This is going to be fun: US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley rips the Security Council's Israel obsession
Here's US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley telling the press about her first Security Council meeting - and she specifically mentions the shameful US abstention (and worse) on Security Council Resolution 2334 during the last days of the Obama administration.
Let's go to the videotape.
For those on the Left who are wondering why you lost the recent US election, you might want to start here.
As Israel seeks help from Trump, Netanyahu spox accuses Obama of orchestrating UN resolution
A spokesman for Prime Minister Netanyahu with what's described as 'ironclad intelligence' is accusing the Obama administration of orchestrating the introduction and passage of UN Security Council Resolution 2334 on Friday.
Speaking to Fox News on Sunday, David Keyes said Arab sources, among others, had informed Jerusalem of Obama’s alleged involvement in advancing the resolution.
“We have rather ironclad information from
sources in both the Arab world and internationally that this was a
deliberate push by the United States and in fact they helped create the
resolution in the first place,” Keyes told the US media outlet.
The White House has adamantly denied “cooking up” the resolution, rejecting accusations by Netanyahu to that effect.
“We did not draft this resolution; we did not
introduce this resolution. we made this decision when it came up for a
vote,” said Obama’s deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes on
Friday. But because of its opposition to settlement activity and concern
for what it could mean for the region, the US “could not in good
conscience veto,” he added.
I'd believe just about anyone before I'd believe BenRhodes.
Netanyahu is now reaching out to the incoming Trump administration,
which takes office on January 20, and to friends in Congress, in the
hope of “deterring” what he sees as further potential Obama
administration-led diplomatic action against Israel, the Channel 2
report said. His aim is for the Trump team to make plain that his
administration will “economically hurt” those countries that voted
against Israel in the UN and that do so in the future.
Netanyahu’s fear is that Secretary of State John Kerry will set out
principles or parameters for a Palestinian state in a speech that he has said he will deliver in
the next few days on his Middle East vision. The prime minister fears
that, in its final days, the Obama administration will seek to have a
resolution enshrining those parameters adopted by the UN Security
Council, the report said.
There are three questions here. First, can Trump deter other nations from cooperating with Obama by threatening them economically? Second, is he willing to use that power if he has it? And third, what price will Israel have to pay in order to get to Trump to act?
In the meantime, hundreds of Syrians are dying daily on Obama's watch, but hey, no Jews involved so what difference does it make?
Oh and by the way, as bad as this situation is, can you imagine how much worse it would be if the President elect were Hillary Clinton?
Deja vu all over again: Obama not the first President to attempt to hurt Israel in his final days
Barack Hussein Obama is not the first US President to try to use the United Nations to hurt Israel in his final days in office. That 'honor' goes to Obama's ideological mate, Jimmy Carter. In this Washington Post editorial from December 21, 1980 (Hat Tip: Mark Dubowitz) (would they publish it today?), if you replace Carter with Obama, the result is uncanny.
THE AMERICAN vote against Israel in the Security Council Friday was,
in a sense, the essential Carter. There was no good reason of state for
the United States to reverse its previous refusal (twice to condemn
Israel for expelling two West Bank mayors -- not least because a change
would mark its previous votes as politically motivated. Moreover, the
issue of the mayors, who are indeed their people's authentic
representatives but are also spokesmen for violence, is more complicated
than any U.N. majority -- and certainly Secretary General Kurt
Waldheim, who immediately offered the mayors the comforts of the house
for a hunger strike -- could be expected to grasp. Yet the
administration condemned Israel. It evidently did so out of a familiar
impulse to be at one with the virtuous souls of the Third World,
notwithstanding the complexities of the larger issue at hand.
That
issue is whether friends should be treated differently from
enemies.It's a tough one. That is, it's a tough one for the United
States and especially for the Carter administration. No other country --
no other president -- has so indulged the luxury of deciding whether to
support friends on all occasions regardless of their failings or
whether to apply ostensibly universal values and condemn them in
particular cases when they are deemed to fall short. It would be truly
regrettable if the United States followed the pack and decided every
case on political grounds alone. At the same time, it cannot be denied
that there is a pack and that it hounds Israel shamelessly and that this
makes it very serious when the United States joins it. Jimmy Carter has
regularly anguished on this score. This time, in perhaps his last U.N.
act of consequence, there was a suggestion in the air that he was
finally doing what in his heart he has always wanted to do: vote for
what he regarded as virtue.
To whatever effect, Ronald Reagan will do it differently.
May God obliterate both Carter's and Obama's names and memories. ימח שמם וזכרם of these evil people. And may Obama's efforts have even less effect than Carter's had.
Obama's hatred of Israel isn't just personal animus against Netanyahu
When Barack Hussein Obama ordered his UN ambassador to abstain in Friday's vote against the 'settlements' at the United Nations, it wasn't just personal animus against Prime Minister Netanyahu.
Mr. Obama’s animus toward Prime Minister Netanyahu is well known.
Apparently Mr. Obama took it as an affront that the President-elect
would express an opinion about this week’s U.N. resolution.
It
is important, though, to see this U.S. abstention as more significant
than merely Mr. Obama’s petulance. What it reveals clearly is the Obama
Administration’s animus against the state of Israel itself. No longer
needing Jewish votes, Mr. Obama was free, finally, to punish the Jewish
state in a way no previous President has done.
What Obama did on Friday went against the views of the vast majority of the US Congress, the vast majority of the American people, and of course, the vast majority of Israelis - including the sane part of the Israeli Left.
I call upon the Obama administration to veto this resolution against Israel at the UNSC.>>
For those who speak Hebrew, there's a video of Lapid blasting the resolution on Saturday here.
What Obama did on Friday will permanently cloud the possibility of any kind of peace. This is from the first link, a Wall Street Journal editorial.
No effort to rescind the resolution, which calls the settlements a
violation of “international law,” will succeed because of Russia’s and
China’s vetoes.
Instead, the resolution will live on as Barack
Obama’s cat’s paw, offering support in every European capital,
international institution and U.S. university campus to bully Israel
with the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
Here in Israel, there's a palpable fear that the mamzer in the White House isn't done 'punishing' us yet.
At the cabinet meeting yesterday the experts on foreign affairs
presented a scenario in which Obama could even on his last day in office
cause harm to Israel.
The concern is that Obama may promote a move in the UN Security
Council giving guidelines for a peace agreement between Israel and the
Palestinians and the establishment of a Palestinian state. Israel would
find it hard to present an alternative model after these guidelines are
set.
The experts on foreign affairs also posed another concern regarding
the Paris conference which is supposed to take place during the course
of February. At the conference a pro-Palestinian peace initiative may be
presented and could be viewed as authoritative if it is adopted.
I'm less concerned about what could happen in February - when Donald Trump is President - than I am about what could happen in the next three weeks.
Obama has earned the title ימח שמו וזכרו - may his name and memory be obliterated. May God Bring that about speedily and in our time.
Dennis Ross rips Obama over abstention, says it's not likely to matter
Former peace processor par excellence Dennis Ross has ripped President Obama for failing to veto Friday's UN Security Council resolution.
If there is one issue on which the President has been consistent
vis-à-vis Israel, it has been settlement construction in the territories
that Israel occupied after the 1967 war. From the outset of his
administration, he called for a freeze on the building of Israeli
settlements to include natural growth. Even when he vetoed a settlements
resolution in 2011, he had his then UN ambassador, Susan Rice, make a
tough statement about our opposition to settlements even as she
explained that the one-sided nature of the resolution left us little
choice but to veto.
Perhaps, President Obama felt this resolution was more balanced. Truth
be told, resolutions in international forum about Israel are rarely, if
ever, balanced.
This one creates the veneer of balance by referring to the need to stop
terror and incitement, but of course it never names the Palestinians so
this effectively refers to stopping all such actions by both sides.
Moreover, the resolution is criticizing only Israel and calling on it to
cease all its activity beyond the June 4, 1967, lines — which is
defined as a violation of international law. Nothing is asked of the
Palestinians.
Sounds just like Obama administration policy all along, doesn't it? Nothing asked of the 'Palestinians.' But Ross also has some good news for the Israelis.
While the Israelis clearly opposed the resolution and hoped it would be
vetoed by the U.S., one can ask: Does this resolution create a
precedent? It is hard to see how. President-elect Trump was clear about
his opposition to it and has already tweeted in response to the
resolution that things will be different in his administration.
Even in UN terms, the fact that the resolution was considered under
Title 6 and not Title 7 means it cannot serve as a predicate for
imposing sanctions later on — clearly a path the Palestinians would like
to go down.
If there is one area in the resolution that may be potentially
problematic for the future, it is the reference to the settlements being
illegal. That could create problems for the one possible formula for
resolving the border at some point: settlement blocs and territorial
swaps. One way to absorb a significant number of settlers is to permit
settlement blocs which are on a small part of the West Bank to become
part of Israel; in return the Israelis would swap territory as
compensation to the Palestinians. Will that not be more difficult if all
settlements are deemed illegal?
Killing what was left of the 'two-state solution' through his bumbling is clearly right up Obama's alley. The mamzer.
Obscenity personified: Obama lies, stabs Israel in the back, wishes us a Happy Chanuka
Shavua tov, a good week to everyone. And a freilichen (Happy) Chanuka too.
The title of this post was stolen from a tweet by Anne Bayefsky after the United States abstained in the Security Council on Friday, allowing a resolution to pass that condemns as 'a flagrant violation' of 'international law' Israel's 'settlements' in the 'West Bank' and 'east' Jerusalem.
Will this resolution matter? John Bolton thinks it will. Let's go to the videotape.
Meanwhile the killing in Syria continues, but since there are no Jews involved, no one cares.
What better time to break with 50 years of US policy in the Middle East and try to impose a 'solution.'
Oh and guess what the mamzer was doing at the very moment he let the resolution pass... he was wishing all the stupid Jews who voted for him a Happy Chanuka.
Thanks for the stab in the back Obama.
While the resolution has not woken up too many Democrats to the fact that Obama's a Jew hater, it has woken up the Israeli government. In fact, Prime Minister Netanyahu claims that Obama had specifically promised to veto any UN resolutions in his last days in office.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday accused President Barack Obama of breaching a specific commitment to Israel by allowing through Friday’s UN Security Council anti-settlements resolution, and compared the outgoing president’s behavior to that of predecessor Jimmy Carter, “a president who was hostile to Israel.”
Vowing not to be forced by international
pressure into withdrawing from disputed territory, he said the incoming
administration of President-elect Donald Trump had indicated that it
would join an all-out war against what he called a “shameful” and
“scandalous” decision.
He described the 14-0 vote in the Security
Council, with the US abstaining, as “the swan song of the old world that
is anti-Israel.” Now, he said, “we are entering a new era. And as
President-elect Trump said, it’s going to happen a lot faster than
people think.”
In this new era, it will a lot more costly for those who seek to harm Israel, he warned.
Practically speaking, Netanyahu also announced
that Israel was re-evaluating all of its dealings with the United
Nations, and that he had already instructed officials to cut off “30
million shekels ($7.8 million) of funding for five UN bodies that are
particularly hostile to Israel.” More such action will follow, he
promised.
He noted that he had recalled Israel’s
ambassadors from New Zealand and Senegal, two of the four countries that
sponsored the resolution that have diplomatic relations with Israel.
Israeli aid to Senegal has also been halted, he said.
I think he should recall his ambassadors from the UK and France and Egypt as well, and call the US and Russian ambassadors in for a dressing down.
Netanyahu had more to say.
The US abstention came in “a complete
contradiction” to a “specific commitment by President Obama in 2011,” he
said. It was “a shameful anti-Israel ambush” by the administration, he
said.
“The whole Middle East is going up in flames,”
he said, “and the Obama administration and the Security Council” target
Israel, the region’s only democracy. “How shameful.”
...
US legislators intend to pass a law to punish
states or organizations, including the UN, that seek to hurt Israel. The
US alone, he noted, provides a quarter of the UN’s funding.
He said Israel was “on a journey” to improve
its relations with the nations of the world. “It could be that this
scandalous decision yesterday will accelerate this process. This is the
straw that broke the camel’s back. Yesterday’s decision is a recruitment
call to all our many friends in the US and around the world — friends
who have had enough of the UN’s hostile treatment of Israel and who
intend to push fundamental change at the UN.”
Therefore, he said, invoking the spirit of the Hanukkah festival which began on Saturday, “the light will oust the darkness.”
Lawless: Obama trying to handcuff Trump on Middle East
Greetings from Israel. I am home again (briefly).
President Hussein Obama is trying to handcuff President Elect Donald Trump's Middle East policy.
Washington DC insiders widely expect the president to launch a bold
effort to constrain the president-elect's options in dealing with the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict by supporting unilateral international
recognition of Palestinian statehood, possibly in the UN Security
Council.
...
In seeking to overturn longstanding precedent and thwart the expressed
policy positions of his successor, Obama presumably hopes that
supporting (or not vetoing) a UN Security Council resolution on
Palestinian statehood will create an irreversible fait accompli
that will eventually spur Israel to make concessions, like a settlement
freeze, which will in turn strengthen moderates on the Palestinian side.
It's the same thinking that led the United States to make concession after concession in the Iran nuclear deal,
and it is likely to backfire in the same way. Unilateral recognition of
a Palestinian state will communicate to Palestinian leaders that they
do not need to concede anything and validate the use and incitement of
violence, vindicating hardliners.
Until the Palestinian leadership can recognize
and accept a Jewish state in the land of Israel, the United States must
continue working to prevent international recognition of a Palestinian
state.
Anyone still want to claim that the Obama administration is the 'most pro-Israel administration evah'? If yes, it's time to take your blinders off.
I've already written a couple of times about the fears here in Israel of what President Hussein Obama might try to do to us in his final days in his office. Here's a really disturbing Wall Street Journal piece from Jonathan Schanzer about some of the possibilities.
The Middle East has few
bright spots these days, but one is the budding rapprochement between
Israel and its Sunni Arab neighbors, including Saudi Arabia and the
United Arab Emirates, thanks to shared threats from Iran and Islamic
State. Now the Obama Administration may have plans to wreck even that.
Israeli diplomats gird for the possibility
that President Obama may try to force a diplomatic resolution for Israel
and the Palestinians at the United Nations. The White House has been
unusually tight-lipped about what, if anything,
it might have in mind. But our sources say the White House has asked
the State Department to develop an options menu for the President’s
final weeks.
One possibility would be to sponsor, or at
least allow, a U.N. Security Council resolution condemning Israeli
settlement construction, perhaps alongside new IRS regulations revoking
the tax-exempt status of people or entities involved
in settlement building. The Administration vetoed such a resolution in
2011 on grounds that it “risks hardening the position of both sides,”
which remains true.
But condemning the settlements has always been
a popular way of scoring points against the Jewish state, not least at
the State Department, and an antisettlement resolution might burnish Mr.
Obama’s progressive brand for his postpresidency.
Mr. Obama may also seek formal recognition of a
Palestinian state at the Security Council. This would run afoul of
Congress’s longstanding view that “Palestine” does not have the
internationally recognized attributes of statehood,
including a defined territory and effective government, though Mr.
Obama could overcome the objection through his usual expedient of an
executive action, thereby daring the next President to reverse him.
Both actions would be a boon to the bullies in
the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, while also subjecting
Israeli citizens and supporters abroad to new and more aggressive forms
of legal harassment. It could even criminalize
the Israeli army—and every reservist who serves in it—on the theory
that it is illegally occupying a foreign state. Does Mr. Obama want to
be remembered as the President who criminalized Israeli citizenship?
The worst option would be an effort to
introduce a resolution at the U.N. Security Council setting “parameters”
for a final settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.
The French
have been eager to do this for some time, and one
option for the Administration would be to let the resolution pass
simply by refusing to veto it. Or the U.S. could introduce the
resolution itself, all the better to take credit for it.
As the old line has it, this would be worse
than a crime—it would be a blunder. U.S. policy has long and wisely been
that only Israelis and Palestinians can work out a peace agreement
between themselves, and that efforts to impose
one would be counterproductive. Whatever parameters the U.N.
established would be unacceptable to any Israeli government, left or
right, thereby destroying whatever is left of a peace camp in Israel.
The Palestinians would seize on those
parameters as their birthright, making it impossible for any future
Palestinian leader to bargain part of them away in a serious
negotiation. Arab states would find their diplomatic hands tied,
making it impossible to serve as useful intermediaries between
Jerusalem and Ramallah. It could refreeze relations with Israel even as
they finally seem to have thawed.
President Obama may be the last man on earth
to get the memo, but after decades of fruitless efforts to end the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict it might be wiser for the U.S. to step back
until the Palestinians recognize that peace cannot
be imposed from the outside.
If Mr. Obama is still seeking a Middle
East legacy at this late stage in his presidency, his best move is do
nothing to make it worse.
A few comments. First, it is longstanding US policy that peace between Israel and the 'Palestinians' can only come through direct negotiations between the parties. Obama has done much to undermine that policy through his insistence on international peace conferences and other ways of allowing the 'Palestinians' to avoid direct negotiations, including his support for preconditions to negotiations. Perhaps that's why Obama has zero influence in Israel, where the government once again spat in his face on Monday, announcing that it would build 98 new homes in Shilo, which is well outside the 'settlement blocs.'
On Monday the state informed the High Court of Justice it awaited
final bureaucratic approval to develop the site within six months as a
relocation option for the 40 families from the Amona outpost.
It, therefore, asked the HCJ to delay by seven months the mandated December 25 demolition of the outpost.
Alternatively,
the state said, it was also pursuing the option of using the abandoned
property law, so that it could relocate the outpost to land adjacent to
the community’s current location.
Washington has rebuked Israel
for both plans, but the State Department issued a particularly sharp
statement in which it said the Shiloh project was tantamount to the
creation of a new settlement, something Israel had promised the US it
would not do.
“This settlement's location deep in the West Bank…
would link a string of outposts that effectively divide the West Bank
and make the possibility of a viable Palestinian state more remote,” the
State Department had said.
Second, as much as I will never vote for Hillary Clinton (#NeverHillary), it is clear to me that this sort of scorched earth strategy from the Obama administration is far more likely if Donald Trump wins next week's election than if Clinton wins it. After all, it was Netanyahu who set up Clinton's illegal private server, and it was he that caused it to be used for government business (/sarc). Obama would have far more interest in trying to tie Trump's hands than in trying to tie Clinton's.
All in all, the outlook is bleak with the 'most pro-Israel administration evah' set to extract revenge from an Israeli government that has not been willing to surrender to Obama's wishes over the past eight years.
Former European Parliament MP Fiamma Nirenstein believes that President Obama is planning a nasty November surprise (or maybe not such a surprise) for Israel.
But like Ariadne’s thread, a number of clues lead us to believe that,
after the November 8thvote and before the inauguration on January 20th,
Obama is planning a very strong move against Israel during a period in
which he can no longer influence the presidential election’s outcome or
damage Hillary.
In other words, facing a U.N. Security Council
resolution during the “lame duck” period, he’ll ignore the need for
negotiations between the two parties, impose borders, as well as set up
the parameters for the birth of a Palestinian State, reneging the
long-standing American veto. He would allow the resolution supported by
the French initiative for a peace conference to win.In practice, the
consequences would only be those of disrepute and, possibly, of
sanctions against Israel. In times of BDS, this discrediting,this
backing into a corner seems to drive more or less consciously America’s
policy toward Israel.
Astonishingly, the White House erased a
reference to the fact that at Peres’ funeral Obama had spoken in
“Jerusalem, in Israel” from a previously released statement on the
President’s speech. That is to say, the revered Peres would no longer be
buried in Israel, but rather, in some no man’s land. Later, using the
funeral as a bludgeon, while the world burns, the U.S. State Department
issued a violently worded statement regarding the construction of some
apartment units in Shiloh, in the West Bank (to relocate the displaced
settlers from Amona, a dismantled illegal settlement). The statement
basically says that the memory of the deceased leader had been betrayed
thus “cementing a one-state reality of perpetual occupation that is
fundamentally inconsistent with Israel’s future as a Jewish and
democratic state." Oh, really! The housing units, repeated the
government, will be built in an old settlement for refugees of another
destroyed settlement, without bringing one man more. Therefore, this
disproportionate criticism leads us to think two things: the first is
that they are creating an atmosphere for a political attack and
secondly, that Obama wants to leave his mark on the Middle East with
what he considers a boost to the peace process. But it is difficult to
think that he’s right: the real contribution that he could have given is
that of devising a new plan of territorial distribution (his
predecessors all did the same thing); to finally push the parties toward
talks; to ask Abu Mazen to renounce his support for terrorism; and to
favor Israel’s integration within the Middle East. However, he didn’t do
it.
Obama - if he insists - will be remembered as the president
whose pacifism(as has already happened in the past) has fueled conflict
throughout the Middle East and beyond. He will be perceived as the
anti-proliferation president who let the pact with Russia fall to
pieces, as the point of reference for Islamic moderation that favored
Iran and Hezbollah’s Shiite extremism, and who failed to stop Sunni
extremism while upsetting his more moderate allies. This legacy of
failures will only be worsened by sanctions upon the only pro-American
democracy in the Middle East.
I doubt anyone here would be surprised by this kind of nastiness from the self-proclaimed 'most pro-Israel administration evah.'
88 US Senators sign letter to Obama opposing UN-imposed 'solutions' in the Middle East, 2 of Israel's best friends don't sign
Greetings from Boston's Logan Airport where I am having a travel evening. I'm headed to... Chicago.
88 United States Senators have signed an AIPAC-drafted letter urging President Obama to oppose UN attempts to impose a 'solution' to the Israeli-'Palestinian' conflict. Two of Israel's best friends in the Senate - Marco Rubio (R-Fl) and Ted Cruz (R-Tx) did not sign the letter. Here's why. The letter says
The only way to resolve the conflicts between the two is through direct negotiations that lead to a sustainable two-state solution with a future state of Palestine living in peace and security with Israel. This outcome would provide Israel with greater security and strengthen regional stability. We remain optimistic that, under the right circumstances, Israel and Palestinians can successfully resume productive negotiations toward this goal.
My guess is that Rubio and Cruz don't agree with two-state anymore. I wonder why.
If you were thinking of celebrating the new United States - Israel Memorandum of Understanding signed by Prime Minister Netanyahu and President Obama this week, Eli Lake has a bunch of reasons why you shouldn't.
After all of this bad blood, in the last months of his
administration, Obama has decided to sign an agreement with Israel that
guarantees $3.8 billion per year between 2018 and 2028. On paper it
seems generous. As Susan Rice, Obama's national security adviser, said
Wednesday, this is the "single largest pledge of military assistance --
to any country -- in American history."
The
fine print tells a different story. The key word in Rice's statement is
"pledge." Congress is the body that appropriates the annual aid budget.
When Obama is long gone, it will be Congress that doles out the money
for Israel to spend on U.S. military equipment. So one aspect of the aid
deal should raise eyebrows: terms saying that Israel will stop making
its case directly to Congress for military aid.
Morris Amitay, a
former executive director of the American Israel Public Affairs
Committee, or Aipac, told me he had never before heard of a president
asking a sovereign country, as part of an aid package negotiation, not
to lobby Congress.
At first Netanyahu didn't want to give up
Israel's ability to ask Congress for more funding. But he relented. A
secret annex to the memorandum signed Wednesday requires Israel to forgo
any funding Congress would want to give it that exceeds what was in the
aid agreement that expires in 2018.
It's unclear how restrictive
the lobbying restriction will actually be. Israel doesn't lobby Congress
much. Far more pro-Israel lobbying is done by Aipac, which comprises
U.S. citizens. Could an agreement between Israel and the U.S. limit the
rights of Americans to petition Congress? When I put this question to
Aipac's spokesman, Marshall Wittman, he told me: "The agreement, of
course, is only between the two governments. When the two governments
reach an agreement on an issue, we give that factor great weight." For
the time being, Aipac says it will lobby Congress to enact the terms of
the new 10-year aid agreement signed on Wednesday.
Obama's 11th-hour
aid deal is less than it seems, not only because the White House cannot
appropriate and because the lobbying restriction is off target, but
also because Obama's successors may not honor his pledge. Obama himself
discarded an agreement with Israel's leaders that was made by George W.
Bush and supported by Congress, to accept the legitimacy of some
settlements in and around Jerusalem. (That agreement was made as part of
negotiations to get Israel to unilaterally withdraw from Gaza.)
The
White House also got its way on another key issue known as the
"off-shore procurement" carve out, whereby Israel is allowed to spend
around 26 percent of the U.S. aid on its own defense industry. In the new aid deal, Israel will spend all of the U.S. subsidy on U.S. defense equipment by 2024.
In
this sense the U.S. aid to Israel is a subsidy to American defense
companies. The U.S. also retains the leverage that comes from
subsidizing around 20 percent of a sovereign nation's defense budget.
Of
course, Israel doesn't even need the money. When the U.S. began giving
Israel serious military assistance in the 1960s, the country's planned
economy was minuscule. In the 1970s it faced a very real boycott, backed
by wealthy nations like Saudi Arabia (as opposed to an inconsequential
boycott backed by U.S. and European college professors). Back then, the
Jewish State really needed as much help as it could get.
Today,
Israel's economy is thriving. In the last 10 years, the country's gross
domestic product has nearly doubled, to $230 billion. Israel has
discovered great deposits of natural gas. Its lawmakers in recent years
have discussed starting a sovereign wealth fund. Israel is a key partner
with the U.S. arms industry.
I've heard it claimed that Netanyahu agreed to this because he 'fears' that if elected President, Donald Trump will force Israel to repay aid money. If that were true, as Lake points out, this deal would not stop Trump from doing that.
I suspect that the quid pro quo is much more immediate and relates to the Obama administration's behavior at the United Nations over its last four months in office.
'Most pro-Israel administration evah' going all out to destroy Israel?
Now that his administration has reached its final months, and little can be done to him personally, Barack Obama is pushing a harder line against Israel in an upcoming report about the 'settlements.'
The report, which is likely to be released in late May or early June,
will focus heavily on Israeli construction in Judea, Samaria, and
Jerusalem, senior diplomats told AP. The Quartet’s report will also take Israel to task for the demolition of illegal Arab buildings – many of which were built with the support of the European Union.
While in the past the US worked to soften some of the criticism
against Israel leveled by the EU, UN, and Russia, now, say officials
working on the Quartet report, US diplomats are pushing for harsher
language against the Jewish state.
One diplomat said the report was the Obama administration’s way of
putting Israel “on notice” that its patience was wearing thin.
Other officials involved in the drafting of the document claimed the
report will also criticize Israel for the legalization of some Jewish
communities in Judea and Samaria.
News of the Quartet report comes amid leaks indicating the Obama
administration is considering unprecedented moves to force Israel and
the Palestinian Authority to the negotiating channel. One option reportedly
on the table is a United Nations Security Council Resolution to layout
the frame work for a final status agreement – and force both Israel and
the Palestinian Authority into final talks.
Because the Iran deal that he rammed through Congress didn't endanger Israel enough.... 'Most pro-Israel administration evah'?
Kerry won't commit to US veto of Iran-Russia arms deal
Under the terms of the Iranian nuclear sellout, the United Nations Security Council must approve the sale of certain conventional weapons to Iran. Since the United States has a veto in the Security Council, this means that the United States can veto such sales.
It was recently announced that Iran intends to purchase the latest Sukhoi-30 warplanes from Russia. Those warplanes would need to be approved by the Security Council under the terms of the nuclear sellout. But under questioning before the House Foreign Affairs Committee by Representative Brad Sherman (D-Ca) on Thursday, Secretary of State Kerry refused to commit to the United States vetoing the sale.
This is from an email I received from Omri Ceren of The Israel Project.
The context is the recent Iranian announcement that they intend to
purchase Sukhoi-30 warplanes from Russia. According to UNSCR 2231 that
sale has to go through the Security Council, which means the U.S. can
veto it. The relevant language says weapons sales to Iran need to be
approved by the UNSC "in advance on a case-by-case basis" if the weapons
fall under the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms. The
section even explicitly specifies "combat aircraft" [a].
At today's HFAC briefing Rep. Sherman asked Sec. Kerry whether the
U.S. intends to veto the sale. Kerry refused to commit to a veto:
SHERMAN: ... under the UN Security Council Resolution 2231, Russia
can't sell fighter planes to Iran unless the Security Council
specifically approves that. I'll ask you, will we use our veto to
prevent fighter planes from being sold to Iran from Russia? KERRY:
Well, I don't think you have to use a veto. I think it's a matter of a
committee. There's a committee and it's in approval in the committee,
but we would not approve it. SHERMAN: And would we use our veto if necessary to prevent the sale? KERRY:
To the best of my knowledge, Congressman, I don't, I haven't looked at
the specifics of the transaction, etc. In principle, we are very
concerned about the transfer of weapons and so, you know, we would
approach it with great skepticism. But I haven't seen the specific
transfer or what the request is. We have a committee that will analyze
this thoroughly before anything happens and the committee signs off on
it, I assure you. We'll stay in touch with you.
It's not obvious why the Secretary hadn't been briefed about "the
specifics of the transaction." The Sukhois took up a week of press
inquiries about Iran. Nonetheless his answer is part of a pattern - now
several weeks old - of administration officials refusing to commit to
vetoing the warplane sale.
The sale first broke across U.S. wires on Feb 10. Reuters quoted
Iranian DM Hossein Dehghan revealing "we have even decided on the number
of Sukhoi-30 fighter jets" to buy and the AP had him elaborating "we
told them that we need to be involved in the production" of the
warplanes [b][c]. Michael Singh - Washington Institute Managing Director
- quickly tweeted "For the next five years, US or other P5 member could
block this per UNSC Res 2231" [d].
Over the next week the administration went from: denying it could veto to not knowing if it could veto to refusing to answer if it would veto.
For the first few days the administration flat out denied that it had
the ability to block weapons sales. All of that was off the record. Then
reporters started asking questions publicly at briefings, and State's
position shifted: for two consecutive days - Feb 16 and 17 - State
Department spokesman Toner told journalists the administration wasn't
sure if the U.S. could veto [e][f]. Then on Feb 18, more than a week
after the news first broke, the State Department acknowledged the sale
is illegal and falls under UNSCR 2231 [g]. Subsequent coverage that day
indicated the Obama administration did indeed have the authority to
block the sale [h].
But it was still not clear if the White House would actually use its
veto authority, and it's still not clear after today's hearing, with
Kerry expressing ignorance of the details of the sale.
Some skeptics are now suggesting that the administration is trying to
sandbag Congress on the Sukhoi sale. The move would be repeat of what
happened throughout the two years of nuclear negotiations:
administration officials would routinely brush off questions about
specific concessions by declaring that the entire package was made up of
moving parts that all had to fit together, so nothing was final until
everything was final.
Then when all the details were finalized, the
entire package was presented to Congress as a fait accompli: lawmakers
were told that the deal couldn't be reopened and that rejecting it would
lead to war.
If that modus operandi sounds familiar, it should - it's the foreign policy equivalent of how Obamacare was railroaded through Congress. And somehow there are people out there who still think that this administration is pro-Israel....
State Department denies threatening Israel over 'settlement' construction
The State Department has denied reports that it has threatened Israel with non-use of its UN veto if Israel pursues 'settlement' construction.
Deputy State Department Spokesman Mark Toner said that while his office was aware of such reports in the press, they were “false.”
“Our position on settlements is well known and hasn’t changed,” he said. “We convey it regularly to the Israeli Government. I know we don’t generally comment on private conversations, but I’d like to nip that story in the bud. We haven’t issued any kind of ultimatum on this.”
Toner emphasized that far from issuing any such ultimatum regarding a UN resolution, “there’s not even a resolution out there right now.”
At a meeting of Israel’s security cabinet on Monday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected calls by senior ministers for construction in Jewish settlements in the West Bank in response to an increase in Palestinian terrorism.
According to Channel 2, Netanyahu refusal to authorize new construction was due to a purported Obama administration warning that the US wouldn’t necessarily veto a French-sponsored resolution at the United Nations Security Council.
...
Washington’s reported threat to not veto the motion at the UN came shortly after a Politico report which said US President Barack Obama had rejected multiple calls by a top Democratic senator that he speak out publicly against a Palestinian statehood resolution at the United Nations.
Obama’s refusal, the report said, “highlights how wide the gulf between the Obama administration and Israeli government has become.” The rebuff “unfolded in the context of a personal relationship between Obama and Netanyahu that’s become highly toxic, poisoning US-Israeli relations more widely.”
In March, the administration signaled that it would reevaluate its automatic-veto policy at the UN, after Netanyahu asserted in a pre-election interview that there would be no Palestinian state during his tenure.
Let's just say that I would not put it past this administration to withhold the veto - certainly on a resolution condemning 'settlement' construction, and even on a resolution calling for a 'Palestinian state' and holding out the threat of sanctions under Article VII of the United Nations charter.
Israel must call Obama on Iran's Fateh 313 missile
Iran has produced a new surface-to-surface missile - the Fateh 313 - which has pinpoint accuracy and a range of 500 kilometers (about 310 miles). This is from the description in Iran's government-owned Press TV's YouTube account:
Fateh-313 is a domestically produced missile with a range of
five-hundred kilometers. It uses combined solid fuel and is capable of
striking targets with pinpoint accuracy. The Defense Ministry is
planning to start the mass production of Fateh-313 which was unveiled on
the occasion of the Defense Industry Day. Iran domestically produces a
wide range of missiles, rockets, military hardware and weapons. It says
they're meant to boost its defense might.
Let's go to the videotape.
Israel is not within 500 kilometers of Iran. However, Damascus is 213 kilometers from Tel Aviv and Beirut is 211 kilometers away. Given that Bashar al-Assad and Hezbullah are both clients of Tehran, that's a real concern. Longer range missiles may also not be far away.
Iran's missile program is one of the largest in the Middle East and a
major sticking point to the agreement, according to Reuters. Under the Iran nuclear deal,
any ballistic missile technology is subject to UN Security Council
approval, something US President Barack Obama promised to veto.
An arms embargo on Iranian missiles
remains for another eight years, The New York Times reported; for
conventional weapons another five. Iran, however, said it refused to
follow any part of the deal that would restrict its military
capabilities.
"We will buy, sell and develop any weapons we
need and we will not ask for permission or abide by any resolution for
that," Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said during the unveiling
Saturday, on Iran's Defense Industry Day.
Despite a
blatant disregard for the nuclear deal signed just over a month ago — a
deal Obama hailed as a triumph of "diplomacy" — Iran continued with the
rhetoric that its military power is necessary for Middle Eastern peace.
Now - before Congress votes on the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action - is the time to call the Obama administration on this development and stop Iran from immediately violating an agreement which is already far too favorable toward Iran.
US President Hussein Obama and US Secretary of State John Kerry are finally listening to Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Prime Minister Netanyahu told Israeli Army Radio on Tuesday that there is no reason for Kerry to come to Israel now, and so Kerry will skip Israel on a trip to the region this coming week that is meant to reassure skeptical allies about the Iran nuclear sellout.
Netanyahu, a fierce critic of the nuclear accord, said that the Iran
deal “has nothing to do with us, and has no influence” on Israeli
policy, before adding, “We’re not at the table, we are one of the
courses on the menu itself.”
Netanyahu was on an official
visit to Cyprus on Tuesday, where he spoke about the international
terrorist network supplied by Iran and its proxy Hezbollah. Netanyahu
said that the sophisticated network “covers over 30 countries on five
continents, including just about every country in Europe.”
...
In defending his alleged snub to the Jewish state, Kerry said, “I
think I’ve had more meetings with an Israeli prime minister and more
visits than any secretary of state in history. And I consider Bibi a
friend, and we talk still and we disagree on this, obviously, and I’ve
told him my feelings.”
I can't wait until Netanyahu's book comes out to hear what 'Bibi' thinks of their 'friendship.'
Ash Carter was in Israel hoping to begin a dialogue on how the U.S.
and Israel can mitigate risks of the international accord intended to
limit Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons and to lift many economic
sanctions. But Carter didn’t even get to begin that beginning. Netanyahu
is said to have insisted on talking only about how the Israeli
government would work against the deal while Congress is reviewing the
accord for 60 days, a period mandated by recent legislation.
An
Israeli official familiar with the conversations told us this week that
Israel is for now trying to thwart the deal. But that could change on
Day 61, the official said.
Carter confirmed on Wednesday that in
the meeting, Netanyahu "was very clear as he has been publicly in his
opposition to the deal." And a U.S. defense official told us that in the
meeting, Netanyahu didn’t explicitly rebuke the defense secretary. In
fact, at other meetings in the trip, Carter discussed expanded security
cooperation with Israel, and the official said Carter left optimistic
despite tension on Iran.
...
"The decision makers in Israel believe we don't start the dialogue
now because it will be used to make it seem like we acquiesce on the
deal,” said Michael Herzog, a former senior Israeli defense official and
the brother of the leader of Israel's Labor Party. All of Israel’s
major political parties have come out against the deal.
The
Israeli campaign for now is focused on Democrats in Congress. Israel's
ambassador to Washington, Ron Dermer, has had dozens of meetings with
lawmakers, urging them to vote against the deal after the review period
ends in September, according to Senate and House lawmakers and staff
members.
While Dermer and allies like AIPAC
are working Capitol Hill, Netanyahu will have lots of opportunities to
make his case directly to lawmakers as well. Dozens of U.S. lawmakers
will travel to Israel during the August recess. House Minority Whip
Steny Hoyer, a key and as yet uncommitted vote on the Iran deal, will
lead a group of freshman Democratic members of Congress to Israel next
month.
Meanwhile, as soon as the vote in Congress is over, the Obama administration is likely to allow a resolution that will be aimed at mandating 'Palestinian statehood' to pass the United Nations Security Council, and Obama may give us bunker busters, which he will of course prevent us from ever using.
Security Council vote on Iranian sellout will include agenda item on Israel
To add insult to injury, the United Nations Security Council session approving the West's sellout to a nuclear Iran will include an agenda item about Israel.
Malaysia, a non-permanent member of the
Security Council, proposed adding the discussion to the agenda,
according to a report in the Hebrew-language website NRG on Sunday.
The Foreign Ministry said the expected
discussion was “an ugly and cynical attempt to further cement the
Palestinian issue on the agenda of the international community.”
The ministry rejected the use of multilateral
organizations such as the UN to coerce it into any sort of action
vis-à-vis the Palestinians, and said that progress in peace talks can
only be achieved in direct bilateral negotiations.
...
According to diplomats, the resolution
endorsing the deal should pass the Security Council with little
difficulty, since the five veto-wielding permanent members of the
Security Council — Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States —
were among those countries that negotiated the accord.
If passed, the new resolution would replace
the existing framework of seven sets of Security Council sanctions
imposed since 2006 on Iran, enshrining a new set of restrictions.
The United Nations symbolizes World anti-Semitism, and the Obama administration has now made the United States much more a part of it than ever before. I hope all those Jewish Americans who voted for him are pleased. Their day will come too.
And you thought John Kerry had taken an oath to uphold the US constitution
US Secretary of State John Kerry went on the US Sunday news magazines on Sunday to defend the Iranian nuclear sellout. The results have to make you question whether Kerry still believes that he took an oath to uphold the United States constitution when he became Secretary of State.
Say, what? The UN may have the right to vote but the US still provides 22% of the UN budget, still has a veto right in the UN and has the right to say that the UN will not hold a vote until the US has decided it's ready for the UN to have that vote.
Under the US constitution, this agreement should be going to the Senate as a treaty, where it would undoubtedly fail to gain the required two thirds margin.
Instead, Congress agreed to have a vote where it will be almost impossible for it to reject Hussein Obama's and FN Kerry's sellout.
Obama and Kerry could at least make sure the vote still has meaning.
They ought to be impeached, tried for treason and hung. As should have happened to Kerry 45 years ago.
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
