A Haaretz report of November 9, recalled it had reported two months ago that, at a conference with their Israeli counterparts, retired American Admirals warned that Washington was simply astonished at Israel’s decision to award major infrastructure projects, including the construction of a civilian port in Haifa, to Chinese companies. Somebody even suggested that the U.S. Sixth Fleet might steer clear of the Israel Navy base in Haifa because of the Chinese involvement in building a civilian port there.It said based on conversations with ministers and other top officials, it now turns out that the Israelis were amazed at the intensity of their American counterparts’ ire on the matter. “They blew up at us,” said one of the Israelis who attended the meetings. The Americans asked Israel for guarantees that China wouldn’t be able to take advantage of projects in Israel to improve its strategic standing and its intelligence capabilities. They remained unconvinced that Israel’s answers were good enough – and said if Israel couldn’t provide the guarantees they wanted, that would be grounds to have Israel reconsider its project contracts with China. In one such exchange, Americans told their Israeli counterparts that the United States could not be friends with a country for which China was building ports. They mentioned another country, not Israel, but Jerusalem got the hint.
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