He stuffed the ballot box, his brother is a powerful warlord with reputed drug ties and when pressed on his government’s rampant corruption, he reportedly threatened to join the Taliban. But Afghan President Hamid Karzai is getting the royal treatment from President Obama in his U.S. visit.
This week Karzai is receiving the same diplomatic rollout he enjoyed during the Bush administration, when he was considered one of the country’s key allies: a one-on-one meeting with the president, a sit-down with the secretaries of state and defense, a joint news conference and a dinner with the president and vice president.
This is understandable. President Obama has doubled down on U.S. troops in Afghanistan. Karzai, for all his flaws, is the leader of a key strategic ally vs. militant Islam. Not every White House guest is a saint.
But the red carpet for Karzai stands in stark contrast to Obama’s open disdain for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in March. When Netanyahu came calling, Obama immediately made a series of demands, including a freeze on Jewish housing in the eastern half of Jerusalem. The visit did not go well, as the U.K.’s Telegraph recounted:
Benjamin Netanyahu was left to stew in a White House meeting room for over an hour after President Barack Obama abruptly walked out of tense talks to have supper with his family
Obama was in a foul mood even before the ill-fated meeting.
Sending a clear message of his displeasure, Mr Obama treated his guest to a series of slights. Photographs of the meeting were forbidden and an Israeli request to issue a joint-statement once it was over were turned down.
But Karzai may offer Netanyahu hope for change. Obama gave Karzai the cold shoulder in their first U.S. meeting last year.
Then the White House declined to schedule a joint news conference between Obama and the Afghan leader, and it limited the number of private meetings between Karzai and Obama officials. When Obama did briefly meet the press, he was joined by both Karzai and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari.
