Bibi just didn’t get the hint

Laura Rozen at ForeignPolicy.com has a fascinating report on the meeting earlier this month between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Benjamin Netanyahu. Apparently, Clinton was trying to get Netanyahu adviser Uzi Arad, who hasn’t been allowed into the U.S. for two years because of concern that he might be a intelligence risk, out of the room, but Bibi didn’t take the hint:

Sources tell Foreign Policy that when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Netanyahu at the King David Hotel earlier this month, such was the concern that a certain former Mossad analyst who now serves as Netanyahu’s security advisor may pose a counterintelligence problem that, after conferring with an aide, Clinton suggested to Netanyahu that they reduce the number of people in the room.

The former analyst, Uzi Arad, has recently headed an Israeli think tank that convenes the influential annual Herzliya strategy dialogue. Arad has been unable to get a U.S. visa for the past two years, he has suggested, because he was identified in a 2005 indictment (though not by name) as one of the Israelis who met with then-Pentagon Iran specialist Larry Franklin. Franklin pled guilty in 2005 on charges related to unauthorized disclosure of national-security information to people not authorized to receive it, including officials with the Israeli government.

Clinton’s suggestion was made, sources say, in the hopes that Netanyahu would get the message and excuse Arad from the meeting. What happened instead, sources report, was that Netanyahu dismissed from the meeting Israeli ambassador to Washington Sallai Meridor, who has since announced his resignation. (An account of the meeting previously published on ForeignPolicy.com revealed that Clinton seemed remarkably constrained and tight-lipped during it.)

U.S. officials knowledgeable about the meeting declined to comment about the incident but did not deny that Arad’s presence at the meeting was a concern to the U.S. delegation. The Israeli Embassy did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rozen also talked to an Israeli diplomat who had a slightly different take:

In addition to Secretary Clinton, the U.S. attendees at the March 3 meeting at the King David Hotel were Middle East peace envoy George Mitchell, ambassador to Israel James Cunningham, and NSC senior director on the Middle East Dan Shapiro. Netanyahu, Arad, political advisor Alon Pinkas, and attorney Yitzhak Molcho represented Isra
"To the best of my knowledge, [Clinton] never indicated she wanted him [Arad] out," an Israeli diplomat apprised of the meeting told Foreign Policy Wednesday. "He slipped in when she asked Cunningham to stay in what was supposed to be a four-eyes meeting."

After Netanyahu suggested ending the meeting in a private conversation between two principals, the diplomat continued, "Clinton said: ‘Let’s start, but I want George [Mitchell] inside.’ He agreed, of course, but then she called Cunningham and asked him to join, at which point Netanyahu asked Uzi — his long time confidant — to join. Meridor was away from the room."

"That said," he added, "it’s not mutually exclusive from what you heard."

Multiple Israeli sources said Netanyahu was well aware of the American sensitivity about Arad, but apparently considers it "overblown." U.S. sources said that once Netanyahu officially forms his government and presumably makes Arad his national security advisor, an American visa would likely come through.

Rozen also reported that after Meridor’s resignation as Israeli ambassador to the U.S., "there was concern in Washington that Netanyahu might try to appoint Arad as his replacement," but "the Obama administration communicated its preemptive disapproval."