David Horovitz, timesofisrael.com
Image from article, with caption: US President Donald Trump speaks as Israeli President Reuven Rivlin and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) listen upon Trump's arrival at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv on May 22, 2017, as part of his first trip overseas
Oren Hazan can’t resist the chance for a presidential selfie. More substantively, Trump stresses partnership and cooperation in peace bid, while Netanyahu makes plain he wants to maintain security control of West Bank
On Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lambasted several of his ministers for planning to skip Monday’s welcome ceremony at Ben-Gurion Airport for US President Donald Trump, and ordered them all to turn up. Come the ceremony, he would doubtless have wished that one Likud colleague, Knesset member Oren Hazan, had stayed away, since Hazan, a perpetual, scandal-prone embarrassment to the prime minister and his party, disrupted an otherwise well-organized and warm airport welcome by insistently stopping the US president as he politely shook dozens of VIP Israeli hands and demanding a selfie with him — to the overt dismay of Netanyahu.
The visitor gave no indication of being irritated, however, not even when Hazan took several seconds to get his photo feature working. And Hazan’s insatiable ego apart, the ceremony was friendly, easygoing and marked by the warmth of the public statements delivered by President Reuven Rivlin, Netanyahu and the honored US guest.
Rivlin, the papers of his short speech threatening to escape him in the airport winds, hailed the US-Israel relationship as shining “like a beacon.”
Netanyahu noted delightedly that “never before has the first foreign trip of the president of the United States included a visit to Israel.”
US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump disembark Air Force One upon their arrival at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv on May 22, 2017, as part of his first trip overseas. (AFP PHOTO / Jack GUEZ)
And Trump declared, simply and movingly, “We love Israel, we respect Israel, and I bring the warmest greetings from your friend and ally, all of the people of the United States of America.”
But the pleasantries apart, also on display was a degree of public diplomacy — pointers to some of the issues to be discussed away from the cameras.
Rivlin noted the timing of the visit, just before the 50th anniversary of Jerusalem’s reunification under Israeli sovereignty — “Jerusalem is the beating heart of the Jewish people, as it has been for 3,000 years,” said Israel’s Jerusalem-born president. That extension of sovereignty remains unrecognized not only by the Palestinians, but also by the entire international community — notably including the United States, whose President Trump has thus far not signaled a shift by relocating the US embassy from Tel Aviv to the capital.
US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump are welcomed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and his wife Sara, upon Trump’s arrival at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv on May 22, 2017, as part of his first trip overseas. (AFP PHOTO / Jack GUEZ)
Netanyahu tapped into Trump’s Riyadh demand that the Arab world battle violence and terrorism, and declared that Israel has had to do so ever since its modern rebirth: “Mr. President, yesterday in Saudi Arabia you delivered a forceful speech on terrorism and extremism, called on forces of civilization to confront the forces of barbarism. For 69 years, Israel has been doing just that. We’ve manned the front-lines of civilization.” He contrasted Israel’s openness to, and protection of, all faiths with the intolerance elsewhere in the region: “We’ve protected all faiths, Muslims, Christians, everyone,” Netanyahu said. “Throughout the Middle East, Christian communities are decimated. We’re proud to have a growing, flourishing Christian community.”
And he embraced Trump’s declared goal of Israeli-Palestinian peace and wider regional peace: “Israel’s hand is extended in peace to all our neighbors, including the Palestinians,” he said. “The peace we seek is a genuine one, in which the Jewish state is recognized, security remains in Israel’s hands, and the conflict ends once and for all.”
The phrase “security remains in Israel’s hands” is worth noting — underlining as it does Netanyahu’s determination not to relinquish overall security control in the West Bank, a position that was unacceptable to the Obama administration and that the Palestinians will doubtless tell Trump is unacceptable to them as well.
Trump, for his part, stressed the imperative to keep Israel secure, and his commitment to partnership and cooperation with the Jewish state. Israel, he noted, is “forged in the commitment that we will never allow the horrors of the last century to be repeated.” Against that background, he urged, “Now let us build together a future where the nations of the region are at peace, and all our children can grow up strong and free from terrorism and violence… We have before us a rare opportunity to bring security and stability and peace to this region and to its people… But we can only get there working together.”
MK Oren Hazan (center) takes a selfie with US President Donald Trump at Ben Gurion Airport on May 22, 2017 (Screenshot)
If the defining image of Barack Obama visiting Israel in 2013 was the sight of a US president and an Israeli prime minister strolling on the airport tarmac, jackets off, in their shirtsleeves, the unfortunate defining image of Monday’s ceremony might be Hazan and his Trump selfie. Quite what Hazan was doing in the receiving line at all is itself a mystery, since rank-and-file Knesset members were not supposed to be there.
US President Barack Obama (left) and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Ben Gurion Airport, March 20, 2013 (photo credit: Avi Ohayon/GPO/Flash90)
But the defining message of the airport welcome was one of warmth and friendliness and a public determination to work together for shared goals. “Mr. President, you just flew from Riyadh to Tel Aviv,” said Netanyahu, encapsulating some of what is at stake. “I hope that one day an Israeli prime minister can fly from Tel Aviv to Riyadh.”
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