I used to feel this way about Jeanne as well, to the point of hating S4 as a whole because she was in it. Of course I was coming from a Tiva pov and disliking that she drove a wedge between my ship, not to mention taking Tony from the team in a lot of instances.
A couple years back, it was all the rage in the fandom to say that Jeanne was necessary for Tony to "grow up," to experience really falling in love and then having that taken away. I say, the same outcome could have been achieved without the deception. (Darn you, Bellisario, and your stupid misdirection arcs!)
But now, I really believe that Jeanne was just a scapegoat for all my frustration with the storytelling of S4. Jeanne was excessively needy with Tony because that's how women act when the guy they're dating seems to be keeping "something" from them - and he was!
The character I should have hated in S4 was Jenny, for allowing her personal vendetta to interfere not only with her job, but the real lives of other people. What she put Tony and Jeanne through gave them scars that they were still dealing with years down the line.
And as for Ziva in all this... The jealousy she exhibited showed that she wasn't ready for a commitment, either. I think it bothered her, subconsciously, that Tony was moving on, maturing in a relationship, and she wasn't. They had their carefree, dating-around lifestyle in common during S3. Then suddenly Tony was taken, so she called it "being worried about her partner," but some of it was also her feeling left behind by him.
That's why I think it was so hard for Tony and Ziva to find balance with each other again in S5 because both had come to realizations without the other. Tony knew he was capable of deeply loving a woman, but the circumstances tainted it and left him with doubts. Ziva had gotten over her crush on him and now she wanted to see if he had actually changed, i.e. if she could trust him with her true feelings, leading to her "testing" him (do you believe in soulmates? Tired of pretending).
So...yeah, that's how I see it. Now go read We are an Ocean for a great alternate take on Tiva in S4. She even made me like Jeanne!
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ellievsbear
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