Moral Equivalence and The Fed's Trillions!

Jonathan Tobin is not buying Obama's moral equivalence shtick. Tobin is more eloquent than I in explaining why.

As for my view:

Obama has rock star prominence and uses 'audacity' effectively in going to places where others may not be welcome. The test is whether his speechifying will change reality. I suspect it will not and in fact I suspect Obama has emboldened our enemies, given them added courage and strengthened their resolve.

Why? Because terrorists will interpret his speech as a sign of weakness. Terrorists relate to power and understand its use. They are not tuned in to moral equivalency and therefore, I doubt Pakistanis are safer today.

Yes, Obama's speech touched all the bases and he articulated all the conflicting problems. He placed the ball neatly in the Muslim's and Israeli's court. He also backed away from repeating former comments about Iran's nuclear ambitions, said we should not tell others what to do and then proceeded to do just that. Obama even backed away from calling terrorists what they are - terrorists. Not too 'audacious' in that regard.

Obama gets an A+ for effort but a questionabe grade for his moral equivalency and a low grade, to date, in reference to N Korea and Iran.

I still rate MLK over BHO when it comes to moral speechifying! MLK both talked the talk and walked the walk and was far more eloquent in so doing.

Perhaps the problem MLK faced was less daunting and complex because it was more black and white. The historical challenge BHO faces when it comes to the Middle East is not so comparably neat. Enslavement is morally wrong, economically stupid and was a blight on our nation. That said, it is not the equivalent of what afflicts the Middle East.

MLK we still need you. (See 1 and 1a below.)

This is a YOU TUBE interview of the inspector general of The Federal Reserve who simply does not know where several trillion dollars went. Maybe she should look under the rug. Absolutely a pathetic example of wanton incompetence on the part of our government. (See 2 below.)

Max Boot likes what he heard but is not sure it will be bought. More pro-con commentary from others regarding Obama's speech. (See 3 to 3i below.)


Obama visited Buchenwald and that is marvelous but will he always remember his visit when he subsequently makes policy decisions and be guided by the impact that decision making may have in signalling those who would repeat this tragic period in history? Does he have the demonstrated fortitude and guts to stand up to the punks of the world with nuclear arms or will he buckle, change his mind, and blame someone else? That remains the unanswered question. (See 4 below.)

Would you buy a car designed by Barney? (See 5 below.)

Dick



1) Obama’s Age of Moral Equivalence
By Jonathan Tobin


President Obama spoke with his usual charm, polish and eloquence in Cairo this morning. These virtues are formidable and, no doubt will win him, if not our country, some friends. But this speech was, like so many of his utterances since taking office, tarnished by a desire to be all things to all people. To be Barack Obama is to be, as he says, a person who can see all issues from all sides and defend American interests while at the same time being everyone’s best friend. He sees himself as someone who can achieve Olympian detachment. Speaking of the Arab-Israeli conflict, he says: “If we see this conflict only from one side or the other, then we will be blind to the truth.”

But there is more than one type of blindness. The search for the truth is not merely an exercise in which all grievances are considered the same. To assert the truth of the Holocaust is appropriate — if unfortunately necessary when addressing an Arab audience — as is calling on the Palestinians to “abandon violence” and to cease “shooting rockets at sleeping children” or blowing up old women on buses.

But the problem with this conflict is not that both sides won’t listen to each other or give peace a chance. That might have been a good point to make prior to the signing of the Oslo peace accords in 1993 when Israel recognized the legitimacy of Palestinian aspirations and began the process of handing over large portions of the area reserved by the League of Nations for the creation of a Jewish National Home for the creation of a Palestinian equivalent. But Israel offered these same Palestinians a state in virtually all of the West Bank and Gaza as well as part of Jerusalem in 2000 and again in negotiations conducted by the government of Ehud Olmert just last year. So, the problem is not that the Israelis don’t want the two state solution that Obama endorsed in Cairo. Rather, it is, as Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said in Washington only a week ago, that the Palestinians aren’t interested in negotiating with Israel.

Even more obnoxious than this refusal to see that the truth about the conflict isn’t to be found through an even-handed “plague on both your houses” approach is his comparison of the Palestinians’ plight to that of African-Americans in the United States before the civil rights era. Israelis have not enslaved Palestinians. The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians rests on the latter’s unwillingness to come to terms with the former’s existence. The plight of Palestinians in Gaza is terrible but it is a direct result of their own decision to choose war over peace, not a lack of understanding on the part of the Jews. Going to the Middle East while ostentatiously avoiding Israel and picking a fight with its leadership sends a message that will resonate throughout the Arab world. His signal that America is now an impartial broker rather than Israel’s ally can only encourage a Palestinian people that continue to reject peace.

Another disappointment was his treatment of the threat from Iran’s drive for nuclear weapons. Again, he re-stated the history of our problems with Iran in a context of moral equivalence. While he has stated elsewhere — and promised as much during his run for office —that he will not allow Iran to achieve nuclear capability, such plain talk was absent in Cairo. Nowhere did he say plainly that Iran must stop its nuclear program or call upon other nations to join the effort to restrain Tehran. That was a major blunder and a missed opportunity to rally the Arab world that fears Iranian nukes as much as the Israelis, to step up on the issue before it is too late.

Though he made a number of important points about fighting terror, religious tolerance and women’s rights and democracy, the speech was constructed and delivered as a series of moral equivalencies that undermine both the search for peace as well as the equally necessary drive to reform the Islamic world. As a statement of philosophy as well as a proclamation of American values it was as morally unserious a speech as an American president has ever made.

1a)My own LTE:

Congratulations President Obama.

In one of your 'rock star' moral equivalent performances you successfully leveled the playing field between a democracy and totalitarian governments, between a friend and Islamist terrorists (you could not even bring yourself to call them as such), between Israelis, who seek to live in peace, with neighbors sworn to Israel's destruction and Palestinians who can't even get along amongst themselves. With a nation that has accomplished beyond belief in less than 65 years under the most dangerous of circumstances and great odds and a region of nations that subjugate their people to misery, backwardness and teach hatred to their children when they are not being encouraged to strap bombs onto themselves.

Yes, you 'bravely' identified all the issues in your stylized speechifying as you sought to mollify world Muslims. You also regrettably 'flipped and flopped' again vis a vis Iran's nuclear ambitions and you preside over a State Department that responds with empty adjectives while N Korea explodes nuclear bombs. However, you remain consistent in one regard -you continue to blame everything on your predecessor(s)ie. 'war of choice.'

In less than 6 months you have accomplished a great deal of 'audacious change' domestically speaking by: intruding government deep into the bowels of the private sector, dictating compensation, saddling trillions of dollars of debt on future generations, instituting policies whose sole purpose is to transfer wealth, in the misguided belief Capitalism, entrepreneurialism and private initiative threaten our nation. You have healed by pitting various sectors of our society against each other?

And if all that 'change' ain't enough you soon plan to infect our health care system with your own heavy handed prescription of a government dictated approach.

You remain a 'whirling dervish' youthful and inexperienced president and when you have completed your magical acts I fear our nation will have been radically altered, the world will be less secure (maybe even a nuclear war will have come and gone) and, I suspect, you will still be blaming your predecessor(s.)


2)http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJqM2tFOxLQ

3) Obama in Cairo
By Max Boot


Having just read Obama’s Cairo speech, my reaction is: Not bad. It could have been better. But it also could have been a lot worse.

Steve Hayes is right in noting that Obama could have talked more pointedly about the relative success of Iraqi democracy and the shocking denial of women’s rights in many Muslim countries, which is no way equivalent to “the struggle for women’s equality … in many aspects of American life.”

There were other examples of attempts to build false equivalence between the Western and Muslim worlds. For instance, he said: “Israelis must acknowledge that just as Israel’s right to exist cannot be denied, neither can Palestine’s.” Of course most Israelis don’t deny Palestine’s right to exist as a Muslim state as long as it is willing to live in peace, whereas Palestinian leaders have shown no comparable willingness to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.

Another example of moral equivalency: “In the middle of the Cold War, the United States played a role in the overthrow of a democratically-elected Iranian government. Since the Islamic Revolution, Iran has played a role in acts of hostage-taking and violence against U.S. troops and civilians.” That is accepting the (false) narrative of the Iranian Revolution, which holds that America’s role in overthrowing Mossadeq more than half a century ago — a development that would not have been possible had the leftist prime minister not lost support in the Iranian street — is just as bad as the campaign of mass murder and kidnapping that Iran continues to support at this very moment.

Obama also twisted history when, for example, he mentioned how “Islam has always been a part of America’s story.” He said: “In signing the Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, our second President John Adams wrote, ‘The United States has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion or tranquility of Muslims.’ ” That made the treaty sound like a celebration of American-Muslim partnership when in reality it was a treaty whereby the U.S. paid substantial bribes to the ruler of Tripoli in return for a cessation of attacks on American shipping by his corsairs. Tripoli didn’t keep its promises, and the result was America’s first overseas conflict — the Barbary Wars fought against the Muslim states of North Africa.

Should Obama have summarized the real — as opposed to the air-brushed — history? Probably not. His point wasn’t to settle historical accounts but to put the best face forward to the Muslim world, and he did that, while still tactfully criticizing Muslim countries and defending the United States. Some passages that I particularly liked:

The United States has been one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known. …

Much has been made of the fact that an African-American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected President. But my personal story is not so unique. The dream of opportunity for all people has not come true for everyone in America but its promise exists for all who come to our shores.

I also liked it that the first issue he addressed was that “we must finally confront together… is violent extremism in all of its forms.” And he didn’t mention anti-abortion extremists as an example. He made clear that the “violent extremism” he was concerned about was perpetrated by Islamic terrorists and that “we will… relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our security.”

I liked his attack on Holocaust deniers and anti-Semites who are pervasive in the Muslim world “Denying that fact [of the six million Jews killed] is baseless, ignorant, and hateful. Threatening Israel with destruction — or repeating vile stereotypes about Jews — is deeply wrong, and only serves to evoke in the minds of Israelis this most painful of memories while preventing the peace that the people of this region deserve.”

And I liked the fact that he put in a Bush-like plug for democracy:

America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. Those are not just American ideas, they are human rights, and that is why we will support them everywhere.

In the course of talking about democracy Obama even mentioned discrimination against Copts in Egypt (”Among some Muslims, there is a disturbing tendency to measure one’s own faith by the rejection of another’s”). This was the extent of his (indirect) criticism of his host, the dictator Hosni Mubarak. Perhaps he should have said more about Egypt’s denial of basic human rights to its people as Bush once did. The problem, however, is that if you talk about human rights in Egypt, the question becomes: What are you willing to do to back it up? Personally, I thought the U.S. should have made Mubarak pay for such outrageous actions as the jailing of liberal opposition leader Ayman Nour by cutting his subsidies. But there was no appetite in the Bush administration for such action and there isn’t in the Obama administration either. If we are going to support the Mubarak regime, it makes sense to soft-pedal criticism of it — a point that even Bush tacitly acknowledged in his second term.

I realize that the Obama speech isn’t going to satisfy those (like me) who once thrilled to Bush’s unapologetic pro-democracy rhetoric but, for all of Obama’s rhetorical sleight of hands and elisions, I thought he did an effective job of making America’s case to the Muslim world. No question: He is a more effective salesman than his predecessor was. Which doesn’t mean that his audience will buy the message.

3a) Obama's speech to the Muslim world
By Leo Rennert

President Obama promised that he wanted his Cairo speech to be the start of an "honest" dialogue with the Muslim world. When it comes to how he handled the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he fell short.


He began his remarks on this issue by recalling a long history of anti-Semitism and persecution of Jews, culminating in the Holocaust. He denounced Holocaust deniers and those who would threaten Israel "with destruction" -- but without mentioning Iran or Ahmadinejad.


Seeking to sound even-handed, he then immediately drew an equivalence between historical Jewish suffering and the lot of Palestinians. "On the other hand," he remarked, "it is also undeniable that Palestinians have suffered in their pursuit of a homeland -- for more than 60years they've endured the pain of dislocation." He pointed to Palestinians still waiting in refugee camps and Palestinians who have to "endure the daily humiliations -- large and small -- that come with occupation." Their situation, he said, is "intolerable" and America will support their legitimate aspirations for "dignity, opportunity and "a state of their own."


And that's where Obama failed to speak "honestly" about Palestinian pain and its causes.


For starters, he drew a totally false analogy between the Holocaust and the Palestinian pain of "dislocations" and "daily humilitations" under Israeli occupation. The parallel between the deliberate slaughter of 6 million Jews and the lot of Palestinians in refugee camps and in the West Bank and Gaza, where the UN supplies them with schools, food and shelter, is unsupportable. Yes, it's an unhappy lot, but it's not Auschwitz or Buchenwald. Not by a long shot. UN reports consistently rank the Palestinian territories ahead of Syria, Egypt, and about 70 other nations in basic standards of living.


Secondly, in discussing the Palestinian "pain of dislocation," Obama bought directly into Palestinian refusal to acknowledge that much of that pain has been self-inflicted. He failed to be "honest" with Palestinians by not telling them that there would be no refugee camps nor "daily humiliations" under Israeli occupation, if only their leaders and the leaders of Arab nations had accepted a two-state solution more than 60 years ago under the UN's partition plan of 1947. Or that all that pain could have been ended in 2000 if Arafat had accepted a generous two-state plan offered by Bill Clinton or Ehud Barak. Or, as recently as last year, when Ehud Olmert proposed a Palestinian state on 95 percent of the West Bank and all of Gaza with a land corridor to connect the 2 territories.


Obama spoke eloquently about the Palestinians' right to claim a state of their own, but totally blanked out a long history of rejectionism of a two-state solution by their own leaders, including Mahmoud Abbas, who flatly turned down Olmert in 2008.


The president also shortchanged Israel and its leaders when he deplored a "continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza" and "lack of opportunity" in the West Bank, without in any way crediting Israel for moving daily truck convoys with medicines, food and other essential goods into Gaza, and without mentioning Israel's relaxation of roadblocks and checkpoints in the West Bank to improve economic progress for the Palestinians.


That said, Obama spoke out strongly and eloquently against Palestinian reliance on violence to achieve their political goals. "Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and does not succeed," he declared. Obama pointed to the suffering of blacks in America under slavery and segregation, noting that peaceful protests -- not violence -- brought about "full and equal rights." Calling violence a "dead end," he added: "It is a sign neither of courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That's not how moral authority is claimed; that's how it's surrendered."


Obama also didn't shy from calling on the Palestinian Authority to work toward a "capacity to govern." While welcoming the Arab "peace" initiative as an "important beginning," he made clear that Arab leader still have a way to go -- by helping to strengthen proper Palestinian governance in the West Bank and by recognizing "Israel's legitimacy."


With Hamas, the president drew a sharp line in the sand against this terrorist organization, saying that it could play a role in fulfilling Palestinian aspirations only by putting an end to violence, recognizing past peace agreements, and recognizing Israel's right to exist.


On settlements, where Obama is applying special pressure on Israel's new government, he said the U.S. "does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop." While the rhetoric was harsh, it fell short of the more implacable anti-settlement gauntlet that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently laid down, when she declared that Israel must cease any and all construction in settlements without exceptions.


Whether significant or not, Obama was less specific than his secretary of state.


All in all, Obama's remarks on Israel and the Palestinians included some welcome truth-saying, along with lots of blindness to the real dangers Israel faces and to continued Arab/Palestinian rejectionism of a genuine two-state solution.


3b) Mutual Of Obama's Wild Kingdom
By Harold Witkov

What's in a pecking order? More than you might wish to believe, especially considering President Obama's speech in Cairo yesterday.


The animal kingdom is full of lessons for humans. We must learn from our fellow creatures. 20th Century zoologist Thorleif Schjelderup-Ebbe, through his study of poultry, learned how chickens related to each other. The Norwegian scientist observed that the most dominant bird could peck upon the head of another without fear. Number 2 could do the same, but never to number 1. Number 3 chicken followed the same pattern, and so on down the line. This pecking order insight, by Mr. Schelderup-Ebbe, provided a psychological understanding into the behavior of animal packs, humans, governments, and nations.


Nature has her reasons for pecking orders within a species and providing sadistic abuse privilege is not one of them. The pecking order, instead, is intended to provide stability and a sense of safety within the hierarchy community.


Nations have pecking orders. Since the end of World War II, the most powerful nation in the world is a free nation, the United States. If Germany had become the most powerful nation in the 1940's, or the Soviet Union in the 1950's, the pecking order of nations would have a far different face today.


Found within the pecking order of nature, is the alpha male. In a pride of lions, for instance, the alpha lion, through intimidating strength, maintains hierarchal stability. Try to imagine an alpha male lion explaining to his pride "For years I've been eating first even though I did not catch the prey but that is going to stop now. We're all going to work, eat and share everything equally."


Like a scene from The Day the Earth Stood Still, President Obama, in his Cairo speech, has just informed the nations of the Earth, "Any world order that elevates one nation or any group will not prevail." With these words, he has provided his plan to abandon the present world pecking order. No longer will the United States, the world's best hope against tyranny and fascism, be front and center. Instead, the nations of the world are going to work together in some type of global mutualism.


Our President's quest for global mutualism will never work because to breakdown the pecking order of nations is not possible. The pecking order will always continue. The question is "Who will be number 1?" In the wild kingdom of nature, when an alpha lion projects weakness, he is challenged. Upon our Earth are the previously less formidable lions of Iran, China, and Russia. They, and perhaps others, are sensing weakness. Global mutualism will never work because there are too many tyrants out there who want to be Alphas.

3c) Obama's speech marks a strategic revolution for Israel
By Aluf Benn

There have been American presidents who saw themselves as God's messengers on earth. There have been presidents who played the role of warrior on the battlefield of the superpowers. There have been presidents who rose through the political system and could pull the strings in Congress. Barack Obama is a rock star. He has total confidence in his powers of persuasion - if he can just have access to a platform, two teleprompters and airtime. Let him speak to the audience, any audience, and he'll sell them a new, friendly, considerate America. Obama's meteoric rise to the presidency and his massive popularity just go to show that his self-confidence is well founded.

Israel has had just one leader who rose to power and governed by virtue of his oratory, and that was Menachem Begin. But Obama is no Begin, who moved the masses with his fiery tone and impassioned rhetoric: The current American president wins his audience over with the inner calm that he projects, and with his ability to sound candid and spontaneous even when reading a speech that has undergone dozens of drafts, and in which every sentence has been carefully weighed - and then weighed again.

Yesterday, Obama took the stage at Cairo University to deliver his most important speech since taking office. After four and a half months in the White House, the signs of accelerated aging are already apparent: His hair is graying and the lines in his face have deepened. But the audience was going wild over him, interrupting him with applause and whistles. This is not the blank, sterile backdrop that accompanied his speech in Turkey a couple of months ago, a speech that stirred very little interest. This time, public opinion was primed ahead of time for a historic event, for a message that would fundamentally alter American-Muslim relations.

Obama met the oratorical challenge he set for himself: He did not sound insincere or hypocritical when paying homage to Muslim culture and its achievements, nor did he sound apologetic or self-righteous when speaking about the disputes of the past and the need to turn over a new leaf. Obama ascribed the mistakes of his predecessor, George Bush, to the trauma of the September 11 attacks.

Osama bin Laden did not wait for Obama. Before the speech, he issued a taped message in which he accused the new president of "planting seeds of hatred and revenge," like his predecessor did. Obama responded with harsh words against Al-Qaida and its murderousness. But the truth is that Bin Laden won. He succeeded where diplomacy failed: The attacks on New York and Washington, and the wars that followed in Afghanistan and Iraq, compelled America to conduct serious soul-searching concerning its relations with Islam, and to try to comprehend the limits of its power.

Less than eight years after September 11, the Oval Office is now occupied by a president who was raised and schooled in a Muslim country, and who is trying to convince Muslims and Arabs that the United States is not the enemy, but rather a legitimate partner to their interests and aspirations. A president who came to Cairo to promise that from now on, America will treat Islam nicely, and that Bush's "crusade" - and attempt to dictate to the Arabs how to behave and how to govern - has come to an end.

For Israel, Obama's "Cairo speech" marks nothing less than a strategic revolution. During the Bush era, Israel was America's friendliest partner in the war on terror, and enjoyed military freedom of operation against the Palestinians, Hezbollah and Syria, for which it in return withdrew from the Gaza settlements. With Obama, Israel has to undergo a re-education, and will have to once again pass a test of its dedication to U.S. interests in the Middle East.

Until yesterday, Obama discussed the Israeli-Arab conflict in terms of interests, and refrained from speaking about values and ethics. But in Cairo, he used the vocabulary and narrative of the American liberal left, whence he came. He spoke unwaveringly about "the occupation" and about the "Palestinians aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own," and promised that the United States would not turn its back on the Palestinians. He called on Hamas to show responsibility and to recognize Israel's right to exist; he did not call it a terror organization, but a movement that enjoys some popular support.

In addressing the Palestinians, Obama urged that they wage their war without violence, and he compared it to the struggle of black slaves in America to be freed from white domination, to the struggle of the blacks in South Africa, and to the struggles of other nations in South Asia and Eastern Europe. This is not an easy comparison for Israeli ears: In Obama's view, the Palestinians are waging a just struggle for national liberation, which reminds him of past efforts to break free of colonialism and Soviet tyranny. In the same breath, he called upon the Arab world to acknowledge the history of Jewish persecution and the Holocaust, and to understand that Arab anti-Semitism only exacerbates the Israelis' trauma, just as Israel's behavior exacerbates the Palestinian trauma of expulsion.

Obama knows what the solution is: the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. He is not prepared to hear any other ideas. He demands that Israel stop expanding the settlements: "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements," he said, adding that this phenomenon violates previous agreements and undermines peace efforts.

Having proclaimed this loud and clear, there is no way that Obama can still agree to "natural growth" and other tricks designed to increase construction in the settlements. Now his credibility is on the line. It's his word against Israel's resolve to keep building. And this means that if Obama does exhibit the patience with which he promised to deal with the conflict, Israel will be facing a political crisis and a serious internal rift.

Benjamin Netanyahu is on the wrong side of Obama's speech, with his refusal to endorse a Palestinian state and his insistence on "natural growth" in the settlements. He might have been able to soften the blow a bit had he formed a coalition with Tzipi Livni on the basis of the two-state solution. Or if, during his White House visit, he had announced that he was embracing the road map. But that's of no importance now. Before long, Netanyahu will have to deliver a speech in response to Obama, and to declare a historic change in his ideology and policy. Until then, he'll go on hoping for a miracle that will wipe the "Cairo speech" off the agenda and make it disappear into the swirling sands of Middle East diplomacy.

3d) Hamas and the Palestinian Authority react to Obama's speech


The Palestinian Authority said it considered US President Barack Obama's speech in Cairo "a new and different American beginning and a new message to the Israelis," while Hamas said the remarks contained a number of good points.

PA presidential spokesperson Nabil Abu Rudeinah said in a statement that
"President Obama's readiness for partnership, listening, building confidence
and confronting tension" ought to be celebrated, and applauded the US
leader's remarks on Palestinian suffering.

He added that "the time has come to establish a Palestinian state," which he
called "the first basic step necessary to build a just and comprehensive
peace in the region."

Abu Rudeinah went on to say that "President Obama's speech is encouraging
beginnings that should be built on and we will be ready to go forward with
the peace process in accordance with the Arab Peace Initiative and the
national rights of the Palestinians, based on justice and equality."

Meanwhile, the Hamas movement hesitantly described Obama's speech as a
refreshing change, although "full of contradictions." Regardless, the
movement welcomed the speech, calling it complimentary and playing on
emotions, as well as focused on diplomacy above threats.

Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhum said that the speech was focused on
"improving America's image in front of the whole world, yet it was full of
contradictions, lacked policies and practical steps on the ground to curb
the [Israeli] assaults and to support the Palestinian right of sovereignty
on their land, end settlement and their suffering under the occupation."

He added that "Obama mentioned the popular support for Hamas but did not
talk about lifting its isolation and respecting its legitimacy," adding that
"he confused the facts when he described Hamas' defense of the Palestinians
as violence, while he did not talk about the real Holocaust and war crimes
that the Israeli army carried out in front of the whole world."

Barhoum noted that Obama's "repeated demands for Hamas to recognize Israel
and the conditions of the Quartet would be legitimizing the occupation,
giving it a cover to continue with its criminal policies against the
Palestinians." "Recognizing the conditions of the Quartet means approving
the righteousness of the policy of collective punishment, which the US
imposed on the Palestinians as a penalty for their democratic choice."

He noted that "Obama's demand for the Arabs to normalize ties with Israel
and to assist it is a frank call to reward the occupation for its crimes."

Regarding Obama's remarks on Jerusalem being a holy city for three faiths,
Barhoum said, "Jerusalem needs an American stand to stop Israeli policies
against it; recognizing the illegitimacy of the settlements [in East
Jerusalem] is a good thing but he needs to actually end settlement there."

The Hamas official concluded by saying, "We noticed that in his speech Obama
ignored the right of return of the Palestinian refugees to their homelands,
even though it is a legitimate right recognized under international law."

3e) Analysis: What Obama failed to understand, or refused to publicly identify
By Efraim Zuroff

As could be expected, President Barack Obama on Thursday identified "the situation between Israelis, Palestinians and the Arab world," as being "a source of tension." In this respect, he correctly delineated the issue as being much broader than a conflict solely between Palestinians and Jews, a distinction which is very important in terms of working towards a possible solution.

Precisely for this reason, however, his comments regarding Israel and Jewish history were so problematic. First and foremost was his linkage of the establishment of the State of Israel and the Holocaust.

Thus, according to Obama, Americans recognize that "the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history that cannot be denied," an obvious reference not to the destruction of the Second Temple and the exile of the Jewish people from its historic homeland, but rather to the Shoa. The continuation of the speech, in which he refers to his visit today to Buchenwald and attacks Holocaust denial, make this linkage absolutely clear.

But besides being historically inaccurate, this false connection strengthens one of the strongest canards of anti-Israel propaganda in the Muslim world; that Europeans guilty of Holocaust crimes established a Jewish state in Palestine at the expense of the local Arab residents to atone for their World War II atrocities.

By ignoring three thousand years of Jewish history, by neglecting to even mention the unbreakable link, started long before the advent of Islam, between the Jewish people and Eretz Yisrael, Obama totally failed to deliver what should have been one of his most important messages to the Arab world.

The major problem of the Arab-Israeli conflict and the tensions between Jews and Muslims all over the world is not Holocaust denial. As irritating and disgusting as that phenomenon undoubtedly is, it is merely a symptom of something much deeper, which Obama either failed to understand or refused to publicly identify. And that is the basic refusal of the overwhelming majority of the Muslim world to accept the legitimacy of a Jewish state in the Dar-al-Islam, the Islamic expanse.

So to devote most of his comments on the Middle East conflict in yesterday's speech to Holocaust denial was to squander a unique opportunity to convey an absolutely vital message which the Arab world has to hear.

Along the same lines, Obama's failure to focus primarily, in his comments about our region, on the open threats by Iran to destroy Israel, should be cause for serious concern in Jerusalem. Instead of tackling Teheran's genocidal bravado head-on, he chose to equate the possibility of a second Holocaust with "repeating vile stereotypes about Jews," something certainly objectionable but hardly comparable.

It was also hardly comforting to hear Obama try and convince the Arab world to stop Holocaust denial and anti-Semitic stereotypes as, bottom line, they are really not worthwhile because they ultimately make Israelis less inclined to make peace.

In summation, the goal Obama sought to achieve was indeed daunting, but the only hope for success, at least as far as Jews and Arabs are concerned, was not to try and take the easy way out, but rather to address the core issues directly.

In other words, even if the Arabs stop denying the Shoa, it will not bring peace to the Middle East. In fact, it is not even that significant in and of itself. What will bring a true change to our region, and to relations between Jews and Arabs, will be when the latter recognize the history of the Jewish people and their connection to Eretz Yisrael and the legitimacy of a Jewish state in the Dar-al-Islam.

That should be the objective of all American governments, since it will mean the end of the religious conflict between Jews and Arabs, which is basically insoluble, and the beginning of steps toward a peace agreement, which hopefully can one day be achieved.

Dr. Efraim Zuroff is director of the Israel office of the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

3f) Obama's Arabian dreams
By Caroline B. Glick

US President Barack Obama claims to be a big fan of telling the truth. In media interviews ahead of his trip to Saudi Arabia and Egypt and during his big speech in Cairo on Thursday, he claimed that the centerpiece of his Middle East policy is his willingness to tell people hard truths. Indeed, Obama made three references to the need to tell the truth in his so-called address to the Muslim world.


Unfortunately, for a speech billed as an exercise in truth telling, Obama's address fell short. Far from reflecting hard truths, Obama's speech reflected political convenience.


Obama's so-called hard truths for the Islamic world included statements about the need to fight so-called extremists; give equal rights to women; provide freedom of religion; and foster democracy. Unfortunately, all of his statements on these issues were nothing more than abstract, theoretical declarations devoid of policy prescriptions.


He spoke of the need to fight Islamic terrorists without mentioning that their intellectual, political and monetary foundations and support come from the very mosques, politicians and regimes in Saudi Arabia and Egypt that Obama extols as moderate and responsible.


He spoke of the need to grant equality to women without making mention of common Islamic practices like so-called honor killings, and female genital mutilation. He ignored the fact that throughout the lands of Islam women are denied basic legal and human rights. And then he qualified his statement by mendaciously claiming that women in the US similarly suffer from an equality deficit. In so discussing this issue, Obama sent the message that he couldn't care less about the plight of women in the Islamic world.


So too, Obama spoke about the need for religious freedom but ignored Saudi Arabian religious apartheid. He talked about the blessings of democracy but ignored the problems of tyranny.


In short, Obama's "straight talk" to the Arab world, which began with his disingenuous claim that like America, Islam is committed to "justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings," was consciously and fundamentally fraudulent. And this fraud was advanced to facilitate his goal of placing the Islamic world on equal moral footing with the free world.


In a like manner, Obama's tough "truths" about Israel were marked by factual and moral dishonesty in the service of political ends.


On the surface Obama seemed to scold the Muslim world for its all-pervasive Holocaust denial and craven Jew hatred. By asserting that Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism are wrong, he seemed to be upholding his earlier claim that America's ties to Israel are "unbreakable."


Unfortunately, a careful study of his statements shows that Obama was actually accepting the Arab view that Israel is a foreign — and therefore unjustifiable — intruder in the Arab world. Indeed, far from attacking their rejection of Israel, Obama legitimized it.


The basic Arab argument against Israel is that the only reason Israel was established was to sooth the guilty consciences of Europeans who were embarrassed about the Holocaust. By their telling, the Jews have no legal, historic or moral rights to the Land of Israel.


This argument is completely false. The international community recognized the legal, historic and moral rights of the Jewish people to the Land of Israel long before anyone had ever heard of Adolf Hitler. In 1922, the League of Nations mandated the "reconstitution" — not the creation -- of the Jewish commonwealth in the Land of Israel in its historic borders on both sides of the Jordan River.


But in his self-described exercise in truth telling, Obama ignored this basic truth in favor of the Arab lie. He gave credence to this lie by stating wrongly that "the aspiration for a Jewish homeland is rooted in a tragic history." He then explicitly tied Israel's establishment to the Holocaust by moving to a self-serving history lesson about the genocide of European Jewry.


Even worse than his willful blindness to the historic, legal, and moral justifications for Israel's rebirth, was Obama's characterization of Israel itself. Obama blithely, falsely and obnoxiously compared Israel's treatment of Palestinians to white American slave owners' treatment of their black slaves. He similarly cast Palestinian terrorists in the same morally pure category as slaves. Perhaps most repulsively, Obama elevated Palestinian terrorism to the moral heights of slave rebellions and the civil rights movement by referring to it by its Arab euphemism, "resistance."


But as disappointing and frankly obscene as Obama's rhetoric was, the policies he outlined were much worse. While prattling about how Islam and America are two sides of the same coin, Obama managed to spell out two clear policies. First he announced that he will compel Israel to completely end all building for Jews in Judea, Samaria, and eastern, northern and southern Jerusalem. Second he said that he will strive to convince Iran to substitute its nuclear weapons program with a nuclear energy program.


Obama argued that the first policy will facilitate peace and the second policy will prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Upon reflection however, it is clear that neither of his policies can possibly achieve his stated aims. Indeed, their inability to accomplish the ends he claims he has adopted them to advance is so obvious, that it is worth considering what his actual rationale for adopting them may be.


The administration's policy towards Jewish building in Israel's heartland and capital city expose a massive level of hostility towards Israel. Not only does it fly in the face of explicit US commitments to Israel undertaken by the Bush administration, it contradicts a longstanding agreement between successive Israeli and American governments not to embarrass each other.


Moreover, the fact that the administration cannot stop attacking Israel about Jewish construction in Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria, but has nothing to say about Hizbullah's projected democratic takeover of Lebanon next week, Hamas's genocidal political platform, Fatah's involvement in terrorism, or North Korean ties to Iran and Syria, has egregious consequences for the prospects for peace in the region.


As Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas made clear in his interview last week with the Washington Post, in light of the administration's hostility towards Israel, the Palestinian Authority no longer feels it is necessary to make any concessions whatsoever to Israel. It needn't accept Israel's identity as a Jewish state. It needn't minimize in any way its demand that Israel commit demographic suicide by accepting millions of foreign, hostile Arabs as full citizens. And it needn't curtail its territorial demand that Israel contract to within indefensible borders.


In short, by attacking Israel and claiming that Israel is responsible for the absence of peace, the administration is encouraging the Palestinians and the Arab world as a whole to continue to reject Israel and to refuse to make peace with the Jewish state.


The Netanyahu government reportedly fears that Obama and his advisors have made such an issue of settlements because they seek to overthrow Israel's government and replace it with the more pliable Kadima party. Government sources note that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel played a central role in destabilizing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's first government in 1999, when he served as an advisor to then president Bill Clinton. They also note that Emmanuel is currently working with leftist Israelis and American Jews associated with Kadima and the Democratic Party to discredit the government.


While there is little reason to doubt that the Obama administration would prefer a leftist government in Jerusalem, it is unlikely that the White House is attacking Israel primarily to advance this aim. This is first of all the case because today there is little danger that Netanyahu's coalition partners will abandon him.


Moreover, the Americans have no reason to believe that prospects for a peace deal would improve with a leftist government at the helm in Jerusalem. After all, despite its best efforts, the Kadima government was unable to make peace with the Palestinians as was the Labor government before it. What the Palestinians have shown consistently since the failed 2000 Camp David summit is that there is no deal that Israel can offer them that they are willing to accept.


So if the aim of the administration in attacking Israel is neither to foster peace nor to bring down the Netanyahu government, what can explain its behavior?


The only reasonable explanation is that the administration is baiting Israel because it wishes to abandon the Jewish state as an ally in favor of warmer ties with the Arabs. It has chosen to attack Israel on the issue of Jewish construction because it believes that by concentrating on this issue, it will minimize the political price it will be forced to pay at home for jettisoning America's alliance with Israel. By claiming that he is only pressuring Israel in order to enable a peaceful "two-state solution," Obama assumes that he will be able to maintain his support base among American Jews who will overlook the underlying hostility his "pro-peace" stance papers over.


Obama's policy towards Iran is a logical complement of his policy towards Israel. Just as there is no chance that he will bring Middle East peace closer by attacking Israel, so he will not prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons by offering the mullahs nuclear energy. The deal Obama is now proposing has been on the table since 2003 when Iran's nuclear program was first exposed. Over the past six years, the Iranians have repeatedly rejected it. Indeed, just last week they again announced that they reject it.


Here too, to understand the President's actual goal it is necessary to search for the answers closer to home. Since Obama's policy has no chance of preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, it is apparent that he has come to terms with the prospect of a nuclear armed Iran. In light of this, the most rational explanation for his policy of engaging Iran is that he wishes to avoid being blamed when Iran emerges as a nuclear power in the coming months.


In reckoning with the Obama administration, it is imperative that the Netanyahu government and the public alike understand what the true goals of its current policies are. Happily, consistent polling data show that the overwhelming majority of Israelis realize that the White House is deeply hostile towards Israel. The data also show that the public approves of Netanyahu's handling of our relations with Washington.


Moving forward, the government must sustain this public awareness and support. By his words as well as by his deeds, not only has Obama shown that he is not a friend of Israel. He has shown that there is nothing that Israel can do to make him change his mind.



JWR contributor Caroline B. Glick is the senior Middle East Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC and the deputy managing editor of The Jerusalem Post. Comment by clicking here.

3g)An Uncertain Future: What's more revealing: What Obama said in Cairo, or what he didn't?
By Robert Satloff



Combining the roles of bridge builder and strategist, President Barack Obama delivered a wide-ranging 55-minute speech to the world's Muslims today, designed to put flesh on the bones of his signature concept of "mutual interests and mutual respect" and to launch a "new beginning" in U.S.-Muslim relations.

Aspiring to speak to the world's billion-plus Muslims has always been a controversial gambit. With Muslims living in every country of the world, speaking every language, and observing a kaleidoscope of religious practices, it is no simple task to say something meaningful and avoid a level of abstraction that would not have people asking, after the excitement of the event wears off, what did the president actually say. For many Muslims, the medium was the message: that a president would come to a major Muslim capital to address Muslims directly and that this president, with his compelling personal biography, would make a special effort to talk to Muslim youth--these are likely to be the most lasting impressions.

Clearly, the president had a lot on his mind. He touched on seven core themes, bracketed by a discourse on the historical and societal role Muslims have played and continue to play in America and by an appeal to young Muslims to "reimagine [and] remake" the world. The fundamental message was a call for partnership--the idea that U.S. goals and the objectives of Muslims around the world are not only congruent but also realizable by active and close cooperation. Obama did not, however, announce many new initiatives; at the close of the speech, he outlined a number of educational, exchange, and private-sector projects, but on no major policy issue, including the Middle East peace process, did the president make headlines.

The seven themes of the speech--violent extremism; the Arab-Israeli peace process; Iran's nuclear weapons ambitions; democracy and human rights; religious freedom and tolerance; women's rights; and economic development--each contained important statements of government policy and revealing clues of how the president conceives of critical issues. Highlights included:



•an unapologetic opening statement that the president's "first duty" is to protect American citizens, thereby explaining our efforts to "isolate the extremists" and persist with military action against al-Qaeda and its affiliates in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and around the world


•a powerful defense of the legitimacy of Israel as a Jewish homeland (though not a specific referral to Israel as a "Jewish state"), a condemnation of anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial, and a call on Palestinians to reject violence in pursuit of political objectives as both immoral and counterproductive


•an empathetic description of Palestinian life under "occupation" as "intolerable"; a blunt call for a "stop" to Israeli settlements; and an affirmation of U.S. support for, and his own personal commitment to, Palestinians having a "state of their own"


•a repeat of Washington's offer of negotiations with Iran without preconditions, coupled with a thinly disguised reference to Arab and Muslim sensibilities about Israel's own nuclear arsenal


•a general reaffirmation of U.S. commitment to universal human rights and the pursuit of democracy, defined broadly by an accountable, law-abiding, service-providing government, rather than by elections alone. Though he neither mentioned his predecessor's favorite term "freedom," nor suggested how the United States would, in policy terms, operationalize its commitments, the president went a long way toward explicitly adopting the pillars of George W. Bush's democracy agenda, including its support of human rights, women's rights, religious freedom, and economic opportunity


•a stark, declarative commitment to recognize all "peaceful and law-abiding" political parties and peaceful and elected governments in Muslim-majority states


•a stirring call for religious freedom and tolerance, both inside Muslim countries and in the West. This included, on the one hand, specific references to the situation of Coptic Christians in Egypt (but, curiously, not the widely persecuted Bahais) and, on the other hand, a sweeping critique (though not by name) of a French law banning the wearing of the hijab in public schools as "intolerance hiding behind liberalism"


•a defense of the right of Muslim women to wear the hijab and to choose traditional roles coupled with an appeal for equal investment in education and literacy for Muslim girls and women as essential for economic development and prosperity.

Key Observations

Limited strategic objectives. Despite his often soaring rhetoric, the president actually outlined a strategic agenda for U.S. interests that is narrowly defined and limited in scope. On Iran, the president again focused on the limited objective of ensuring that Iran does not have nuclear weapons; no longer do senior Americans talk about preventing Iran from completing the nuclear fuel cycle, having a uranium enrichment capability, or even being able to develop a nuclear weapon. Additionally, in contrast to recent statements by Arab leaders, he made no reference to Iran's state-sponsoring of terrorist groups Hizballah and Hamas, including their activities against host-country Egypt. On Iraq, the president defined America's twin goals as building an undefined "better Iraq" and leaving Iraq to the Iraqis; he made no reference either to having democracy take root in that country or to aspirations for long-term U.S. alliance with a country that was a long-time adversary. Notably absent was any reference to Lebanon, viewed widely as a strategic fulcrum for both the current and the previous administrations, except for an odd reference to religious tolerance for Maronite Christians. And in terms of combating extremism, the president narrowly defined the objective as countering violence (i.e., counterterrorism), moving backward from the emerging consensus among professionals here and abroad that it is essential to compete against extremists far earlier in the process of radicalization (i.e., counterradicalization).

An implicit acceptance of political Islam. The president waded into heated political debate within Muslim societies and, either by design or by inattention, came down in favor of local Islamists, not local liberals or even anti-Islamists. Islamist parties across the region will cheer the fact that Obama cited only two benchmarks for U.S. recognition of Islamist parties, i.e., "peaceful and law-abiding," when the content of their message and the values they project--including the imposition of sharia (Islamic law)--can often be antithetical to our own. He made no reference to the frequent cooperation of autocrats and Islamists in denying political space to non-Islamist political parties, especially liberals who often do share American values. Most strikingly, no fewer than three times the president defended the right of Muslim women to wear the hijab, but at no point did he defend the right of Muslim women not to wear the hijab. (Indeed, immediately after the speech, the White House website put up a full-screen picture of a hijab-wearing woman, an eerie echo of an amateurish post-September 11 State Department brochure about Muslim life in America in which all American Muslim women were depicted wearing hijabs. Millions of Muslims--including Muslim women--will not be heartened by this message.

Lots of respect, not enough interest. In charting his proposed "new beginning," the president's words certainly emphasized the "mutual respect" part of his signature formula over the "mutual interests" part. His forceful words on terrorism, nuclear proliferation, and other difficult policy questions notwithstanding, the speech was notable for its often manufactured parallelism between blemishes in Muslim societies and blemishes in America and the West. From his opening refrain of decrying a "cycle of suspicion and discord," the president suggested that we are all equally at fault for bringing down the U.S.-Muslim relationship. This is problematic on two levels. First, this approach inflates the gravity of current problems and thereby aggravates the search for a solution; the reality is that America has excellent relations with numerous Muslim-majority countries, from Africa to Asia, and equally harmonious relations with hundreds of millions of Muslim citizens of those countries. Second, this approach equates heinous crimes in the name of religion--e.g., the state-approved killing of apostates, adulterers, and others in some Muslim countries--with laws adopted in Western countries for legitimate political and security objectives (e.g., France's law to ban headscarves in public schools or U.S. laws to prevent the illegal funding of terrorism via the cover of charitable organizations). More generally, in its appeal to "our common humanity"--its recitation of largely discredited population statistics for Muslims in America and strikingly defensive declaration that "America and Islam are not exclusive" (who, after all, suggests this is the case?)--the speech conjured up uneasy reminders of the "I'm OK, you're OK; we're all just moms and dads" speeches of previous failed attempts at public diplomacy.

This parallelism was perhaps most artificial in the president's discussion of the contours of the Arab-Israeli conflict. While no impartial observer can dispute the hardship of Palestinian life, it runs counter to history to suggest that Palestinians have "suffered in pursuit of a homeland," when, since 1937, Palestinian leaders have rejected no fewer than six proposals to achieve just that goal. Similarly, the president's statement about Palestinians who "wait in refugee camps ... for a life of peace and security" says as much about Arab governments' indifference to their fate as the inability to reach a diplomatic solution with Israel. And the president's drawing of a connection from the Palestinian conflict with Israel to the fight for civil rights in America or the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa will be interpreted by many as an endorsement of the moral righteousness of the Palestinian cause, not--as he apparently intended--a call for strict nonviolence.

This focus on respect was not matched by a focus on interest. On no issue, except when discussing plans for economic development projects, did he go beyond generalities and offer specific policy initiatives or definitive positions. While the president said a lot, he also didn't say much, choosing to leave many critical questions unanswered: What is the U.S. view of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, for example, a party that may be peaceful (for now) but is not legal? What will be the U.S. position if the Hizballah-led alliance wins Lebanon's parliamentary elections? What will the United States do if Iran persists in its pursuit of nuclear weapons? What implications will there be for U.S. relations if Arab and Muslim autocrats do not move toward accountable, transparent, democratic rule? What will the United States do if Saudi Arabia, generally recognized as among the world's foremost violators of religious freedom, moves at glacial speed on its promised reforms? And, perhaps most importantly, how will the United States, as a global superpower, prioritize the various themes and interests the president outlined? On none of these issues did the president's speech reveal much.




What He Didn't Say


The Cairo speech was also notable for specific words the president did not say and references he did not make.


•Most important was the absence of any reference to "the Muslim world" and a preference instead for the more accurate phrase "Muslim-majority countries." This recognition of the continued primacy of states and an implicit rejection of the Islamist objective of a global caliphate that unites all Muslims in a single, supranational entity is a major step forward and should be commended.


•Now that "Muslim world" has been banished from the lexicon, the next textual improvement he should make is to distinguish between his defense of Muslims and defense of Islam. While the U.S. government has a strong interest in preserving and protecting the rights of Muslims to live freely and practice their religion, as we have done in Bosnia, Iraq, and elsewhere, it is unsettling for any president to suggest that "partnership between America and Islam must be based on what Islam is, not what it isn't." First, America partners with peoples and governments, not religions; second, the president executes the U.S. Constitution, he doesn't interpret the Quran. President Bush made the mistake of donning the mantle of "Imam-in-chief" when he applauded certain Muslim religious edicts (e.g., fatwas against violence) over edicts he didn't like (e.g., fatwas calling for resistance to U.S. forces in Iraq); President Obama risks the same mistake with language that suggests a relationship with a religion, rather than its adherents.


•Surprisingly, in the capital of one of only two Arab countries at peace with Israel, the president made no reference to the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty, which celebrated its thirtieth anniversary this year, no reference to the courage and vision of Anwar Sadat, nor even a reference to the role of courageous leadership as an essential element of peacemaking. This was a lost opportunity and will be celebrated by some as a nod to Islamist antagonism toward Sadat.


•On the Middle East peace process, the president notably avoided announcing a new plan to translate the Arab Peace Initiative into an operational process that would incentivize Israeli-Palestinian diplomacy through actions and commitments of Arab states. While he did make an important plea for Arab states to stop exploiting the conflict with Israel "to distract the people of Arab nations from other problems," he did not appear to press the matter or to demand clear and speedy action. Vagueness on this issue (and the president was very vague in this part of the speech) suggests he did not get from Saudi king Abdullah substantive commitments that could form the basis of a truly new approach.


•Also on the peace process, the president roundly criticized Israeli settlement activity, but did not use the Cairo platform to repeat the specific demand to end "natural growth," perhaps the most contentious aspect of U.S. policy on the issue. Whether that suggests a willingness to engage with Israel on the issue is unclear.


•In a discussion of tolerance and religious freedom, the president missed an opportunity by failing to celebrate the success of Muslims in India, home to the world's third-largest Muslim population.

Phrases Pregnant with Implication


As officials, diplomats, and scholars pore over the speech for hints of policies yet to come, two passages deserve special scrutiny:


•In the peace process section, Obama said the following on Jerusalem: "[We should all work for the day] when Jerusalem is a secure and lasting home for Jews and Christians and Muslims, and a place for all of the children of Abraham to mingle peacefully together as in the story of Isra, when Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad (peace be upon them) joined in prayer." This sentence is a prima facie rejection of Israel's position that adherents of all faiths currently enjoy freedom and access in Jerusalem and, by its invocation of a Quranic vision of Jerusalem, will be interpreted in Muslim capitals as tilting toward an Arab/Muslim view of Jerusalem's eventual disposition.


•On nuclear issues, Obama made a veiled reference to Arab charges of a U.S. double standard in focusing on Iran's nuclear ambitions while overlooking Israel's existing weapons. Some have cited a recent statement by a U.S. State Department official calling for Israel's inclusion in the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as a sign that the Obama administration intends to address this issue directly, in a way certain to provoke tension with Jerusalem. In Cairo, however, Obama offered a different vision, suggesting that addressing Israel's nuclear capability falls under the heading of "America's commitment to seek a world in which no nations hold nuclear weapons." Israelis can happily live with that worthy--and long-term--goal.

Conclusion

Cairo marks President Obama's fifth major message to the world's Muslims--following his inaugural address, early al-Arabiya television interview, Iranian New Year greetings, and speech to the Turkish parliament. Debates about the content of these remarks notwithstanding, no one can contest the fact that he has fulfilled a personal commitment to make "engagement" with Muslims a high priority. If there is any meaning to the phrase "mutual interest and mutual respect," America can now rightfully expect to hear and see what Muslims--leaders and peoples--say and do in response.

Robert Satloff is the executive director of The Washington Institute.

3h) Obama the Humble
By Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- Obama the Humble declares there will be no more "dictating" to other countries. We should "forge partnerships as opposed to simply dictating solutions," he told the G-20 summit. In Middle East negotiations, he told al-Arabiya, America will henceforth "start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating."

An admirable sentiment. It applies to everyone -- Iran, Russia, Cuba, Syria, even Venezuela. Except Israel. Israel is ordered to freeze all settlement activity. As Secretary of State Clinton imperiously explained the diktat: "a stop to settlements -- not some settlements, not outposts, not natural-growth exceptions."

What's the issue? No "natural growth" means strangling to death the thriving towns close to the 1949 armistice line, many of them suburbs of Jerusalem, that every negotiation over the past decade has envisioned Israel retaining. It means no increase in population. Which means no babies. Or if you have babies, no housing for them -- not even within the existing town boundaries. Which means for every child born, someone has to move out. No community can survive like that. The obvious objective is to undermine and destroy these towns -- even before negotiations.

To what end? Over the last decade, the U.S. government has understood that any final peace treaty would involve Israel retaining some of the close-in settlements -- and compensating the Palestinians accordingly with land from within Israel itself.

That was envisioned in the Clinton plan in the Camp David negotiations in 2000, and again at Taba in 2001. After all, why turn towns to rubble when, instead, Arabs and Jews can stay in their homes if the 1949 armistice line is shifted slightly into the Palestinian side to capture the major close-in Jewish settlements, and then shifted into Israeli territory to capture Israeli land to give to the Palestinians?

This idea is not only logical, not only accepted by both Democratic and Republican administrations for the last decade, but was agreed to in writing in the letters of understanding exchanged between Israel and the United States in 2004 -- and subsequently overwhelmingly endorsed by a concurrent resolution of Congress.

Yet the Obama State Department has repeatedly refused to endorse these agreements or even say it will honor them. This from a president who piously insists that all parties to the conflict honor previous obligations.

The entire "natural growth" issue is a concoction. It's farcical to suggest that the peace process is moribund because a teacher in the Jewish Quarter of Jerusalem is making an addition to her house to accommodate new grandchildren -- when Gaza is run by Hamas terrorists dedicated to permanent war with Israel and when Mahmoud Abbas, having turned down every one of Ehud Olmert's peace offers, brazenly declares that he is in a waiting mode -- waiting for Hamas to become moderate and for Israel to cave -- before he'll do anything to advance peace.

In his much-heralded "Muslim world" address in Cairo Thursday, Obama declared that the Palestinian people's "situation" is "intolerable." Indeed it is, the result of 60 years of Palestinian leadership that gave its people corruption, tyranny, religious intolerance and forced militarization; leadership that for three generations -- Haj Amin al-Husseini in 1947, Yasser Arafat in 2000, Abbas in December 2008 -- rejected every offer of independence and dignity, choosing destitution and despair rather than accept any settlement not accompanied by the extinction of Israel.

In the 16 years since the Oslo accords turned the West Bank and Gaza over to the Palestinians, their leaders -- Fatah and Hamas alike -- built no schools, no roads, no courthouses, no hospitals, no institutions that would relieve their people's suffering. Instead they poured everything into an infrastructure of war and terror, all the while depositing billions (from gullible Western donors) into their Swiss bank accounts.

Obama says he came to Cairo to tell the truth. But he uttered not a word of that. Instead, among all the bromides and lofty sentiments, he issued but one concrete declaration of new American policy: "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements," thus reinforcing the myth that Palestinian misery and statelessness are the fault of Israel and the settlements.

Blaming Israel and picking a fight over "natural growth" may curry favor with the Muslim "street." But it will only induce the Arab states to do like Abbas: sit and wait for America to deliver Israel on a platter. Which makes the Obama strategy not just dishonorable but self-defeating.


3i) Barack into the breach: President Obama goes the distance in reaching out to Muslims


An American President could not have extended a more understanding hand to Muslims than the one Barack Obama extended in his much-anticipated speech in Cairo.

He was respectful, praised Islam as a great humanizing faith, paid tribute to Muslim contributions through history and used his presence in the Egyptian capital as a powerful statement of good faith.

So far, so very good.

The intent was to begin changing hearts and minds among the many millions for whom an irrational hatred of the U.S., if not of all Western civilization, has been woven into the fabric of life. The most starry-eyed optimist would have to agree that this will be a long, long process, at best.

You have to start somewhere.

Maybe by saying Assalamu Aleikum in the largest city in the Arabic-speaking world.

Obama married his appeal for better relations with some hard truths that needed telling and challenges that needed making.

Explaining the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, he said:

"I'm aware that there's still some who would question or even justify the offense of 9/11. But let us be clear. Al Qaeda killed nearly 3,000 people on that day. The victims were innocent men, women and children from America and many other nations who had done nothing to harm anybody."

Describing Israel and the terrible history that led to the country's founding, he said:

"America's strong bonds with Israel are well-known. This bond is unbreakable. ... Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries. And anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust. ... Six million Jews were killed, more than the entire Jewish population of Israel today. Denying that fact is baseless. It is ignorant, and it is hateful."

Speaking of the most destructive currents of Islam, he said: "Among some Muslims, there is a disturbing tendency to measure one's own faith by the rejection of another's."

As for the tough facts on the ground, Obama approached the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by placing burdens on the two sides with, it must be said, extraordinarily excessive evenhandedness.

Leaving aside that Israel has made repeated moves toward a two-state resolution - including withdrawing from Gaza - and leaving aside that Hamas fired 7,000 Gaza-based rockets last year, Obama called on Israel to stop settlements and "to ensure that Palestinians can live, and work, and develop their society."

On the other hand, Obama tasked the Palestinians with renouncing violence and building a civil society. And he said Hamas must recognize Israel's right to exist. All of which represent fundamental and necessary prerequisites for progress.

As unbalanced as the President's burden-sharing was, Hamas' hearts and minds remain locked in stone.

"Obama's speech is an attempt to mislead people and create more illusions to improve America's aggressive image in the Arab and Islamic world," eight Palestinian factions, including Hamas, said in a statement.

Open hand, meet clenched fist.


4)Obama in Buchenwald: I will never forget what I've seen here


President Barack Obama said on Friday that the Buchenwald concentration camp "is the ultimate rebuke" to those who deny the Holocaust.

Obama bvisited the Nazi-era camp where 56,000 people died. He toured the memorial Friday with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and survivor Elie Wiesel. They laid roses at a memorial.

Obama said people today have a duty to confront those who deny such concentration camps existed, adding that he would "never forget what I've seen here today."

A somber Obama told reporters that his great-uncle helped liberate a nearby satellite camp, Ohrdruf, just days before other US Army units overran Buchenwald. Obama says his great-uncle returned from war and was unable to speak of the horrible scene.

5) Barney Frank, Car Czar: Let GM restructure…except in my state.

President Obama may have "no interest" in running General Motors, as he averred Monday. But even if that's true, we are already discovering that he shares Washington with 535 Members of Congress, many of whom have other ideas.

The latest self-appointed car czar is Massachusetts's own Barney Frank, who intervened this week to save a GM distribution center in Norton, Mass. The warehouse, which employs some 90 people, was slated for closure by the end of the year under GM's restructuring plan. But Mr. Frank put in a call to GM CEO Fritz Henderson and secured a new lease on life for the facility.

Mr. Frank's spokesman, Harry Gural, says the Congressman discussed, among other things, "the facility's value to GM." We'd have thought that would be something that GM might have considered when it decided to close the Norton center, but then a call from one of the most powerful Members of Congress can certainly cause a ward of the state to reconsider what qualifies as "value." A CEO who refuses the offer can soon find himself testifying under oath before Congress, or answering questions from the Government Accountability Office about his expense account. To that point, Mr. Henderson spent Wednesday with Chrysler President Jim Press being castigated by the Senate Commerce Committee for their plans to close 3,400 car dealerships. Every Senator wants dealerships closed in someone else's state.

As Mr. Gural put it, Mr. Frank was "just doing what any other Congressman would do" in looking out for the interests of his constituents. And that's the problem with industrial policy and government control of American business. In Washington, every Member of Congress now thinks he's a czar who can call 'ol Fritz and tell him how to make cars.