Taking the first step to ending our unhealthy dependence - by Vic Rosenthal

...Surveys show that a solid majority of the American people still support Israel and her right to defend herself, and the US Congress follows their lead. But foreign policy is controlled by the administration, and as we saw with the Iran deal, Congress can do little to prevent a determined administration from getting its way. Israel has been lucky until now that American presidents have at worst been indifferent to her. Today there is an actively hostile one, and we can’t predict what the future will bring.

Vic Rosenthal..
Abu Yehuda..
07 August '16..






In a press conference at the Pentagon last Thursday, US President Obama said,

[The] Israeli military and security community … acknowledges [the Iranian nuclear deal] has been a game changer. The country that was most opposed to the deal.

Sorry, but no. A fact-checker would have to give this at least 3 or 4 Pinocchios. I don’t doubt that Obama found some former or present Israeli official who said this, but it definitely does not represent the views of the “military and security community” here. PM Netanyahu responded (too) politely that Israel’s position opposing the deal hasn’t changed, but Israel’s Defense Ministry issued a very harshly-worded comment, comparing it to the Munich agreement of 1938 that sacrificed Czechoslovakia to the Nazis and paved the way for the Second World War.

As always, Israel sent a mixed message. The PM’s office later conveyed via its ambassador in Washington that it had not seen or approved the stronger Defense Ministry statement. Left-wing politicians in Israel blamed hawkish Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman and chastised him for trying to destroy the relationship between Israel and the US.

Here we go again, the submissive wife walking on eggshells so as not to upset the abusive husband. Obama is easily “infuriated,” by such things as announcements of planned Jewish construction in eastern Jerusalem or Netanyahu’s recognition of the fact that a Palestinian state is unlikely to come about in the near future. And he makes his anger evident in numerous ways, all the way from vulgar insults to attempts to intervene in our elections.

As these things go, this is a minor incident but it is indicative of the unhealthy relationship between Israel and the US administration. And since it really is true (as Netanyahu noted in his response to Obama’s very-misleading-if-not-lying remark) that America is our greatest ally, we need to do what we can to improve it.

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