Opinion Them fighting words
Sometimes diplomats and world leaders reveal what they really think. Pass the popcorn.
Apparently, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the man who stands in defiance of international condemnation of his muscular policies on Palestine, is a “chickenshit”. At least, that’s what unnamed officials at the US department of state think. Netanyahu, one is quoted as saying, is also a “coward”, because he refuses to do anything to “reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or the Sunni Arab states”. Such scatological denouncements of US-Israel ties seem to be an accurate summation of the behind-the-scenes state of the Obama administration’s relationship with Israel — in public, of course, both parties continue to put up a happy front.
But even as the White House races to distance itself from its inconveniently outspoken bureaucracy, it can relax. This isn’t the only bilateral relationship where the chickenshit has hit the fan because someone has displayed the finely honed athletic ability to put their foot in their mouth. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott threatened to “shirtfront” frequently shirtless Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier this month. Said confrontation was to occur at the G20 summit in Brisbane this November, purportedly over Russia’s conduct through the MH17 crash investigation. More likely, though, Abbott was indulging in a spot of posturing to burnish his macho credentials. And what better target than Putin, with his penchant for wrestling bears and tagging whales bare-chested? Of course, Abbott modified his rhetoric scant days later, after Russian newspaper Pravda launched a colourful broadside in response, calling him “a disturbed mind crying out for therapy”.
It’s a step up — or down, depending on one’s perspective — from the Chinese and Japanese trading barbs over who more closely resembles Harry Potter villain Lord Voldemort. In a world of carefully calibrated media messages, such saltiness, though diplomacy’s cardinal sin, can be refreshing.
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