How Bibi Pulled Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

So, John Boehner invites Israeli PM Benyamin Netanyahu to speak before Congress without consulting Obama, and what's more, he does it a few weeks before Israeli elections.

I'm sure that he expected to jack Democrats up over this, and force them to choose between rebuking what is a clear violation of protocol or demonstrating support for the Jewish state.

It turns out that the choice for Democrats was not difficult, and they chose to make the House Speaker look like a complete prat:

Israeli Ambassador Ron Dermer and Knesset Speaker Yuli Edelstein rushed to meetings on Capitol Hill on Wednesday trying to calm a furor created by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned speech to Congress next month and quell a Democratic revolt that has dozens threatening a boycott.

It didn’t work.

If anything, Democrats finished the day more frustrated. According to a source in the room, one Jewish Democratic member of Congress even accused Dermer of being insincere when he claimed not to have anticipated the partisan uproar he’d ignite when he skirted protocol and went around the White House and scheduled the speech only with House Speaker John Boehner.

White House press secretary Josh Earnest, meanwhile, dangled the possibility that the White House would have Vice President Joe Biden skip the speech in what the West Wing acknowledges would be a serious snub.

Actually, the possibility is now a certainty.

Biden has officially announced that he will not attend the speech, and at least a dozen other Dems who appear to be busy washing their hair at that time as well.

It's gotten so bad that Netanyahu is trying to walk back his diss of Obama:

A senior Israeli official suggested on Friday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been misled into thinking an invitation to address the U.S. Congress on Iran next month was fully supported by the Democrats.

Netanyahu was invited by the Republican speaker of the house, John Boehner, to address Congress on March 3, an invitation Boehner originally described as bipartisan.

The move angered the White House, which is upset about the event coming two weeks before Israeli elections and that Netanyahu, who has a testy relationship with Democratic President Barack Obama, is expected to be critical of U.S. policy on Iran.

"It appears that the speaker of Congress made a move, in which we trusted, but which it ultimately became clear was a one sided move and not a move by both sides," Deputy Israeli Foreign Minister Tzachi Hanegbi told 102 FM Tel Aviv Radio on Friday.

The interviewer asked if that meant Netanyahu had been "misled" into believing Boehner's invitation was bipartisan, a characterization Hanegbi did not contest.

Asked whether the prime minister should cancel or postpone the speech, Hanegbi said: "What would the outcome be then? The outcome would be that we forsake an arena in which there is a going to be a very dramatic decision (on Iran)."

To be fair, Bibi is not just dissing the President, he is also trying to sabotage the Iranian nuclear negotiations, and he is also trying to make political hay of this just before elections for the Knesset.

It now looks like both Boehner and Netanyahu will both look like intemperate fools, and if anything this controversy will hurt the chances of the Likud in the upcoming elections.