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| Reference ID | Created | Released | Classification | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 09TELAVIV457 | 2009-02-26 12:12 | 2010-11-28 18:06 | CONFIDENTIAL | Embassy Tel Aviv |
VZCZCXRO3204
PP RUEHROV
DE RUEHTV #0457/01 0571219
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
P 261219Z FEB 09
FM AMEMBASSY TEL AVIV
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 0661
INFO RUEHXK/ARAB ISRAELI COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 TEL AVIV 000457
SIPDIS
E.O. 12958: DECL: 02/26/2019
TAGS: PREL PGOV KPAL IS IR SY
SUBJECT: CODEL CARDIN DISCUSSES IRAN, SYRIA, PALESTINIANS,
AND ISRAEL ELECTION WITH BENJAMIN NETANYAHU
Classified By: DCM Luis G. Moreno, Reason 1.4 (b) (d)
¶1. (C) SUMMARY During their trip to Israel, CODEL Cardin
discussed Iran, Syria, Israel-Palestinian negotiations, and
the Israeli elections with Likud Party leader and candidate
for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu described a
nuclear Iran as the greatest threat facing Israel, and urged
strong economic sanctions backed by a viable military option
to confront a problem that he said threatened the region and
could prove a "tipping point" in world history. Describing
his approach to "economic peace" with the Palestinians,
Netanyahu suggested he would cut through bureaucratic
obstacles to Palestinian economic development to build a
"pyramid" from the "bottom up" that would strengthen the
Palestinian Authority, and offer the Palestinians a viable
alternative to radicalism. Netanyahu expressed support for
the concept of land swaps, and emphasized that he did not
want to govern the West Bank and Gaza but rather to stop
attacks from being launched from there. Netanyahu suggested
Syrian interest in peace negotiations with Israel were really
overtures to the United States, and described the Syrians as
firmly in the Iranian camp. Netanyahu expressed confidence
that President Peres would offer him rather than Kadima Party
leader Livni the opportunity of forming a coalition because
the bloc of center-right/right wing parties in the new
Knesset amounted to 65 seats. Netanyahu said his desire
would be to form a unity government with Kadima, but would
not agree to a rotating prime ministership. END SUMMARY
¶2. (SBU) As part of their February 14-17 visit to Israel,
CODEL Cardin met with Likud Party leader and candidate for
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on February 16 in
Jerusalem. Netanyahu was at the center of intense political
speculation about the formation of a governing coalition
following the extremely close Israeli national election of
February 10, which did not produce a clear winner. The CODEL
met with Netanyahu following meetings the previous day with
President Peres, and prior to meetings later in the day with
Prime Minister Olmert and Palestinian Authority Prime
Minister Fayyad.
----
IRAN
----
¶3. (C) Netanyahu quickly launched into his oft-stated
position that Iran is the greatest threat facing Israel.
Noting that "Persia" already had two bases on the
Mediterranean (referring to Hizballah and Hamas), Netanyahu
complained that Iran's "tentacles" were choking Israel, and
that a new one grew back whenever one was cut off. Netanyahu
charged that Iran was developing nuclear weapons with the
express purpose of wiping out Israel, and described
preventing Iran from developing a nuclear capability as
Israel's highest policy priority. Netanyahu described five
threats that he saw emanating from Iranian nuclear
development: a direct threat to Israel; a direct threat to
other regional states; increased terrorist power under an
Iranian nuclear umbrella; a Middle East nuclear arms race;
and a destabilized Middle East, with Arab regimes
"terrified" of Iran in his view. Netanyahu, commenting that
he normally avoided political jargon, pointed to one phrase
that he said applied to this issue - "a tipping point."
According to Netanyahu, if Iran develops a nuclear weapon
capability it will "topple the peace process" and "change the
history of the world."
¶4. (C) When asked what advice he offered to the United
States, Netanyahu reported that he had spoken to
then-candidate Obama and said the method was less important
than the goal, and asked rhetorically whether the President
would allow Iran to "cross the nuclear threshold ... on his
watch." Netanyahu suggested there were many ways to pressure
Iran, which he saw as economically weak at the moment due to
plunging oil prices at the same time that the U.S. President
had strong international backing, a situation Netanyahu
described as the opposite of the past few years. He said he
would look forward (as Prime Minister) to discussing with
President Obama concrete measures to be taken against Iran.
Netanyahu said these would not be a substitute for
Palestinian negotiations, but that any result from such
negotiations would be "washed away" by Iran's attaining a
nuclear bomb.
¶5. (C) When asked how Iran could be isolated, Netanyahu
suggested a blockade as one possibility. The nuclear program
could be stopped if the U.S. led the international community
to "ratchet up" economic sanctions, but that these sanctions
would only work if Iran knew that the U.S. military option
remained viable. Netanyahu said he did not object to a U.S.
dialogue with Iran provided the talks were close ended,
perhaps two months, with fixed results, otherwise Iran would
TEL AVIV 00000457 002 OF 003
"take you to the cleaners." He said he agreed with the
Europeans' urging the U.S. to postpone any talks until past
the Iranian elections in June. Netanyahu said he did not
know for certain how close Iran was to developing a nuclear
weapons capability, but that "our experts" say Iran was
probably only one or two years away and that was why they
wanted open ended negotiations. He again urged "tough
negotiations" if military means were not used (and added
that Special Envoy Mitchell was both nice and tough.)
Netanyahu described the Iranian regime as crazy, retrograde,
and fanatical, with a Messianic desire to speed up a violent
"end of days." That was not the whole country, however, in
his view, as he said that "75 percent of the Iranian people"
oppose the regime, but that it governed with terror and would
be hard to overthrow. There was no single view from
Iranians, therefore, but there was from the powers that
dominate. He reiterated that strong economic action could
stop their nuclear development or possibly even bring down
the regime - as could "the U.S. military process."
-----------------
PALESTINIAN TRACK
-----------------
¶6. (C) Turning to peace with the Palestinians, Netanyahu
said the reason the process had not worked so far was that
while 70 percent of Israelis were willing to make
concessions, the same number were convinced that there was no
real Palestinian partner. Netanyahu warned that when Israel
left Lebanon is created a first Iranian base, that when it
left Gaza it created a second Iranian base, and if Israel
"promised" a third retreat from the West Bank it would see
the same results. There were three options, according to
Netanyahu - withdrawing to the 1967 borders (that would "get
terror, not peace"); doing nothing ("just as bad"); or
"rapidly building a pyramid from the ground up." Netanyahu
suggested a rapid move to develop the West Bank economically,
including "unclogging" bureaucratic "bottlenecks." He
promised to "take charge personally" (as Prime Minister) to
facilitate this bureaucratic reform, which would occur in
tandem with political negotiations and cooperation with
Jordan to build up Palestinian Authority security capacity.
Netanyahu noted that there were larger demonstrations
against the Gaza operation in Madrid and London than in the
West Bank. He said this was because the West Bankers
recognized that Hamas represents the prospect of "violent,
crazy" people in charge of their society; they should be
offered real alternatives in order to have the strength to
resist the radicals.
¶7. (C) Netanyahu said his "new approach" would also
include not continuing to fund a "bloated" Palestinian
bureaucracy. It would be aimed at direct development.
Netanyahu, noting that he had previously "turned around" the
Israeli economy (as Finance Minister), gave one example of a
problem he would fix as an electric powerline in the West
Bank that was held up by conflicting and competing agencies.
He said this powerline was needed and would create jobs, but
was held up not because the Palestinians were targeted, but
because that was how the Israeli bureaucracy worked for
everyone, including Israelis. When asked whether these
reforms could include room to modify security arrangements,
Netanyahu agreed that some of what the GOI calls security is
in fact bureaucracy. Pointing to what he described as strong
but unpublicized trade between Haifa port and Iraq via
Jordan, he suggested assembly points could be set up in the
West Bank for some goods, which would create thousands of
jobs. This would not be a substitute for a political
settlement, according to Netanyahu, but economic prosperity
would make peace possible, as occurred in Northern Ireland.
-----
SYRIA
-----
¶8. (C) Netanyahu said he was actually more optimistic about
dealing with the Palestinians than with Syria, because he was
confident that the Palestinian Authority wants Iran and its
proxies out. He said he was less sanguine about Syria, which
he complained straddles the fence all the time. The Syrians
might "talk about" a new (U.S.) relationship, but he did not
see them disconnecting from Iran. Netanyahu suggested that
Israel "giving up" the Golan would just result in assurances
that Syria would later "tear up." Describing King Hussein as
heroic, and noting that the King came from his "death bed" in
1998 to get then-Prime Minister Netanyahu and
then-Palestinian Authority Chairman Arafat to reach an
agreement at the Wye River talks, Netanyahu said that when
Saddam Hussein took Kuwait, even King Hussein "snuggled up"
to the Iraqi leader out of necessity. Such is the reality in
the Middle East.
TEL AVIV 00000457 003 OF 003
-------------------
COALITION FORMATION
-------------------
¶9. (C) Despite finishing one Knesset seat behind Kadima and
its candidate Tzipi Livni in the February 10 Israeli national
elections, Netanyahu expressed complete confidence that
President Peres would offer him the opportunity to form a
government because the bloc of center-right/right wing
parties in the new Knesset has 65 seats compared to Livni's
potential bloc of 45 seats for center-left/left wing parties
plus 11 seats for Arab parties. Netanyahu said his desire
would be to form a unity government with Kadima, but would
not agree to a rotating prime ministership with Ms. Livni.
He explained that the one time Israel had a rotation came as
a result of an exact tie between the two political
coalitions, but this time the right wing bloc was much
larger.
¶10. (C) When asked about Avigdor Lieberman's Yisrael
Beiteinu party, Netanyahu reminded the CODEL that Kadima had
in fact included Lieberman in their government in its earlier
stages. Netanyahu stressed repeatedly that he preferred a
unity government, and said the large security and economic
problems facing Israel called for the strength that a unity
government would offer. Livni "collapsed" left- wing votes
(from Labor and other parties) to score a one vote margin for
Kadima over Likud in the elections, but took no votes away
from the right, according to Netanyahu. When asked what he
might offer to Kadima, Netanyahu suggested Kadima would get a
few key ministerial portfolios, but did not elaborate. He
said that he while he was convinced a rotating Prime
Ministership would not happen, he was confident a unity
government could. Netanyahu said the government would not
include the Arab parties.
¶11. (C) Netanyahu promised that as Prime Minister his
government would not "go back" to unilateral withdrawals, and
would have a clear focus. On the economy, he said Israel was
not a huge economy such as the United States or China, and
that he would be able to turn things around quickly, as "a
small share of a declining market" was big for Israel. Asked
about settlements, Netanyahu noted that he had not
established any new settlements when he was Prime Minister.
Half of the West Bank, the area east of the ridge line and
the Jordan Valley, is virtually unpopulated and only contains
a few settlements. In the other half, Israeli and
Palestinian populations are intertwined. Once the
Palestinian Authority develops into a real partner it will be
possible to negotiate an agreement over territory,
settlements and "refined" Palestinian sovereignty without an
army or control over air space and borders. Netanyahu said
it would be too hard to negotiate agreements over Jerusalem
and refugees until the other issues are resolved. Claiming
that many Palestinians accept this point, Netanyahu said he
was not talking about a delaying tactic but rather a
temporary freeze, adding that he hoped PA Prime Minister
Fayyad would still be around since Fayyad also thinks along
economic lines.
¶12. (SBU) As an example of economic development, Netanyahu
spoke about expanding faith tourism. He said that it "defied
imagination" that the well-known site on the Jordan River
where John the Baptist baptized Jesus was "paralyzed" by a
GOI/PA jurisdiction dispute. With Jericho only a mile away,
Netanyahu offered to give an "easy", secure "envelope" for
transporting tourists from the Galilee to this part of the
West Bank. That would lead to "co-production" that would
provide large revenue streams of tourist dollars to the
Palestinians, from a population that was already coming to
Israel. He asked why Israelis would be less disposed to
make concessions to a viable Palestinian government and
society. Netanyahu agreed that West Bank checkpoints take
too long, and offered to look into express lanes, increased
staffing, and other possible solutions - as Prime Minister.
¶13. (U) CODEL Cardin has cleared this cable.
********************************************* ********************
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CUNNINGHAM
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