Benjamin Netanyahu

Just how in the tank for Barack Obama is CNN's Piers Morgan?

During an interview with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak Wednesday, Morgan actually said to his guest concerning Iran, "President Obama clearly would prefer not to see Israel take any action before the election" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Newsweek's Eleanor Clift and National Review's Rich Lowry got into quite a heated debate on PBS's McLaughlin Group this weekend.

With the topic being President Obama's Middle East policy, after much back and forth, Lowry scolded, "If you’re honest about it, that is your bottom line. You are okay with [Iran] getting a nuclear weapon" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Newsweek's Eleanor Clift got a bit of a tongue-lashing from US News and World Report's Mort Zuckerman on this weekend's McLaughlin Group.

After Clift predictably praised President Obama's press conference last week, Zuckerman aggressively shot back, "That's nonsense to say the Israelis don't think through the consequences of war! That’s ridiculous!" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Chris Matthews doesn't just hate American conservatives.

On MSNBC's Morning Joe Wednesday, the Hardball host said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should "stay out of our elections" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Appearing as a panel member on the syndicated Chris Matthews Show on Sunday, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius predicted that President Obama would be more aggressive in taking on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a second term, as he cited the  belief by Obama's people that the President "has had success" in Middle East policy so far. (Video below)

Ignatius seemed to go along with the idea that President Obama has a "strong foreign policy record" as he ended up asking rhetorically:

The New York Times learned Thursday that its biases have consequences.

In a letter from his senior adviser Ron Dermer obtained by the Jerusalem Post, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu scornfully declined the Gray Lady's offer to write an op-ed due to the paper's long history of anti-Israel sentiments:

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who poses as a tough friend of Israel, offensively referred to the “Israel lobby” in his Wednesday column “Newt, Mitt, Bibi and Vladimir."

After bashing Newt Gingrich for suggesting the Palestinians are an “invented” people, Friedman reiterated the usual talking points in support of a Palestinian state, but with a hostile and paranoid twist.

On Wednesday, New York Times reporter Isabel Kershner covered an embarrassing gaffe involving President Obama – a private conversation between Obama and French President Nicholas Sarkozy, in which both men were overheard insulting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Yet somehow the paper managed to omit Obama from its headline: “In Overheard Comments, Sarkozy Calls Netanyahu a ‘Liar.’”

It's as if they think it's 1991 -- or even 1961.

Drudge is currently linking to a "trash talk" story at Ynetnews.com about how, with a microphone still on, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "is a liar." U.S. President Barack Obama's response, also audible, was: "You're fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!" That's not necessarily the most disgraceful aspect of the story. What follows after the jump, which explains why the story is just coming out now, is at least as reprehensible:

Message to Ed Schultz -- if you are going to weigh in on the news, and in braying, scorched-earth fashion, it helps to pay attention to the news.

Case in point -- Schultz's fantasy-based claim on his radio show Monday about US relations with Israel since President Obama took office. (audio and video clips after page break)

Friday at the UN (text here), Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas accused Israel of engaging in "ethnic cleansing."

Earlier, in a speech to 200 supposed "senior representatives of the Palestinian community in the U.S." (would that include Gaza flotilla organizers and Barack Obama pals Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn? Just askin'), Abbas declared, as relayed by Ynetnews.com, that "They talk to us about the Jewish state, but I respond to them with a final answer: We shall not recognize a Jewish state."

Given that there would hardly be a point to covering Abbas's speech if readers knew of the just-cited statements, it's hardly surprising that the press is also in a non-recognition mode:

NBC's David Gregory on Sunday did his darnedest to get Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to say Israel has had no better friend in the White House than President Obama.

As the "Meet the Press" host continued to force the issue, Netanyahu finally said, "David, you're trying to throw me under the bus of American politics. And guess what, I'm not going to be thrown there" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On Wednesday's Last Word on MSNBC, substitute host Chris Hayes of the left-wing Nation magazine used conservative talk radio host Glenn Beck's rally in Israel as an occasion to blame conservative Israelis like Prime Minister Netanyahu for the absence of a peace agreement with the Palestinians and asserted that it was "dangerous" for such Israelis to ally with America's Christian Zionist movement.

NewsBusters previously reported that CNN's Fareed Zakaria had met with President Obama face-to-face to discuss foreign policy. Obama's other reported "source" of information on foreign policy, New York Times foreign affairs columnist Thomas Friedman, mocked Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu Sunday on CNN, and added that he should have dutifully obeyed the demands Obama outlined in his recent Mideast speech.

According to a May 11 New York Times article, Friedman was one of two foreign policy journalists "sounded out" by President Obama for information on foreign affairs. The other, CNN's Fareed Zakaria, has previously criticized Israel's prime minister for not agreeing to the Israeli-Palestinian borders laid out by Obama in his Mideast speech.

[Click here for audio. Video below the break.]

Just how in bed with Barack Obama is Fareed Zakaria?

On the Sunday CNN program bearing his name, the host began the show by saying Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should have thanked the President for his Middle East peace proposal given earlier this month (video follows with transcript and commentary):

After proclaiming last week that he would be "surprised if anyone in Israel" objected to Obama's Middle East speech, CNN's Fareed Zakaria ripped Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu for his refusal to accept the President Obama's plan for Israeli-Palestinian borders. On CNN's In the Arena Thursday, Zakaria expounded upon his Washington Post op-ed criticizing Netanyahu, which NewsBusters reported on.

Zakaria has admitted to having face-to-face meetings recently with President Obama to discuss foreign affairs, and revealed that information before Obama's Middle East speech. Zakaria appeared on CNN before and after the speech last Thursday to give his commentary, talked about the speech on his Sunday show, and then wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post criticizing Netanyahu for his stubbornness.

[Click here for audio. Video below the break.]

 In the opinion article, "Where Netanyahu Fails Himself and Israel," in the May 25 Washington Post, CNN anchor Fareed Zakaria blasted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for rejecting President Obama’s peace proposal invoking Israel’s pre-1967 lines. Zakaria compared the Israeli prime minister to former Soviet Union Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, known as "Mr. Nyet" for his stubbornness in dealing with the U.S.

Zakaria also charged that Netanyahu "might sound like Churchill, he acts like a local ward boss, far more interested in holding onto his post than using it to secure Israel’s future," and that Israel "continues to rule millions of Palestinians in serf-like conditions - entitled to neither a vote nor a country." Zakaria seemed to forget that, while Palestinians outside the boundaries of Israel who are not Israeli citizens do not get to vote in Israeli parliamentary elections, they did get to cast ballots for their own parliament in February 2006, with the terrorist group Hamas winning a narrow victory.

New York Times Jerusalem bureau chief Ethan Bronner inaccurately portrayed on Thursday how Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was greeted on his return to Israel after a lively visit to America, which included a tense meeting with President Obama and a triumphant speech to Congress. Examining the trip solely from the angle of Netanyahu's refusal to offer territorty concessions in the name of peace talks, Bronner found failure: "In Israel, Premier’s U.S. Trip Dims Hopes for Advancing Peace Talks." The online headline was worse: "Israelis See Netanyahu Trip as Diplomatic Failure."

Which "Israelis" are the Times talking about? In the headline, substitute "Some liberal Israeli newspaper columnists" for "Israelis," and it would be accurate and also signal the pointlessness of the story. Is it news that some liberal Israelis oppose Netanyahu and his refusal to accept the pre-1967 boundary lines demanded by the United Nations and other anti-Israel entities?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel returned from Washington on Wednesday to a nearly unanimous assessment among Israelis that despite his forceful defense of Israel’s security interests, hopes were dashed that his visit might advance peace negotiations with the Palestinians.

New York Magazine apparently believes that opposing foreign aid is literally xenophobic - rooted in irrational fear of foreigners - and is willing to engage in some pretty sketchy journalistic practices to make its case. Those are a pair of lessons Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., learned on Tuesday.

For many in the media Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu's reaction to Barack Obama insistence that his country return to the 1967 borders was out of bounds. ABC's Christiane Amanpour declared she was "stunned" by his "public lecture" of the President and NBC's Andrea Mitchell hissed, "it was really rude," and charged he treated Obama "like a school boy." Mitchell didn't reserve her criticism to Netanyahu as she even went after Republicans who dared to take his side, accusing them of "piling on the President."

(video montage after the jump)

At the end of Sunday's Meet the Press, NBC chief foreign affairs correspondent Andrea Mitchell scolded Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for daring to criticize President Obama's call for Israel to return to 1967 borders: "...he criticized the President, and in such a fashion! He lectured him in the Oval Office....basically treating him like a school boy."

Mitchell went on to declare: "People even who work for Netanyahu, some Israeli officials, told him later that he went too far. That it was, it was really rude and that there would be blowback to this." The leading voice of criticism in Israel was Netanyahu's liberal political opponent, Tzipi Livini, who also called on the Prime Minister to resign.

Saturday’s lead from New York Times reporter Steven Lee Myers did its best to paint Israel’s conservative, pro-security prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu as being disingenuous and stubborn in the face of President Obama’s reasonable offer for Israel to give up land to the Palestinians: "Israeli Leader Rebuffs Obama On ‘67 Borders – Both Denounce Hamas – Meeting at White House Underscores Barriers to Peace Process."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel told President Obama on Friday that he shared his vision for a peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and then promptly listed a series of nonnegotiable conditions that have kept the two sides at an impasse for years.

You've heard the paranoid, anti-Semitic claim that Jews control the press in this country?

Well, the Daily Beast's Andrew Sullivan believes the Israelis got United States media representatives to spin President Obama's Middle East speech as an attack on the Jewish state:

Fareed Zakaria said Sunday the speech President Obama gave last week about conditions in the Middle East was "fair" and "balanced."

As the host of CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" might have advised the current White House resident on its contents, this came as no surprise (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Most Americans are probably familiar with outspoken Kiss star Gene Simmons, but likely didn't know that he was born and partially raised in Israel.

With this in mind, when he was asked by CNBC's Jane Wells what he thought about President Obama's suggestion that Israel's borders be redrawn to pre-1967 levels, Simmons replied, "He has no f--king idea what the world is like because he doesn’t have to live there" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On Friday's Early Show, CBS called upon Clinton administration alumnus Jamie Rubin to act as a flack for the current Obama White House and to comment on the President's speech on the Middle East. Rubin lamented the President's poor approval rating in Israel: "Unfortunately- and this is unfortunate for everyone, I think...Obama doesn't have the huge popularity in Israel that, perhaps, President Bush had."

Anchor Erica Hill brought on the husband of ABC host Christiane Amanpour and first identified him as "Assistant Secretary of State Jamie Rubin, who is now executive editor of the Bloomberg View [the new opinion section of Bloomberg News] " However, she failed to mention at any point in the interview that Rubin served under former President Clinton, unlike Nicholas Burns, who appeared later in the program. Hill clearly identified him as "undersecretary of state under President George W. Bush."

President Obama’s much-hyped speech Thursday on the Middle East called for a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians and endorsing Israel’s pre-1967 borders as the starting point for the negotiations. The New York Times’s lead story Thursday morning by Helene Cooper and Ethan Bronner, "Focus On Obama As Tensions Soar Across Mideast," set the table by sharpening the focus on Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s "unyielding" recalcitrance as the main "stumbling blocks" to negotiations.

Mr. Obama, who is set to address Americans -- and, more significantly, Muslims around the world -- from the State Department on Thursday morning, may yet have something surprising up his sleeve. One administration official said that there remained debate about whether Mr. Obama would formally endorse Israel’s pre-1967 borders as the starting point for negotiations over a Palestinian state, a move that would send an oratorical signal that the United States expected Israel to make concessions.

Times reporting from Jerusalem is often hostile toward the conservative security-conscious Netanyahu, while whitewashing the terrorist origin of the Palestinian militants of Hamas, and there were traces of that on Thursday’s report from Washington.

"Meet the Press" host David Gregory said Friday there are "prominent views within Israel" that support President Obama's controversial Mideast peace ideas expressed the day before.

When asked by MSNBC's Joe Scarborough, "What major Israeli public figures have come out supporting the President's speech," Gregory couldn't name one (video follows with transcript and commentary):