Obama Default Mode: Blame Israel

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West of Eden Haaretz.com By title: By writer: Ofer Aderet Raphael Ahren Dov Alfon Gideon Alon Alona Ferber Shulamit Aloni Nirit Anderman Moshe Arens Shaul Arieli Meirav Arlosoroff Ehud Asheri Eli Ashkenazi The Associated Press Shachar Atwan Shlomo Avineri Reli Avrahami Eytan Avriel Yuval Azoulay Emily B. Landau Anat Balint Zvi Bar'el Shlomi Barzel Moti Bassok Nir Becher Yossi Beilin Avi Beker Yehuda Ben Meir Noam Ben Zeev Dan Ben-David Kobi Ben-Simhon Ron Ben-Tovim Aluf Benn Meron Benvenisti Uzi Benziman Doron Bergerfreund Morten Berthelsen Amos Biderman Haim Bior Daniel Blatman Uri Blau Zohar Blumenkrantz Bradley Burston Chemi Shalev Vered Cohen Ora Coren Orna Coussin Mike Dagan Uzi Dann Mohammad Darawshe Adi Dovrat-Meseritz Yehezkel Dror Yuval Dror Ofra Edelman Haaretz Editorial Ehud Ein-Gil Hagai El-Ad Akiva Eldar Yair Ettinger Fadi Eyadat Donna Feinstein Yotam Feldman Michalis Firillas Shay Fogelman Michael Fox Lily Galili Doram Gaunt Ruth Gavison Anat Georgi Dana Gilerman Avirama Golan Riva Gold Shai Golden Yuval Goren Gershom Gorenberg Carmel Gould David Green Guy Grimland David Grossman Nathan Guttman Haaretz Dea Hadar Charlotte Halle Doron Halutz Michael Handelzalts Amos Harel Israel Harel Yaron Harel Zvi Harel Danna Harman Amira Hass Nir Hasson Tali Heruti-Sover Rami Hipsh Shahar Ilan Ofri Ilani Avi Issacharoff Gili Izikovich Claude Kandiyoti Or Kashti Sayed Kashua Etgar Keret Jerrold Kessel Jack Khoury James Kirchick Steve Klein Uri Klein Yossi Klein Sivan Klingbail Lior Kodner Noya Kohavi Shoshana Kordova Noah Kosharek Sefi Krupsky Ruta Kupfer Liel Kyzer Gadi Lahav Yehuda Lahav David Landau Yitzhak Laor Vered Lee Shiri Lev-Ari Alex Levac Chaim Levinson Vered Levy Barzilai Daniel Levy Gideon Levy Yitzhak Levy Revital Levy-Stein Nathan Lipson Jonathan Lis Tami Litani Neri Livneh Elka Looks Yoel Marcus Yossi Melman Liron Meroz Merav Michaeli Sara Miller Jerry Mittleman Natasha Mozgovaya Mazal Mualem Moshe Negbi Tal Niv Gonny Noy Amir Oren Ram Oren Oz Rosenberg Allegra Pacheco Michal Palti Reuven Pedatzur Lisa Peretz Sami Peretz Anshel Pfeffer Adar Primor Zvi Rafiah Barak Ravid Dmitry Reider Ran Reznick Zafrir Rinat Reuven Rivlin Daniel Rogov Guy Rolnik Doron Rosenblum Tamar Rotem Danny Rubinstein Ruth Schuster Relly Sa'ar Yuval Saar Gideon Samet Yossi Sarid Hillel Schenker Ze'ev Schiff Amos Schocken Hillel Schocken Gershom Schocken, Haaretz chief editor, 1939-1990 Ze'ev Segal Tom Segev Nabil Sha'ath Aner Shalev Shlomo Shamir Ari Shavit David Sheen Gabi Sheffer Na'ama Sheffi Smadar Sheffi Yair Sheleg Ruth Sherlock Sharon Shpurer Nehemia Shtrasler Asaf Shtull-Trauring Eli Shvidler Ruth Sinai Roni Singer-Heruti Emmanuel Sivan Shahar Smooha Ephraim Sneh Norman Spiro Simon Spungin Haaretz.com Staff Rotem Starkman Yuval Steinitz Yedidia Stern Yoav Stern Zeev Sternhell Carlo Strenger Mira Sucharov Yuli Tamir Ahmed Tibi Aliyana Traison Tamara Traubman Uri Tuval Tzvia Greenfield Assaf Uni Uri Avnery Yossi Verter Orly Vilnai Dana Weiler-Polak Gidi Weitz Yanir Yagna Eldad Yaniv Oded Yaron A.B. Yehoshua Nir Zalik Tomer Zarchin Benny Ziffer Avi Zilberberg Maya Zinshtein Zvi Zrahiya From date: To date: West of Eden by Chemi Shalev | Last Update: 09.12.2011 Published 12:37 09.12.11
Latest update 12:37 09.12.11
If Obama treated Israel like Reagan did, he'd be impeached
Former President Ronald Reagan's confrontations with Israel were harsh and personal, yet Republican conservatives revere him and the Jews remember him as a great friend.
By Chemi Shalev
Tags: Israel US Barack Obama Benjamin Netanyahu



Imagine if Israel would launch a successful preemptive strike against a country that is building a nuclear bomb that threatens its very existence, and the American president would describe it as “a tragedy”.

And then, not only would the U.S. administration fail to “stand by its ally”, as Republicans pledged this week, but it would actually lend its hand to a UN Security Council decision that condemns Israel, calls on it to place its nuclear facilities under international supervision and demands that it pay reparations (!) for the damage it had wrought.

And then, to add insult to injury, the U.S. president would impose an embargo on further sales of F-16 aircraft because Israel had “violated its commitment to use the planes only in self-defense”.

Can you imagine the uproar? Can you contemplate the brouhaha? I mean, if Mitt Romney believes that President Obama “threw Israel under the bus” just for suggesting that a peace settlement with Israel be based on the 1967 borders - what would he say about a president who actually turns his back on Israel in its greatest time of need? That he hurled Israel over the cliff with a live grenade in its pocket and into a burning volcano?

And what if that very same president, only a few months later, would decide to sell truly game-changing sophisticated weaponry to Saudi Arabia, an Arab country that is a sworn enemy of Israel? And not only would this president dismiss Israeli objections that these weapons endanger its security, but he would actually warn, in a manner that sent shivers down the spines of American Jews, that “it is not the business of other nations to make American foreign policy”. And his Secretary of State would mince no words, just in case Walt or Mearsheimer hadn't heard the first time, saying ominously that if the deal would be blocked by Israeli influence, there would be “serious implications on all American policies in the Middle East... I'll just leave it there.” And then the two of them would extend the abovementioned arms embargo, just to twist Israel's arm a little bit more.

I mean, what words would be left to describe such behavior, after the entire thesaurus' arsenal of synonyms for “insult” “perfidy” and “knife in the back” have been exhausted to describe the official White House photo of President Obama talking to Prime Minister Netanyahu with his shoes on the table?

And what if this same president - you know who I'm talking about by now, but let's keep up the charade - what if this same president, time after time after time, not only failed to exercise the U.S. veto in the UN Security Council to block anti-Israeli resolutions, but actually joined Muslim and Communist and other heathen countries in supporting Security Council decisions that condemned Israel for assassinating well-known terrorists; for annexing territories that Michele Bachman has clearly stated belong only to Israel; for killing violent jihadist students at Bir Zeit University; for waging war against the enemies of Western civilization in Lebanon; and even for “Israel's policies and practices denying the human rights of Palestinians.” Denying the human rights of Palestinians? Who wrote that? Judge Goldstone? Khaled Meshal?

But because Newt Gingrich is already on record as saying of the Obama Administration that “this one-sided, continuing pressure that says it's always the Israelis' fault no matter how bad the other side is has got to stop,” we have no doubt that he would say much worse things about this president we're talking about, don't we?

Especially when that president called for a settlement freeze that “more than any other action, could create the confidence needed for wider participation in these talks”; when he threatened a reluctant Israeli prime minister in an official letter that “the relationship between our two countries is at stake”; when the same Israeli prime minister - that this president couldn't stand, by the way - is forced to ask why the US is treating Israel as if it was a “banana republic”; when this Administration's secretary of defense doesn't veil his criticism of Israel before a pro-Israeli crowd at the Saban Forum, like Leon Panetta did this week, but actually tells Congress in open session that the Israeli leader “is not a moderate”; or when the White House spokesman - Marlin Fitzwater, for God's sake - says that the Israeli “occupation” actually “damages the self-respect and world opinion of the Israeli people.”

I mean, if Ambassador Gutman should be tarred, feathered and sacked for saying that the Middle East conflict fuels Muslim anti-Semitism, what should one do with a White House that is openly providing ammunition to the boycotters and the delegitimizers? And what would all the piqued pundits and bristling bloggers who scribed this week that the words of Panetta and Gutman along with Hillary Clinton's off-the-record concern for Israel's democracy prove the Obama Administration's animosity towards Israel - what would they have to say about an Administration that often spoke to Israel with all the subtlety of Tony Soprano holding a sledgehammer in his hand?

And finally - and this is where we really enter the Twilight Zone, I admit - imagine if this president not only never once visited Israel, despite being eight years in office, but he even balked at visiting a concentration camp, as Obama did after his speech in Cairo. You want to know why? Because - take a deep breath - because the Germans “feel that they have a guilt feeling that's been imposed upon them." Poor things.

But wait, I'm not finished yet. So where does this president insist on going, despite overwhelming Jewish objections and an emotional last-minute appeal by Elie Wiesel in the name of Holocaust survivors? To lay a wreath at a ceremony commemorating the memory of the soldiers of the Waffen SS, a Nazi unit designated as a criminal organization at the Nuremberg trials, whose soldiers committed countless war crimes, including the razing of the Warsaw Ghetto, and murdered hundreds of thousands of Jews. And what does this president, this American idol of Republican conservatives, this righteous gentile of right-wing Jews, what does he have to say about these Nazi war criminals? That “they were victims just as surely as the victims in the concentration camps."

NOW, SERIOUSLY, can you even begin to imagine what mayhem would break out if Obama would say such an insensitive, obtuse and borderline Holocaust-denying sentence? Can you picture the earthquake of rage and the tsunami of venom that would spontaneously and simultaneously erupt and sweep forth all the way from Fox News through Newt Gingrich to Pamela Geller? Is it far-fetched to imagine that America would actually grind to a halt as Republicans frantically sought a constitutional offence with which to impeach Obama and angry multitudes gathered before the White House lawn?

Ah, but Ronald Reagan, obviously, was not Obama, notwithstanding what some of Obama's advisers once wanted you to believe. Reagan was the Gipper, the Great Communicator, the father of Reaganomics, the scourge of the Evil Empire, the great conservative revivalist who, in retrospect at least, can do no wrong. And he was a mensch, the Jews will add, because no matter what he did to Israel and how often he did it, his heart was always in the right place.

And Obama? I mean, perhaps he's failed in other matters, but by all accounts he's been a great help to Israel in many security -related areas, he's supported Israel in countless international forums, and even if he has made some bad mistakes, in comparison to Reagan's often roughshod treatment of Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, he's a Zionist-loving pussycat, no?

That's when your interlocutor will look you in the eye and sigh with a mix of scorn and pity. Yes, well, he's a kalter Fisch, you know, a cold fish, he doesn't “feel” for Israel like Reagan did, he didn't want a photo-op with Bibi, he bowed his head before the Saudi king, his middle name is Hussein and, well, you know. We don't have to spell it out.