Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s latest campaign ad suggests that Israel doesn’t need the United States. Here it is at Youtube. In an obvious reference to Netanyahu’s ongoing battle with the U.S. president, the ad tells Israeli voters that the U.S. opposed the creation of Israel.

1948 – Ben Gurion faces a crucial decision: establishment of the State of Israel.

The American Secretary of State strongly opposed.

Ben Gurion, contrary to the position of the American State Department, declares the establishment of the state.

Would we be here today if Ben Gurion hadn’t done the right thing?

Only the Likud, Only Netanyahu.

So Netanyahu is saying that his defiance of President Barack Obama over Iran is part of a great tradition. But Secretary of State George Marshall, who opposed the creation of Israel, served President Harry Truman, who recognized Israel within 11 minutes or so of its declaration of its existence on May 15, 1948. Truman had approved the Partition plan of 1947 and had overruled his State Department when it wanted to bag on partition and set up another international mandate, due to the skirmishes and ethnic cleansing it had unleashed in the first few months of 1948 (a fact that the New York Times gets wrong today in a review of S. Yizhar’s novel, saying the Nakba began after Israel’s declaration of independence). If you read Genesis, by John Judis, you see that Truman repeatedly acceded to the wishes of Zionist supporters, in some part because he needed campaign cash in a close presidential race that year.

The truth is: Israel never would have come into existence without the United States.

Netanyahu is thumbing his nose at Truman and at Obama all at once. So he wants to get along without the United States? It’s a good idea; Israel would have to come to terms with its neighbors and Palestinian citizens. But I wonder what AIPAC will have to say about that, and the liberal Zionists.

P.S. Buzzfeed got to the ad last night.