Without going into the substance of Obama's remarks to AIPAC today, I find the comments at Y-NET telling:
1. Stupid American Jews! Obama just wants your MONEY & VOTES!
Dan (03.04.12)
And:
3. Another campaign speech full of lies
I don't even know where to begin. I will start with the most recent incident of Obama postponing the military excersices with Israel. Obama said an unprecedented military training excersices were conducted. There has always been military training with Israel, what makes yours unprecedented is the fact that you, Obama, allowed Iran to dictate to the US if we should have any excersices. Second, with the flotilla incident, you came out against Israel demanding a complete investigation after condemning Israel. And lastly, you did nothing during the Goldstone investigation and report. You were forced into making a statement. Mr. Obama, people with intelligence will see through your lies, and not buy your full of nonsense speech. America is a friend of Israel, you, Mr. Obama are not. You are forced to accept it. I can go on and on, but for now this is enough.
LYP, Brooklyn, NY USA (03.04.12)
And:
4. Bibi be smart
Say thank you and go home
Avramele (03.04.12)
And:
6. Trusting obumma is like trusting hitler, NEVER AGAIN.
Bunnie Meyer, Los Angeles, CA USA (03.04.12)
And:
7. Liar
Albrecht Klein, Germany (03.04.12)
And:
8. obama - aipac
TO THE JEWS OF THE USA. THIS IS AN ELECTION YEAR. OBAMA IS NOT A TRUE FRIEND OF ISRAEL. has anyone asked him why he never visited israel as President??????? - his first trip abroad was to Egypt. he is ONLY LOOKING for your votes.
sas, israel (03.04.12)
And:
10. Obama, you trust ? ? ?
No longer than 1o Minutes. And Haverim I am in a good mood this morning.
AlbertoGA, St. George,USA (03.04.12)
Of the ten comments currently up at the Y-NET article on this subject nine were negative and one was a plea for peace.
The point is, though, that there is considerable animosity toward Barack Obama coming from the American Jewish community.
It should not be surprising given how hostile Obama has been to Israel while coddling Israel's enemies. I mean, you cannot tell Israelis that they need to search their souls to see if they truly want peace while helping to usher the Muslim Brotherhood into power throughout the Middle East and then expect love from that segment of us who are conscious.
Once you throw trust into the garbage it is exceedingly difficult to get it back.
By the way, the comments in the Jerusalem Post are considerably worse, although I imagine that at Ha'aretz they are in their usual posture... prone.
Typical ideological responses. If he says something you don't like, attack it. No luck? Then find something you wanted him to say and didn't, attack him for not saying it. Still no luck? If he says the right things, call him disingenuous, or worse, a liar.
ReplyDeleteYou're right.
DeleteThese are merely bits of anecdotal evidence which suggests that there is considerable disdain and distrust toward Barack Obama given his mishandling of I-P and his clear disdain for the Jewish state.
I still can't believe that he told American Jewish leadership that their friends and relatives in Israel need to "search their soul" to see if they really want peace.
What a revealing comment that was.
Search THEIR souls? Give me a huge break. We all know whose souls need to be searched. Course he'd be labelled racist if he asked them to.
DeleteSuch comments are not a good indicator, in my opinion, of reality.
ReplyDeleteTo me, the matter is not Obama's friendship with Israel, which is actually America's friendship, bipartisan and strong.
Rather, the issue is that Obama is the most pro-Palestinian of all US Presidents. For the most part, at least publicly, he does not seem to take anti-Israel actions to task when they occur. This sends the wrong message and encourages continuation of the poor behavior. One example is the hero worship of terrorists.
In my recollection, other Presidents have been much more outspoken in criticizing these actions that Israel cannot see as friendly, but proof that there are not peaceful intentions on the part of its adversaries.
They're just little pieces of anecdotal evidence.
DeleteThe polling, however, suggests considerable discontent with this president among Jews.
I don't know about you, but I would never trust an American president who is so blind as to suggest that the "Arab Spring" (which is actually the rise of the Jihad in the Middle East) is something akin to the Civil Rights movement.
There are both aspects to the Arab Spring, the one for freedom and the one where the Islamists take hold.
DeleteI believe it was more concerning that he asked Jews to search their souls.
I also will say, again, that by taking a pro-Palestinian orientation, not recognizing that this movement is more about getting rid of Israel than getting a Palestinian state, he has made the situation worse, thinking he has made it better.
There is no good rationale not to criticize Palestinians for their actions.
That said, I agree with Dershowitz in his recent article at Stonegate, entitled:
President Obama Turns a Corner on Iran
http://www.stonegateinstitute.org/2908/president-obama-turns-a-corner-on-iran
Obama, in my opinion, just thinks he knows better, and sometimes those who believe so, in the end, are proved wrong.
I don't have a problem with that comment about soul searching. Has Israel done everything it could, at every step along the way to secure peace? I don't think so. Neither have the Palestinians. Far from it. Neither side is blameless. Internal politics has taken precedence, on both sides of the conflict, over peace at any cost. More than 40 years of opportunities lost.
ReplyDeleteI also disagree about the soul searching comment.
DeleteHas he publicly called on Israel's adversaries to do likewise?
It must ALWAYS be remembered which of the sides has been the aggressors.
Sorry my reply button doesn't like me. We can just agree to disagree whether Israel could have ever done anything different, that might have futhered the peace process. But there is one point I want to address, that I've been meaning to mention for awhile.
ReplyDeleteYour points about the 1300 years of dhimmitude are appropriate. Particularly in relation to most every surrounding country. It is, and has remained an issue for Egyptians, the Saudis, and most certainly the Iranians for the last 30+ years. For some of her other neighbors, less so. But I think the least with regards to the Palestinians.
I know you've written often of the late 20th century emergence of the Palestinians as a people. And as I've responded in the past, their Arab neighbors made them a people, as much as any internal need for a separate identity. Forty-five years ago, they were not a religious people. Among the least observant Muslim populations in the region. (I could be wrong on this one, but I think their Christian population was also higher than most surrounding populations, with the exception of maybe Lebanon.) Re-establishment of the caliphate was not on their timeline 45 years ago. They had no relationship with the Saudis or Iranians, who both shunned them. The Egyptians and Jordanians were not much better.
I would argue that the possibility exists that while many of Israel's neighbors were fighting racist wars against the Jews, the Palestinians, who had lived side by side with Jews for centuries, and whose population had grown over the previous 100 years in exact parallel with that of the Jews, were fighting an entirely different war. I do not know whether that remains true today. In any case, any differentiation which may have existed 45 years ago, is smaller today than then.
Stuart, thank you for this very interesting comment.
DeleteYou may be onto something, but I am uncertain.
The thrust of your comment seems to be that the Palestinians may have been fighting a different war from the racist Arab war against the Jews.
How so?
You may very well be right, but clarification would be helpful.
What naturally occurs to me, though, is that on top of racism (which, of course, went both ways) it was, and remains, a war of competition over land.
Is that what you are referring to?
Oh, and by the way, in terms of your reply button, try scrolling down after you hit it to see if the reply box appears.
The reply box does appear. Just not in the right place. Eventually i'll slap my forehead and figure out what I'm doing wrong.
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, a war for land and sovereignty. Sovereignty being something, of course, that they never had before. My observations have obviously been warped by the years, skewed by my own experiences, and strongly influenced by what I know, in hindsight anyway, failed miserably.
You know that I think the Israeli settlements, which started in ernest after the Yom Kippur war were a mistake. At the time, Fatah, and Arafat in particular, rejected association with other Arab governments, including Egypt and Jordan (with good cause). I have little illusion that Arafat was ever a willing peace partner during those years. That said, his goal was not resumption of dhimmitude or the resurrection of the caliphate. And the influence of uncle grand mufti not withstanding, I've seen little evidence that he was ever an observant Muslim. Whether he was driven more by anti-semitism or a desire a sovereign homeland for the Palestinians I guess is up for debate. I'm inclinded to believe, at least during that part of his life, it was more the latter then the former.
That was not what Egypt wanted. Nor Jordan, Syria or Lebanon. They each, to some extent, could have granted Palestinian sovereignty between 1949 and 1967 and did not.
I know i'm kind of rambling here, and this is not much more than a useless exercise. And it is fuel for the very type of discussion about the conflict that I so disdain. Which is history of who did what to whom, and whose fault it is that there isn't currently peace. But I'll conclude quickly.
I think the Israelis missed a perfect opportunity in the mid-70's for a lasting peace by allowing the settlments and not seeking a prompt resolution with Arafat. As our friend Paul has often said, the Jews and the Palestinians are natural partners, everybody else in the middle east hates them.
I'm not blaming the Israelis for not making that happen. Arafat may have remained an unwilling partner until the following century. We'll never know. And I have the benefit of almost 40 years of history, that they obviously did not have in the mid-70's. I don't know that the rise of political Islam could have been predicted. I'm just pretty confident it was not a factor until after the 2nd intifada.
I want to take this bit by bit and little by little to see where it might lead us, if you are willing.
DeleteYou know that I think the Israeli settlements, which started in ernest after the Yom Kippur war were a mistake.
You might be surprised to learn that I actually agree with that. What I argue, nonetheless, is that these Jewish communities on the western bank of the Jordan river should be no reason why dictator Abbas and PM Netanyahu cannot draw a line on a map.
I can think of no other ethnic communities anywhere in the world where the president of the United States objects to their presence.
Can you?
No, I can think of no other ethnic communities in the world where the president of the US objects to their presence. Nor can I think of any in the last 50 years that matches the fact pattern of the Israeli settlements. Can you? Any that are even close?
ReplyDelete"Fact pattern"?
DeleteIn any case, we are in agreement that of all the world's communities, Barack Obama objects only to the Jewish presence on the west bank of the Jordan river.
Is that correct?
Do you not find that to be a tad bit odd?
Do you suppose that Barack Obama would object to a Chinese presence in Japan?
A Venezuelan presence in Colombia?
A Rosicrucian presence in Schenectady?
But Jews living in Judea are a problem for Barack Obama because Mahmoud Abbas is a racist.
Fact pattern:
DeleteIf Costa Rica and Nicaragua went to war (irrespective of who started it), and Costa Rica ended up occupying the west coast of the former sovereign territory of Nicaragua. And the UN adopted a resolution calling for:
i) Withdrawal of the Costa Rican armed forces from territories occupied in the recent conflict;
(ii) Termination of all claims or states of belligerency and respect for and acknowledgment of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of every State in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries free from threats or acts of force.
And, the Costa Rican government sanctioned, and in some cases encouraged the establishment of settlements within the occupied territory, by Costa Rican citizens, in some cases displacing existing former Nicaraguan citizen residents for a period exceeding 40 years....
I suspect both Barack Obama and much of the rest of the world would object.
Your simple analogy of Chinese in Japan doesn't quite fit.