Wednesday, December 5, 2012

Obama Strikes Against Israel

Mike L.

{Cross-posted at Geoffff's Joint, Bar and Grill and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}

Two different stories, one in the Times of Israel and one in Y-Net, infer that the Obama administration is now taking a measure of revenge on the Jewish State of Israel for daring to build housing for its citizenry in eastern Jerusalem.  Given Obama's objection to Israel fighting back against Hamas, it may also be the case that Obama is punishing Israel for daring to defend itself from the Hamas rocketeers.

According to the Times of Israel:
NEW YORK — A series of hard-hitting amendments that would have severely penalized the Palestinian Authority, along with several states and international bodies, for the successful bid last week to upgrade the PA’s status to a “nonmember observer state” at the UN failed to pass in the Senate Tuesday. One of the defeated amendments would have closed down the PLO’s office in Washington...

According to Capitol Hill observers familiar with the amendments, they were removed due to pressure from the White House. While the Obama administration actively opposed PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s UN General Assembly move — which saw a vote of 138-9 last Thursday in favor of upgrading “Palestine” to a nonmember observer state — it was concerned that the proposed amendments would limit its options when dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian issue going forward.
While it's unclear just how "actively" the White House actually opposed dictator Abbas's successful UNGA bid to see "Palestine" recognized as a non-member state, it does seem clear that Obama has, in fact, actively prevented the the US Senate from taking action in support of Israel.  This is fully consistent with Barack Obama's ongoing hostility toward that country.  Obama wrecked whatever potential that there may have been in a negotiated conclusion of hostilities through his demand for total settlement freeze.  He blamed Israel for his own miscalculations.  And he then went forward to help usher the Muslim Brotherhood into power in Egypt and, thereby, assisted the rise of political Islam throughout the Middle East.

According to Y-Net:
The European countries plan to impose sanctions on the Israeli government: Freezing agreements, labeling items that are manufactured in the settlements and lowering the level of diplomatic relations.

"In the aftermath of the decision to upgrade the Palestinians' status in the UN to that of a non-member observer state, Netanyahu acted like the leader of a criminal gang, not like the prime minister of a country that is a member of the world body," the European official said. "We were shocked by the decision to build (more housing units beyond the Green Line). It shows that all of Netanyahu's statements regarding the two-state solution idea are meaningless."

It is safe to say that the Washington is encouraging Europe's conduct. The White House authorized Europe to punish Netanyahu's government. This has nothing to do with Netanyahu's behavior during the US elections. The Obama administration realizes that a way must be found to jumpstart the negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians and reach an agreement.
It's difficult to draw hard and fast conclusions on stories such as the above.  Nonetheless, it is not unlikely that the Obama administration is taking behind the scenes actions against Israel as a punitive measure for green-lighting future homes in the eastern section of Jerusalem and for daring to defend itself during the recent conflict with Hamas.

Some will say, strangely enough, that smacking around Israel is good for the Jewish State.

There are any number of "progressives," including "progressive Zionists," who think that punishing Israel is the true yardstick of friendship and alliance with that country.  The more one smacks around Israel... for its own good, of course... the greater a friend one is.

I hope that I can perhaps be forgiven for doubting that a kick in the teeth is the behavior of a friend.

Barack Obama is no friend to the Jewish State of Israel, nor therefore a friend to the Jewish people, in general.

The evidence for this conclusion continues to mount, yet I am certain that it will be perpetually ignored by Obama's "progressive Zionist" supporters.  Jeremy Ben-Ami and Peter Beinart must be very pleased.

7 comments:

  1. Yeah, funny how that therapeutic kicking in teeth works. Tough love was never a progressive type value in my day. Course maybe it's a different thing when the victim is an evil old right winger. But then we'd be seeing a lot of that same old tough love directed at Mursi and the MB. Oh, I'm just sooooooo confused by it all. You think they'd issue a program like at a baseball game or something.

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    1. "therapeutic kicking in teeth"

      Aghghghghgh!!!

      Hysterical, Doodad. I love this.

      Imagine an old-timey Freudian psychologist, with a thick German accent, talking to Woody Allen on the couch. And he says, "Vut you need is unquestionavly a good therapeutic kicking in zee teeth."

      :O)

      I'm rolling.

      Good one, dude.

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    2. Glad you liked it. Sometimes I have a knack for bon mots. That one just seemed to materialize from thin air as a most apt descriptor of what THEY do. And you know who THEY are.

      On a more sombre note, my step dad was never afraid of using the belt and he would ALWAYS say, "this is going to hurt me more than it hurts you." The lying bastard. Sometimes THEY remind me of him.

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  2. This adds strength to your argument, especially because it is done in retribution.

    Obama's actions push Israel into further isolation. Under those circumstances it will do what is necessary to its strategic interest.

    Progressives will find a way to paint it differently, as usual. They invariably do when it comes to Obama. He held a seder in the WH! Thus, they have paid their lip service.

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    1. Re: "He held a seder in the WH! Thus, they have paid their lip service."

      This has always been a problem with Jewish people.

      "...Irrational optimism got many Jews killed in the Holocaust. It is the reason so many got on the trains. And yet it is just as easy as it ever was to sell irrational optimism to the Jews: they all want it. Denial of reality is the Jewish way of finding psychological solace. It is understandable. It is also deadly...."

      -- Francisco Gil-White, "Optimism is dangerous - Israelis, and Jews more generally, are better served by healthy pessimism" (http://www.hirhome.com/israel/optimism_is_dangerous.htm) (Although I wouldn't call it "pessimism". I'd call it being mindful.)

      "...a weak spot for Jews has been dealing with situations where hatred for them and an effort to destroy them as a community has been coupled with seemingly humanitarian, progressive rhetoric."

      -- Barry Rubin, "Explaining Jewish Political Behavior" (http://rubinreports.blogspot.com/2010/08/explaining-jewish-political-behavior.html)


      "Around the world, there is a striking convergence of opinion concerning the relationship between the US and Israel.

      "Supporters of the PLO - synonymous with 'supporters of a Palestinian state', because the PLO will run any such state - are convinced that the US is an ally of Israel. Some believe the US employs Israel in order to expand the American empire, and others - echoing the claims of that infamous forgery, 'The Protocols of Zion' - believe that history's greatest superpower, the US, is actually the pawn of tiny Israel. Either way, they are agreed that the US and Israel are supposedly 'a team.'

      "Supporters of Israel naturally disagree with supporters of the PLO about most things but not on this point, as they also believe that the US is a friend of Israel - perhaps its only real friend. Whereas those who are pro-PLO are especially infuriated by perceived US support for Israel, those who are pro-Israel are deliriously grateful for the same (especially so in the case of Zionist Jews).

      "Given that across the spectrum of those politically mobilized on this issue, from one pole to the other, everybody appears to have the same opinion on this, casual observers are naturally drawn into agreement as well, creating a crushing consensus all over the world: the US is an ally of Israel.

      "But is it true?

      "Let us first ask: what is an ally? My dictionary defines 'ally' as 'one who is associated with another as helper.'

      "Everybody knows that the US says it supports Israel. But actions speak louder than words. What is the evidence of US actions? ..."

      -- Francisco Gil-White, "Is the US an ally of Israel? A chronological look at the evidence" (Part 1: http://www.hirhome.com/israel/hirally.htm; Part 2: http://www.hirhome.com/israel/hirally2.htm)



      Note:

      Francisco Gil-White doesn't quite "get" Jewish Stockholm Syndrome. That is: He hasn't quite understood Jewish Stockholm Syndrome and he has misinterpreted some cases of what have been Jewish Stockholm syndrome. And I think that, in some cases, he thinks that what I think, in those cases, is just normal Western anti-Jewish bigotry and, as part of that, "willful ignorance", is conscious "intentional" intendedly genocidal anti-Jewish bigotry. But he's got all the facts. He's well worth reading.

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    2. BTW:

      On the Orwellian use of the terms ‘left’ and ‘right,’ and on the dangers therein to Israeli politics., by Francisco Gil-White

      "...The use of the terms ‘right’ and ‘left’ has also become rather strange in Israel. Just as the United States does not have a significant left-wing, Israel has never had a significant right-wing when it comes to issues unrelated to the Arab-Israeli conflict. Just as all politics in the United States is conducted on the right, because both major parties are right wing, most politics in Israel are conducted on the left, and this skew, as in the mirror-image that is the United States, accounts for the curious manner in which these terms are used in Israel. ..."

      http://www.hirhome.com/israel/left_right2.htm

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    3. "Right" and "Left" are little more than signifiers for, "See those guys over there? Don't listen to what they have to say."

      Those who self-identify as "conservative" or "right-wing" or, even, Republican do this among themselves concerning "liberals" or "progressives" or "leftists."

      And, needless to say, those who self-identify as "left-wing liberal" use the term "right-wing" to simply delegitimize, if not dehumanize, anyone who says things that they may not like.

      My progressive-left detractors (I will not call them "critics") call me "right-wing" in order to get other people to simply not listen to what I have to say.

      I criticize progressives constantly, but it is not because I wish to delegitimize them, but because I have honest criticisms of their political movement, behavior, and ideas. I may be correct in my criticisms or incorrect in them, but they are not attempts at delegitimization.

      And that makes all the difference in the world.

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