Avigdor Lieberman is thrilled by a speech that called Israel the “historic homeland” of “the Jewish people.” AIPAC is over the moon: “President Obama demonstrated his understanding of Israel’s legitimate requirements.” J Street is happy, too.
Netanyahu called the speech a “badge of honor.” Of course. Because Obama’s description of “the Jewish people’s burden of centuries of exile, persecution”– and the Palestinians’ burden to amend for that– is straight from Netanyahu himself.
Not a word about settlements or occupation. Not a word about Palestinian conditions, or Palestinian nonviolent resistance, while he sang praises of the Arab spring. No sense of the strategic let alone moral urgency of ending the longest military occupation in modern history.
Zbig Brzezinski said (on PBS’s News Hour) that Sarkozy’s speech had urgency while Obama’s was a speech for a domestic audience, for the 2012 election. Brzezinski found it tragic: it abandoned any pretense that Americans would be fair in the conflict, and the loss of an American role is bad for Palestinians and Israelis. “Senior Palestinian negotiator Nabil Shaath said Wednesday that the Palestinians’ statehood bid at the United Nations is the only alternative to violence.” —Haaretz.
All our politicians belong to the Tea Party when it comes to Israel. The Times reports that the Republican Party has forged a bond with Netanyahu (surely not just for voters, but for money), and the Democratic Party doesn’t want to be left behind. They are cultivating the same government. The Washington Post says says there must be no daylight between Obama and Netanyahu, and Congressional Democrats gave Netanyahu 29 standing ovations last May.
What do people who care about Palestinian rights gain by being Democrats? Where is the left in this conversation? Where are the 20 percent of Americans who think we are too supportive of Israel? Do we have a voice in Congress or the media?
Back in the 60s, the Democrats gave up part of their coalition to choose equal rights. “We have lost the south for a generation,” said Lyndon Johnson. Will anyone in our politics be willing to take a principled step in support of Palestinian rights and risk losing those Jewish voters and donors who will back Israeli discrimination forever?
Based on today’s performance in New York, I doubt it.
People who love Palestine (or Israel come to that) or compliance with international law must “eat bitter” today. I hope some major EU leader will take time out from economic and banking troubles to “call” Obama on his dereliction of duty and abandonment of the American dream set forth in out own Declaration of Independence
Obama is winning a Pyrrihc victory over the Palestinians right now. He is attempting (and in my view will likely succeed) to block or defeat a PA request at the Security Council WITHOUT having to use the US veto. The US’s fear, of course, is for the obvious destructive effect such a veto will have on US standing all across the Middle East. As I said, he’ll probably succeed (I never really believed Abbas would formally go to the UNSC). However, after that speech, this is largely a Pyrrhic victory. Obama’s speech, combined with Netanyahu’s and Lieberman’s gloating (hell, even Israelis called him Barak Netanyahu), will succeed in doing almost as much damage as a US veto would have.
I loved Obama the candidate. Obama the office holder is someone I don’t even like as a friend. I wonder, will the Swedes ask Barack ‘merchant of death’ Obama to return his Peace Prize trophy?
The background to Obama’s speech at the UN was set by the NYT story which saw “a ripple in the jewish vote”.
Obama’s then goes to the UN and, outdoing R. Perry and Co., parrots, chapter and verse (Holocaust, right to exist, jewish state etc.), the zionist narrative. Avigdor is thrilled and Bibi radiates vindication, but others smell a rat.
“The Zionist turns of phrase that were uttered yesterday have a price tag affixed to them, and payment will be due — if not tomorrow, then on the day after,” says Yediot Aharonot’s columnist Eitan Haber.
Ironically, the price tag that troubles the Yediot Aharonot crowd is that some progress will actually be made towards a resolution of the decades of humiliation, subjugation and group punishment of the Palestinians. They quite rightly fear that Obama is only saying what he says for domestic political purposes and that sooner or later, as the price for US support, the Israelis will be obliged to fall in line with the long established US policy re 1967 borders. And agreeing with anyone about borders is definitely not part of the zionist repertoire. :-)
This specter of reconciliation that looms out of the fog of lies is sending a chill down the spine of all right thinking zionists. Haber again, “The United States has not changed the principles of its policy since 1967, and there was one thing that could have been understood from the president’s speech even though it wasn’t said — just you wait, your day of reckoning will come.”
So what should Pres. Obama have done?
Should he have acknowledged the brutal mistreatment of the Palestinians; the cynical intransigence of Israeli peace negotiators; the refusal of Israel to abide by UNSC resolutions and international law and the absolute “rightness” of the establishment of a Palestinian state?
Had he done so, there isn’t a single contributor to this website who would not know that he kissed his chance of re-election good-bye – AIPAC and its minions in the MSM would have mounted an almost unimaginably vicious attack resulting in a huge loss in campaign contributions and relentless criticism and denunciation in the MSM.
Folks – he did what he was compelled to do – live with it or consider what life would be like with another Texas idiot as president.
I, for one, believe that if he is re-elected and is free of the AIPAC shackles, he will make Netanyahoo pay for the humiliation he has taken.