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Netanyahu Apologizes for Comments About Israeli Arabs Netanyahu Apologizes for Comments About Israeli Arabs
(about 2 hours later)
JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel apologized Monday for warning last week that Arab citizens were voting in “droves,” comments that have been denounced by President Obama, other world leaders, American Jewish leaders and many Israelis as anti-democratic, race-baiting and fear-mongering. JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel apologized on Monday for making what were widely condemned as racist comments last week in saying that Arab citizens were voting in “droves.”
“I know that my comments last week offended some Israeli citizens and offended members of the Israeli Arab community,” Mr. Netanyahu said, according to a translation provided by his party, Likud. “This was never my intent. I apologize for this.” But even as he spoke with a group of Israeli Arabs gathered at his Jerusalem residence, the White House issued a new signal that it remained furious with Mr. Netanyahu for campaign comments that also appeared to close the door on a two-state solution to the Palestinian conflict.
The apology came hours after Israel’s president, Reuven Rivlin, announced that Mr. Netanyahu had secured the backing of 67 of the 120 Parliament members elected last week and officially designated him to form the next government. Mr. Rivlin, whose first months in office have been marked by outreach to Arabs in Israel, was among those who criticized Mr. Netanyahu’s Election Day statements, saying on Sunday, “Everyone must be careful in their comments, especially those that the entire world hears.” In the days since the bitter Israeli election, Mr. Netanyahu has been denounced for two statements he made toward the conclusion: his assertion that no Palestinian state would be established on his watch, and his alarm over voting by Israeli Arab citizens. He has been trying, with limited success, to backpedal on both.
The uproar served as a final act for a divisive, ugly campaign of personal attacks. Midway through last Tuesday’s balloting, Mr. Netanyahu posted a video on his Facebook page expressing alarm that Arabs were “being bused to the polling stations in droves” by left-wing organizations. Mr. Netanyahu said in a series of interviews on Thursday that he did not intend to suppress the Arab vote, as many critics contended, only to inspire Israelis who supported him to get to polling places themselves. In Washington on Monday, Denis McDonough, President Obama’s chief of staff, said in a speech that Mr. Netanyahu’s pre-election assertions about Palestinian statehood were “very troubling.” It was the latest in a series of public scoldings by senior members of Mr. Obama’s team, including one by the president himself, rejecting the prime minister’s attempts to explain himself.
But Monday’s statement, made to a gathering of Israeli Arabs at the prime minister’s residence, was the first hint of an apology. According to the statement, Mr. Netanyahu also told the group: “I view myself as the prime minister of each and every citizen of Israel. Without any prejudice based on religion, ethnicity or gender, I view every citizen as my partner in building a more secure, more prosperous state of Israel and a nation that benefits the needs and interests of all our citizenry.” “After the election, the prime minister said that he had not changed his position, but for many in Israel and in the international community, such contradictory comments call into question his commitment to a two-state solution,” Mr. McDonough told the annual conference of J Street, a pro-Israel group aligned with the Democratic Party.
The prime minister’s original comments regarding Israel’s 1.4 million Arab citizens helped fuel the escalating crisis between Mr. Netanyahu and the Obama administration, which has said in recent days that it is reassessing its policy of protecting Israel in forums like the United Nations. Mr. Obama, in an interview published by The Huffington Post on Saturday, said, “That kind of rhetoric was contrary to what is the best of Israel’s traditions,” can “give ammunition to folks who don’t believe in a Jewish state” and “starts to erode the meaning of democracy in the country.” After of the voting, Mr. Netanyahu said his reference to Israeli Arabs had not been intended to dissuade them from voting but to encourage his own supporters to cast ballots. He said his remarks on a Palestinian state had been widely misunderstood and that he still supported the idea but not under current conditions.
The White House said it was proper for Mr. Netanyahu to apologize. The White House was unmoved by the recalibration, and Mr. Obama offered harsh criticism of Mr. Netanyahu in an interview with Huffington Post on Saturday.
”We’ve made pretty clear the serious concerns that we had with those comments,” said Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, when told on Monday that Mr. Netanyahu had expressed regret. “So if that’s what he said, then it certainly seems appropriate for him to make that acknowledgment.” While the White House spokesman, Josh Earnest, said Monday that it was appropriate that Mr. Netanyahu apologize for his comments about Israeli Arabs, there was no sign of any softening from the administration over its anger with Mr. Netanyahu over his comments about the Palestinian question.
The Anti-Defamation League, which was among the prominent rights groups that had criticized Mr. Netanyahu’s original comments, said it welcomed his apology. “We cannot simply pretend that these comments were never made,” Mr. McDonough said. He told a crowd of 3,000 at the J Street meeting that Israel’s occupation of the West Bank “must end.”
“While I do not believe the prime minister’s Election Day remarks were intended to be anti-Arab or racist, his words left questions in people’s minds about how the Arab community is viewed by Israel’s leadership and their place in Israeli society,” Abraham H. Foxman, the group’s national director, said in a statement. The two-state solution “remains our goal today, because it is the only way to secure Israel’s future as a Jewish and democratic state,” he added. “We will look to the next Israeli government to match words with action.”
The apology was orchestrated by Mr. Netanyahu’s political team, not his government office. Photographs and video distributed by a party spokesman showed the prime minister and his wife surrounded by several dozen Arab, Bedouin and Druze leaders, some in traditional headgear, in a courtyard of their official Jerusalem residence. The guests rewarded Mr. Netanyahu’s words with vigorous applause, some even rising to their feet. Israelis and American Jewish leaders had largely embraced Mr. Netanyahu’s backpedaling on the Palestinian state, in which he insisted he had not reversed his 2009 endorsement of the concept of two states for two peoples. The language he used regarding Israel’s 1.4 million Arab citizens, however, had fomented domestic discord in quarters that Mr. Netanyahu counts on.
Ahmad Tibi, a Palestinian member of Israel’s Parliament, said none of the people elected Tuesday on a joint list of Arab parties had been invited to the event, and that the group was made up mainly of longstanding Likud supporters. “I know that my comments last week offended some Israeli citizens and offended members of the Israeli Arab community,” Mr. Netanyahu said, according to a translation provided by his political party, Likud. “This was never my intent. I apologize for this.”
Mr. Tibi called Mr. Netanyahu’s statement “an expression of regret and not a sincere apology,” and he said “the test needs to be in the actual steps” in terms of treatment of minorities, who make up a fifth of Israel’s population. Critics included President Reuven Rivlin of Israel, whose first months in office have been marked by outreach to the state’s non-Jewish minorities and who said on Sunday: “Everyone must be careful in their comments, especially those that the entire world hears.”
He called on the prime minister to stop progress on the so-called nationality bill approved last year, which would emphasize Israel’s Jewishness, and to retract his statement inviting Arabs who demonstrate against Israeli policies, including last summer’s war in Gaza, to leave the country. Mr. Rivlin officially handed Mr. Netanyahu the keys to form that next government on Monday, announcing amid two days of consultations with leaders of 10 political factions, that, as expected, he had the backing of 67 of the 120 members of Parliament elected last week.
“Discrimination is the policy,” Mr. Tibi said in a statement to reporters, “and equality is a way of life that the prime minister and his government are as far away from as the skies are from the ground.” Likud won a decisive victory, with 30 Parliament seats, over the center-left Zionist Union’s 24, and most analysts think Mr. Netanyahu will form a narrow coalition of rightist and religious parties as he starts his third consecutive and fourth overall term at Israel’s helm. He has until May 7 to put the pieces in place, a ritual of deal-making over ministries and policy positions.
Israeli news sites reported that the Arab joint list coalition of small parties, which garnered 13 parliamentary seats in Tuesday’s election, also dismissed Mr. Netanyahu’s apology. This year, it is taking place against a backdrop of tension after a divisive campaign of personal attacks.
“To our regret, the racism of Netanyahu and his governments did not begin and will not end with this inciting statement,” the coalition said, according to the NRG website. “Racist and separatist legislation and discriminating policies are Netanyahu’s working plan for the new Parliament, and so we are left with no option but to reject his apology and to continue our struggle for equality for the Arab population.” It was midway through last Tuesday’s balloting that Mr. Netanyahu posted a video on his Facebook page expressing alarm that Arabs were “being bused to the polling stations in droves” by left-wing organizations. The White House quickly expressed its own alarm at what it called “divisive rhetoric,” and Mr. Obama gave his counterpart a strongly worded lecture about the matter during a congratulatory phone call two days after the election.
“We indicated that that kind of rhetoric was contrary to what is the best of Israel’s traditions — that although Israel was founded based on the historic Jewish homeland and the need to have a Jewish homeland, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly,” Mr. Obama said in the Huffington Post interview. “If that is lost, then I think that not only does it give ammunition to folks who don’t believe in a Jewish state, but it also, I think, starts to erode the meaning of democracy in the country.”
Amid signs that this had not assuaged the outrage within Israel or abroad, he went further on Monday to apologize directly to an invited group of Muslim, Christian, Bedouin and Druse supporters.
“I view myself as the prime minister of each and every citizen of Israel, without any prejudice based on religion, ethnicity or gender,” Mr. Netanyahu said at the event. “I view every citizen as my partner in building a more secure, more prosperous state of Israel and a nation that benefits the needs and interests of all our citizenry.”
A video circulated by Likud officials showed several dozen Arab leaders, some in traditional headgear, responding with vigorous applause that brought some to their feet at the words “I apologize.” In New York, the Anti-Defamation League, which had written a letter urging Mr. Netanyahu to apologize, issued a statement praising him for doing so and his previous government for investing heavily to improve Arab education and employment.
Lawmakers from Israel’s joint list of Arab political parties – who said they were not invited to the event – said Monday’s statement was not sufficient.
“To our regret, the racism of Netanyahu and his governments did not begin and will not end with this inciting statement,” said a statement from the list, which won 13 Parliamentary seats in last week’s balloting. “Racist and separatist legislation and discriminating policies are Netanyahu’s working plan for the new Parliament, and so we are left with no option but to reject his apology and to continue our struggle for equality for the Arab population.”
Ahmad Tibi, a veteran lawmaker from the list, said in his own statement: “Discrimination is the policy, and equality is a way of life that the prime minister and his government are as far away from as the skies are from the ground.”