{Cross-posted at Geoffff's Joint and Pro-Israel Bay Bloggers.}
Op-ed: Lack of public interest particularly intriguing as US president repeatedly urged to come to Israel
Tamar HermannNot only is Obama not well-liked in Israel, but his administration has been lowering expectations since we first started hearing about this trip. I suspect that our friend "Ziontruth" would agree with that assessment because the less western powers seek to impose their will upon Israel the better off everyone is, including the Palestinian-Arabs.
President Obama's arrival is just around the corner, and apart from those in charge of the visit in government ministries and secret security agencies – there seem to be no fervent preparations or any special excitement ahead of the visit. It appears that the construction of the new coalition, the distribution of government portfolios and the upcoming Passover holiday with all its family and consumer-related aspects, are overshadowing the upcoming event.
Every thought or slip of the tongue made by Lapid/Bennett are perceived as much more fateful than the president's planned speech this Thursday, and discussions revolving around what we'll be cooking this holiday are more heated than those dealing with the approaching visit's positive or negative potential.
Obama's decision to deliver his address at Jerusalem's International Convention Center in front of students rather than at the Knesset – is particularly intriguing in light of the fact that many in Israel and abroad it recommended such a visit repeatedly.Obama's decision to not speak before the Knesset represents his general dismissal of Israeli concerns as a whole. I suppose that I have been frustrated over the last few years in how Obama's Jewish supporters not only overlook all these little symbolic gestures of contempt, but even overlook or dismiss or apologize for the foreseeable negative results of his actual behavior. I tend to harp on the Brotherhood as regular readers of these pages know, but it remains unfathomable to me why Barack Obama would seek to help the rise of political Islam in the Middle East.
It's a mystery, tho many of our participants do not find it mysterious, at all. There are those who argue that Obama favors political Islam because he favors political Islam.
Period. End of story.
I prefer to be generous to my President in the hope that he may not be malicious... merely ideologically misguided and not terribly bright.
What remains more mysterious is why so many American Jews don't mind the fact that Obama supported the rise of the premier anti-Semitic organization in the world today?
How is it possible, you may ask yourself?
So it is quite surprising that when the visit is actually happening, the hosts seem unenthusiastic. What does the Jewish public in Israel think about the president and his visit to the region, and can that explain the apparent lack of interest we are witnessing?I don't know about Arab-Israelis, but the Jews of the Middle East are entirely uninterested in Obama's visit because they know he's no friend to them and because they know that he is weak and increasingly irrelevant. You can bet that if Obama had said something like, "I am coming to Israel in order to bring peace to the region," they would have stood up and taken a great deal of notice.
They would have run for the friggin' hills, in fact.
The very notion that Barack Obama would try to bring "peace" to Israel would have caused a panic among reasonable people, both Muslim and Jewish, throughout the region.
Many of them, and for very good reason, would have immediately stockpiled serious weaponry because the Israelis understand that whenever the west seeks to impose peace that the bloodshed is going to ramp up, as we saw with the Second Terror War after Arafat dismissed Bill Clinton.
I find myself, therefore, reasonably pleased that Obama might have the decency to approach things with a smidge of modesty this time around. With any luck he won't allow his racism to get the better of him and start telling the Jewish people where we may, or may not, be allowed to live in Judea.
My suggestion to the Israelis is to ignore the guy as much as politically possible. Be nice to him. Feed him a good lunch and dinner. Pat him on the head.
And then send him on his merry way.
All second term US Presidents do something half hearted like this to 'solve' the Mideast because they are focused on their own posterity and not any particular set of results. Obama has no specific objectives for his trip other than "Obama went to Israel". If world peace breaks out he can commission his face to replace all four heads on Mt Rushmore and if not, so what? No better no worse than Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush.
ReplyDeleteOf course if I were horribly cynical I'd surmise that Obama travels to Israel in order to deliver an important message face to face. One which is so sensitive it can't be delivered any other way. And that is, that Obama knows that Iran is a nuclear state now and not only is there nothing anyone can do about that but the US will never back Israel's efforts, albeit overdue, to unwind that clock. Since Obama's entire Mideast Strategy is centered on "Leave the Area Now!" he will prod the Jews to do that as well. Not literally mind you but he will quietly link all of Yesha with Iran and utter a vague warning that time is not on their side.
By the way, anyone seen this?
http://rickrozoff.wordpress.com/2013/01/01/u-s-congress-approves-transfer-of-guided-missile-warships-to-turkey/
Given, not sold to. Given. 2 FFG-7 class missile boats. Each one roughly twice the size of one the three INF's Saar-5 corvettes.
You have a dark and brooding soul, Trudy.
DeleteAnd, yet, that pooch is so cute.
If I am wrong, that's great. I am still more convinced than not that Obama will decline the trip at the last possible second. There really is no earthly reason he should arrive at all let alone arrive to have almost nothing to say or do. Unless of course he really does believe that he can 'buy off' all the American Jews who complained he never visited at all with a silly pointless site seeing tour. If he brings nothing then he should stay home. As it is, if his car gets a flat tire the western media will never stop screaming how the Jews imperiled their Lord and Savior while Chris Matthews has a good laugh during his 9 minutes of hate segment at the front of "Hardball" about how "Bibi can't keep the streets clean haw haw haw".
DeleteThe fact is that American and Israeli citizens alike are rather disinterested in foreign policy - there are too many domestic issues pressing; issues about the economy the distribution of wealth, etc. Israelis see Obama but what they're thinking about is Israel's economy, growth and such while American voters see Obama once more leaving Washington so as not to have to deal with his teetering budget which- according to his own speeches, threatens to kill and eat all babies, old people and teachers-cops-firefighters in America. But there he is flying off to the Mideast with a raft of NYT scribes in his wake praising terrorists.
Can you imagine what would occur if he cancelled today? It would be incredible to watch how it would be covered. I think it's good that he goes. He has not done well to show Israelis he is a real friend, when he searches his soul.
DeleteYes, foreign policy is a stepchild. Some of the smartest people I know are clueless about the realities that occur in the world. What they know is skewed, too, for they are in an domestic Obama vs. Republican echo chamber. The recent Pew polling helped explain a portion. 85% of what is on MSNBC is opinion, not news, and hard news reporting itself is vanishing from the airwaves.
http://stateofthemedia.org/2013/special-reports-landing-page/the-changing-tv-news-landscape/
His pretension to being able to make peace in the region is not at first alarming, just pathetic. He might as well say he's going to eradicate poverty and disease.
ReplyDeleteOf course, that's only the immediate reaction. For most Israeli Jews, it's very clear there's a price to pay for his delusional thinking, hence the low polling for Obama's favorability in Israel (the original article is on Politico, but I'm not linking to it because it's full of Nazi-like comments. Caveat lector). As for the nature of that price, that's not hard to guess.
Pointed that out elsewhere, but was censored by a usual suspect who goes the extra mile to insult others, then courageously deletes the response, in petty dictator fashion.
DeleteHere is part of what was censored:
The map of Israel on the Obama video shows the Golan Heights, Jerusalem, northern Israel, and areas surrounding what is currently the West Bank as non-Israeli territory. The Golan Heights is shown as part of Syria; Jerusalem is shown as part of the West Bank; and northern Israel is shown as part of Lebanon. A small thing, but perhaps not to an Israeli that does not see Obama as this blog does. In a recent poll, only 36% of Israeli Jews defined his attitude as "friendly" and he is perceived as more pro-Palestinian (23%) than pro-Israel (18%).
Those nice Palestinian boys welcomed Obama with fireworks (aka rockets.) What a swell buncha guys.
ReplyDeletehttp://elderofziyon.blogspot.ca/2013/03/rockets-from-gaza-to-greet-obama.html