To be funny, or not to be funny: National Security Adviser James Jones, shown here in 2004 in his role as Nato Supreme Allied Commander
WHAT WAS THE JOKE?
The lost Taliban fighter had been wandering the desert searching for water when he came across the Jewish merchant's shop, Mr Jones explained.
When he asked for water, the merchant said he had none - but offered to sell the Taliban a tie.
The Taliban launched into a stream of curses, at the end of which the Jewish merchant told him that over the hill was a restaurant where he could find water.
Still muttering, the Taliban headed off towards the hill. An hour later, he was back at the shop.
He said: 'Your brother says I need a tie to get into the restaurant.'
The White House has been forced to issue an apology after an adviser to Barack Obama caused a furore with a Jewish merchants joke.
National Security adviser Jim Jones was speaking to the pro-Israeli think tank Washington Insitute for Near East Policy when he made the joke about a Jewish merchant and a Taliban fighter.
The joke was met with laughter as General Jones, a former Nato Supreme Allied Commander, delivered it at the gala celebrating the 25th anniversary of the think tank yesterday.
But not everyone in the audience found it funny - in particular one anonymous audience member who happened to be a member of the Anti-Defamation League, an international non-governmental organisation that protects against anti-Semitism.
The League complained and the White House did not include the joke in its official transcript of the event.
Anti-Defamation League head Abraham Foxman said the joke was 'insensitive', 'inappropriate' and 'stereotypic'.
'I wish that I had not made this off-the-cuff joke at the top of my remarks, and I apologize to anyone who was offended by it,' General Jones said.'It also distracted from the larger message I carried that day: that the United States commitment to Israel's security is sacrosanct.'
When ABC News asked a Jewish member of Congress for a response to the situation, he replied: 'Lighten up'.
The furore came as U.S. President Barack Obama assured Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak yesterday of Washington's 'unshakeable' commitment to the Jewish state's security, despite tensions over Israeli settlement building.
Mr Obama also told Mr Barak, who was at the White House for a meeting with General Jones, that he remained determined to achieve comprehensive peace in the Middle East, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.
Israel's main opposition party said on Monday Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government had quietly frozen approval of Jewish housing projects in East Jerusalem in a bid to heal the rift with Washington and coax Palestinians into peace talks.
This followed the conclusion on Sunday of a three-day peace mission by Mr Obama's Middle East envoy George Mitchell, who said he would return to the region next week.
The Obama administration's peace moves have been stymied by a dispute with Israel's right-leaning government over settlement construction in and around Jerusalem and by divisions among the Palestinians.
'The president reaffirmed our unshakeable commitment to Israel's security and our determination to achieve comprehensive peace in the Middle East, including a two-state solution,' Mr Gibbs told reporters, saying Mr Obama had 'dropped by' the meeting between Mr Barak and General Jones.
Though Mr Netanyahu has insisted publicly he would not curb Jewish housing projects anywhere in Jerusalem, including the Israeli-annexed predominantly Arab eastern section, Israeli legislator Roni Bar-On of the centrist Kadima party said there had been a de facto freeze.
An Israeli government spokesman said there had been no fundamental change in government policy.
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