Report: Netanyahu Working to Block Obama Bid for U.N. Secretary-General

Israel National News describes a Kuwaiti newspaper’s report about President Barack Obama’s post-presidential plans as “somewhat far-fetched,” but apparently plausible enough to bounce through publications around the world.

According to the Al Jarida report, President Obama wants to be appointed Secretary-General of the United Nations after he leaves the White House, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is working to thwart his ambitions.

Al Jarida has Netanyahu exclaiming, “Is it not enough that we have had to live through eight years of Obama’s rule, in which he ignored Israel? Now he wants to be in a position to cause us difficulty in the international arenas?”

Netanyahu also reportedly complained about President Obama’s “closeness to the Muslim Brotherhood, the toppling of Hosni Mubarak’s regime in Egypt, and attempts to forge alliances with political Islam,” as well as the President’s nuclear deal with Iran, according to an Israeli source.

Netanyahu is said to have compared the likely outcome of the Iranian nuclear deal with the current consternation over North Korea’s claimed development of a hydrogen bomb.

The Washington Times adds a quote from a Netanyau aide who ostensibly told the Kuwaiti paper his boss exclaimed, “Obama is the worst president Israel has had to deal with and the worst president for the Middle East and its allies, the moderate Arab states.”

Although the rumor about President Obama and Netanyahu sparring behind the scenes over the Secretary-General slot has been mentioned in a variety of media outlets over the weekend, all of those references apparently trace back to the Al Jarida report, which Israel National News observers has not been corroborated by any other source as of yet.

It is a spicy rumor that has a little something for everyone: Obama critics are likely to respond in much the same way Netanyahu allegedly did, while Obama fans and Netanyahu critics can fulminate over claims that the Israeli leader is trying to sabotage President Obama’s ambitions. It is not hard to believe that President Obama has at least discussed the possibility of pursuing the Secretary-General’s position.

Of course, plausibility is the finest cloth for weaving believable fantasies. If any of what Al Jarida reports is true, independent confirmation should not be long in coming.