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Honest broker? Israeli consulate sponsors Obama’s former Middle East peace adviser at Stanford talk!

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Ross and Obama in the Oval Sept 2011 White House photo by Pete Souza
Israeli consulate’s man Dennis Ross (center, in red tie) in the Oval Sept 2011 (White House photo by Pete Souza)

Dennis Ross worked for Obama for several years on Middle East peace. And before that he worked for Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush too. But he was always accused of bias toward Israel. Aaron David Miller called him Israel’s lawyer. Abe Foxman celebrated him as Israel’s advocate.

But Obama’s spox Jay Carney said Ross was a fair dealer when he left a year back:

Dennis has been a remarkable contributor to this administration.  He is — going back to the questions we were discussing just now with Jill about Iran — very much a part and an architect of the sanctions regime and the effort to pressure and isolate Iran, and has been at the forefront of our deliberations about handling the Arab Spring, the remarkable events we’ve seen in the Middle East and North Africa this year.

So I believe there might have been a statement that’s been put out already on this, but he’s certainly served his country and this administration and this President very well.

Joe Biden said he was a good man too! This is when they were setting out on the difficult path of making peace:

I understand why both sides are skeptical.  I’ve been doing this for a long time, not as long as my friend, Dennis Ross who is with me — Ross, who is with me — Ross who is with me.  He is with me.  (Laughter and applause.)  He has even more experience in the nitty-gritty of this than I do.  We understand why both sides are skeptical.  We’ve been down this road before and so have you, which every time makes it a little harder to go down the road again.

Well, I guess the egg’s on the Obama administration’s face. Ross is speaking tonight at Stanford. And guess who’s sponsoring him? Boldface mine!

Sponsored by: Stanford Center on International Conflict and Negotiations (SCICN), International Law Society, Taube Center for Jewish Studies, Consulate General of Israel, Pacific Northwest Region, SF World Zionist Organization, J Street, Stand with Us, Jewish Community Relations Council, The David Project, Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law.

“Chief Middle East Advisor to Three Presidents Reflects on Strategies to Peace”

Oh and notice J Street standing with the David Project and Stand With Us. J Street fights its own delegitimization!

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In the upcoming presidential elections of 2012, Netanyahu is sure to win both the electoral college and the popular vote.

Seriously, why pretend as though the United States of America is an independent nation?

Talk about masses yearning to be free.

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We’ve been down this road before and so have you, which every time makes it a little harder to go down the road again.

a biden classic, the more ross is with him the harder it gets.

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RE: “Honest broker? Israeli consulate sponsors Obama’s former Middle East peace adviser at Stanford talk!” ~ Weiss

FROM Robert Naiman, Policy Director at Just Foreign Policy, 11/23/12:
“Would It Make a Difference to Progressives if Norman Solomon Goes to Congress?”

(excerpts) A key paradox for progressives of our national political life goes something like this: everybody complains about Congress, but nobody does anything about it. . .
. . .Even now, the national infrastructure for effective caring is too weak. If the Progressive Caucus and the groups that support it effectively exercised all the functions of a political party, the fact that Norman Solomon is a candidate for Congress with a serious possibility of winning would be foremost in the consciousness of every pragmatic peace advocate in the United States. Every pragmatic peace advocate would know that Norman is running, every pragmatic peace advocate would know that there is a primary on June 5 and that voting by mail is already underway, every pragmatic peace advocate would know that Norman will survive the primary if he places second, every pragmatic peace advocate would understand why it matters if Norman survives the primary, and every pragmatic peace advocate would be doing their bit to help ensure that Norman survives the primary. . .
. . .I am looking forward to Norman going to Congress because I know that Norman will work to raise the profile of the Progressive Caucus and will work to help make the Progressive Caucus more effective. Right now progressives in Congress are fighting to end the wars, to prevent war with Iran, to curtail drone strikes, to cut the military budget and redirect the money to human needs. But too few progressives in the country even know these fights are taking place, still fewer are engaged in them. With Norman in the Progressive Caucus, with Norman on TV, more people would know about these fights and more people would be engaged in them.
Having Norman in Congress would do a lot to help build the progressive movement for political reform in this country. Check out his website. – http://solomonforcongress.com/ Think about what you could do to help move the ball forward.*

SOURCE – http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/05/22-7

* I made a modest contribution via ActBlue and Paypal. – https://secure.actblue.com/contribute/page/solomonforcongress?refcode=site-front-button

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Phil wrote: “Oh and notice J Street standing with the David Project and Stand With Us. J Street fights its own delegitimization!”

From a BDS debate on May 11, 2010:

Rebecca Vilkomerson: “J Street took a position against that divestment resolution at Berkeley along with a long list of other organizations, including the David Project and the Anti-Defamation League and Stand With Us, which have been quite extreme in their tactics and rhetoric.”

Jeremy Ben-Ami: “For the record, J Street will not be signing on to letters with organizations like that in group settings again. I won’t comment on going backward, but I will just say going forward you won’t find us signing on to letters like that.”

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>”Aaron David Miller called him Israel’s lawyer.”

Actually, Miller didn’t single out Ross specifically for that title – he gave it to the U.S. peace processors generally, including himself. In 2005 he wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post entitled “Israel’s Lawyer.” It began “For far too long, many American officials involved in Arab-Israeli peacemaking, myself included, have acted as Israel’s attorney, catering and coordinating with the Israelis at the expense of successful peace negotiations.”

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