Schoolyard bullies (from the film "Back to the Future"). Why is the Obama Administration joining them?
The Obama Administration has joined the schoolyard bullies:
U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta warned Sunday that Israel is becoming increasingly isolated in the Middle East, The Associated Press reported.
Panetta added Israel must restart negotiations with the Palestinian Authority and work to restore relations with Egypt and Turkey.
Panetta made the comments as he was traveling to Israel, saying the ongoing upheaval in the Middle East makes it critical for the Israelis to find ways to communicate with other nations in the region in order to have stability.
“There’s not much question in my mind that they maintain that (military) edge,†AP quoted Panetta as having told reporters traveling with him. “But the question you have to ask: Is it enough to maintain a military edge if you’re isolating yourself in the diplomatic arena? Real security can only be achieved by both a strong diplomatic effort as well as a strong effort to project your military strength.†– (my emphasis)
Let’s compare the implications of Panetta’s remarks to reality:
“Israel must restart negotiations.” Why is the onus on Israel? It was the Palestinian Authority (PA) that broke off negotiations and then violated the agreements it had signed by seeking UN sanction for a unilateral declaration of statehood. It was the PA that insisted on one precondition after another, and Israel that agreed to talk without preconditions.
Making Israel give in to PA demands on the grounds that then there will be productive negotiations has exactly the opposite effect. The Arabs pocket the latest concession and demand more. Negotiations are never ‘productive’ because the PA will never agree to end the conflict.
“Israel must work to restore relations with Egypt and Turkey.” This is Kafkaesque. A terrorist attack which killed 7 Israelis was launched from Egyptian territory, Egyptian soldiers or police murdered at least one of the victims and were themselves killed when the Israelis returned fire. Israel apologized — for self-defense — and had its embassy destroyed, and barely avoided having security officers who were trapped inside ripped to bloody bits. Now Israel needs to “work” to restore relations? With a country that while allegedly ‘at peace’ with it, continues its vicious incitement against Jews and Israel?
In fact, why hasn’t the US suggested to Egypt that in return for the billions in aid it gets every year, maybe it should stop being the biggest purveyor of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish hate in the world? This has been going on for decades.
And Turkey — whose leader has systematically tried to humiliate Israel since he took power almost 10 years ago, whose campaign climaxed with the intentional provocation of a bloody incident in the Mediterranean, who has gone as far as to threaten acts of war against Israel when even the usually-pliant UN said that Israel was justified in its actions — what kind of self-abnegation does the Obama Administration expect from Israel and what makes them think it would make Turkey change course, when the present one is so deliberate?
“Israel is isolating itself.” No, Israel has bent over backwards to have good relations — with the Palestinians, with Egypt, with Turkey. Any isolation is being imposed by those who — pay attention, here it comes — do not want a solution to the conflict between Israel and its neighbors that leaves a Jewish state in existence. Can anything be more obvious?
Do Mahmoud Abbas and Fatah want coexistence? Of course not, the evidence is overwhelming that their goal is to destroy Israel. Does Hamas want coexistence? Don’t make me laugh. Does the Turkish Islamist AKP regime want good relations? Of course not, the more they hurt Israel, the better a candidate for leadership of the Muslim Middle East they will be. Do the Egyptian Islamists and nationalists want good relations? Of course not — they, too, want to prove that they are qualified to lead the Muslim world, and they need someone to blame for the economic catastrophe that is already brewing.
The Europeans (although there are exceptions) play along. They have trade relations with Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, etc. — whose regimes, incidentally, are at each others throats about every imaginable issue other than the need to end the Jewish state. And the Europeans have good, solid Israel-hating — Jew-hating, too, if the truth be told — constituencies at home, and it is not all due to Muslim immigrants, either.
So what about the Obama Administration? What does it get for joining in with the scapegoating of Israel, along with the rest of the schoolyard bullies? Somebody should ask them, because I am giving up on looking for economic and geopolitical explanations.
Technorati Tags: Leon Panetta, Israel
Hi, Vic.
In answer to the question you pose in your final paragraph:
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. The election of Obama was a virtual coup d’etat, the crowning achievement of the Saudi petrodollar prostitution machine.
They’ve got the media. They’ve got academia. They’ve got State (they’ve had that a long time). They have made inroads into the Pentagon. Theyve got all kinds of former high government officials on their payroll, working at “think tanks” they subsidize, lobbying for their point of view. This has two objects: Obscure the barbaric, medieval nature of their society, and blame EVERYTHING on Israel, so as to isolate them and strangle them politically and economically, in the manner of Rhodesia in the 1970s.
A Saudi democracy activist, Ali Alyami, told me face-to-face back in ’09, “..the Saudis own this town”, referring to D.C.
AMERICA, WE NEED TO TAKE BACK OUR COUNTRY!!!! IN TERMS OF FOREIGN POLICY, WE ARE NOW LITTLE MORE THAN A COLONY OF SAUDI ARABIA!!!
Yes, I know Obama and the Saudis have had disagreements, particularly concerning Mubarak, Iran, and Bahrain. These are tactical differences. Obama really believes the cynical nonsense narrative propagaged by the Saudis about the need to “address the rights of the Palestinians”. To the Saudis, this is simply a huge, cynical lie designed to undermine Israel. When there are more objectively important issues to attend to – such as a nuclear Iran – these ruses can be swept aside. But Obama is a “true believer” in this crap, just like he was taught by their stooges and lackeys such as Khalid Al Mansour, Rashid Khalidi, and Rev. Wrong.
I’m not saying someone in Riyadh picks up a phone and tells Obama what to do every week. Like a true, brainwashed “Manchurian Candidate”, as in the old movie, Obama really believes he’s a “patriotic American”, doing what is best for this country.
But he is only the tip of a large iceberg. There is a very powerful infrastructure behind him, pursuing the same agenda. The Saudis did the same thing in Britain, and they are trying to do it here: throw out a lot of noise – via the media and academia – to confuse people and drive them away from treating the Israeli-Palestinian conflict a going concern, even if they are pro-Israel at heart. Once popular pro-Israel sentiment is neutralized and “shouted down” in this fashion, the field is clear to concentrate on corrupting the higher echelons of government that are directly concerned with foreign policy implentation, such as the executive branch of government, and the foreign service apparatus. In a democracy such as ours – or Britain’s – it is also important to currupt the major national parties that vie for power, so that no matter whom they put up for election, policy towards Israel remains the same – negative.
In this way, it doesn’t matter how “pro-Israel” a given polity may be. The default policy position of the national government in question will be negative towards Israel.
That’s how that dingaling Ron Paul suddenly became a “viable” candidate this year. That’s why Chris Christie is being primed now for a run (he’s as anti-Israel as Obama). These are the “fail safe” provisions of this plan, if Obama can’t do what they want him to do.
The main things standing in the say of the Saudi scheme here is the fiercely pro-Israel Evangelical movement (representing approx. 30% of the U.S. electorate), and the fact that so far, much of the Republican party – though hardly all – seems resistant to their efforts.
That’s right, Vic. There’s no sensible ideological, economic, or geopolitical rationale for the current administration’s policies towards Israel. Not from the point of view of objective U.S. interests. But we’re not talking about U.S. interests here, Vic. I know it is hard to accept, but yes, a nation of syphilitic, medieval, child-molesting towel-heads has made a very powerful bid at utterly warping the foreign policy of the U.S. to their ends.
If Ron Paul or Chris Christie get the Republican nomination for 2012, I submit that the game is over and they have won. But the bad guys, for all their money and cunning, are not invincible. After all, Obama was supposed to have wrapped up shoving his Saudi diktat down Israel’s throat by now, per the commitments he made before the UN a year ago. He has failed utterly. We can all be proud of that. We have slowed them down a lot, but the war is far from over, obviously. Now, like the Soviets pushing the Nazis back from Stalingrad from February 1943 onwards, we have to push these frauds and interlopers back. And, it will be a hard, long slog with many setbacks along they way.
But we can still win.
After Obama’s positive U.N. speech many thought of his Administration as basically sympathetic to Israel. But Panetta’s words are consistent with what has been the overall Administration attitude which from the beginning has been far more critical of Israel than of its adversaries. Panetta’s words as this article points out are truly unfair, and again blame the wrong party for the problem. Once again the thought goes to whether or not the Republicans will field a candidate who is competent to deal with major U.S. problems and who will also be a staunch , and not merely opportunistic friend of Israel.
Shalom Freedman:
What “positive” UN speech? I must have missed that one. You have to listen carefully to Obama. He’s an intellectual mediocrity, but he has one great talent, and that is deceit. This trained ear got his message very clearly.
First, he did not retreat one iota from what he laid out in his May 19 speech. Instead, he made reference to his positions on this matter, which were “well known”.
Second, he said that resolving this issue was THE commitment of the U.S., and SHOULD BE the MAIN focus of the UN in the weeks and months to come. Never mind anything else going on in the world, shoving his Saudi diktat down Israel’s throat would remain his #1 priority.
He talked about the need for Israel’s neighbors to “recognize” her. But even here, he minces words. Recognize her as what? Even the Fatah PA leaders say the “recognize ” Israel…they just won’t recognize her as a Jewish state.
A true pro-Israel speech would say unequivocally that the PA must recognize Israel as a Jewish state, and amend their national chartar accordingly, before Israel can be expected to negotiate with them over anything. Failing that, the U.S. would back Israel completely in her defense against anything the PA does or tries to do to them.
A true pro-Isreal speech would say that as the PA does not recognize Israel as a Jewish state, then Israel is released from any obligation to recognize the PA as anything but a bunch of terrorist thugs.
A true pro-Israel speech would say that the fact that the PA is now sidestepping negotiations by going to the UN means that Israel is released from any prior agreements made with the PA, including Oslo, since in this action by the PA, Oslo has been abrogated.
A true pro-Israel speech would say that the UN should not even consider the PA statehood bid, as this action runs completely counter to UNSCR 242.
No, Shalom, this president is absolutely NOT symapthetic to Israel, he never was, and he never will be. He hates Israel, and he loves appeasing Moslems and Arabs. That is not going to change. We have to face this fact, and act accordingly. His corrupt administration must be resisted in every way while he is still polluting the White House with his putrid presence, and over here in the U.S., we must do everything we can to ensure that he gets the boot in 2012, and that he is NOT replaced with yet another Saudi stooge.