From Instapundit: LOOKING BACK ON “SCOOP” JACKSON. “A Democrat representing the state of Washington in the U.S. Senate from 1953 until his sudden death in 1983, he deserves to be recalled not only because he merits honor but also because little of today’s politics would be comprehensible without understanding his 30 years in office.”
Labels: US Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:59 PM
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A 1964 Democratic campaign advertisement known as Daisy showed a young girl counting daisy petals, from one to ten. Immediately following this scene, a voiceover counted down from ten to one. The child's face was shown as a still photograph followed by images of nuclear explosions and mushroom clouds. The campaign advertisement ended with a plea to vote for Johnson, implying that Goldwater (who was not mentioned by name) would provoke a nuclear war if elected. The advertisement, which featured only a few spoken words of narrative and relied on imagery for its emotional impact, was one of the most provocative in American political campaign history, and many analysts credit it as being the birth of the modern style of "negative political ads" on television. The ad only aired once, and was immediately pulled, but then was shown numerous times by television stations.Let's go to the videotape.
Labels: Campaign 2012, US Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:42 AM
2 comments
This trip will include briefings and meetings with senior leaders in Israel, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It will also include touring important sites in the country. In addition, given the Governor's strong interest in energy issues, there will be visits to several sites such as the Noble Energy offshore gas rig and the Better Place electric car facility outside Tel Aviv. The trip will conclude with Governor Barbour making a major address at the prestigious Herzliya Conference on February 9.No word on a visit by President Obama.
RJC Executive Director Matt Brooks said, "We are especially pleased that Governor and Mrs. Barbour will visit Israel at this incredibly important time. The Middle East faces many challenges, from the instability in Lebanon and Egypt and the threat of a nuclear Iran to the continuing danger posed by Hamas in Gaza. As Iran and its proxies attempt to expand their reach in the region, it is vitally important that American and Israeli officials build and nurture a strong partnership in the fight against terrorism.
"This visit will give Governor Barbour the opportunity to learn more about the difficulties facing Israel, about the current thinking of Israel's political, military, and economic leaders, and about the Jewish state's exciting advancements in the development of new technologies."
Labels: Binyamin Netanyahu, Haley Barbour, Jon Voight, Mike Huckabee, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 12:27 AM
0 comments
A Wikileaks cable discloses that a British government minister advised Libya on how to obtain the 'compassionate release' of Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, and that the United States was aware of that advice. A Foreign Office minister sent Libyan officials detailed legal advice on how to use Abdelbaset al-Megrahi’s cancer diagnosis to ensure he was released from a Scottish prison on compassionate grounds.Read the whole thing.
The Duke of York is also said to have played a behind-the-scenes role in encouraging the terrorist’s release.
The Libyans closely followed the advice which led to the controversial release of Megrahi – who was convicted of the murder of 270 passengers on Pan Am Flight 103 – within months of the Foreign Office’s secret intervention.
The disclosure seriously undermines British Government claims that is was not complicit in the release of al-Megrahi, and that the decision to free the convicted terrorist was taken by the Scottish Executive alone.
It will also lead to renewed pressure from senior American politicians on David Cameron to release all internal documents detailing Britain’s role in the scandal. Last summer, the Prime Minister pledged to release the relevant information – but the publication has yet to occur sparking fears that a cover-up may have been ordered.
...
In October 2008 – as negotiations on the prisoner transfer agreement were ongoing –Megrahi was diagnosed as suffering from cancer.
It can now be disclosed that within a week of the diagnosis, Bill Rammell, a junior Foreign Office minister, had written to his Libyan counterpart advising him on how this could be used as the grounds of securing al-Megrahi’s compassionate release from prison.
Rob Dixon, a senior Foreign Office official, met with the American Ambassador to brief him on the letter. An official American memo on the meeting states: “FCO Minister for the Middle East Bill Rammell sent Libyan Deputy FM Abdulati al-Obeidi a letter, which was cleared both by HMG and by the Scottish Executive, on October 17 outlining the procedure for obtaining compassionate release.
“It cites Section 3 of the Prisoners and Criminal Proceedings (Scotland) Act of 1993 as the basis for release of prisoners, on license, on compassionate grounds. Although the Scottish Crown informed the families of the Pan Am 103 victims in an email October 21 that the time frame for compassionate release is normally three months from time of death, Dixon stressed to us that the three month time frame is not codified in the law.”
Mr Dixon went on to disclose to the Americans that Jack Straw, the then Justice Secretary, had also spoken to Alex Salmond, the Scottish First Minister about the case which had led Government officials to believe that the terrorist would be released.
The minute of the meeting with the Americans records: “Scottish First Minister Alex Salmond told Jack Straw that he will make the final decision in this case. Salmond told Straw that he would make the decision based on humanitarian grounds, not foreign policy grounds; Dixon told us HMG has interpreted this to mean that Salmond is inclined to grant the request.”
Following the meeting, the American Ambassador reported back to his superiors in Washington said that the release of al-Megrahi could “occur sooner rather than later” and that Whitehall officials were handling sensitive negotiations with the Libyans on the issue.
Later documents also disclose that the Qatari government, one of the richest in the world, also became involved in the effort to secure al-Megrahi’s release. The Americans thought that the Qataris may have offered financial incentives to the Scottish Government. The Libyans are also recorded to have offered a “parade of treats” to the Scottish government.
A senior Qatari minister visited Scotland to discuss the case.
Labels: Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, David Cameron, Jack Straw, Libya, Pan Am 103, Politics, Prince Andrew, US Politics, Wikileaks, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 1:55 PM
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William Jacobson has this right (Hat Tip: Instapundit). Internationally, it more is a matter of neglect and disregard, rather than a causal connection.Meanwhile, Jim Hoft reports that while Egypt burned on Saturday, Obama spent the day watching basketball and partying.
Having prostrated the United States before the world in the first months of his administration, and then having largely abandoned that world while focusing on Obamacare, we have watched a de facto Iranian takeover of Lebanon via Hezbollah, and a spread of Iranian and Islamist influence. It remains to be seen in which direction the Egyptian crisis moves, but all signs point to creater instability in the region and greater influence of Islamists.
The administration's complete obsession with Obamacare has had intended and unintended consequences, only some of which presently are known.
Update: Yes, I know, not all of the foreign policy has been neglectful. The Obama administration was quite active in supporting the Hugo Chavez-wannabee who tried to make himself president-for-life over the objections of the Honduran people, and in publicly scolding the Israelis for the lack of progress in peace talks.
Labels: Barack Obama, Egyptian riots, Nero, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:50 AM
1 comments
A group of senior members of the US House of Representatives has sent a letter to President Obama urging him to veto the 'Palestinian'-sponsored resolution condemning Israeli 'settlements' that is to be voted upon in the UN Security Council next month. U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and five fellow senior Members of Congress sent a bipartisan letter today to the President, requesting that the Administration take a number of steps to advance security and peace between Israel and the Palestinians, including to pledge to veto a pending United Nations Security Council resolution that condemns Israel. The letter also calls on the President to hold the Palestinian leadership accountable for their actions that undermine opportunities for peace and security. In addition to Ros-Lehtinen, the letter was signed by: House Majority Leader Eric Cantor; House Democratic Whip Steny H. Hoyer; Foreign Affairs Committee Ranking Member Howard L. Berman; and U.S. Reps. Steve Chabot and Gary L. Ackerman, the Chairman-designate and Ranking Member-designate, respectively, of the House Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia.The more I see of Ros-Lehtinen, the more I hope she'll run for higher office some day.
Labels: Eric Cantor, Gary Ackerman, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Politics, Steny Hoyer, Steve Chabot, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:43 PM
1 comments
Potential Republican Presidential candidate Mike Huckabee will arrive in Israel on Sunday for his 13th visit. While Huckabee is coming on his own initiative to lead a group of American Christian pilgrims, he will meet on Monday with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu – as Romney did – and take tours both of east Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria.Read the whole thing.
Although the presidential election is not until November 2012, and neither man has officially announced his candidacy, Huckabee and former Massachusetts Gov.Romney are running neckand- neck in US polling.
An ABC News/Washington Post poll from mid-January puts Huckabee as the favored candidate among Republican and independent voters, with 21 percent of the respondents saying they would vote for him in their state primary or caucus, 19% saying former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, and 17% for Romney.
An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll from the same period among Republicans and Republican-leading independents gave Romney a 1- percentage point lead over Huckabee, 19% – 18%, with Palin in third place with 14%.
Huckabee’s tour in Jerusalem on Monday is sponsored by Ateret Cohanim/ Jewish Reclamation Project, an organization spearheading efforts to buy property for Jewish homes in east Jerusalem.
Also on Monday, Huckabee -- who was invited to the Knesset by Shas MK Nissim Ze'ev -- will address the Knesset Immigration and Absorption Committee, at the request of committee chairman Danny Danon. In a rare appearance for a US presidential candidate before a Knesset committee, Huckabee will speak about diplomacy, anti- Semitism and Israel’s public relations effort.
Danon, who has hosted Huckabee on previous trips to Israel, said he would welcome other presidential candidates at his committee as well.
And on Tuesday, he will take a tour of the West Bank, led by Danny Dayan, as guest of the Council of Jewish Communities in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza Strip, which Dayan heads.
Labels: Ateret Cohanim, Mike Huckabee, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:37 PM
3 comments
This is too good not to share even though it has very little to do with Israel. Senator Joseph McCarthy was exposed by the phrase "Have you no decency, Sir?" as if the American people suddenly realized that McCarthy was a demagogue. But the left has no decency; it has smeared and slandered decency over and over again, until whole generations of young people can no longer recognize decency as a basic human virtue. The left will never hold itself to that standard. It desires power and control too much. Everyday decency is just bourgeois morality, and the left holds such concepts in contempt. That is why an appeal to their conscience never works.I am thrilled that warm support for Israel is part of a package of wholesomeness and decency in the United States.
Then Sarah Palin comes along, and by gum, they tear their own masks off, over and over again. It's a kick to watch. If you can stand the tension.
The American people are watching. If the people rally to Sarah, instinctively, they will be going for wholesomeness and decency. If the people don't even recognize all this Snidely Whiplash rage from the left, you can kiss the culture goodbye. The left will have triumphed at last.
Sarah Palin is therefore a last-chance test of our cultural health. If the people don't get what's right in front of their eyes, if we allow Palin to be scapegoated like Clarence Thomas and Newt Gingrich were scapegoated by a "high tech lynch mob," as Justice Thomas called it, we've lost the culture.
That's how important this is.
How Governor Palin is treated in public is therefore is even more important than the presidency. If the left manages to whip up a mob assault on her, that will tell us all we need to know about ourselves -- and whether the American experiment in constitutional government has come to an end.
Labels: Politics, Sarah Palin is a true friend of Israel, US Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 8:41 AM
2 comments
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fl) is proposing to make US funding of the United Nations contingent upon how the United Nations treats Israel. Members of Congress threatened to withhold US funding for the UN unless it increased transparency, countered a culture of corruption and reformed its Human Rights Council.Read the whole thing.
Several members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, which held a hearing on “The United Nations: Urgent Problems that Need Congressional Action” on Tuesday, took the Geneva-based Human Rights Council to task for singling out Israel and allowing major human rights abusing nations off the hook.
“US policy on the United Nations should be based on three fundamental questions: Are we advancing American interests? Are we upholding American values? And are we being responsible stewards of American taxpayer dollars? Unfortunately, right now, the answer to all three questions is ‘No,’” committee chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida) said in her opening statement, read in absentia as a family emergency kept her out of town.
“In the past, Congress has gone along by willingly paying what successive administrations asked for – without enough oversight,” she said.
Ros-Lehtinen announced she would be reintroducing legislation that would make American contributions to the UN budget – which now comprise about 20 percent of the total – voluntary.
The US now contributes more than $6 billion a year to the UN, and Republicans have been keen to cut the budget deficit in a time of financial crisis. Several have pointed to international assistance as a key target.
Ros-Lehtinen particularly objected to the US “paying onefifth of the bills for the UN’s anti- Israel activities, including the UN Human Rights Council, a rogues’ gallery dominated by human rights violators who use it to ignore real abuses and instead attack democratic Israel relentlessly.”
Committee ranking member Howard Berman (D-California) agreed that he was “repelled by these examples of corruption, mismanagement and bias” at the UN, including the rights council’s “obsession with and biased treatment of Israel.”
But he defended the organization for also addressing issues important to US interests, including providing peace-keeping missions, humanitarian aid and sanctions resolutions against Iran.
Berman pushed for engagement with rather than defunding of the UN, and similarly pressed the US to make strong use of its position of the rights council rather than walk away, noting its achievements such as keeping Iran out of the body.
He pressed Hillel Neuer, the head of UN Watch and one of the witnesses at the hearing, on whether the US should leave and defund the UN.
Neuer said that his organization supported the US paying all its dues and taking advantage ofits position on the rights council rather than ignoring it. However, he also criticized the US for not doing more.
Labels: House Foreign Affairs Committee, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Politics, United Nations budget, United Nations Human Rights Council, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:46 PM
1 comments
In an earlier post, I reported that Congressman Gary Ackerman has cut his ties with J Street, the This IS good news! I'm very pleased to see that Congressman Gary Ackerman is finally ending his relationship with the anti-Israel J-Street (which raised funds to re-elect Ackerman and endorsed Ackerman's position of pushing for further dangerous Israeli concessions). Congressman Ackerman's relationship with J-Street outraged people throughout our Congressional District.I hope Liz will run again in 2012 - and win.
However, several aspects of Congressman Ackerman's accompanying cut-off statement are of concern. First, we do NOT need any more so-called "aggressive pro-peace pro-Israel" organizations, as Ackerman states. J-Street is not the only culprit, and it is very troubling that Ackerman says that we need more organizations of the same ilk as J-Street. All of these leftist organizations (e.g., Peace Now, Brit Zedek v'Shalom, Israel Policy Forum, etc.) have a history of supporting policies that endanger our ally Israel’s security and continued existence. For instance, Brit Zedek recently defended Palestinian school textbooks, which preach hatred of Jews, Israel and America. These textbooks incite a new generation of Palestinians to continue violent attacks on Israel. The leftist organizations also continue to pursue the flawed "land and more and more concessions for empty promises of peace" model which has been proven time and time again to damage Israel's ability to defend herself (e.g. the Gaza withdrawal resulted in thousands of rocket attacks on southern Israel).
Second, when Ackerman calls Israel's unilateral lifting of hundreds of West Bank security checkpoints and 10-month settlement freeze "gestures of good faith," he misses the point that these "gestures" should never have been made, and were only made as the result of pressure from Obama and his administration (and perhaps due to Ackerman's own comments in Congress criticizing Israel and Israel's much-needed checkpoints). The lifting of checkpoints resulted in Palestinians murdering and injuring Israelis at locations which were previously protected by the checkpoints. The one-sided settlement freeze made life miserable for Israelis (while Palestinians continued to build thousands of homes in the West Bank) and gave the wrong impression that settlements are an obstacle to peace. The real obstacle to peace is continued Palestinian intransigence, terrorism, and determination to destroy Israel.
In addition to cutting ties with J-Street, Congressman Ackerman should also consider donating the money that J-Street raised for his re-election campaign to an organization that assists American and Israeli victims of Palestinian terrorism.
In any event, thank you, Congressman Ackerman for taking a step in the right direction.
Elizabeth (Liz) Berney, Esq.
Republican Committeewoman and attorney Liz Berney ran against Ackerman in 2008 and 2010.
Labels: Gary Ackerman, J Street, Liz Berney, Politics, US Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 7:22 PM
2 comments
One of the biggest reasons for the morass is also one of the most obvious. As Schaefer put it, “the bulk of the U.N. member states simply do not pay enough to the U.N. for waste, or corruption to trouble them.” The combined payments levied on 128 of 192 U.N. members “totals less than 1 percent of the regular budget and less than one-third of 1 percent of the peacekeeping budget,” he told the committee, even though they have enough votes to approve the budget and block U.S. attempts at reform.Could that last line include UNRWA? Hmmm.
So Byzantine has the U.N. become, in fact, that Schaefer says no-one in Washington really knows how much the U.S. spends on it. The U.N.’s biennial “regular” budget has more than doubled in the past decade from $2.49 billion to$$5.16 billion, Schaefer said, and the U.S. pays 22 percent of that.
But the peacekeeping budget has jumped higher and faster, from $1.7 billion in 2000-2001 to $7.2 billion in 2010-2011, and the U.S. pays 27 percent of that. Moreover, new missions could yet be added in Cote d’Ivoire or Somalia.
Then there are so-called “voluntary” funds where the U.S. contributions to a variety of sprawling U.N. funds, programs and agencies have also risen fast: according to sources cited by Schaefer, reaching $3.5 billion last year. (There are also independent funds, in such areas as climate change, that U.N. agencies also spend and manage.)
To combat the wasteful sprawl, Schaefer suggested that “Congress should not be shy in suggesting budget cuts.” Among other things, he proposed reinstating a long abandoned U.S. policy of pushing for “zero growth” for the U.N. regular budget, but also suggested pruning a variety of U.N. organizations, like a flock of U.N. regional economic commissions, that could be financed by their regional members.
Seemingly eternal U.N. mandated activities—there are more than 9,000 mandates in all—should also be chopped, he said.
The same see-no-evil philosophy applies to the U.N.’s 47-member Human Rights Council, according to Hillel Neuer, head of a Geneva-based non-governmental watchdog, Human Rights Watch. With a handful of exceptions, he told the committee, “the council has systematically turned a blind eye to the world’s worst human rights violations. The council has failed the victims who are most in need of international attention.”Read the whole thing.
There have been no Human Rights Council resolutions against China, Cuba, Saudi Arabia or Zimbabwe, he declared, Nor has there been any against Iran “even as it massacred its own citizens while the council was in session.” Moreover, he testified, “no resolution has even been proposed regarding these gross violators.”
Israel, on the other hand, gets plenty of attention. In all, Neuer testified, the council has adopted 35 resolutions condemning alleged human rights abuses in Israel, and “a little over a dozen against the rest of the world combined.”
Some of the council’s special sessions have even been used to legitimize violations, he said. One example Neuer cited: a special session on Sri Lanka, after the alleged government massacre of 20,000 people, ended, he said, in a draft resolution that praised the Sri Lanka government for “promotion and protection of all human rights.”
The Human Rights Council’s favored experts also came in for scorn. One of them, Richard Falk, who has a permanent mandate to report on Israel’s alleged transgressions, is known as a 9/11 “denier” who has called for investigations of the U.S. governments role in the terrorist attacks. On the eve of the Foreign Affairs Committee hearing, Secretary General Ban Ki-moon suddenly declared that Falk’s 9/11 remarks were “preposterous,” and “an affront to the memory” of the victims.
The Human Rights Council’s record is supposed to be reviewed by U.N. members this year, on the fifth anniversary of its founding. Neuer’s judgment is already in. He told the committee, “according to the U.N.’s own standards, the promises of the council’s founding resolution—improved membership, action for victims, an end to politicization and selectivity—have not been kept.”
Labels: Hillel Neuer, Politics, United Nations Human Rights Council, United Nations reform, United Nations Watch, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 3:26 PM
1 comments
Navi Pillay is the United Nations 'High Commissioner for Human Rights.' In an email on Monday, Anne Bayefsky sent me a lengthy expose of how Pillay has colluded with Richard Goldstone, Christian Tomuschat, Param Cumaraswamy, Mary McGowan Davis and others of her former colleagues from courts in South Africa and Rwanda, to demonize Israel, advance their own careers and enrich their own pockets. It's a complex web that is way too long to post, and I urge you to read the whole thing. You will be astounded at how openly and brazenly corrupt the UN is. Here's the bottom line: So this is how the U.N. works. A High Commissioner with a clear bias, shared by the U.N.’s most unscrupulous set of state actors, contrives to create a series of committees to forward her agenda. The job descriptions are liberally sprinkled with the word “independent.” But, in fact, she ensures that individuals who are anything but “independent” fill the positions. They are either indebted to her or to each other. They share her biases or are tied to those who do. And in the face of criticism, they manufacture and give each other awards. Those with bruised reputations depart, only to be replaced by other reliable friends.Read the whole thing.
It is hard to know which of these many steps is more deplorable than the next. In the name of “independence” and “accountability,” the U.N.’s top human rights official is busy promoting a vicious campaign to demonize one U.N. member state and throwing the rules about impartiality and fairness out the window.
Commissioner Navi Pillay and her appointments, Lennert Aspegren and Mary McGowan Davis, are the wrong people to take any leadership role in demanding accountability from others.
Labels: Christian Tomuschat, Goldstone Report, Lennert Aspergren, Mary McGowan David, Navi Pillay, Politics, Richard Goldstone, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:17 PM
1 comments
On Monday, J Street became too big a liability for even Representative Gary Ackerman (D-NY) to handle. Ackerman cut J Street off. U.S. Rep. Gary Ackerman (D-NY), the presumed Ranking Democratic member of the House Subcommittee on the Middle East and South Asia issued the following statement today:I added the emphasis. That quote is a classic.
“After learning of J-Street’s current public call for the Obama Administration to not veto a prospective UN Security Council resolution that, under the rubric of concern about settlement activity, would effectively and unjustly place the whole responsibility for the current impasse in the peace process on Israel, and—critically—would give fresh and powerful impetus to the effort to internationally isolate and delegitimize Israel, I’ve come to the conclusion that J-Street is not an organization with which I wish to be associated.
"It is not Israel that is refusing to enter final status negotiations. It is not Israel that has refused again and again to make unilateral gestures of good faith (recall the hundreds of West Bank security checkpoints and roadblocks removed, and the 10 month settlement freeze). It is not Israel that is now trying to force the peace process back in to the same dead-end from which the Obama Administration has spent the past month trying to extract itself. But astonishingly, it is Israel that J-Street would put in the stocks in the public square.
"The decision to endorse the Palestinian and Arab effort to condemn Israel in the UN Security Council, is not the choice of a concerned friend trying to help. It is rather the befuddled choice of an organization so open-minded about what constitutes support for Israel that its brains have fallen out.
"America really does need a smart, credible, politically active organization that is as aggressively pro-peace as it is pro-Israel. Unfortunately, J-Street ain’t it.”
J Street deeply regrets and objects to Rep. Gary Ackerman’s statement today. It reflects a misunderstanding of J Street’s position and of the UN Resolution in question.Ron Kampeas can't take Ackerman's statement at face value. He blames Ackerman's defection from the Far Left camp on 'conservative pressure.' Really? In downstate New York?
J Street hopes “never to see the state of Israel publicly taken to task by the United Nations,” as we said in our statement last week. In fact, our statement outlined how both Israel and the United States can help to avoid this issue coming to a vote at the United Nations – first, by Israel acting in its own self-interest to freeze settlement activity over the Green Line and, second, by the Obama Administration asserting “clear leadership in a serious effort to reach a two-state resolution of the conflict.”
In the absence of either of these, it should not surprise Representative Ackerman or other friends of Israel that the issue is brought to the United Nations and the broader court of world opinion. Without a two-state solution to the conflict in the near term, pressure on Israel in international fora will increasingly be the norm and not the exception.
As supporters of Israel, the fact that we have reached this point pains us deeply, and so does the Congressman’s misrepresentation of our position and of this resolution.
First, we do not “support” UN condemnation of Israel or endorse this resolution. We have urged the United States to consider withholding its veto from a resolution criticizing Israeli settlement activity – a resolution that closely tracks the policy of the United States under the last eight administrations.
Second, the resolution expresses support for a two-state solution and stresses the urgency of achieving a just, comprehensive and lasting peace. It calls on both parties to improve the situation on the ground, build confidence, and create conditions necessary for promoting the peace process. The resolution does not, as the Congressman implies, place the ‘whole responsibility for the current impasse in the peace process’ on Israel – and neither does J Street.
Third, the resolution calls on both parties to continue negotiations on final status issues.
The status quo in the Middle East is untenable. The future of Israel, as both a democracy and the homeland of the Jewish people, hangs in the balance without progress toward a two-state solution.
At a moment crying out for leadership, what’s needed now is not the politics of yesterday that the Congressman offers with this attack, but the courage to put on the table the tough steps that are needed to end this conflict. We do Israel no favors by offering a pass from facing the consequences of counter-productive actions and policies.
J Street has never excused Palestinian intransigence or signaled that the Palestinian leadership need not meet its obligations as well. We have called on the leaders of all parties to help bring about a reasonable, negotiated two-state resolution to the conflict.
We urge Congressman Ackerman to take a closer look at J Street’s statement, the UN Resolution and the situation on the ground. Saving the two-state solution will require leaders with courage and vision, both of which are sadly lacking in the Congressman’s statement today.
It's a mark, though, of how difficult J Street is finding it to hold a "pro-Israel, pro-peace" line in Washington. The obvious test will be in whether it can convince as many members of Congress to sign on in support as it did at its annual conference last year.My own view is that J Street's support for the Clemons letter was too much for even Ackerman to handle. It simply crosses a red line. As Josh Block wrote in an email to Ben Smith that was published last weekend,
Working to isolate Israel in the United Nations, and calling on the United States to abandon our policy of opposing unbalanced, anti-Israel Security Counsel resolutions, is the DEFINITION of anti-Israel activism, as is bragging or promoting in widely circulated emails one's letter being signed by the likes of Walt/Measheimer, Chas Freeman and a like crowd of mostly anti-Israel actors and critics.What remains to be seen is whether any other J Street supporters notice.
Labels: Gary Ackerman, J Street, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 11:08 AM
1 comments
In an earlier post, I discussed a Ben Smith piece from Politico, whose theme was that President Obama has had it with Prime Minister Netanyahu because of the latter's refusal to move in lockstep over the 'peace process.'Contrary to Smith, if there has been one consistent point about the administration’s attitude toward Israel during this period, it has been its hostility to Netanyahu. From the start, Obama, who prior to his election claimed to be all right with Israel but not with Netanyahu’s Likud Party, showed his dissatisfaction with the outcome of the Israeli vote in February 2009. Rather than seek a common strategy to revive a peace process that had crashed in 2008, when Abbas refused Netanyahu’s predecessor Ehud Olmert’s offer of a Palestinian state, Obama was determined to create some distance between the United States and Israel. Though the Palestinians had already conceded that most Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem would stay under Israeli control even as they rejected Israel’s offer of peace, Obama drew a new line in the sand. The president demanded that Israel freeze all building, even in areas — like Jerusalem — where everyone knew that Israel would not retreat even in the event of peace. Finding themselves outflanked, the Palestinians had to similarly dig in their heels, and the last two years of failed attempts to get them back to the negotiating table were the inevitable result.Indeed.
Obama’s first attempts to outmaneuver Netanyahu seemed to be based on a foolish hope that the prime minister would be forced into a coalition with the American favorite Tzipi Livni or out of office altogether. Rather than being weakened by this, Netanyahu gained strength. In the spring of 2010, Obama tried again when he deliberately picked a fight with Israel over the construction of new homes in existing Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem. The White House and the State Department subjected Netanyahu to an unprecedented campaign of abuse, but the result was no different than their previous efforts. Soon Obama was forced to back down and resort to a charm offensive aimed at damping down criticism from American Jews.
Rather than take responsibility for their own mistakes and the president’s relentless hostility to Netanyahu — whose grip on his parliamentary majority is stronger than ever — all we’re getting from the White House is more negative spin about Israel. But in order to believe a word of it, you’ve got to be afflicted with the sort of short-term memory loss that is the premise of Ben Smith’s article.
Labels: Barack Obama, Ben Smith, Binyamin Netanyahu, Jonathan Tobin, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 2:53 AM
0 comments
Jennifer Rubin has some great ideas for things President Obama should say in his State of the Union message.On Iran, Obama has a chance to reaffirm the policy of two presidents -- George W. Bush and himself -- that Iran can never obtain nuclear weapons. We may have bought some time, but reports emphasize that Iran continues to make progress on nuclear enrichment. As Iran has becomes more recalcitrant, Obama should become more direct: The United States will use military force if needed to halt Iran's nuclear ambitions, and, more important, we stand with the people of Iran who seek a democratic government that respects human rights and wants a normal relationship with the outside world.More suggestions here.
Then there is the rest of the Middle East. As we know from documents released over the weekend, Israel has been generous in its offers of Palestinian statehood and the Palestinians have been more than willing to concede nearly all of East Jerusalem. The problem is not, and has never been, Israel's settlements. This would be a grand opportunity for Obama to step away from the disastrous obsession with settlements, make clear that the U.S. will stand with Israel at the United Nations (in vetoing resolutions on settlements and unilateral declarations of Palestinian statehood) and give a boost to the Fayyed plan that seeks economic and political progress on the West Bank.
Labels: Barack Obama, Iran, Jennifer Rubin, Middle East peace process, Politics, US Politics, World Politics
posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 9:12 PM
1 comments
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
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