Assassination Plot Weakens Netanyahu Bungled Attack Has Israelis Questioning Leader’s Judgment

Benjamin Netanyahu loves a daring feat.

As a deputy foreign minister a decade ago, he suggested in a meeting to blow up an Israeli hotel rather than hand it to Egypt. At the time, his idea was dismissed with embarrassed silence.

But now he is prime minister and often acts on his impulses without seeking expert advice.

Netanyahu’s latest venture - ordering the assassination of a Hamas leader in Jordan to avenge suicide bombings in Israel - is still reverberating across the Middle East in ways never anticipated by the Israeli leader.

The bungled job has strengthened the very Islamic militants he sought to contain; soured ties with Jordan, his only friend in the Arab world; chilled relations with Canada; weakened Israel’s Mossad spy agency; and loosened his grip on power.

Netanyahu ordered the Sept. 25 hit on Hamas political strategist Khalid Mashaal without consulting his Cabinet - including his foreign minister, who subsequently threatened to resign - and Israeli newspapers say he didn’t bother to get an opinion from the chiefs of military intelligence and the domestic Shin Bet security service. Only the Mossad chief, Danny Yatom, was in the picture.

Israelis are now wondering why Netanyahu ignored the obvious political repercussions of ordering a clandestine operation in Jordan.

Netanyahu didn’t even consider the mission could fail, even though it involved a high-risk technique of injecting poison into a moving target on a busy street in broad daylight, according to the Haaretz daily. The newspaper reported the Israeli leader thought the assault would be untraceable, thus allowing Israel to deny involvement as it has done in the past.

If a three-man inquiry committee appointed by Netanyahu confirms that he acted alone in ordering the Mashaal assassination, it would deepen his image as a reckless leader.

Several major scandals in Netanyahu’s 16 months in power have been attributed to his habit of not seeking advice. Among these were opening a tourist tunnel along Muslim holy sites - which triggered Palestinian riots that cost 80 lives - and appointing a political crony as attorney general

“Since coming to power, he has been continually plagued by serious errors of judgment,” journalist Uri Benziman wrote in Friday’s Haaretz.

Many Israelis don’t care if the Mossad assassinates suspected terrorists - and there is a long list of successful hits - but they do mind failures that undercut Israel’s power of deterrence.

“For the average Israeli, the failure is that one Hamas bodyguard achieved this victory over Mossad and the prime minister,” said political scientist Menachem Klein at Tel Aviv’s Bar Ilan University.

Still, the scandal is unlikely to bring Netanyahu down now.

He has broad support in his right-wing coalition that only increased by his having targeted Hamas; under Israel’s new electoral system, parliament needs to muster an absolute majority to oust the prime minister; he is very skilled in influencing public opinion; and many Israelis have become indifferent.

“Israelis have become accustomed to very strange ways of government,” said Avner Shalit of the Hebrew University. “You would expect we would all take to the streets.”

Other than assuring his political survival, Netanyahu will have to try to win back the trust of Jordan’s King Hussein. The monarch, according to Israeli newspapers, suspected that Netanyahu deliberately tried to destabilize Jordan with the attack on Mashaal.

In a phone call to President Clinton, an exasperated Hussein reportedly said, referring to Netanyahu: “He is an impossible man to deal with.” Hussein refused to see Netanyahu when he came to Jordan several days after the attack to try to mend relations.