Obama Administration Has A New Angle In Its Claim To Support Israel

Daled Amos
16 July '10

The Obama administration has been working on its claim to support Israel, and truth be told--it has gotten better than this embarrassing moment during a State Department press conference back in November--when the State Department spokesperson tries desperately to point to some kind of accomplishment in Obama's efforts for Mideast peace--and keeps getting fisked on the spot by the questioner:

QUESTION: You mean you got the Israel Government to say, yes, we’re willing to accept a Palestinian state? You got Netanyahu to say that, and that’s his big accomplishment?
MR. KELLY: That is an accomplishment.
QUESTION: But previous Israeli administration – previous Israeli governments had agreed to that already.
MR. KELLY: Okay, all right.
QUESTION: So in other words, the bottom line is that, in the list of accomplishments that Mitchell has come up with or established since he started, is zero.

MR. KELLY: I wouldn’t say zero.
QUESTION: Well, then what would you say it is?
MR. KELLY: Well, I would say that we’ve gotten both sides to commit to this goal. They have – we have – we’ve had a intensive round or rounds of negotiations, the President brought the two leaders together in New York. Look --
QUESTION: But wait, hold on. You haven’t had any intense --
MR. KELLY: Obviously --
QUESTION: There haven’t been any negotiations.
MR. KELLY: Obviously, we’re not even in the red zone yet, okay.
QUESTION: Thank you.
MR. KELLY: I mean, we’re not – but it’s – we are less than a year into this Administration, and I think we’ve accomplished more over the last year than the previous administration did in eight years.
QUESTION: Well, I – really, because the previous administration actually had them sitting down talking to each other. You guys can’t even get that far.
MR. KELLY: All right.
QUESTION: I’ll drop it.

Since then, the Obama administration has figured out that if it is going to push a pro-Israel image, it is going to have to try a different angle, especially given the recent chill in US-Israel relations--caused in part by such things as:

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