Answer: The Israel lobby’s primary lever is the congressional elections

by on October 4, 2010 10
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From Ynet, quoting Avigdor Lieberman, the Israeli Foreign Minister:

"During my recent visit to the US I learned that Washington is planning to force a permanent agreement on Israel – two states for two peoples along the 1967 borders, plus-minus 3 or 4% of the territory exchanged," Lieberman said. "This is the objective of a continued freeze – to give the US and the international community two months to come up with a solution that will be forced on Israel."

According to the FM, in two months' time "The US, along with the Quartet, the Arab League and the Palestinians will tell Israel, 'This is the solution, take it or leave it. If you don't, there is a price – a confrontation with the international community'.

Question: Why does the US want a two-month extension of the settlement freeze--what happens in the next two months that Obama is trying to get past?

About Philip Weiss

Philip Weiss is Founder and Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Israel Lobby, Israel/Palestine, US Politics | Tagged , , , , ,

{ 10 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. annie says:
    October 4, 2010 at 12:24 pm

    in answer to your question, obama doesn’t want any kind of a showdown prior to the nov elections. he doesn’t want the ‘or else’ (assuming he has a plan) held against congressional members. he wants a window of time between backing him and the next election cycle. likely precisely the reason netanyahu timed the freeze to end right 6 weeks before the election.

  2. Avi says:
    October 4, 2010 at 2:08 pm

    Obama should have asked for a 34 day extension. But, that was too obvious, so he went for two months. Just like these terror alerts and warnings that go up every election cycle and then disappear into the ether come December.

    • MHughes976 says:
      October 4, 2010 at 3:22 pm

      Our Conservative Party Conference is just opening amid reports of rifts over defence spending. There was at the same time a mighty rush of non-event reporting over ‘fears that terrorists had changed their tactics’. I don’t think that the public takes much notice of such rubbish but the degree to which news organisations can be suborned is very alarming.

  3. potsherd says:
    October 4, 2010 at 2:37 pm

    If only Obama were able to force Israel!

  4. DICKERSON3870 says:
    October 4, 2010 at 4:48 pm

    RE: “During my recent visit to the US I learned that Washington is planning to force a permanent agreement on Israel…” – A. Lieberman
    MY COMMENT: I wonder just where he learned about this secret plan.
    ALSO FROM THE YNET ARTICLE: “…The FM also spoke of his controversial speech before the UN General Assembly. “Arthur J. Finkelstein told me not to deliver the speech, but I decided otherwise…
    EXCERPTED FROM WIKIPEDIA:

    Arthur J. Finkelstein (born 1945) is a New York-based Republican Party (GOP) consultant who has worked for conservative candidates in the United States, Canada, Israel and Eastern Europe over the past four decades…While a student at Columbia University, Finkelstein interviewed and helped produce radio programs for author/philosopher Ayn Rand,[2] and was a volunteer at the New York headquarters of the Draft Goldwater Committee in 1963-64 (the famous “Suite 3505″)…
    …The 1972 election also saw the first of his three victorious campaigns to elect Jesse Helms as U.S. Senator from North Carolina.[4] After the election, Finkelstein worked with Helms political aides Tom Ellis and Carter Wrenn to establish a permanent conservative organization, the National Congressional Club, which lasted until 1995.
    Finkelstein later helped Helms’s Congressional Club turn around the 1976 presidential campaign of Ronald Reagan with a victory in the April North Carolina primary.[2] His work continued in the subsequent Texas primary. At Finkelstein’s urging, Reagan made a major issue of the impending Panama Canal Treaties, which Gerald Ford was negotiating and which infuriated conservative voters. As Jules Witcover later reported, “Tens of thousands of Wallace voters were gradually cut adrift during his slide [in the primaries]… and Reagan media man Arthur Finkelstein recruited a Wallaceite from Fort Worth to radio and television spots for Reagan…. It was dynamite.”…
    …the subsequent 1976 Supreme Court decision in Buckley v. Valeo, drastically altered the rules by which Presidential and Congressional contests were waged. Finkelstein saw an opportunity and pioneered the concept and execution of independent expenditure campaigns (IEs), which would operate as a third force in an election beyond the control of candidate or party officials. Finkelstein was the chief strategist behind the most successful IE operation of this period, the National Conservative Political Action Committee (NCPAC). In 1981 New Right activist Richard Viguerie wrote, “NCPAC relies heavily on research and polling, a reflection of one of its founders, conservative pollster Arthur Finkelstein.”[7]…
    …In 1978, he was consultant to the successful re-election campaigns of Jesse Helms in North Carolina and Strom Thurmond in South Carolina…
    …. in 1996, he also helped Benjamin Netanyahu oust Shimon Perez as leader of Israel.[25] According to the Jerusalem Post, “Finkelstein was largely responsible for the strategy that brought Netanyahu victory in the 1996 general elections.” [26]…
    …England’s Daily Telegraph: “In the 1996 election in Israel, Arthur Finkelstein, the American consultant who had turned ‘liberal’ into a swear word, used polling data to pinpoint precisely the issue over which Israelis would reject a deal with the Palestinians – the division of Jerusalem – and propel Benjamin Netanyahu to a victory based on exemplary scare-mongering.” [32]…
    …In the 2000s, Finkelstein has spent more time working overseas than in previous decades, with clients in Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Kosovo and the Ukraine. He has continued to consult in Israeli elections, working for Ariel Sharon, Benjamin Netanyahu and most recently Avigdor Lieberman. He also ran the successful campaign of Nir Barkat for Mayor of Jerusalem in 2008….

    WIKIPEDIA SOURCE – link to en.wikipedia.org

  6. eljay says:
    October 6, 2010 at 6:35 am

    >> Actually, reasonable would be a permanent halting of Israel’s land theft and ethnic cleansing.

    Yup, there is absolutely NO valid reason for Israel to continue its aggression, occupation, land theft and colonisation. None whatsoever. Israel has the power to halt all of it immediately, completely and forever.

    “Humanists” don’t seem to like that fact, probably because they prefer their Palestinians “resilient and energetic”.

    Oh, by the way, ethnic cleansing is “currently not necessary”. :-)

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