By Barry Rubin
Could President Barack Obama’s strategy possibly be more obvious to Israel? Not for the mass media, of course, but for Israel. Here’s a summary: Due to the Obama Administration’s ineptness, the Palestinian Authority (PA) is planning to ask the UN to give it unilateral independence in September. But rather than use its leverage against the PA–including pointing out that what it’s doing is contrary to every U.S.-guaranteed agreement that the PA signed with Israel during the last 18 years–the Obama Administration wants to use its leverage on Israel to force it to save Obama.
You see, Obama will find it hard to escape vetoing the PA’s bid in the Security Council before it ever gets to the General Assembly. This will not make Obama or the United States more popular with Muslims or Arabs. So Obama wants Israel to pay the price in exchange for…nothing.
To avoid the PA declaring unilateral independence without making any concessions, Obama wants Israel to accept what amounts to the PA getting independence without making any concessions! But it won’t be unilateral, right? Obama’s plan is for Israel to negotiate, turn over the all of the West Bank to the PA as soon as possible and then negotiate on all the issues with a PA-led state. Of course, that means Israel would give up all of its bargaining chips at the beginning of the negotiation rather than get something for them at the end in exchange for Palestinian concessions.
And, of course, Obama wants Israel to depend on his promises and support, not exactly reliable, right?
What’s really going on is that Obama wants Israel to take enormous risks and give up a huge amount of political capital, thus endangering its citizens and future in order to spare Obama from vetoing the PA’s initiative. And since Obama takes no strong action against the Fatah-Hamas coalition, he’s asking Israel to give these concessions to an interocutor that includes genocidal-minded antisemitic terrorists working with Iran, Syria, and the Muslim Brotherhood.
John Bolton had the right idea – if the US really wanted to block the Palestinian bid at the UN, all they have to do is threaten to cut off funds to the UN.
And what about Jerusalem? What about the several hundred thousand Jews who live in the large settlement blocs? The Jordan Valley, essential to our security? End of conflict & no further claims? Recognition as the State of the Jewish people?
The situation in the region is fast becoming like the pre-1967 situation.
The real question is will we react as in 1967 or like 1973?
How Israel is going to react in this mess is the real question. We already know that obama does not have it in his heart to support Israel in anything but a token support. obama just wants to look good, so if Israel can find a way for obama to look good and still keeps it’s borders and not allow the people of Gaza to get Statehood…WOW, where is Houdini when you need him most??
I am afraid that obamain all his haste to look good in front of “HIS” people, is going to let Israel fall. that will also be bad for obama but to late for israel.
Barack Obama is viscerally hostile to Israel, ambivalent towards Jews in general, sees Israel as the main problem for America and the Middle East, largely views Israel as the “bad guy”, and sees the Palestinians as “good guys” forced to misbehave by an oppressive and colonial Israel.
Thus Obama’s Middle East policy is largely concerned with chastising, berating, and humiliating Israel and demanding Israeli concessions to her enemies. And as we all know, these Israeli concession are to be made with the expectation of nothing in return from the Arabs, and what is even worse and far more disturbing, even after making concessions, Israel routinely gets nothing but more hostility and demands for more concessions from Obama.
Of course this has been Obama’s foreign policy for pretty much all of America’s allies. That is, America’s allies are treated with treachery and faithlessness, while Obama’s foreign policy for America’s enemies and rogue states has been one of understanding and compassion.
The real kicker in all this is that none of this has made Obama popular with America’s enemies and the rogue states, they still hate his guts and do what they can to annoy him. And on the other hand, America’s allies are left feeling confused and angry.
And Obama hasn’t got a clue why this is!
You are right about obama. he is setting Israel up, and the mainstream media is too stupid and blind to see the truth. Know this though, there are millions of Americans who stand with Israel against this administration and hopefully, by the grace of God, we will elect a president next year that is pro-Israel. Our prayers are with Mr. Netanyahu that he will continue to fight for the nation of Israel and the Jewish people and not give in to this administration’s demands. Remember, the same God that fought King David’s battles will also fight for Israel today! Our prayers are with you Israel.
Obama’s position is not surprising at all. He is asking Israel to follow his lessons in negotiation. He has consistently shown a pattern of fully capitulating and giving away all bargaining chips before the start of negotiations. That is why his “base” is so totally pissed off with him.
It is incredible. Obama makes the same mistake again and again.
The next step, after Israel refuses Obama’s kind offer, will be to blame Israel for the lack of ‘progress’ towards ‘peace’. And it may be that this will be used as an excuse for the US to allow the Security Council to pass a resolution — possibly not admitting ‘Palestine’ to the UN, but very bad for Israel.
#4 – …and God hardened Pharoah’s heart.
You are watching the unfolding of the destruction of Pharaoh’s army. About 3500 years ago they thought they could enter in after the splitting of the Yam Suf. But it didn’t split for them, it split for us. Once again their cockiness will be their undoing.
“And since Obama takes no strong action against the Fatah-Hamas coalition, he’s asking Israel to give these concessions to an interocutor that includes genocidal-minded antisemitic terrorists working with Iran, Syria, and the Muslim Brotherhood.”
From Hamas covenant:
“Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it, just as it obliterated others before it”
Article 2 states that Hamas is “one of the wings of Moslem Brotherhood in Palestine”.
Hamas’ slogan (article 8), same as the slogan of the Muslim Brotherhood:
“Allah is its target, the Prophet is its model, the Koran its constitution: Jihad is its path and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes.”
Article 11 states that there cannot be any compromize on land because according to Islamic Sharia law any land the Muslims conquered by force belongs to the all future generations of Muslims, and that applies not only to Israel: “and the same goes for any land the Moslems have conquered by force, because during the times of (Islamic) conquests, the Moslems consecrated these lands to Moslem generations till the Day of Judgement.”
Article 7 makes clear that the only alternative is jihad until the Jews are exterminated as quoted from Islamic scriptures:
“The Day of Judgement will not come about until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O Abdulla [slave of Allah, P], there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews.”
Article 32 mentions the Czarist-fabricated “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” as their source of “information” about an alleged Jewish conspiracy to rule the world, a “conspiracy” mentioned also in some other articles. That “document” inspired the Nazis too, but then the Muslim Brotherhood and the Nazis were good budies back in the day, so it’s not much of a surprise.
Article 22 lays down Hamas’ sophisticated and nuanced geopolitical understanding of the global powers and world events:
“The imperialistic forces in the Capitalist West and Communist East, support the enemy with all their might, in money and in men. These forces take turns in doing that. The day Islam appears, the forces of infidelity would unite to challenge it, for the infidels are of one nation.”
Several articles state the intention of Hamas to create an Islamic state on the entire land, including Israel.
Articles 17 and 18 discuss the importance and role of the woman. A couple of lovely quotes:
“The Moslem woman has a role no less important than that of the moslem man in the battle of liberation. She is the maker of men. Her role in guiding and educating the new generations is great. The enemies have realised the importance of her role. They consider that if they are able to direct and bring her up the way they wish, far from Islam, they would have won the battle. That is why you find them giving these attempts constant attention through information campaigns, films, and the school curriculum, using for that purpose their lackeys who are infiltrated through Zionist organizations under various names and shapes, such as Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, espionage groups and others, which are all nothing more than cells of subversion and saboteurs.”
“Woman in the home of the fighting family, whether she is a mother or a sister, plays the most important role in looking after the family, rearing the children and embuing them with moral values and thoughts derived from Islam. She has to teach them to perform the religious duties in preparation for the role of fighting awaiting them. That is why it is necessary to pay great attention to schools and the curriculum followed in educating Moslem girls, so that they would grow up to be good mothers, aware of their role in the battle of liberation.”
And there’s plenty more where these came from… Real cheery stuff. And they don’t even use LSD to produce it.
But I can hear the average leftist’s response: “So what’s your point?”
“Well, alright”, they’d say, “it does sound like a combination of the most radical and violent interpratations of Islam mixed with a good measure of Nazism, but surely if you give them the West Bank to create an Arab-Palestinian state next to Israel they will stop hating you so much and become pragmatic, even though they hated you for decades before 1967 and were never pragmatic. But surely if Hamas will be in the government it will moderate. What on earth could make you think they might use it to launch rockets, missiles and terrorist attacks or war?”
Nice addition to Barry’s post. Pnina, do you write your own blog?
Obama has run roughshod over Israel because he wanted to go down in history as
“THE MAN”. The man who did what no other U.S. President could do. He also knew that by forcing Israel to be the one to give and give and give, he would endear himself to the muslim world and be a hero there as well. Now that he has made mistake after mistake both domestically and in foreign affairs he needs something smashing to bring back the respect of the world and will push Israel as much as it takes. He needs to do this before Abbas puts his plan before the U.N. because when that happens he knows that he will have to veto it or he’s a goner at the 2012 election. Watch the pressure mount. Bibi…stay staunch.
Jomit, I appreciate your analysis but remember Occam’s razor, the simplest reason is most likely the true one. In this case the simplest explanation for Obama’s actions are not that he has some Machiavellian scheme but that he is simply a fool, IMHO.
Bob – Actually, with Obama, both explanations are probably true: he’s a damned fool and he’d love to deliver Israel to the Mahomentans.
I guess Obama is just “bad for the Jew” ….
Our Secretary of State Hillary is incompetant in middle east diplomacy. The State Dept., which has always had arabists and antisemites in it’s ranks, is totally ineffective at a time we need deplomacy urgently. Ms. Clinton’s closest aid and confident, Ms. Weiner, is a muslem. How impartial do we think she can be? I think our entire middle east foreign section needs a thorough debridement and reconstruction. It is a holy mess.
It’s very upsetting when one talks to the Administration’s representatives about Obama’s middle east policies. To complaints that they are taking the wrong tack with the Arabs they respond that they are committed to maintaining Israel’s military superiority over them. It’s not difficult to realize, then, that President Obama’s intent is to promote Arab hate and future armed clashes between Arabs and Israelis, rather than alleviate Arab hostility towards the Jews and promote peace.