond is “a personal commitment that will never waiver,” Clinton added, and that bond, she said, obligates the U.S. to nudge Israel toward an end to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“For President Obama and for me and for this entire administration,” Clinton said, “our commitment to Israel’s security and Israel’s future is rock-solid, unwavering, enduring and forever.” It’s a value-driven relationship “for a future of peace, security and prosperity.”

Before Clinton spoke, AIPAC executive director Howard Kohr set out AIPAC’s effective diplomatic position, rejecting the “reductionist view” that the U.S.-Israel relationship depends on the resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Kohr urged “differences” to be resolved “in private,” and focused comparatively more emphasis on “the challenge to Israel’s very existence posed by Iran.” (He added for good measure, “Finally, Jerusalem is not a settlement.”)

Clinton brought the packed house at the Washington Convention Center to its feet for the first time during her speech when she referenced Iran by saying, “we know that the forces that threaten Israel also threaten the United States of America.”

There’s not really much of a way that a secretary of defense can play a role in the health care fight. But Robert Gates last night sent out a statement letting everyone know that nothing in the health care bill passed by the House last night will mean anything for the medical insurance plan used by U.S. service personnel. Did anyone suggest it would? Not really, but just in case, now you know.

As Secretary of Defense, the health and well-being of America’s men and women in uniform is my highest priority.

Our troops and their families can be re-assured that the health care reform legislation being passed by the Congress will not negatively impact the TRICARE medical insurance program, as it already meets the bill’s quality and minimum benefit standards. This was clarified by a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives yesterday and is expected to be re-affirmed by the Senate.

The President and I are committed to seeing that our troops, retirees and their families will continue to receive the best quality health care.

Who knows — a future talking point against the bill preemptively debunked?

Josh Gerstein reports on a speech Attorney General Eric Holder gave today:

“Lawyers who accept professional responsibility to protect the rule of law and the right to counsel and access to our courts, even when this requires defending unpopular positions or unpopular clients deserve …. the praise and gratitude of all Americans. It also deserves respect,” Holder said in a speech to lawyers active in pro bono work.

“Those who reaffirm our nation’s most central and enduring values do not deserve to have their own values questioned,” Holder said in his speech to a luncheon sponsored by the Pro Bono Institute. “Let me be very clear about this: those who provide counsel for the unpopular are and should be seen for what they are: they are patriots,” he said to broad applause from the crowd.

Holder may yet lose a bitter fight over trying Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in a military commission, which he opposes, so it must feel good to stand up for his people against a hysterical McCarthyite attack.

I snarked Wednesday about CIA Director Leon Panetta’s assertion that the CIA has lately dealt al-Qaeda a hefty blow, since we don’t really have the visibility into that process to independently evaluate the claim. But the Los Angeles Times’ Greg Miller has a great piece about how U.S. intelligence believes al-Qaeda is switching its signature tactical approach away from massive, simultaneous media-spectacle-ready attacks to something, well, smaller:

Al Qaeda and its affiliates have adapted their tactics to emphasize speed and probability of success over spectacle, U.S. intelligence officials believe, a shift in strategy that poses problems for spy agencies that were reorganized in recent years to stop large-scale attacks like those of Sept. 11, 2001.

The new emphasis is seen as a significant departure for a terrorist network that had focused on sophisticated plots involving synchronized strikes on multiple targets, and teams of operatives coordinating across international borders.

If that’s a problem for spy agencies, it’s one of those good problems. Al-Qaeda would not lower its ambitions away from Huge and Simultaneous and Redundant if it had a choice in the matter. If Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab is the future — and remember, he came from al-Qaeda’s Yemen affiliate, not the central, Pakistan core that has previously directed U.S.-focused attacks, an indication of pressure on the senior leadership — well, the guy didn’t even detonate correctly. Even if he had, he would have been a vicious murderer of 300 people, an order of magnitude fewer than those al-Qaeda murdered on 9/11. Compare this to worries from years ago about al-Qaeda obtaining weapons of mass destruction and we have a real measure of progress.

It’s not a substitute for clarity on whatever it is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu promised her about his commitment to peace, but Laura Rozen reports that Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in an interview today that the Jerusalem settlement expansion dust-up worked out fairly well for the peace process:

Ghattas: You took a risk in escalating the tone with Israel last week, I understand the relationship is solid but the Israelis could have said we never promised restraint on settlments in east Jerusalem,- is the risk paying off?

Clinton: I think we’re going to see the resumption of the negotiation track and that means that it is paying off because that’s our goal. Let’s get the parties into a discussion, let’s [get] the principle issues on the table and let’s begin to explore ways that we can resolve the differences.

She also poured cold water on the idea that the U.S. is trying to destabilize Netanyahu’s governing coalition.

Whether or not Sen. Lindsey Graham’s (R-S.C.) objections to a civilian trial for Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and the other 9/11 conspirators have any merit, The Wall Street Journal thinks Graham is inching closer to securing a deal with the administration to trade putting KSM before a military commission in exchange for closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay. The Journal reports that Graham has indications of support from two Republican senators for — well, actually, the Journal doesn’t say. It reports that ”Senate Democratic aides say Mr. Graham believes two other Republicans are willing to join the compromise, but they would not say who.” That’s a whip count you can believe in.

Still, the unnamed aides tell the Journal, “We’re now at the ‘getting serious’ stage.” Whether Graham can deliver Republican support to break a filibuster also depends on keeping progressive Democrats in the Senate from joining a filibuster. Those senators can be expected to be upset about a deal to military-commission Khalid Shaikh Mohammed in exchange for shutting Guantanamo’s detention facility down and moving it to Thomson prison in Illinois, where that prison will host… military commissions and indefinite detention. Meanwhile, the actual legislative vehicle for closing the Guantanamo facility is in the politically-potent Afghanistan war-funding request, raising questions about whether Graham’s deal is necessary in the first place for getting the money through.

Finally, shut out of this deal is the Justice Department, which, you know, might have some issues with this prospective deal.

The Quartet of major international players attempting to broker an Israeli-Palestinian negotiated settlement — the European Union, the U.S., Russia, and the United Nations — have issued a new statement lauding George Mitchell’s brokered “proximity talks” between the two parties, and calling for those talks to yield direct negotiations with the goal of an independent Palestinian state in 24 months. Well, that’s 24 months from whenever those direct talks (to which neither the Israelis or the Palestinians have yet agreed) actually begin. The statement endorses Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s call for talks “without pre-conditions.” But then it gets more troublesome for Netanyahu:

Recalling that the annexation of East Jerusalem is not recognized by the international community, the Quartet underscores that the status of Jerusalem is a permanent status issue that must be resolved through negotiations between the parties and condemns the decision by the government of Israel to advance planning for new housing units in East Jerusalem. The Quartet re-affirms its intention to closely monitor developments in Jerusalem and to keep under consideration additional steps that may be required to address the situation on the ground.

So much for Jackson Diehl’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” on Jerusalem settlement construction.

As an update to my piece this morning, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday called Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, who’s traveling in Russia, to discuss Clinton’s demand that Netanyahu reverse the East Jerusalem settlement expansion that Israel announced last week. That planned expansion resulted in nearly two weeks’ worth of diplomatic tension that both sides are spooling back, although Clinton scotched Mideast envoy George Mitchell’s trip to the region as a sign of her displeasure with Netanyahu.

So what did Netanyahu tell Clinton? No one knows right now, but Mitchell’s trip is back on. Jackson Diehl at The Washington Post is under the impression that the Israelis are proposing a don’t-ask-don’t-tell bargain on settlement construction: the Israelis pledge not to build in East Jerusalem for another couple of years; the U.S. pledges not to be the strictest building inspector. Who knows? It’s not implausible, but Diehl isn’t exactly transparent about whether he’s reporting this out or analyzing what’s going on.

Interestingly, President Obama’s poll numbers among the Israeli public are rebounding, according to a new Ha’aretz poll, with most seeing him as “fair or friendly.”

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during her visit to Moscow on Thursday (EPA/ZUMApress.com)

When Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton addresses the America Israel Public Affairs Committee conference on Monday morning, she’ll be addressing a global audience eager for clues about the future of the Mideast peace process and the U.S.-Israel relationship after last week’s diplomatic tumult over Jerusalem settlements. Those in the peace camp wonder if the natural impulse to defuse the tension will lead Clinton to paper over the Israeli government’s plans for continuing settlement construction in Jerusalem — or whether she will continue her challenge to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, also scheduled to speak at the conference, to demonstrate his commitment to peace.

Image by: Matt Mahurin

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The initial announcement last week — during Vice President Biden’s goodwill visit to Israel — of an expansion of 1,600 new housing units in the Ramat Shlomo neighborhood of Jerusalem has obscured even greater settlement construction in the planning stages. Peace Now, the leading Israeli progressive non-government organization, released a report last week documenting “18 plans to build 7,094 new housing units for Jewish population in East Jerusalem, and another 1,450 hotel rooms,” as well as a still-unpublished plan to build another 2,337 units on top of that. The construction occurs in areas of Jerusalem seized by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War and annexed in 1980, a move that the United Nations rejected as illegal.

Clinton said the announcement of the Ramat Shlomo settlement expansion occurring during Biden’s visit was “an insult to the United States.” So far, however, Netanyahu has not backed away from the Ramat Shlomo plan, despite more than a week’s worth of diplomatic acrimony. And no Obama official has yet publicly challenged Netanyahu on the additional settlement expansions Peace Now documented.

“Clinton’s speech should clearly explain, to Israel and to its friends in America, why settlements in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem are so destructive,” Peace Now spokesman Ori Nir said. “She should say that they both prejudge the outcome of the negotiations and that they send a message to the Palestinians, which reverberates worldwide, that Israel’s government is not serious about peace.”

A map of settlements in East Jersusalem. Click to enlarge. (Courtesy of Peace Now)

The Obama administration took office in the wake of Israel’s operations against Hamas in Gaza, a move that heightened Palestinian reluctance to return to negotiations for an independent state. Obama’s team vowed to breathe diplomatic life into the process, and pressed the new Netanyahu to agree to a freeze on settlement construction as a gesture of good faith. Instead, Netanyahu resisted for months, stalling momentum for the process and creating bitterness between Jerusalem and Washington for which each blamed the other. In November, Netanyahu agreed to a partial freeze on settlement construction for ten months that excluded East Jerusalem — further angering the Palestinians. On the eve of Biden’s visit, both sides agreed to “indirect” talks heavily mediated by administration envoy George Mitchell, who scrapped a trip to the region after the Ramat Shlomo announcement.

Speaking in Russia on Thursday, Clinton indicated that the Obama administration would move forward with a rescheduled Mitchell visit in the near future even if Netanyahu did not back down on Ramat Shlomo. “Our goals remain the same,” Clinton told reporters. “It is to re-launch negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians on a path that will lead to a two-state solution. Nothing has happened that in any way affects our commitment to pursuing that.”

Amjad Atallah, director of the New America Foundation’s Middle East Task Force and a former legal adviser to Palestinian peace negotiators, pointed out that the Palestinians and the Arab world at large have felt let down by Obama’s inability to break the diplomatic stalemate. “Having an administration that so obviously wants peace but seems so obviously unable to deliver it is more disheartening than thinking the United States was a bad guy to begin with,” Atallah said in an email. “Having said that, the love in the love affair (even if temporarily sour) is still there.”

Similarly sour are the feelings between the Obama administration and the more conservative wings of the pro-Israel community. That sourness took an unexpected turn at an unexpected target this week.  On Tuesday, Gen. David Petraeus, the commander of U.S. troops in the Middle East and South Asia, testified to a Senate panel that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict “foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel,” destabilizes moderate regimes and gives a pretext to extremists. In response, the Anti-Defamation League’s longtime national director, Abraham Foxman, called Petraeus’ comments “dangerous and counterproductive.” It is the first time Petraeus has been criticized by a lobby group since the progressive activist organization MoveOn questioned his integrity during his 2007 Iraq testimony.

Most observers expect Clinton to sound decidedly reconciliatory notes in her AIPAC address. Daniel Levy, a former Israeli peace negotiator who works with Atallah at the New America Foundation, encouraged Clinton to pivot to productive moves on peace negotiations — especially the presentation of the administration’s own peace plan. “Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak has often drawn the analogy between ending the conflict and cutting off the tail of a dog – in other words, you do both in one chop, not incremental snips,” Levy said. “When it is ready to lead rather than be led, the administration should place a clear choice of an implementation plan for two states in front of Israel and stick to that plan.” Levy added that Netanyahu’s embrace of settlement expansion “may strengthen American resolve to put forward such a plan.”

A collaborative affair. Politico’s Marin Cogan IM’d me to say Rep. Steve Cohen was commemorating Alex Chilton on the House floor. So I called Cohen’s office for the text of his remarks. Before I received them, though, Alex Pareene tweeted that there was video floating around, thanks to an alert CSPAN producer, and then young Dylan Matthews squared the circle.

Rest in peace, Alex. Good work, Rep. Cohen.

Tags: Alex Chilton, Alex Pareene, Dylan Matthews, Marin Cogan, Obituary, RIP, Steve Cohen

The Anti-Defamation League takes the unexpected step of criticizing Gen. David Petraeus, the widely respected commander of U.S. troops in the Middle East and South Asia, for his recent comments to the Senate Armed Services Committee that lack of progress on Israeli-Palestinian peace sets the “strategic context” for U.S. security fortunes in the region. “Gen. Petraeus has simply erred in linking the challenges faced by the U.S. and coalition forces in the region to a solution of the Israeli-Arab conflict, and blaming extremist activities on the absence of peace and the perceived U.S. favoritism for Israel,” the ADL’s Abraham Foxman says in a just-released statement. “This linkage is dangerous and counterproductive.”

Not quite a General Betray-Us ad, but this is the first time a lobby group has gone after Petraeus since MoveOn attacked his integrity during the 2007 Iraq debate. All Petraeus did was acknowledge the uncontroversial truth that “conflict foments anti-American sentiment, due to a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel. Arab anger over the Palestinian question limits the strength and depth of U.S. partnerships with governments and peoples in [the Middle East and South Asia] and weakens the legitimacy of moderate regimes in the Arab world. Meanwhile, al-Qaida and other militant groups exploit that anger to mobilize support. The conflict also gives Iran influence in the Arab world through its clients, Lebanese Hizballah and Hamas.” For this, Foxman labels Petraeus’ views “dangerous” while taking care to call him a “patriot and hero.”

The ADL’s full statement:

The assumptions Gen. Petraeus presented to the Senate Armed Services Committee wrongly attribute “insufficient progress” in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process and “a perception of U.S. favoritism for Israel” as significantly impeding the U.S. military mission in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan and in dealing with the Iranian influences in the region. It is that much more of a concern to hear this coming from such a great American patriot and hero.

The General’s assertions lead to the illusory conclusion that if only there was a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the U.S. could successfully complete its mission in the region.

Gen. Petraeus has simply erred in linking the challenges faced by the U.S. and coalition forces in the region to a solution of the Israeli-Arab conflict, and blaming extremist activities on the absence of peace and the perceived U.S. favoritism for Israel. This linkage is dangerous and counterproductive.

Whenever the Israeli-Arab conflict is made a focal point, Israel comes to be seen as the problem. If only Israel would stop settlements, if only Israel would talk with Hamas, if only Israel would make concessions on refugees, if only it would share Jerusalem, everything in the region would then fall into line.

I’ve confirmed with Pakistan’s Washington embassy that Gen. Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, the chief of staff of the Pakistani Army, will arrive in D.C. early next week. He’ll spend four days in town, probably joining Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi for Wednesday’s big bilateral talks at the State Department, and definitely meeting with Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Kayani’s closest American counterpart. My understanding is that Kayani will also meet with Defense Secretary Robert Gates, but the general’s schedule has yet to be finalized. It’s Kayani’s first visit to Washington since last year, and an opportunity for the Obama administration to press one of the most important men representing one of the most important institutions in Pakistan about just what’s behind Pakistan’s recent arrests of Afghan Taliban figures.

I’m not there, but Twitterborne images of openly gay Lt. Dan Choi, a New York National Guardsman, show him and a comrade leading a group of activists to the White House gates in protest of the military’s ban on open gay service. Joe Sudbay of AmericaBlog, who’s on scene, tweets that Choi handcuffed himself to the gates and led the crowd in the pledge of allegiance.

Across town, Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) held yet another hearing on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” this one featuring the accounts of two young officers who, like Choi, were forced out of the military for their sexual orientation despite their sterling military records. Levin commented:

Cases like these make it clear to me why we should repeal this discriminatory policy.  I did not find the arguments used to justify Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell convincing when it took effect in 1993, and they are less so now, as made evident by the experiences of Mr. Almy and Ms. Kopfstein.  What matters is a willingness and ability to perform the mission – not an individual’s sexual orientation.

Via Robert Mackey at The New York Times, CNN obtains a new audiotaped message from Yemen-based Anwar al-Awlaki. He aims a section of the tape at challenging American Muslims to choose between their country and their faith.

This probably wouldn’t count as renouncing his citizenship, though, which is something of a formalized process.

The conventional wisdom in Washington about the U.S.-Israel spat is well expressed by this Josh Rogin post and this Ben Smith post. Basically, people think the Obama administration messed up by publicly recognizing that Prime Minister Netanyahu insulted the U.S. by moving forward with settlement expansion in East Jerusalem while Vice President Biden visited Israel last week. And maybe that’s true; after all, Netanyahu isn’t backing away from his government’s plan to build new houses for Israelis in parts of Jerusalem that the U.N. has held for 30 years do not legally belong to Israel.

But Netanyahu’s obstructionism could be pushing the administration into a more intensified phase of diplomatic effort on Mideast peacemaking, and one that benefits the Palestinians more than the Netanyahu government. According to The New York Times, the Obama team is considering putting forward its own peace plan — which would effectively dare Netanyahu to oppose it. Key graf:

After Washington condemned the housing announcement, Mr. Netanyahu apologized for its timing, but has so far not responded to American demands to rescind the building plan. The series of tense, back-channel interchanges between the two governments, in the words of one administration official, demonstrated to White House officials that “the current status quo won’t work, and won’t get us anywhere.”

As the Times points out, putting forward a peace plan creates a domestic political problem for Netanyahu, who’d have to decide “between the peace talks and the right-wing elements of his coalition” or whether to form a new government with the more centrist Kadima party, which has positioned itself much closer to the Obama administration and the peace process. For Netanyahu to side with the rightist elements of his coalition would place Israel in deeper opposition to the U.S., which is not a safe place in Israeli politics. If, on the other hand, Netanyahu opted to more fulsomely embrace both the peace process and Israel’s American patron, that would be a win-win from Obama’s perspective.

Gen. Stanley McChrystal has long made clear that the next major offensive by NATO and Afghan forces in Afghanistan, following the reclamation of Marja in Helmand, will be Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban. With Marja barely in the “hold” phase, though, it came as a surprise in McChrystal’s briefing yesterday when the commanding general of NATO forces told reporters that “instead of putting a date certain on which there would be a climactic military operation, I tell you, that process has already begun.”

What he meant was that he’s seeding the bed with local leaders to enter the city, so that his forces enjoy maximum political legitimacy when they arrive. The push into Kandahar won’t look like Operation Moshtarek, he elaborated:

What you are going to see in the months ahead, without giving too much detail, is a number of activities to shape the political relationships in and around Kandahar. As you know, it’s a complex grouping of tribes and then other relationships that define how power is shared in Kandahar, and that’s traditional, although it has become a little bit damaged — and let me put it this way, it’s become very damaged and mutated in the last years.

So one of the things we’ll be doing in the shaping is working with political leaders to try to get an outcome that makes sense. That would then be supported by security operations, and that will, in some cases, be increased partnering inside the city with the Afghan National Police. We intend to put more forces in there to get a better presence and better support to their internal security.

But then in the environs — what we call the environs, the districts, the places like Zari, Panjwai, Arghandab, [inaudible], we are increasing our forces. We have already increased our forces somewhat, and we will continue to increase Afghan national security forces and coalition forces in the months ahead.

If you control the environs around Kandahar, you go a long way to controlling Kandahar. And so unlike a Marja operation, where there was a D-day and an H-hour for part of the operation, it is more likely that this will be a series of activities that target different parts of it to increase that security.

(Special bonus point for what you might call meta-Afghanistan obsessives: McChrystal’s comment about the “mutated” power structure in Kandahar appears to represent the first time McChrystal has tempered a picture of Afghanistan as a tribal society. There’s a heated meta-debate going on about whether such a sociological designation withstands critical scrutiny. Anyway.)