Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who is often chided by local media as “Israel’s Republican prime minister,” received a rare public dressing-down from an American Republican leader when Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told a conference call with Jewish participants that Netanyahu “should not pull the rug from under us.” The rebuke came after Israel signed a 10-year Memorandum of Understanding for US military aid that will provide some $3.8 billion annually for the Jewish state. While the administration is playing heavily on the commitment being the largest to ever come out of Washington, the deal became controversial when the American administration inserted provisions that effectively locked Congress out of the process, infuriating Israel’s Capitol Hill allies and leaving Netanyahu to choose sides. While Graham was still fighting to increase the aid package, Netanyahu signed the memo with terms that prohibit Israel from going to Congress with funding requests and going so far as to require Israel to return any funding that comes from Congress without White House approval. It also portends to cost the Israeli defense sector thousands of jobs and wreak economic havoc with Israeli defense contractors through a provision that does away with Israel’s ability to spend 26 percent of the funds with Israeli companies. Netanyahu’s decision to submit to the unprecedented provisions has, as expected, opened the prime minister to scathing criticism from his domestic political rivals. But the tirade from Graham is potentially more damaging as it drives a wedge between Netanyahu and his primary source of American political support. Using Netanyahu’s nickname, the South Carolina Republican said, “Bibi made a decision he wanted to do a deal with Obama…I am going to push back. We will see what Bibi does. But I will tell you right now, from my point of view, the prime minister has made a mistake here, and, basically, setting up a situation where his friends in Congress – on both sides of the aisle – can’t help Israel apart from what this president says.”