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The White House Chief of Staff has fallen on his sword for the Monarch, claiming Israel has been an occupier for more than 50 years.
McDonough, like his boss, is a liar and distorter. Israel was attacked by Arab armies within weeks of its establishment, won every war and captured land. To the victor belongs the spoils.
Israel has tried, on three occasions, to resolve the issue but every time they have done so Palestinian leaders have rejected their offer.
Israel voluntarily gave back Gaza and were rocketed . That should make any nation leery.
When Abbas. or some other terrorist parading in a Brooks Brother's Suit, actually sits down and negotiates and stipulates it recognizes Israel as a legitimate nation, as the sole Jewish Nation and pledges Israel has a right to exist; implying it will not be attacked, Israel will sit down and negotiate a two state solution involving territorial concessions.
Until such time as this occurs ,Israel is not an occupier. Rather it is a reluctant conqueror and thus occupier by default. Israel lost the propaganda war a long time ago and thus must suffer the consequences of those who want to call Israel an occupier because it suits their framing of the issue but now Obama has decided to put the screws to Israel so he has adopted using the same language.
I hope and pray Netanyahu does not grovel and lets Obama rant and rave and act like the aggrieved and pouting child that he is.
Israel neither has the desire to occupy Palestinians nor does it wish to put itself in a vulnerable position by allowing Palestinians to rocket them from territory it cedes. This may prolong the accusation that Israel is an occupier - so be it!
Nothing Israel does will satisfy weak anti-Semitic Europeans or Obama except meeting every demand Abbas makes and Israel will not commit suicide even though that may displease its so called friends. Abbas knows he can hide behind Obama his American protector.
Suck it up McDonough. Sink to your bosses' level and live with your conscience, if you have one. Your appearance before J Street says it all!
Meanwhile, Obama continues to act like a wrecking ball seemingly out of control.
I have called Obama President 'Pinata' from the git go. His defensive personality constantly needs an enemy. I am sure I will miss a few but this is a somewhat comprehensive list.
He began with GW and now has ended with Jews (Israelis.)
GW, Cheney, America, U.S. Military, The Constitution, Congress, Republicans and FOX News, O'Reilley, Netanyahu, Gun toting, bible thumping Christians, Police from Mass. to Missouri, the rich, Whites, Israel and Jews.
E mail from a friend and fellow memo reader:
"OUR ILLUSTIOUS PRES STRIKES AGAIN. PEOPLE OWE BIBI A BIG APOLOGY. HOW ANY JEW CAN SUPPORT THIS ADMINISTRATION JUST GOES BEYOND COMPREHENSION.
DR. F---"
Obama simply lurches from one failure to the next like a wrecking ball seemingly out of control, when , in fact, his actions are directed, controlled and purposeful. The problem is Obama fails miserably .(See 1, 1a, 1b and 1c below.)
===Dick
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1) Obama’s Israel Tantrum
The leader of the free world takes revenge on an ally.
You’ll have to forgive President Obama. The leader of the free world is still having difficulty accepting that the Israeli people get to choose their own prime minister, never mind his preferences.
The latest White House tantrum in the wake of Benjamin Netanyahu’s re-election last week took the form of a speech delivered Monday by Chief of Staff Denis McDonough, in which he declared that “an occupation that has lasted for almost 50 years must end.”
When a chief of staff speaks in public, especially as the keynote speaker at a scheduled event, the President has signed off. In this case the audience was also carefully chosen: the annual conference of J Street, a left-leaning Jewish lobbying group that has never met an Israeli concession it didn’t like. Which makes it all the more distressing that Mr. McDonough would talk about Israel in language usually associated with Palestinian terror groups.
Mr. McDonough’s remarks come amid other expressions of presidential pique—including last week’s unprecedented threat that Mr. Netanyahu’s re-election may mean an end to U.S. backing for Israel at the United Nations, and this week’s report in the Journal that the Israelis have been spying on the U.S.-Iran nuclear talks. (Israel denies it, and we don’t condone such spying, but the U.S. also shouldn’t be keeping its allies and Congress in the dark.) Not to mention the more or less constant snubs and insults directed at the Israeli prime minister by unnamed Obama officials, with one calling him a “coward.”
Mr. Obama was counting on Mr. Netanyahu to be defeated in last week’s election, and the President did what he could to help that defeat along. But Mr. Obama’s overt hostility backfired. In the normal course of things, this would be the time for the White House to soften the rhetoric and seek to restore relationships.
Instead, the President and his team seem out for revenge. So while Mr. Netanyahu has clarified his comment about his opposition to a Palestinian state (he says he supports a two-state solution but now is not the time) and apologized to Arab Israelis for his remarks about their votes during the waning hours of the election, the President and his team have been escalating.
Perhaps this is a sign that the nuclear negotiations with Iran aren’t going as well as the President had planned, notwithstanding his willingness to let Iran preserve much of its nuclear infrastructure. So desperate is the U.S. for an Iran deal, the French look like hard-liners, hardly a consoling thought.
But these latest anti-Israel conniptions from the White House could well mean something else. Namely, that President Obama believes what he and his team are saying: that the Israelis are unjust occupiers, an obstacle to peace in the region and no longer worthy of the full support they have historically counted on from Uncle Sam.
Yet even if you believe the main challenge in the region is getting Israel to cede more territory to the Palestinians, that day won’t happen until Israelis feel secure. But Israelis can be forgiven for feeling the opposite with a raging civil war in Syria, Islamic State and an offshoot of al Qaeda operating near the Golan Heights, Iranian General Qasem Soleimani leading Shiite militias in Iraq, and a U.S. Administration sounding and acting as if Iran can be a more constructive partner for peace than Israel.
The main threat to Middle Eastern peace today—even beyond Islamic State—is the rise of an imperial Iran using its own troops or proxies effectively to colonize Arab capitals. The prospect of an imperial Iran on the cusp of becoming a nuclear power has all of America’s traditional Arab friends in the region now closer to Mr. Netanyahu’s position on the Middle East than to Mr. Obama’s.
“We cannot simply pretend that those comments were never made.” These were the words Mr. McDonough used in his speech about Mr. Netanyahu’s election comments.
But Mr. McDonough’s words might be easily turned around. In a day when the President’s chief of staff invokes the lexicon of Palestinian terrorists to describe Israel’s democracy, Americans and the world are left to wonder whose side the leader of the free world is on.
1a) America's Left-Wing Jews Ashamed of Israel's Jews
By Dennis Prager
American Jews on the left were beside themselves last week. Israel's Jews did something that utterly infuriated these American Jews: Israel's Jews overwhelmingly voted for a man of the right (or for other right-of-center parties). And not just any right-winger, but the only leader in the Western world to publicly differ from their hero, President Barack Obama.
To understand their fury, one must first understand that no one is more certain of their moral superiority than the left. This is true the world over, and among Jews it is particularly so. For the leaders of the American Jewish religious left (Reform, Reconstructionist, and now Conservative Judaism) Jews who are politically or socially conservative are a disgrace to Judaism, which, for left-wing Jews, is essentially the same as leftism. Both religious and secular Jews on the left regard Jewish conservatives as moral traitors to the Jewish people.
But certitude of their moral superiority is not the only reason American Jews on the left went ballistic last week. There are deeper, psychological, reasons.
Left-wing Jews live, work and socialize with left-wing non-Jews, and they believe that they are — to their great regret — identified with the Jewish state in the eyes of fellow leftists. Now, when Israel has left-wing governments — as it did in its first few decades and periodically after that — being identified with Israel is not problematic. But with Israel's Jews repeatedly electing conservative governments, American Jews on the left believe that they must make it as clear as possible that they in no way support a right-wing Israel. Their moral self-esteem needs it and their left-wing credentials need it. Just look at how Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz, a lifelong Democratic activist and fervent liberal, has been ostracized from polite left-wing company solely because he is an outspoken defender of Israel.
As American Jews on the left see it, their moral credibility in the eyes of fellow leftists in the news media, Hollywood, and academia is threatened by Israel. They must therefore make it abundantly clear that a) they not only do not support the right-wing government of Israel; they do not even support Israel at this time; b) they regard Benjamin Netanyahu as a vile human being; and c) they are ashamed — simply ashamed — of Israel's Jews for having voted for a right-winger.
Thus, to cite only a few examples:
In Time Magazine, Joe Klein wrote:
The great majority of Israel's Jews are bigots:
[Netanyahu] "won because he ran as a bigot. ... The public ratification of Netanyahu's bigotry [confirmed this]."
Most Israeli Jews are as contemptible as history's anti-Semites:
"A great many Jews have come to regard Arabs as the rest of the world traditionally regarded Jews."
Israel's very founding was steeped in evil:
"[Read about] the massacres perpetrated by Jews in 1948 to secure their homeland."
These Israeli Jews embarrass me. Don't consider me one of them:
"This [victory] is shameful and embarrassing."
In Israel's Haaretz last week, left-wing American Jewish writer Peter Beinart actually advocated that America punish Israel and join the international fight against Israel:
"[This means] backing Palestinian bids at the United Nations. It means labeling and boycotting settlement goods. It means joining and amplifying nonviolent Palestinian protest in the West Bank. ... It means pushing the Obama administration to present out its own peace plan, and to punish — yes, punish — the Israeli government for rejecting it. It means making sure that every time Benjamin Netanyahu and the members of his cabinet walk into a Jewish event outside Israel, they see Diaspora Jews protesting outside."
In The Washington Post, Harold Meyerson, another American Jewish left-wing columnist, joined the hysteria with these calumnies against Netanyahu (and the equally reviled Republicans):
"At the rate he was going, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu might have called for stripping Israeli
Arabs of the right to vote altogether."
"Bibi [is] henceforth the Jewish George Wallace."
"Perhaps Likud and the Republicans can open an Institute for the Prevention of Dark-Skinned People Voting."
Of course, as Charles Krauthammer, an American Jewish conservative, wrote last week, "There would be no peace and no Palestinian state if Isaac Herzog were prime minister either. Or Ehud Barak or Ehud Olmert for that matter. The latter two were (non-Likud) prime ministers who offered the Palestinians their own state — with its capital in Jerusalem and every Israeli settlement in the new Palestine uprooted — only to be rudely rejected.
"This is not ancient history. This is 2000, 2001 and 2008 — three astonishingly concessionary peace offers within the past 15 years. Every one rejected."
But none of that matters to the left. The left lives in John Lennon's song "Imagine." Thus, the left imagines that if Israel completely withdrew from the West Bank and allowed a Palestinian state to be created now, it would be completely unlike Gaza and completely unlike Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Iran and Libya; it would be a peaceful Arab Muslim island in the midst of the cruel sea of Arab Muslim countries that surrounds it.
But what if they were wrong and rockets then rained down on Israel?
The Kleins and the Beinarts and the Meyersons wouldn't retract a word. As I wrote some 30 years ago: "Being on the left means never having to say you're sorry."
Anyway, only those bigoted Israelis would pay the price.
1b) Obama’s Mideast Realignment
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Will Mr. Obama succeed in pulling off his sweeping diplomatic realignment? He still has almost two years in office and considerable presidential prerogative to reorient foreign policy as he sees fit. Ironically, the biggest obstacle in his path may be the Iranian mullahs. If they reject his extraordinarily generous offer for fear of doing any deal with the Great Satan, the folly of his foreign-policy revolution will be brutally exposed.
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Mr. Boot is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of “Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Times to the Present” (W.W. Norton, 2013).
1b) Obama’s Mideast Realignment
His new doctrine: Downgrade ties to Israel and the Saudis while letting Iran fill the vacuum left by U.S. retreat.
Let’s connect the dots.
Data point No. 1: President Obama withdrew U.S. forces from Iraq in 2011 and is preparing to leave Afghanistan by the end of 2016, even while keeping a few more troops there this year and next than originally planned.
Point No. 2: The Obama administration keeps largely silent about Iran’s power grab in Iraq, Syria and Yemen, even going so far now as to assist Iranian forces in Tikrit, while attempting to negotiate a nuclear deal with Tehran that would allow it to maintain thousands of centrifuges.
Point No. 3: Mr. Obama berates Benjamin Netanyahu for allegedly “racist” campaign rhetoric, refuses to accept his apologies, and says the U.S. may now “re-assess options,” code words for allowing the United Nations to recognize a Palestinian state over Israeli objections.
Taken together, these facts suggest that Mr. Obama is attempting to pull off the most fundamental realignment of U.S. foreign policy in a generation. The president is pulling America back from the leading military role it has played in the Middle East since 1979, the year the Iranian hostage crisis began and the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. He is trying to transform Iran from an enemy to a friend. He is diminishing the alliance with Israel, to lows not seen since the 1960s.
Call it the Obama Doctrine: The U.S. puts down the burden, and Iran picks up the slack.
Perhaps the least disputed of these points is the notion that Mr. Obama is stepping back from the Middle East. He has repeatedly said as much, promising to “rebalance” our commitments by shifting forces to the Pacific. The U.S. still maintains substantial forces in the Persian Gulf, as it has done since the early 1980s. But the number of troops in Iraq has fallen from 142,000 when Mr. Obama took power to fewer than 3,000 today, after an interregnum of zero between 2011 and 2014. The number of troops in Afghanistan tripled to 100,000 in 2010 but has since fallen to 10,000 and is supposed to hit zero before the president leaves office. This will be disastrous and destabilizing, but it will allow Mr. Obama to claim that he “ended” the war. In reality, pulling out U.S. troops will only fuel the conflict.
A corollary to Mr. Obama’s vow to make the “tide of war” recede is his determination, if forced to fight, to employ air power alone. The U.S. took part in the NATO air campaign to depose Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, but afterward Mr. Obama refused to send a peacekeeping force, a decision that has consigned the country to anarchy. Now Mr. Obama is launching airstrikes against Islamic State while refusing to commit to any ground troops—even though they are essential to ensuring the success of airstrikes.
This brings us to the second part of the Obama Doctrine. The U.S. has regarded Iran as its enemy since our embassy in Tehran was stormed and our diplomats taken captive. The Iranians have sponsored numerous terrorist attacks on American targets, in Lebanon in the 1980s and Iraq in the 2000s.
In response, successive U.S. presidents have backed Israel and Sunni allies, notably Saudi Arabia. Mr. Obama is bucking this foreign-policy consensus. He is offering Iran extraordinarily generous terms in the current negotiations, suggesting that he will lift sanctions if Iran merely slows down its nuclear-weapons program for a decade.
Mr. Obama is also doing little to contest Iran’s growing imperium in the Middle East, symbolized by the ubiquitous presence of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force, which is charged with exporting Iran’s revolution. Tehran backs proxy militias such as Hezbollah, which has moved from its Lebanese base to support Iranian clientBashar Assad in Syria; the Badr Organization, which is leading the charge against Islamic State in Tikrit; and the Houthi militia that has taken over San’a, the capital of Yemen, and is now at the gates of Aden, a strategically vital port near the entrance to the Red Sea.
All U.S. officials will say in response is that Iran’s actions are “helpful” as long as they are not too “sectarian”—akin to praising Al Capone for providing liquor to the thirsty masses while piously expressing the hope that his conduct isn’t too criminal. Now the U.S. is even supporting the Iranian-directed offensive against Tikrit by providing surveillance flights and airstrikes for attacking forces.
The flip side of this shift toward Iran is a move away from longtime allies, most notably Israel, which views the Iranian nuclear program as an existential threat. The president vowed to put some “daylight” between Washington and Jerusalem, and boy has he delivered. His aides deride the Israeli prime minister as a “chickens—” and a “coward,” and Mr. Obama has exhibited more visceral anger at Mr. Netanyahu than he has atVladimir Putin or Ayatollah Khamenei.
Mr. Netanyahu has sometimes played into Mr. Obama’s hands—for example, by agreeing to address Congress without first running it by the White House and then vowing, in the closing days of his campaign, that there will be no Palestinian state while he is prime minister. What Mr. Netanyahu meant, as he later explained, was that the Palestinians have not shown a commitment to peace that would make him comfortable giving up further land in the West Bank at the moment. But by appearing to flip-flop on his pledge to seek a two-state solution—a bedrock of U.S. policy under Mr. Obama and George W. Bush—Mr. Netanyahu has provided ammunition for those in the White House who maliciously insist on painting him as a crazed warmonger and ethnic cleanser.
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