Israel Matzav

Sunday, January 11, 2015

Guess who isn't in Paris today

Prime Minister Netanyahu is in Paris at the rally against Islamic terrorism. So are Britain's David Cameron, Germany's Angela Merkel, Jordan's King Abdullah, and even Abu Bluff. Guess who isn't there. Uh huh.

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Obama's arrogance, Obama's dream, Obama's friends, Obama's middle name, Obama's obsession with engaging Iran

Friday, December 05, 2014

Obama mulling sanctions... against Israel

I guess when you're a lame duck, you can do whatever you please. President Obama, who has been doing his best to remove all sanctions against Iran is now mulling imposing them on Israel.

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf dodged several questions on Thursday when confronted with reports that the administration had held secret internal meetings to discuss taking action against Israel for its ongoing building in East Jerusalem.

The classified meetings were reportedly held several weeks ago and included officials from both the State Department and White House, according to the Israeli daily Ha’aretz, which first reported on the meetings.

The possibility of sanctioning Israel for its ongoing construction sends a signal that the Obama administration is willing to go further in its denunciations of Israel then any previous White House.

At the same time, the White House is vigorously pushing Congress against passing new sanctions on Iran.

When asked to address the reports Thursday afternoon, Harf declined to take a stance.
“I’m obviously not going to comment one way or another on reported internal deliberations,” she said. “We’ve made clear our position on settlement activity publicly and that hasn’t changed.”

When pressed to address whether the White House has reached a point at which it believes its harsh rhetoric against Israel is not enough, Harf again demurred, stating that she would not “address hypotheticals.”

A White House National Security Council (NSC) official also would not comment on the report when contacted Thursday by the Washington Free Beacon.

And I just had to share this quip from my friend, Noah Pollak

“The Obama administration is against sanctions on Iran, but for them on Israel,” said Noah Pollak, executive director of the pro-Israel organization Emergency Committee for Israel. “Is [White House deputy national security adviser] Ben Rhodes wearing a green headband to work these days?”

Read the whole thing.

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Iran sanctions regime, Obama's dream, Obama's obsession with Israel

Sunday, September 28, 2014

Obama's dream world

If you're an Orthodox Jew like I am, you may have missed President Hussein Obama's speech to the United Nations on Wednesday, the eve of Rosh HaShanna. Here's a recap.

Obama in his remarks offered praise to controversial cleric Sheikh Abdallah Bin Bayyah and referred to him as a moderate Muslim leader who can help combat the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant’s (ISIL or ISIS) radical ideology.

However, Bin Bayyah himself has long been engulfed in controversy for many of his views, including the reported backing of a 2004 fatwa that advocated violent resistance against Americans fighting in Iraq.

...

“The ideology of ISIL or al Qaeda or Boko Haram will wilt and die if it is consistently exposed, confronted, and refuted in the light of day,” Obama said before the U.N., according to a White House transcript of his remarks.

“Look at the new Forum for Promoting Peace in Muslim Societies—Sheikh bin Bayyah described its purpose: ‘We must declare war on war, so the outcome will be peace upon peace,’” Obama said, quoting the controversial cleric.

Concern over the administration’s relationship with Bin Bayyah started as early as 2013, when outrage ensued after he was reported to have met with Obama’s National Security Council staff at the White House.

While Bin Bayyah has condemned the actions of groups such as Boko Haram and ISIL, he also has taken controversial positions against Israel.

He issued in 2009 a fatwa “barring ‘all forms of normalization’ with Israel,” according to a Fox report on the White House meeting.

Additionally, the notorious 2004 fatwa permitting armed resistance against U.S. military personnel in Iraq reportedly stated that “resisting occupation troops” is a “duty” for all Muslims, according to reports about the edict.

Bin Bayyah wasn't the only subject of Obama's screed.

And then Obama dropped the other shoe. After spending fifteen minutes blabbering about the glories and wonders of Islam, even as he decried extremism and sectarianism, Obama proceeded to blame Israel for conflict in the Middle East:

Leadership will also be necessary to address the conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. As bleak as the landscape appears, America will never give up the pursuit of peace. The situation in Iraq, Syria and Libya should cure anyone of the illusion that this conflict is the main source of problems in the region; for far too long, it has been used in part as a way to distract people from problems at home. And the violence engulfing the region today has made too many Israelis ready to abandon the hard work of peace. But let’s be clear: the status quo in the West Bank and Gaza is not sustainable. We cannot afford to turn away from this effort – not when rockets are fired at innocent Israelis, or the lives of so many Palestinian children are taken from us in Gaza. So long as I am President, we will stand up for the principle that Israelis, Palestinians, the region, and the world will be more just with two states living side by side, in peace and security.

The Israelis may not be the “main source of problems in the region,” but by pressuring Israel before the entire world just weeks after Hamas continuously fired rockets into Israel and shielded its own rockets with children, Obama demonstrates his distaste for the Jewish State, and his desire to cast them as a bleeding abscess leading to more violence. The moral equivalence here was stunning, unjustifiable, and purely disgusting.

There was more too. Read the whole thing.

Over the weekend, my children asked how much longer would be in power. One of the older ones helpfully figured out that the next election is in 2016. I told them that may not help. Hillary Clinton is as bad as Obama, and Elizabeth Warren could be worse.

What could go wrong?

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Obama administration's fecklessness, Obama's dream, Obama's obsession with Israel, Obama's obsession with Palestinians, United Nations General Assembly

Monday, March 24, 2014

Obama setting Israel up to take the fall for his failed peace talks

Jennifer Rubin's analysis of President Hussein Obama is spot-on..

This past week, Abbas came to visit Obama at the White House. In advance of his trip, Obama made no statements expressing displeasure with the Palestinian Authority’s intransigence and its continued demonization of Israel. Just before the meeting Obama told the assembled press corps:

I have to commend President Abbas. He has been somebody who has consistently renounced violence, has consistently sought a diplomatic and peaceful solution that allows for two states, side by side, in peace and security; a state that allows for the dignity and sovereignty of the Palestinian people and a state that allows for Israelis to feel secure and at peace with their neighbors. . . . I also want to point out that the Palestinian Authority has continued to try to build strong institutions in preparation for a day in which the Palestinians have their own state, and I will continue to emphasize the importance of rule of law, transparency, and effective reform so that not only do the Palestinians ultimately have a state on paper, but, more importantly, they have one that actually delivers on behalf of their people.
In fact, Abbas last year forced out the only true Palestinian reformer Salam Fayyad, has refused to hold elections and occupies the presidency beyond the legally allotted term.

Moreover, as former deputy national security adviser Elliott Abrams explains: “By making the ‘right of return’ a personal right for each Palestinian, Abbas is saying the PLO has no right to negotiate over it and no right to sign an agreement that defeats or even limits that ‘right.’ If that’s really the PLO position, there will never be an agreement.”

How did the Abbas-Obama meeting go? The Times of Israel reports:

On his trip to Washington this week, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas rejected US Secretary of State John Kerry’s framework document for continued peace talks with Israel, and issued “three no’s” on core issues, leaving the negotiations heading for an explosive collapse, an Israeli TV report said Friday. . . .

Specifically, the report said, Abbas rejected Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that he recognize Israel as a Jewish state. He also refused to abandon the Palestinian demand for a “right of return” for millions of Palestinians and their descendants — a demand that, if implemented, would drastically alter Israel’s demographic balance and which no conceivable Israeli government would accept. And finally, he refused to commit to an “end of conflict,” under which a peace deal would represent the termination of any further Palestinian demands of Israel.

We can therefore see that Obama’s words are entirely at odds with the conduct of the parties in the region. He either chooses to misrepresent the facts or he is blinded by unremitting hostility to Israel. In any event, he indulges the PA’s intransigence despite replete evidence that this only worsens the divide between the parties. The inescapable takeaway is that Obama lacks real affection for the Jewish state and when things fail intends to blame Israel.

But then, did anyone really expect otherwise? Why?

Labels: Abu Mazen, Barack Hussein Obama, Binyamin Netanyahu, Middle East peace process, Obama's dream, Obama's obsession with Israel, Obama's obsession with Palestinians

Monday, September 03, 2012

Wall Street Journal slams Obama, makes news in Israel

In an earlier post, I discussed an editorial that appeared in the Wall Street Journal late Friday night, in which the Journal slammed President Obama for, among other things, burying his head in the sand on Iran's nuclear weapons program. That report, which was set off by Obama's ignoring comments made by Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Martin Dempsey, is continuing to make headlines here in Israel.

"Since coming to office, Obama administration policy toward Israel has alternated between animus and incompetence," The Wall Street Journal said. "No wonder the Israelis are upset. It's one thing to hear from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad that he wants to wipe you off the map: At least it has the ring of honesty. It's quite another to hear from President Obama that he has your back, even as his administration tries to sell to the public a make-believe world in which Iran's nuclear intentions are potentially peaceful, sanctions are working and diplomacy hasn't failed after three and half years."

The article said it was the Obama administration's "head-in-the-sand performance" on Iran that had convinced Israel that it is better to strike sooner rather than later. "Not only is there waning confidence that Mr. Obama is prepared to take military action on his own, but there's also a fear that a re-elected President Obama will take a much harsher line on an Israeli attack than he would before the first Tuesday in November."

Toward the end of the article, The Journal offered Obama a piece of advice: "If Gen. Dempsey or administration officials really wanted to avert an Israeli strike, they would seek to reassure Jerusalem that the U.S. is under no illusions about the mullahs' nuclear goals — or about their proximity to achieving them. They're doing the opposite."

The Journal is seeing things exactly right. What could go wrong?

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Iranian nuclear threat, Israeli attack on Iran, Obama's dream, Wall Street Journal

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Video: Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Obama on Israel (animation)

Here's an animation that someone made of the Daily Show's Jon Stewart interviewing President Obama about Israel.

Let's go to the videotape.

Heh.

Labels: Barack Hussein Obama, Jon Stewart, Obama's dream

Thursday, December 02, 2010

David Horovitz gets to say 'I told you so'

Although he is not the only one who said it, JPost Executive Editor David Horovitz has been one of the earliest, most public and most consistent voices arguing against the 'linkage' the Obama administration attempted to create between resolving the dispute between Israel and the 'Palestinians' and dealing with the Iranian nuclear drive. And now, with what we know from Wikileaks, Horovitz and many others get to say 'I told you so.' The difference is that David has a JPost column from which to do it.

To my mind, the president’s thinking defied common sense. Now we know, however, that it also defied the concrete information he was receiving from his own diplomats.

THE OBAMA administration, it is now clear for all to see, was not pressing a reluctant Netanyahu to make settlement-freeze and other concessions to the Palestinians in part because it truly believed this would be helpful in generating wider support for tackling Iran.

Not at all. The United States, we now know courtesy of WikiLeaks, was being repeatedly urged by a succession of Arab leaders to smash an Iranian nuclear program they feared would destabilize the entire region and put their regimes at risk. Their priority was, and is, battering Ahmadinejad, not bolstering Abbas.

King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, in 2008, had not urged the US to chivvy those recalcitrant Israelis toward concessions to the Palestinians as a pre-condition for grudging Saudi support for a firmer US-led position against Iran. Anything but. Never mind the Palestinians, the king simply implored Washington to “cut off the head of the [Iranian] snake.”

Likewise, with minor variations in the course of the following year, the rulers of Bahrain and Abu Dhabi.

We are now starting to hear, courtesy of WikiLeaks, what Jordan and Egypt had to say on the matter too.

Obama, that is, was not the prisoner of a misconception, convinced in absolute good faith that if he could deliver Israeli concessions at the negotiating table he might stand a greater chance of getting the Arabs on board for the battle with the mullahs. No, he had the diplomatic cables to prove that the Israeli- Palestinian conflict was no obstacle to wide Arab backing, indeed wide Arab entreaties, for the toughest possible measures against Iran, emphatically including military action.

Either the president, it can be concluded, was so attached to his misconception that he refused to let the concrete information he had on Arab leaders’ thinking get in the way – sticking to his view of the region in defiance of the facts.

Or, more plausibly, he had internalized full well that he didn’t actually need the cover of a substantive Israeli-Palestinian peace process to generate Arab support for tackling Iran’s nuclear program, but chose to pressure Israel just the same, as a tactic, because he felt Israel was not being sufficiently forthcoming on the Palestinian front.

Neither explanation sits well, to put it mildly.

Read the whole thing. David is much more mildly mannered than I am (some of you may recall that we met three and a half years ago when I attended a talk of his), and he doesn't get into Obama's motivations. The picture at the top of this post illustrates what I believe to be Obama's motivations. It's saved on my computer under the caption "Obama's dream."

Jews believe that God is behind anything and everything that happens in this World. Nothing happens without a reason. Nothing can be dismissed as coincidence. Wikileaks' massive document dump may have had other reasons, but I believe that one of them was to give us the opportunity to see clearly the enemy in the White House (and yes, I believe the Wikileaks dump makes clear that he is an enemy) and to take action to make sure his dream does not come true.

Labels: David Horovitz, linkage, Obama's dream, Wikileaks