An anonymous US official’s reported description of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a “chickenshit”, or worthless coward, drew a sharp response yesterday from the Israeli leader – no stranger to acrimony with the Obama administration.

The American broadside, in an interview in The Atlantic magazine, followed a month of heated exchanges between the Netanyahu government and Washington over settlement building in Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem, which Palestinians seek as the capital of a future state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

“The thing about Bibi is, he’s a chickenshit,” the unidentified official was quoted as saying, using Netanyahu’s nickname and a slang insult certain to redden the ears of the US-educated former commando.

“The good thing about Netanyahu is that he’s scared to launch wars,” the official said, in apparent reference to past hints of possible Israeli military action against Iran’s nuclear programme. “The bad thing about him is that he won’t do anything to reach an accommodation with the Palestinians or with the Sunni Arab states.”

Netanyahu, the official was reported to have said, is interested only in “protecting himself from political defeat ... He’s got no guts.”

Israeli leaders usually do not respond to comments by unidentified officials. But Netanyahu addressed those remarks directly in opening a memorial ceremony in parliament for an Israeli cabinet minister assassinated by a Palestinian in 2001.

“Our supreme interests, chiefly the security and unity of Jerusalem, are not the main concern of those anonymous officials who attack us and me personally, as the assault on me comes only because I defend the State of Israel,” Netanyahu said.

“...Despite all of the attacks I suffer, I will continue to defend our country. I will continue to defend the citizens of Israel,” he said.

Such pledges by Netanyahu have resonated among Israeli voters, even amid fears his strained relations with US President Barack Obama could ultimately weaken support from Israel’s main diplomatic ally and arms provider.

Some pundits predict an Israeli election in 2015, two years early, speculation seemingly supported by the absence of any strong challenger to the Likud party leader and increasingly vocal challenges to his policies from senior ministers to the left and right of him within the coalition government.