President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) have been very public about their harsh political differences and strong feelings of contempt for each other. They disagree very openly, but Speaker Boehner recently made a political move that was unprecedented. In an attempt to spite and embarrass President Obama, Boehner has invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress. Typically, an invitation to a world leader is extended through the White House. According to The New York Times, in a breach of the established diplomatic practice, John Boehner and the Israeli Ambassador to the U.S., Ron Dermer, invited Netanyahu to speak to Congress without first discussing the issue with the executive office in an attempt to publicly demonstrate the two conflicting foreign policies towards the Middle East within the US government.
Netanyahu is using the disjointedness between Congress and the White House for his own political agenda. General elections are coming up in Israel in March. Netanyahu, hoping to bolster his popularity, decided to address the Congress about Obama’s approach to reach a nuclear agreement with Iran to limit its nuclear power to peaceful uses like nuclear power. Netanyahu wants the Israeli population to view him as a strong political leader with Israel’s best interests in mind, but according to Newsweek, his publicity surrounding the visit to the U.S. seems to be having the opposite effect. Israeli voters do not want their Prime Minister ignoring the U.S. diplomatic traditions and the power of the President because of their deep dependence on the United States for protection and preservation of their country.

Netanyahu’s political agenda does not stop there and nor does Boehner’s. Neither of these leaders agree with Obama’s approach to make progress in negotiations toward a nuclear deal with Iran in order to create more peaceful relations with the country and with the Middle East. The Republican Party disagrees with such negotiations and instead wants the United States to place more sanctions on Iran. Netanyahu and the Republicans do not trust the Obama administration’s effort to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons.
According to the Times of Israel, Iran has been negotiating with the United States to reduce its sanctions in return for limiting the country’s production of nuclear fuel. Yet Congress under Speaker Boehner’s leadership will be voting soon on a bill that will place even harsher sanctions on Iran. The growing controversy between the President’s office and Congress in this issue has caused even stronger friction between the government and at the same time has magnified also the tensions between the U.S. and Israel.
Overall, the tension between Obama’s administration and Speaker Boehner makes the United States look weak and divided in the eyes of the world. If countries like Israel under Netanyahu’s leadership are abusing this conflict for their own political agendas, then Congress and the White House need to reassess their behavior so that they can report to the world from one standpoint of power.