Israel Matzav

Will Obama back off Israel?

Caroline Glick reviews President Obama's failures in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria and with the 'Palestinians' and concludes that President Obama will not back off Israel regardless of what his bullying costs him politically.

In his interview last week with Channel 2, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said he has no doubt that if Obama wishes to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons he is capable of doing so. As he put it, “Barack Obama demonstrated his determination with regard to issues he felt were important, and his determination was quite impressive. I think President Obama can show that same determination with regard to Iran.”

No doubt Netanyahu is correct. Moreover, the politics of such a move would make sense for him. Whereas Obama’s decision to ram the nationalization of the US healthcare industry through Congress against the wishes of the American public caused his personal ratings and those of his party to plummet, were Obama to decide to take on Iran, he would win the overwhelming support of the American public. Indeed, a determined and successful bid by Obama to block Iran’s nuclear aspirations could potentially block what is currently looking like a midterm election catastrophe for his party in November.

But as Gates’s memo about Iran, Clinton’s announcement that the administration will go ahead with its plan to dispatch an ambassador to Damascus, Mitchell’s latest failure with the Palestinians, Jones’s newest accusation against Israel, and the US’s strategic incoherence in Iraq and Afghanistan all show, mere politics are irrelevant to Obama. It doesn’t bother him that his most loyal supporters abandoning him. It doesn’t matter that his policies have endangered the Middle East and the world as a whole.

Obama’s refusal to acknowledge his own failures make clear that his goal is different than that of his predecessors. He is here to transform America’s place in the world, not to safeguard the world. And he will move ahead with his transformative change even if it means abetting war. He will push on with his transformative change even if it means that Iran becomes a nuclear power. And he will push on even if it means that US forces are forced to leave Afghanistan and Iraq in defeat.

The bigger problem is that bullying Israel may cost Obama nothing politically. This is Ed Koch - Ed Koch! - who was ripping Obama a week ago for doing nothing about Iran. After seeing Obama's letter to Alan Solow, Ed Koch was gone silent.

I accept the letter as having been written in good faith. I cannot state that it restores my absolute good faith in the president. The unique trust that I and so many others, Christians and Jews, placed in him on the issue of supporting our close alliance with the Jewish state does not exist to the same extent, so I will look more to his actions than to his words. However, his letter is a start that I hope will be followed by concrete deeds.

What could go wrong?

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:49 PM