Hostility between the Obama administration and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu exploded on Wednesday after the Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg revealed that a senior Obama administration official made disparaging remarks about Netanyahu, calling him both a "coward" and a "chickenshit."
Responses from the White House and State Department were both dismissive and vague, but as CBS's Charlie Rose noted, the administration is "rejecting the language but not the message."
"President Obama's relationship with the Israeli prime minister has been tense for years," CBS White House correspondent Major Garrett said. "Those long simmering disputes have turned profane."
Garrett said the official's "disparaging avian adjective" has driven U.S.-Israeli relations to a "new low."
"The White House did not quarrel with the reporting of Jeffrey Goldberg, and showed no interest in identifying or punishing its source," Garrett said.
Netanyahu pushed back against the comments on Wednesday, refusing to stoop to the level of the Obama administration official who launched the verbal attack.
"If I didn't stand for our national and security interests, they wouldn't be attacking me," Netanyahu said before the Israeli Knesset. "And despite the attacks, I will continue to defend our country."
