Israelis grow increasingly anxious about Obama

JERUSALEM — Sirens blared across Israel on Tuesday as the nation carried out its biggest-ever "doomsday" drill meant to simulate a catastrophic attack.

The faux fears, however, were overshadowed by deepening anxiety in Jerusalem that Israel is heading for an unavoidable political showdown with President Obama over the center-right government's refusal to stop building Jewish homes in the predominantly Palestinian West Bank.

Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel's largest daily newspaper, carried a front-page story Tuesday bluntly titled: "The American Threat."

Its biggest competitor, Maariv, carried a bold headline: "Pressure."

The building apprehension comes as Obama prepares to make a direct appeal to the Islamic world in Cairo on Thursday, a speech widely seen as a chance for the United States to launch a new, more cooperative era with Arab nations.

Central to the success of Obama's attempts to reshape America's image in the region will be a shift in U.S. policy toward Israel.

And for many, the heart of that discussion is Israel's refusal to stop building Jewish settlements in the West Bank.

Under the 6-year-old Road Map for Middle East Peace, drafted by the Bush administration, Israel was to stop settlement construction in the West Bank, including development in major settlements that Israel expects to retain in a peace deal.

Israeli leaders accepted the plan but imposed their own interpretation of it, arguing they had the right to build in existing settlements.

The Bush administration never seriously challenged Israel on this point. Obama, however, has stated plainly that Israel must honor its commitment to stop all settlement construction. Period.

"It is important for us to be clear about what we believe will lead to peace and that there's not equivocation and there's not a sense that we expect only compromise on one side," Obama told National Public Radio on Monday. "It's going to have to be two-sided."

That stand has set off alarms in Jerusalem, where Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said this week that Obama's call for Israel to accept the Road Map conditions was "unrealistic."

In an apparent attempt to offer Obama a goodwill gesture as he prepared to deliver his Cairo speech, Israel demolished a small number of trailers in rustic settlements established by extremist Jewish settlers opposed to ceding West Bank land for a Palestinian state.

The steps don't appear to be enough for the Obama administration.

"The issue of settlements is not a very comfortable one for Israel's backers," said Oded Eran, director of Israel's Institute for National Security Studies. "Israel is divided about this issue, and its friends are divided about this issue, so I think if the president concentrates on settlements, it will be difficult for Israel to call on its friends to defend them."