http://www.jewishworldreview.com/0511/tobin052311.php3
May 23, 2011 / 19 Iyar, 5771 Obama's False Choice By Jonathan Tobin In his address to AIPAC Sunday morning, President Obama doubled down on the points he made in his speech on Thursday. After a lengthy, and not entirely unjustified defense of his administration's record of support for Israel's security, he continued talking down to the Jewish state and its government as if he knew better than they about the situation in the Middle East. Following the talking points that the administration has been furiously spinning since Thursday, Obama attempted to explain that there was nothing original or new in his attempt to lay down the 1967 lines as the starting point for future talks. It is true, as he asserted that his line about "mutually agreed upon swaps" of territory means that the "borders will be different." But contrary to his claim that this is what past administrations also support, the Bush 2004 letter let it be known that the United States supported Israel's claims on Jerusalem and the major settlement blocs. Obama is neutral about Israel's borders. That is why the Palestinians view his support of the 1967 borders as a green light for them to refuse to talk unless Israel agrees to surrender every inch of territory. Even worse, Obama's lecture about why Israel must make further concessions in spite of Arab intransigence was condescending and somewhat misleading. Obama said that demographics and technology mean the status quo can't be sustained and implicitly accused Israel of "procrastination." But Israel has already offered the Palestinians a state in virtually all of the West Bank, part of Jerusalem and Gaza and been turned down twice. Even the supposedly right-wing government of Benjamin Netanyahu has made its commitment to a two-state solution clear. Obama says Israel can't wait "another decade or two or three decades" to make peace. But Israel has been trying to make peace for 63 years. The world may be "moving too fast" to wait for peace but why must he lecture the Israelis when it is the Palestinians who refuse to talk, let alone recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state no matter where its borders are drawn? Although Obama rightly declared that the United States would oppose attempts to bypass the peace process via the United Nations, his mention of the 1967 borders will be used, as it has already by the Palestinians, to buttress their attempt to get recognition for an independent state inside those lines with no recognition of Israel. Like all Obama speeches, the president presented a false choice in which he said the "easy thing" would be to say nothing about the peace process rather than to confront it as he has done. Democratic Party donors will have the final word on how foolish his attempt to ambush Netanyahu this past week. But the real false choice is the notion that it is somehow in Israel's power to magically create peace. That decision has always been in the hands of the Palestinians and the Arab world. So long as they ally themselves with terrorists and refuse to negotiate and to demand a "right of return" which would destroy Israel (and which Obama again failed to condemn) there will be no peace. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------------------ -------------------------- Want to discuss this topic? Head on over to our discussion list, [email protected]. -------------------------- Brooks Isoldi, editor [email protected] http://www.intellnet.org Post message: [email protected] Subscribe: [email protected] Unsubscribe: [email protected] *** FAIR USE NOTICE. This message contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. OSINT, as a part of The Intelligence Network, is making it available without profit to OSINT YahooGroups members who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information in their efforts to advance the understanding of intelligence and law enforcement organizations, their activities, methods, techniques, human rights, civil liberties, social justice and other intelligence related issues, for non-profit research and educational purposes only. We believe that this constitutes a 'fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond 'fair use,' you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. For more information go to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtmlYahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/ <*> Your email settings: Individual Email | Traditional <*> To change settings online go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/osint/join (Yahoo! ID required) <*> To change settings via email: [email protected] [email protected] <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [email protected] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
