Benjamin Netanyahu shrugs off US official's anonymous insult
Israeli leader, accused in magazine interview of lacking guts, says he'll keep defending nation
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has hit back after an anonymous US official reportedly described him as a "chicken***t", or worthless coward.
The American broadside, in an interview in The Atlantic magazine, follows a month of heated exchanges between the Netanyahu government and Washington over settlement building in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem, which Palestinians see as the capital of a future state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
"The thing about Bibi is, he's a chicken***t," the unidentified official was quoted as saying, using Netanyahu's nickname and a slang insult.
"The good thing about Netanyahu is that he's scared to launch wars," the official said, in apparent reference to past hints of possible Israeli military action against Iran's nuclear programme. "The bad thing about him is that he won't do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states."
Netanyahu, the official was reported to have said, is interested only in "protecting himself from political defeat ... He's got no guts."
Israeli leaders usually do not respond to comments by unidentified officials. But Netanyahu addressed those remarks directly in opening a memorial ceremony in parliament for an Israeli cabinet minister assassinated by a Palestinian in 2001.