Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu has given an angry response to being called a coward by an unidentified US official.
“Our supreme interests, chiefly the security and unity of Jerusalem, are not the main concern of those anonymous officials who attack us and me personally,” said Netanyahu who was addressing the Israeli parliament on Wednesday.
I come under attack because I defend the interests of the Israeli regime and its people, he added.
Netanyahu’s angry response came in reaction to the recent remarks of a senior US official who described the Israeli premier as a “chickenshit,” expressing US President Barack Obama’s frustration with the Israeli premier.
“The thing about Bibi is he’s a chickenshit,” the unnamed official told the Atlantic magazine.
“The only thing he’s interested in is protecting himself from political defeat… He’s got no guts,” the official said, adding that Netanyahu “won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians.”
US State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said on Wednesday that Washington will not apologize to Tel Aviv over the controversy since the US statesman’s remark “isn’t the position of the administration.”
Washington and Tel Aviv have recently exchanged heated arguments over the Israeli regime’s plan to build more than 1,000 settler units in the occupied Palestinian lands.
Netanyahu had earlier lashed out at Washington for condemning Israeli expansionist plans, saying US officials are “disconnected from reality.”
