Israel Matzav

Obama sends a message to Israel and Iran

I hope Alana Goodman will forgive me if I link her excellent piece on the message that Chuck Hagel's appointment as Secretary of Defense sends to Israel and Iran, and I add John Brennan's appointment as CIA director to the picture. The message is the same: The US under Obama is not to be trusted by Israel.

As Jonathan wrote, we’ll probably hear how Hagel’s views have “evolved” and “don’t matter anyway,” because Obama sets the policies. That’s nonsense. Just about the only thing notable about Hagel’s decades-long record is that, when given a choice between totalitarian regimes and democrats, time and time again he has sided with the former. And if Obama just wanted a lackey, he had plenty of more qualified choices who would have breezed through confirmation. There is only one reason, one possible advantage, of choosing a fight over Hagel. And that’s to send a message to Israel and Iran.

It’s a message Iran has apparently received loud and clear....

...

For whatever reason, Obama wants a defense secretary who the Iranian regime views as “anti-Israel” and anti-military force. Maybe he thinks it will help bring Iran to the negotiating table, or push the Israeli military to try to deal with the problem unilaterally. But it’s clear Obama never really gave up on his desire to reach out to the genocidal butchers in Tehran. He just put it off until he had more flexibility.

What could go wrong?

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Chuck Hagel, John Brennan

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:13 PM