Ex-Ambassador Oren: Obama 'Deliberately' Abandoned Israel

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Barack Obama are both guilty of making mistakes in the way they've handled the relationship between the two countries, but the president is more to blame for deliberately damaging U.S.-Israel relations, said Michael Oren.

In an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, the former Israeli ambassador makes the case that the president deliberately violated two key principles at the heart of the understanding between the two countries: "no daylight" and "no surprises."

"'Nobody has a monopoly on making mistakes.' When I was Israel's ambassador to the United States from 2009 to the end of 2013, that was my standard response to reporters asking who bore the greatest responsibility — President Barack Obama or Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu — for the crisis in U.S.-Israel relations," Oren wrote.

"I never felt like I was lying when I said it. But, in truth, while neither leader monopolized mistakes, only one leader made them deliberately."

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