Shoula Romano Horing has a Jerusalem Post article with the above title that I think is worth sharing.
While publicly reassuring Jewish supporters of his commitment to Israel’s security and repeatedly pointing to the close cooperation with the Israelis, privately Obama has been undermining Israel by agreeing with European leaders that Israel’s prime minister is to be blamed for the lack of progress toward peace in the Middle East (while giving the Palestinian leader a pass.)
There is something remarkably delusional about these people who blame Netanyahu for the fact that the Palestinians refuse to negotiate a conclusion to hostilities. I think that it is an example of the sort-of western liberal pro-Arab racism that is so typical around this issue. The Arabs, in general, and the Palestinians, in particular, are treated as little children who have no responsibility for anything whatsoever. This means that they must blame the Israelis and therefore must blame Netanyahu.
I think it's sick, given these facts:
Netanyahu agreed to commit for the first time his Likud party to accepting a Palestinian state. He froze West Bank settlement growth as well as any buildup in east Jerusalem, Israel’s eternal capital, something no other Israeli leader has ever agreed to do, including dovish prime ministers such as Rabin and Peres. Netanyahu removed dozens of roadblocks, agreed to dismantle illegal outposts, and eventually accepted Obama’s territorial formula for a Palestinian state based on the pre-1967 borders with land swaps.
Moreover, while Netanyahu accepted the Mideast Quartet’s call, which included France and the US, to return back to negotiations with the PA without preconditions, Palestinian leader Abbas said no.
Western progressives, like Barack Obama, are toying with Jewish lives. It's a sick game in which the Jews of the Middle East are told that they must do this or that for peace and then when they do this or that they are informed that it's not enough or that they did not do it right or that they need to do it again and so on and so forth.
Netanyahu agreed to negotiations without preconditions, yet western progressives blame him for Palestinian intransigence. It is both fundamentally unjust and it rewards that Palestinian intransigence which prevents the establishment of a Palestinian state in peace next to the Jewish one.
Only fools will ignore the alarming signs of Obama’s animosity, and Jews are not fools. Each Jewish voter must decide if he or she can trust Obama with Israel’s survival for four more years.
Given Obama's incompetence and hostility, Jewish people should very definitely not vote for the guy next year.
He is no friend to the Jewish state and, thus, no friend to the Jewish people.
He squandered any possibility of a peace agreement between Israel and the local Arabs by demanding "total settlement freeze" as a precondition for talks. Such a move on Obama's part was not only counterproductive, but entirely racist. Understand this. It is racist to tell Jews where they may or may not be allowed to live on historically Jewish land and that includes, I'm sorry, Judea.
One thing that Barack Obama and Mahmoud Abbas have in common is that neither one wants Jews living in the area that may become, at some point in the future, a Palestinian state.
It is, in fact, stone cold racism.
It would be the equivalent of telling Abbas that Israel cannot negotiate a peace so long as Arabs live in Israel. How could that not be racism?
It is racism.
Thew writing was on the wall for Obama when the first guy he called after becoming President was Abbas. That symbolism colored every anti_Israel move he made since.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, many of our friends at dKos don't agree with us per Mets new diary.
ReplyDelete" I stand with our President. As a proud Jewish-American, I give him my hechsher (seal of approval). President Obama is pro-Israel."
The sentiment is pretty well unanimous.
Well, most liberal Jews are still doing team sports, unfortunately.
ReplyDeleteOne of the things that we will be discussing here, going forward, are the numerous and various ways in which Obama has failed in his presidency.
We'll obviously focus on his ridiculous failure in the I-P conflict, but we have a year to help remove this man from office.
Obama is not a friend to Israel and that makes him not a friend to me.
And how does wishing to see Israel continue as a Jewish and Democratic State make him "not a friend to Israel?" That is what President Obama seeks. He rejects the one-state solution put forth by the anti-Israel crowd and realizes that the one-state solution offered by the pro-Israel right will cease Israel's existence as both a Jewish and Democratic state. Additionally, he takes the line that every administration since the Johnson Administration has taken. Those administrations, particularly those of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are never called anti-Israel, so, why is it that President Obama, hewing to the same line, is called anti-Israel?
ReplyDeleteReuven,
ReplyDeleteI know that you are a good guy and that your heart is in the right place. I also respect your knowledge on this topic.
But, I judge Obama, as I would any president, around I-P, according to his accomplishments and the nature of his relationships.
His accomplishments are non-existent and his relationships are hostile.
This is not good, my friend.
Bill Clinton had a terrible relationship with Bibi during Bibi's first go round as prime minister. In fact, it was Clinton's advisers that went to Israel and helped Ehud Barak and Avodah win the 1999 elections when Netanyahu's first government fell. And, yet, no one considers Clinton anti-Israel.
ReplyDeletePrecisely two presidents have achieved peace treaties between Israel and one of her Arab neighbors. Carter achieved the Israeli-Egyptian treaty; Clinton achieved the Israeli-Jordanian treaty. Additionally, for what it's worth, Oslo was signed while Clinton was in office, although the process began before that. Note what those two have in common with Obama.
It's not Obama's fault that he stuck with a really crappy partner in Jerusalem. Bibi had problems before, but Lieberman's presence exacerbates those problems and makes them worse. And, remember, I don't come at this from a leftist perspective. I come at this from someone, who if I made aliyah, would be considered in the centrist camp. I'm someone, who if Israeli, would likely be voting for Kadima and neither Likud nor Avodah.
No president has been able to make that big peace thing happen. Have all of them been saddled with a Bibi? I think not. But it is a good excuse for the guy who 2 years before Bibi was even elected said,"There is a strain within the pro-Israel community that says unless you adopt an unwavering pro-Likud approach to Israel that you're anti-Israel."
ReplyDeleteThe problem lies elsewhere in Gaza and the West Bank, in almost all Arab/Muslim countries. Bibi just happens to be one of the current players in a constant zero sum event.