STEPHANOPOULOS: And meanwhile, Prime Minister Netanyahu has made it pretty clear that he agreed with President Obama to give until the end of the year for this whole process of engagement to work. After that, he's prepared to make matters into his own hands.
Is that the right approach?
BIDEN: Look, Israel can determine for itself -- it's a sovereign nation -- what's in their interest and what they decide to do relative to Iran and anyone else.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Whether we agree or not?
BIDEN: Whether we agree or not. They're entitled to do that. Any sovereign nation is entitled to do that. But there is no pressure from any nation that's going to alter our behavior as to how to proceed.
What we believe is in the national interest of the United States, which we, coincidentally, believe is also in the interest of Israel and the whole world. And so there are separate issues.
If the Netanyahu government decides to take a course of action different than the one being pursued now, that is their sovereign right to do that. That is not our choice.
STEPHANOPOULOS: But just to be clear here, if the Israelis decide Iran is an existential threat, they have to take out the nuclear program, militarily the United States will not stand in the way?
BIDEN: Look, we cannot dictate to another sovereign nation what they can and cannot do when they make a determination, if they make a determination that they're existentially threatened and their survival is threatened by another country.
STEPHANOPOULOS: You say we can't dictate, but we can, if we choose to, deny over-flight rights here in Iraq. We can stand in the way of a military strike.
BIDEN: I'm not going to speculate, George, on those issues, other than to say Israel has a right to determine what's in its interests, and we have a right and we will determine what's in our interests.
]]> It sure sounds to me like Biden is saying that Israel can do what it feels it must.To be honest, I' don't know what I think the world should do about Iran. The thought of nuclear armed mullahs is terrifying. I used to think that the mullahs were not crazy enough to nuke Israel knowing that millions of Iranians would also die. I no longer think that. Iranian people love life. But they are ruled by ultra-religious lunatics who are capable of anything.
I think that a regime stupid enough and evil enough to have rigged the election to preserve Ahmadinejad's hold on power -- and then open fire on demonstrators -- does indeed operate without any kind of rationality. If I were an Israeli, I'd be terrified at the prospect of those crazed mullahs with the bomb. Or a Jordanian, Saudi, Syrian, Palestinian or anyone else in the region.
This is not just Israel's problem and if Biden is suggesting that Israel can respond anyway it sees fit, he's wrong. Mullahs with nukes would be the entire region's problem and that makes it the world's problem.
Biden is right to say that we are going to continue negotiations and that, if negotiations fail, we'll have to decide what to do next. Suggesting that we are going to let Netanyahu (or Peres or Livni or any Israeli leader) make the decision for us is a colossal mistake. Remember how the first President Bush kept Israel out of the first Gulf War so it would not look like the war was about Israel? That approach. worked then and it still a good idea. For quite legitimate reasons, nothing Israelis say about Iran (or Arabs) has much, if any, credibility -- certainly not while the occupation, and siege of Gaza continues.
Allowing the prospect of nuclear armed mullahs to be perceived as an Israeli-Iranian problem is a recipe for disaster. Not everything in the world is about Israel. Not everything in the Middle East is about Israel. If Israel wants to help solve this problem, it can end the occupation and remove Iran's pretext for holy war. And then step back and quiet down.
The Obama administration needs to let Israel and the world know that we are not giving Israel any permission slip to attack Iran. At the same time, we are not going to tolerate nuclear armed mullahs either.
During the campaign, there was a great poster of Obama telling nervous Democrats "will everyone just chill the fuck out, I've got this." That is also what he should tell nervous Israelis. He's got it. He'll handle it. Israel is the last country on earth that can solve this. They should, for once, just chill. And let the United States and the other major powers deal with it.
]]>There clearly is a story here and it is not that Palin can do more for Alaska NOT as governor.
Anyone who missed the announcement, check it out on TPM or wherever. It was incoherent, even scary. Obviously something is about to hit the fan and she is bailing.
She clearly is not running for President. A governor or senator who is running for President delivers some kind of policy address. Palin ignored policy, limiting herself to whining about media scrutiny.
She's done. My only hope is that she doesn't ruin Levi Johnston's career before it starts. I was so looking forward to his book. Actually, this craziness may increase interest in the book and the true story behind the Palin family follies.
What a fun 4th. Sanford, Ensign and now Palin gone. Three candidates, three scandals. Bring em on. The new GOP is delightful.
And check out this Alaska website which has done great work in uncovering the mystery called "Who Is Trig's Mom." Or dad.
Also, check out what the crazy right is saying. I love these automatons. Whatever they are fed, they swallow.
]]>Also this from Natan Guttman, the ace Forward reporter.
Good reading for the Fourth of July.
Parting thought: Al Smith once said that the "only cure for democracy is more democracy." If he were alive today, he'd add "and by that I mean getting all money out of politics through 100% public financing."
]]>Netanyahu was speaking to the ambassadors in English. If he was using Hebrew, he would say that he didn't want to be a "freier" which is Hebrew (really Yiddish) for sucker. Ha'aretz says that "thou shalt not be a freier" is Israel's 11th commandment. Above all, an Israeli does not want to be taken advantage of which is why he often will take advantage of the other guy first. (The Palestinians have almost always been freiers in their dealings with the Israelis).
Americans don't spend much time worrying about being suckers. The equivalent "thou shalt not be" for us is not to be an "a-hole" which is what we would call the people who make other people into freiers. In my experience, most Americans would rather be accused of being a sucker than of being an a-hole. For Israelis, it is just the opposite.
See this Ha'aretz piece elaborating on this Israeli malady which causes so many problems, especially for those Israelis who have to deal with those adhering fiercely to that 11th commandment and, above all, for Palestinians.
For the record, Rahm Emanuel is not a freier. That is one of the reasons President Obama is not backing down in the face of the pushback from Israel on settlements. I can just hear him tell Obama, "If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times. You can't be a freier when you deal with the Israelis. Trust me on that one, sir."
]]>It is by Gary Rosenblatt, editor of the New York Jewish Week, and one of the most highly respected writers in Jewish journalism.
Gary's thesis is that self-proclaimed "mainstream" pro-Israel organizations (i.e., the organizations of the right and center right) are deeply worried that President Obama is going to keep pushing Israel toward a settlement freeze. Their immediate worry is that Obama does not distinguish between good settlements and bad ones. And also that Jews are backing President Obama not Prime Minister Netanyahu.
Here are the money quotes but the whole piece is worth reading.
"When one Jewish organizational leader questioned a White House aide as to why the president only sought advice from American Muslim leaders prior to the Cairo speech, he said he was told: "Why should we invite Jews in? We have so many here." (N.B, the President's top two aides are knowledgeable Jews; one has Israeli parents. There are no Muslims in the West Wing).
"What troubles me most is a lack of consultation and the need [for the administration] to do things publicly. There's a [U.S.-Israel] relationship of 60 years and all of a sudden they're treating Israel like everyone else. I find that disturbing."
]]> And my favorite: "There is an increasing unease" about a number of the Obama administration's recent statements and actions. Those include the president's reference in his Cairo speech to 7 million American Muslims, when in fact most studies believe the number to be closer to 2.5 million.Say what. Unease because the President said there are more Muslims in America than these organizations believe there are? Bizarre. And kind of ugly, as if it is intrinsically threatening to Jews if there are more rather than fewer Muslims. What is that all about?
One thing is clear: the "mainstream" organizational leaders are out of step with American Jews who, like their neighbors, welcome the administration's push to achieve peace. These leaders -- like many Israelis -- liked and still like George W. Bush. But American Jews in general were (next to African Americans) the segment of the population that disliked Bush most intensely. 78% voted for Obama and his popularity among Jews is probably above that now.
Rosenblatt's piece provides good insight into what a certain segment of the organizational elite is saying. But the "Jewish street" is saying something very different. Of course, the "Jewish street" is almost 80% Democratic and inclined to deeply admire Presidents who make them feel proud rather than embarrassed. It is no surprise they like President Obama and know that he will not sell out Israel -- although he will do his damnedest to end the settlement enterprise.
The old Jewish organizations do have reason to be worried. Their attitudes toward Israel (right to very right) are, according to the polls, held primarily by older Jews. Jews born after World War II just don't see the world the way their parents did, let alone the Jews who were born since 1960.
With the baby boomers moving into their 60's, that means that very soon even the Jewish seniors are going to be left-liberals who came of age during the Vietnam era. That is their frame of reference. And that is why there will be ever fewer American Jews who buy into the nervously hardline approach of today's Jewish elders. Few have ever even experienced anti-Semitism and none recall a time when a powerful nuclear armed Israel did not exist. They worry more about America's future than about Israel's, if only because this is where they and their children and grandchildren will live and, after all, the worst terrorist attack in history happened here. This is not to say that they don't care about Israel. They do -- and that is why they support policies that will bring it peace rather than fear those policies as threatening the precious status quo.
Obama, and that overwhelming majority of Jews who support him, are the future. In that sense. the people Rosenblatt quotes have every reason to worry. Their audience is leaving the building, and it wasn't that crowded to begin with.
And here's Alan Dershowitz (of all people) who agrees that the "Jewish leaders" are utterly wrong about Obama.
]]>Barak, who is a big believer in spinning the media to create conditions that don't necessarily exist hopes that by saying there was progress he puts pressure on the Americans to yield. Pretend there is progress and you create it.
But, for Barak, progress means that the United States abandons its demand for a total settlement freeze and accepts some meaningless offer that will enable him to claim that he ended the confrontation with the United States. Then he's a hero and positioned to be the next Prime Minister (with policies every bit as hawkish as Bibi's).
]]> It's not happening. While Team Barak is hailing "progress" made with Mitchell, Team Barack simply says that the "discussions were constructive." In other words, nothing happened.The President is holding firm. On the other hand, the settlement expansion continues. Until it stops, completely, we're all the losers.
One more point. The Israelis seem to have convinced the United States that before a freeze goes into effect Israel has the right to expect concessions of one kind or another from the Saudis.
King Abdullah told the President in Riyadh that the kingdom was not prepared to offer anything in advance of Israel living up to commitments it has made not once, but several times. Waiting for the Saudis is waiting for Godot. They are not coming - at least not until they see Israel take steps it has promised to take.
The conflict is between Israelis and Palestinians. If Israel, or the United States, wants Saudi involvement, they can simply accept the Saudi-sponsored Arab Peace Initiative and bring them in. Otherwise, the role of the US should be to broker between Israelis and Palestinians and leave extraneous issues for later.
Of course, as Max explains, it is hard for Americans to become outraged by events they rarely see. The American media decided long ago that reporting honestly on the occupation was dangerous. Advertisers and pressure groups don't much care about Iran but they do care about anything related to Israel.
Fortunately, the public mood is changing. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are changing our ridiculously one-sided Middle East policies. And, according to the polls, the public at large agrees with them.
But the media lags behind and no wonder with the MSM in such financial problems. Not so the blogosphere which is entirely (with the exception of the crazy right) opposed to Israel's current policies. It is no coincidence that the blogosphere is immune to pressure from big advertisers and from highly paid lobbyists. That may be one reason an Andrew Sullivan can move from being a typical New Republic type friend of the occupation to its most powerful and persuasive internet opponent.
]]> I'm not saying that Sullivan wouldn't have changed his mind if he had to respond to powerful advertisers (he's brilliant and no one with even half a brain supports the occupation) but it might have been harder.Nonetheless, as Max writes, the MSM is still significant and it is still in the business of keeping the West Bank Story off your television screens. Read Max and watch those videos he posts.
One day videos like them will be on cable, but not now. For now, rely on Max and youtube.
Here is Kelly's response. "We look forward to sitting down and talking about what can we do to move this process forward. In order to create this environment that will be conducive to resumptions of the negotiations, both sides need to comply with road map commitments....Freeze on all activity relating to settlements including natural growth is laid out very clearly. Working out the way to our resolution, I'm not going to say we're not going to compromise; we'll see what happens."
Note that last part. "Working out the way to resolution, I'm not going to say we're not going to compromise; we'll see what happens."
He seems to be saying that the US will compromise on settlements or "natural growth," but, in fact, he is saying the opposite. He says that first the freeze goes into effect, the Roadmap is complied with, and then "working our way to a resolution....we'll see what happens."
]]> Perfect. The United States is telling Israel that we are open to discuss anything and even to compromise but not in advance of final status negotiations along the lines we favor, i.e. "our resolution."In that context, we'll consider Israel's argument about natural growth or anything else it wants to discuss. But not in advance of those negotiations, not in advance of fulfillment of the terms of the Roadmap, and certainly not now.
For those worried that the President might blink, it looks like that worry is misplaced. I don't say you shouldn't worry. President Obama is getting serious pushback from the usual suspects. But today's statement indicates that he isn't backing down, quite the contrary.
NOTE ON PUSHBACK FROM NEOCONLAND: TNR owner Martin Peretz, who was a strong supporter of Obama in the primaries -- mainly because he feared Hillary was not, in fact, Golda Meir -- has now turned on Obama with all the fury he can muster. And it's enough that he actually reverts to German and calls Obama's aides nochleifers. I looked it up and I still dfon't know what it is but I do know that when neocons switch to German they aren't making paying compliments.
Peretz is an outlier, way to the right of AIPAC etc but his joining the Obama opposition is a sign of coming times. Obama is losing the far right of the Jewish community. That could mean that in 2012, he'll only get to 75% of the Jewish vote and not 78%. The Peretzites will stand with Sarah Palin or Mike Huckabee or Newt Gingrich.
]]>Basically that offer means nothing. The status quo will be frozen for a few months (except where "construction is underway" and in East Jerusalem). And then, when the heat is off, there will, as always, be a huge explosion in settlement building. By the end of the year there will be more settlers and more land expropriated for settlements than now.
The Jerusalem and "construction underway" exemptions are typical. With these exemptions, the Israelis are rejecting Obama's demand. He said no exceptions and Clinton reiterated it. But here they "accept" with gigantic holes. Jerusalem, come on! Only a credulous press will call this acceptance. Rest assured it will.
Nonetheless, this offer -- if it pans out -- is good news. It means that the pressure is working. The administration should just pocket this offer and keep the heat on. Our goal must remain, in Secretary Clinton's words, "stopping the settlements."
Three to six months is a nice start to forever. But you can be sure that Netanyahu and Barak do not intend it that way. It's up to the President to ensure that is how it plays out.
]]>I read this item after coming in from a walk. Five houses away from my house, there is a sign in front of the nicest house on the street. "FOR SALE BY THE BANK."
I live in Chevy Chase, Maryland and, no surprise, I don't see many of these.
As for this house, it was pretty gorgeous. It was owned by a very old couple who kept the house immaculate. We didn't know them but saw them around. And we knew their name because it was affixed to the house on a beautiful mosaic sign. They obviously were proud people.
Now they are in foreclosure. The spot where their name was is mangy looking and, believe it or not, the house is already looking shaggy.
So what happened?
]]> It turns out that they vacationed in Florida where they met one Bernie Madoff. You know the rest of the story.I'm not crying over this old couple. There are surely people worse off who never could have had the means to invest with that pig Madoff.
But I am furious contemplating my neighbors losing everything while Bernie's wife and partner gets to walk away with $2.5 million in stolen money. Ruth worked. No one can touch her social security. She's eligible for Medicare. Let her live off that.
Why does she get to keep money she and hubby stole? Justice. Feh.
Only time will tell whether Obama will choose to prevail; I say "choose" because he holds all the cards in the U.S.-Israel relationship. If he wants an end to settlements, he can make it happen. Beyond that is the simple fact that the largest foreign policy challenge he faces, Iran, is directly linked to Israel-Palestine. Although the usual suspects say that the Iran crisis is a reason to turn away from pressuring Israel over settlements, more fair-minded observers take the opposite approach.
"Iran is so central to the fate of the Middle East that even a partial shift in regime behavior--an added degree of nuance in its approach to Iraq, Lebanon, Israel or the United States--could dramatically affect the region. Just as a radical Iranian leader can energize the 'Arab street,' an Iranian reformer can energize the emerging but curiously opaque Arab bourgeoisie. This is why the depiction of presidential candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi as but another radical, albeit with a kinder, gentler exterior than President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, completely misses the point," he writes.
Kaplan, no softie on matters Middle Eastern (he served in the IDF and was a big Iraq hawk), believes that the United States must seize the opening presented by the post-election developments in Iran.
But he adds a caveat. Neither the United States nor Israel will get anywhere with Iran unless it addresses the issue that inflames Iranians as much as it does Arabs: the issue of Palestine.
"A future behind-the-scenes battle between Sunni Arabs and Shiite Iranians for a silent strategic contract with Israel can be affected only if the United States exerts strong pressure on Israel to cede West Bank territory. Never has there been a better time to push for an Israeli-Palestinian peace settlement, even if it requires the collapse of today's Israeli coalition in the process," he writes.
So add Iran to the long list of Middle East countries whose relationship with the United States could be transformed if Obama continues his push for an end to settlements and a Palestinian state.
Actually, it is not so much the substance of what Obama demands that matters as it is the fact that he maintains pressure. Neither Arabs nor Iranians believe that America will ever stand firm in a confrontation with an Israeli government. Quite simply, they believe that Israel owns U.S. policy toward the Muslim world. While this may not be true, it is believed widely enough to prevent America from making much headway with Muslims, whether Shi'ite, Sunni, or secular. It was only with Obama's Cairo speech that they began to consider the possibility that the United States was capable of approaching them with some degree of even-handedness.
Marc Lynch, the professor and Foreign Policy magazine analyst, has another set of reasons why Obama has to maintain the pressure: it is working.
"Obama's pressure has actually been quietly working," he writes. "Lost in the public pyrotechnics over Netanyahu's grudging utterance of an emasculated two state phraseology, Israel has over the last few weeks actually been making serious changes to the checkpoints and roadblocks in the West Bank and to the blockade of Gaza. The siege of cities such as Nablus has been lifted, major choke-points on key West Bank roads have been significantly opened, and journalists report being able to drive to Jenin without being stopped at a checkpoint. This is new."
He writes: "That Israel has quietly made significant changes to the checkpoints in the last few weeks--after ignoring six years worth of Road Map commitments, snubbing Tony Blair and the Quartet's persistent demands, dismissing the recommendations of the World Bank and other international development agencies, and greatly expanding them even while negotiating during the Annapolis process--suggests that Obama's tough love approach has actually been the only one able to achieve real results. It hasn't gotten much publicity, and it's only a minor thing in the wider context of the occupation, the battle over the settlements, the tortuous politics of the final status issues, the trends in Israeli politics and the disastrous Palestinian political divisions. But it shows that there is already something to show for his policy and that it's worth fighting for."
Lynch adds that Obama can lose these advantages in a heartbeat if he backs down. "Obama has to stand tough on the settlement expansions if he hopes to not squander the tentative gains of the last few weeks--and, more broadly, to see his administration's credibility on Israeli-Palestinian issues shattered forever," he writes. "This is going to be hard to do, since the administration is badly distracted by the events in Iran and might not see this as a good time or an important enough issue to pick a costly fight with Netanyahu. But that would be a huge mistake, because credibility lost here will be very, very hard to recover. Mitchell's abrupt cancelation of a meeting with Netanyahu should only be the beginning: he and Obama need to be ready to take concrete steps to force Israel to back down, or see all of the tentative progress they've seen made evaporate."
He believes Obama will take those steps and "surprise a lot of people."
But, fair is fair. It would not only be Obama who surprises "a lot of people" but Netanyahu as well. It is just possible that he has decided not to go to the mat with Israel's only ally in the world. Perhaps Netanyahu will begin the process of extricating Israel from a situation that is destroying it.
We have heard for years that beyond the rhetoric, Bibi is a pragmatist and not an ideologue, capable of the kind of flexibility Menachem Begin demonstrated when he evacuated every last inch of Sinai in order to achieve a real peace with Egypt that has held for 30 years. Maybe he sees the handwriting on the wall; the occupation cannot be sustained without ultimately losing the support of the United States. As an Israeli patriot, he may just understand that he has to do everything in his power to prevent that from happening. In his heart of hearts, Netanyahu may believe that it would be nice to hold on to the West Bank. But in his brain he knows that maintaining Israel's friendship with the United States, and achieving the kind of peace Begin did, is infinitely nicer.
Here's Mondoweiss on Israelis and Obama. Bottom line: Israelis are clueless about America (they think they understand us because they watch Seinfeld but they understand us the way we undestand Japan because we drive Hondas).
It's clear that President Obama does not like to be reminded that he is a struggling smoker. (I know this from personal experience).
It's obvious why. His inability to quit could be considered a chink in his armor. The world's most self-disciplined man can't lick the evil weed.
But this character defect -- such as it is --- is a political plus. No, Americans don't want their Presidents to smoke (bad example, etc).
But they do want to view their President as human. And Obama fails in that department. The guy is perfect or damn close to it.
He is brilliant, handsome, athletic, disciplined -- too wonderful in every way to be perceived as one of us in a country in which almost everyone is struggling to overcome something. Most Americans are not terribly happy with who they are and how they behave and could start resenting a President who clearly is.
]]> It's time to highlight Obama's defect. He needs to publicly work to kick an addiction -- just like all the rest of us addicted to alcohol, cigarettes, food or sex. He has to struggle with cigarettes publicly. .Not only will doing so enhance his image, it will convey the sheer addictive perniciousness of this drug. This is why we have to regulate it: even a king of self-discipline like Obama is its captive.
Also, it's not that terrible a sin. He's no Sanford or Ensign or Spitzer. He's just like millions of Americans who started smoking because they thought it was cool and now see that it is anything but.
Remember, Mr. Presidents, Americans hate the sin but love the sinner. Exploit that. No one wants perfections. It makes the rest of us feel crummy about ourselves.
Get off the pedestal and make it harder for your enemies to knock you off it. Preempt the bastards.
PS, I've thought you were perfect since you ran for the Senate in 2004. What can I tell you?
]]>In this piece in Jewcy, Dr. Yaroni debunks the whole natural increase myth (the argument that a settlement freeze will prevent settler families from having kids) and explains why a freeze is worth the political capital it will cost Obama to achieve it.
It is worth a read. Obama is under pressure from the Likudniks in Israel and the neocons here. Here are the facts.
And here is an amazing video from Israel that shows that Palestinians are Jews who stayed put when the other Jews went into diaspora. It is definitely worth watching especially for those who might doubt how utterly absurd the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. (Note: the film can easily be used by those who argue that all of Israel-Palestine should be one state. But whose?)
]]>It is, as I've written all along, a new demand designed only to torpedo negotiations.
From the fine piece by Howard Schneider.
"It has never been an Israeli demand," said Ron Pundak, a member of Israel's negotiating team in Norway and now director of the Peres Center for Peace in Tel Aviv. "When we negotiated Oslo, the issue of the characteristics of our state was never an issue."
]]>There is no other way to interpret Netanyahu's dismissal of the settlement issue in his interview with RAI TV in Italy. Settlements? "I think that the more we spend time arguing about this, the more we waste time instead of moving towards peace," he said.
]]> He added that his conditional endorsement of a Palestinian state is all that matters. "A demilitarized Palestinian state that recognizes the Jewish State of Israel I think is the winning formula of peace," he said. "I can not understand why anybody who wants peace should reject it."And, of course, no one does reject it, certainly not the Palestinians who accepted the two-state formula fifteen years ago and remain committed to it. It is just that unless Israel stops settlements, there will be no place for that state to go. And just yesterday the Israeli government authorized another 500 housing units in Har Homa, a West Bank settlement -- a gigantic slap in Obama's face. The US response: silence.
Former Israeli Defense Minister, Moshe Arens, from Netanyahu's Likud party told us exactly what the government is thinking in a wonderfully frank Ha'aretz column on Tuesday. "There was a time before the State of Israel was established when the Jewish people had no choice but to take orders from others...We will gladly accept advice, but not orders."
Netanyahu believes that President Obama has gone as far as he intends to go and that he need only dig in to win. Is he right? The longer we have to wait for an answer, the more likely that he is.
Israel-Palestine is the test. It is the one issue all Arabs and Muslims (and most of the world) is in substantial agreement i.e., that the occupation must end and the two state solution must be implemented.
As Obama said about Iran, the whole world is watching. If the administration flinches, it will be noticed. And our credibility in the Middle East will go back to where it was before Jan. 20. That will be despite all the progress this President has already made in repairing our tattered reputation.
President Obama cannot allow that to happen.
]]>