ISRAEL: Diplomacy, from the diving board

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Last week, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert rather nonchalantly disclosed the last minute behind-the-scenes events preceding the vote on U.N. Security Council Resolution 1860. The proposed resolution that called for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza wasn’t phrased beneficially for Israel, and Olmert told an audience in Ashkelon that Bush, after a short phone conversation with him, had instructed Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to zigzag. The U.S. abstained but the resolution passed.

One by one, the White House, State Department and finally Rice herself denied Olmert’s account of events. The prime minister’s office insisted that the description reflected the way things happened, and now his version is said to have been closer to the truth than that of U.S. officialdom.

What possessed Olmert to publicly humiliate Bush and Rice when they had only one week left on the job?

Well, he probably didn’t intend to. The comments in question actually started out well for the outgoing administration, with Olmert saying, ‘There has been no greater friend to Israel than Bush, nor will there be. When we needed his help, he was there.’ The trouble started after that, when he got carried away with the United Nations vote as an example.

One commentator noted that Israel got sassy with the U.S. only when the administration was already packed and sitting around on its suitcases. I’d like to see them do this with Barack Obama, he said.

The real answer to the question resides in not in American politics but in Israeli politics. It also starts with ‘he probably didn’t intend to.’ Most likely, it continues with ‘it was his own foreign minister he intended to humiliate.’ Foreign ministry sources had sold the U.N. vote as a brownie point for Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, who had reportedly been the one to secure Rice’s abstention. (The opposition regarded it as a failure altogether and seemed puzzled by the fact that Olmert and Livni should be quarreling over credit for a diplomatic flop.) Political relations between the two have been strained since Livni replaced Olmert as head of ruling party Kadima in a civilized but coerced ouster orchestrated by Labor chairman Ehud Barak.

And Olmert will no doubt enjoy watching Livni, Barak and Bibi Netanyahu, the three would-be heirs to his (hot!)seat, in the few weeks left before the elections.

Olmert himself had been on his best behavior throughout the assault on Gaza. He was stately and reserved — none of that trademark character of his that the Israeli press likes to call ‘haughtiness.’ He kept a lid on it for two weeks but had a relapse and ‘blew his Olmert,’ as commentator Emanuel Rosen had described his bragging about the U.N. vote. Others said the guy was just being himself, always having to have the last word.

Some fretted that the PM’s indiscretion would start relations with the new administration on a sour note. Others were mortified by the uncool kiss-and-tell. There are lots of metaphors that come to mind. Best of all was that of legislator Ophir Pines-Paz, who had said ‘OK, maybe it’s true. But why do it from the diving board?’

Listen to Olmert’s comments (Hebrew), recorded from Israel Radio, here: Download rec0114-023236.rar

— Batsheva Sobelman in Jerusalem

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