Category Archives: Current Events

It has finally occurred to me why President Obama’s vision of the world is so skewed. He is cross-eyed,  though not in the physical sense. That is to say, his I’s are crossed and so his world view is distorted.

There is a long and honorable tradition in American history of debating the proper role of the United States in the greater world. Bret Stephens, in his recent book “America in Retreat,” spells out the debate with keen insight. This debate began in Washington’s time and extends until today, and has in different eras spanned both or either major party. In short hand, the two contrasting approaches are those of the Interventionists and the Isolationists.

Isolationists believe that the United States should keep to itself, safely ensconced behind two oceans and only involve itself in global affairs when the homeland or its interests are directly threatened. The US should avoid “entangling alliances” and, in modern lexicon, should not endeavor to be the world’s policeman. (Of course, as Stephens points out, no one wants to live in a neighborhood where there are no policemen.)

Interventionists do not hesitate to project American strength and especially values whenever and wherever it seems appropriate. Freedom, liberty, democracy and respect for individual rights seem to them admirable objectives and countries that embrace these values do not wage war against each other and generally make the world a better place. Interventionists also believe – deep down but often manifestly apparent – that the US is an exceptional society and, notwithstanding its occasional missteps, seeks a stable, prosperous and peaceful world instead of creating an American empire.

Certainly, since World War II, the United States has dominated world affairs, provided a bulwark against the expansion of Communism and even presided over its demise. It has intervened in a number of wars and skirmishes across the globe – usually with some American interest at hand, but often a very loose or fluid definition of an American “interest” – and even more frequently with humanitarian assistance in a case of a natural or political disaster afflicting some country, although not always.

Both Isolationists and Interventionists recognize the world is a very dangerous place and America cannot really hide behind its ocean borders anymore. This is not only because ICBM’s mock borders but also because the global economy is closely linked, and America’s own prosperity would suffer if it shut itself off from other countries. Of course, Isolationists have a much higher threshold to warrant American military involvement overseas.

These are necessarily simple definitions but over the decades and centuries the debate in the US has roughly followed these lines. At various times, Democrats were Interventionists (FDR, Scoop Jackson) and Republicans were Isolationists (Arthur Vandenberg, until World War II; Pat Buchanan). Although there are some outliers today as well, most Democrats tend towards isolationism and most Republicans tend towards Interventionism. All would agree that President Obama was elected in large part because, in 2008, Americans had tired of overseas military operations and favored retrenchment.

These are not just two distinct political philosophies but are also two disparate elements of the American psyche that are often in conflict and sometimes even in the same person. Americans hate injustice and especially genocide (as do all normal people) but differ as to whether there must be an American role in halting either repugnance. Thus, many Americans were horrified by the massacres in Darfur but many of them also felt there was no role for the American military and merely preferred to salve their consciences by “raising awareness” of the genocide but without actually doing much to stop it. “Raising awareness” is a noble venture but disconnected from a plan for action doesn’t save any innocent lives. Lamenting tragedies that can be avoided or minimized is certainly better than being indifferent to them, but not by much. And you can’t have it both ways – you cannot decry Interventionism and at the same time lament the inevitable effects of Isolationism. That, literally, is “dancing between two opinions” (I Kings 18:21).

No one has yet been able to repeal this truism: the only way to stop a man with a gun (or machete) is with other men having more guns. That simple bit of logic does not always permeate the natural do-gooder who has an aversion to war. Darfur is Iraq is Syria is Libya is Srebrenica is Rwanda is Cambodia is the Holocaust, etc. There are too many people who cry “never again” and when “again” happens again will again cry “never again” in a doleful refrain of helplessness and pity.

Obama is a reluctant warrior, to be sure, but here is where his I’s are crossed. He is an Interventionist where he should be an Isolationist, and he is an Isolationist where it would behoove him to be an Interventionist. Cross I’s!

When it comes to Israel, Obama is a brazen Interventionist, attempting to dictate solutions to a long conflict and threatening dire consequences if his will is not heeded.  He revokes prior commitments, pays lips service to Israel’s right of self-defense, exaggerates the plight of the Arabs of the land of Israel and even makes excuses for their brutality and mendacity.  It’s a classic bully tactic, but made especially insufferable because he gives a free pass to real dictators and thugs. If Obama has made a virtue of “leading from behind,” why can’t he employ that same virtue when it comes to Israel? The number of Arab dead in last summer’s Gaza War amounted to fewer casualties than in an off week in Syria, so why the obsession over the former and the disregard of the latter?

Conversely, Obama has exacerbated the suffering of millions across the globe by embracing a neo-Isolationism when American Intervention could make a difference. That American reticence has earned him admiration and respect but primarily from dictators throughout the world. Evil people want nothing more than to be left alone to carry out their acts of evil. The realignments taking place across Europe and the Middle East are rooted in the recognition that Pax Americana is over and America’s role in guiding world affairs to some sense of order – or at least a minimum of disorder – is on hiatus.

Blaming Bush – natural instinct in Obama’s White House – for the current collapse of Iraq is like blaming divorce on the fact that the couple married in the first place. (True; marriage is the leading cause of divorce. People who do not marry by definition never divorce.) Yes, but there are more proximate causes of divorce that need to be explored, and here as well. Bush the Iraq Interventionist was followed by Obama the Iraq Isolationist. There was no continuity in policy and in fact, the exact opposite – a reversal of policy. Hence the current chaos. In all the failed Arab states – Libya, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen – and in Russia’s expansionist ambitions, the hand of Obama Isolationism, of “America in Retreat,” is visible.

It is why Europe’s leaders deride Obama as a “follower, not a leader” and criticize his weakness, and why France, irony of ironies, has taken the leading role in trying to limit US concessions to Iran.

And those are the other set of I’s that are crossed – Iran and Israel. Obama has begun treating Israel like a pariah state, a threat to world order and security and a nation deserving of sanctions and reprobation because it is obstinately trying to cling to its divinely bestowed homeland while simultaneously attempting to create a model Jewish society and bring some good to the world. And for that – Israel is treated like Iran should be treated, with threats, recriminations and public humiliation of its leaders. If Obama could muster even a smidgeon of the deference to PM Netanyahu that he shows when referring to Iran’s Ayatollah – unabashedly – as “Supreme Leader,” then, well, he would be a different person.

At this point, Israel could benefit from a little American Isolationism, and the rest of the world could benefit from a little more American Interventionism. Obama could benefit from uncrossing his I’s and perceiving Israel as the friend and ally of the United States and Iran as America’s enemy. So could we – and so could truth and honor. Something is very wrong when Iran’s Khamanei joins a mob in chanting “Death to America” (just last week) without any discernible reaction from the American President, and pandemonium breaks out and vicious opprobrium are unleashed when Israel’s Prime Minister calls on his supporters to flock to the polls because Arabs are voting in large numbers.

Something is quite wrong – even ugly – in the differing responses to the two events. It is enough to make one’s head spin, another consequence of seeing the world with crossed eyes.

POTUS (the President of the United States) is pouting over the re-election of PM Netanyahu. He withheld his congratulatory phone call to Netanyahu for two days. By comparison, Obama called Iran’s Rouhani immediately, perhaps even before the polls closed. Netanyahu received the al-Sisi treatment, another leader who is disfavored by the White House and received the two-day delayed phone call.

There is something perversely delightful in observing the irrational anger in the administration and among Jews on the far left of the political spectrum on Israel’s election results. Granted, millions of dollars were wasted trying to unseat Netanyahu and augment the vote of the Israeli Arabs – some of that, disgracefully, US taxpayer dollars. Watching another’s tantrum is often amusing and it doesn’t seem to abate. The commentators and activists who hide their anti-Israel animus behind their Jewish genes – the Friedman’s, Klein’s and J Street’s of the world – are nearly apoplectic.

It is sort of funny – the irrationality of it all, especially considering the number of dictators and thugs with whom Obama plays footsie – but Obama can still be dangerous.

Now, the threats against Israel are mounting. As predicted here last month, the US will soon recognize a Palestinian state and seek a UN Resolution that enshrines in international law that amputation of the Jewish homeland. Obama is simply using the Netanyahu’s re-election as an excuse to execute one of his cherished goals.

The two pretexts that Obama and the left have seized on were comments made by Netanyahu in the days before and on the day of the election. Last week, he was said to have walked back his support of a “Palestinian” state by saying that such would not happen as long as he was prime minister. For sure, one can see that the ambiguous language used was designed to win him votes from right-wingers who otherwise would have voted for the “Jewish Home.” If one parses his words, Netanyahu was not saying that he was “against” a Palestinian state, but rather that such would not happen while he was prime minister – not because he personally opposes it but because the conditions he placed on the creation of such a state would not occur while he is prime minister. There are no Arab interlocutors who would agree to a demilitarized Palestinian state that recognizes Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people.

Add to that the radicalization of the Middle East, now well under way, that has brought radical Islam to the gates of Israel – and the dominance of the genocidal Hamas in Gaza and ISIS just over the border – and anyone with sense realizes that conditions are not ripe for the creation of an irredentist Arab state in Israel’s heartland. Big shock.

But that statement sent the White House into paroxysms of rage. Rather than attribute the statement to a campaign ploy, Obama went into rhetorical overdrive, and his minions began threatening Israel with dire consequences. How ironic – how drippingly cynical is it – that Obama, of all people, is complaining about the effect of misleading rhetoric. Apparently what Netanyahu should have said on the eve of Election Day was this: “If you like your peace process you can keep your peace process.” Indeed, keep it.

Netanyahu’s Bar Ilan speech from 2009 in which he unilaterally reversed a campaign pledge (hey, there’s a tactic Obama could appreciate) and endorsed a Palestinian state was a mistake, but a tactical mistake. Netanyahu today operates based on a formula that much of the world – even much of the Arab world – tacitly but never explicitly supports: favor the establishment of a Palestinian state in theory but not in practice. From my perspective this too is a mistake – you don’t offer your divinely-given patrimony to others because you are effectively renouncing your rights to it – but at least it has strategic value. Indeed, that tactic has worked for five years, as the hatred of the Palestinians for Israel is so intense and unhinged that they have repeatedly rejected the two-state fantasy.

But the diplomatic outrage itself is so contrived as to be farcical. Conventional wisdom is that Israel has walked back from the Oslo Accords and refused to implement the clause calling for a “Palestinian” state. But – note this well – the Oslo Accords did not guarantee or even offer the Arabs of the land of Israel a second “Palestinian” state. (Jordan remains the first.) Yitzchak Rabin opposed a Palestinian state, and he thought – perhaps foolishly – that he could thwart those desires by offering self-rule and Israeli withdrawal.

Nor is support for a “Palestinian” state long-standing Israeli or American policy – exactly the opposite. Until two decades ago, the mainstream of Israeli politics – both Likud and Labor – opposed a Palestinian state. In the 1970’s, none other than Shimon Peres himself equated the creation of a “Palestinian” state with the destruction of Israel. So did Golda Meir, Yitzchak Rabin, Menachem Begin and of course Yitzchak Shamir. It was a sign of bad faith, fatal to the electoral hopes of any Israeli politician. It was assumed that a second “Palestinian” state would lead to Israel’s demise.

Israeli politics has changed but the basic equation remains the same. The assumption of the 1970’s is as true today as it was then. There is not a shred of evidence indicating otherwise, notwithstanding the pronouncements of Israeli politicians or the blathering of the liberal left in the American Jewish community.

American diplomacy also opposed a Palestinian state for decades. Jimmy Carter publicly opposed a Palestinian state (in private he was adamant about it, and was studiously ignored by both Begin and Anwar Sadat). Ronald Reagan was opposed, as was George Bush I. Bill Clinton was opposed, at least until the Israeli left started to weaken and permeate Israeli society with their weakness. It was George Bush II – with the acquiescence of Israel – who officially endorsed a Palestinian state on June 24, 2002 – the same letter in which he endorsed the retention of Israeli settlements in any agreement. As noted here, that part of the letter was renounced by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. So, tantalizing question, why can the Americans change their minds about paragraph seven of the letter and deem it no longer binding, but Israel cannot do the same about paragraph three of the same letter?

Some questions are only answered by references to double standards and anti-Jewish bias.

Support for a Palestinian state is therefore a relatively new diplomatic phenomenon. More importantly, the Arabs of the land of Israel have consistently rejected this offer – most notably from Ehud Barak in 2000 and Ehud Olmert in 2007. Spend one day in law school, and you will learn that an offer that is rejected is construed as revoked. Israeli concessions do not remain on the table for eternity and certainly not embarrassing concessions that trifle with the sanctity and inviolability of the land of Israel. Finesse it all you want with diplomatese, but it is quite reasonable to maintain that that Israeli offer has been withdrawn in light of the new and catastrophic strategic environment in the Middle East.

Arabs: you didn’t accept the offer when it was made – repeatedly – so that house you wanted was sold to the settler down the street.

The second Obama pretext was Netanyahu’s Election Day warning to his constituents that Arabs are voting in “droves” and his supporters must get to the polls. Racist? Hardly. It did frustrate the Obama team’s efforts to so discredit Netanyahu that his base would stay home; hence the feigned anger. But, hey, that’s hardball politics, with which the Obama team is very familiar. Those who equate producing photo ID’s at the American voting booth (by the way, the law in Israel!) with suppression of the black vote (!) cannot in good faith claim that a call for one’s voters to vote because one bloc inimical to Israel’s national interests is voting in large numbers is racist.

And wasn’t Obama the one who told a black audience (August 14, 2012) that if Romney was elected, they would “put y’all back in chains?” No, it was actually Joe Biden, but Obama’s White House said that they saw nothing wrong in Biden’s remark. And he’s complaining about Netanyahu exhorting Likud voters to vote? It is difficult to stomach a White House that uses self-righteous, phony outrage as a fig leaf for its Jew hatred. Both are execrable.

What is as clear as the hostility of Barack Obama to Israel is the panic among liberal American Jews. I recall quite well being pilloried for my public opposition to Oslo by liberal Jews and their organizations for “opposing the will of the lawfully elected government of Israel.” Hmmm… Will these same Jews and their organizations now defy President Obama – risking their invitations to the White House, photo ops and other perks – by supporting the duly elected Prime Minister of Israel? Will they lovingly embrace – as they should – a Foreign Minister Naftali Bennett?

Or will they persist in their defense of Obama?  That Jews can be fooled is obvious. That Jews allow themselves to be fooled is even more obvious. That some Jews beg to be fooled is obvious and sad.

It is crunch time for Jewish identity in America. The Reform and Conservative movements have already denounced PM Netanyahu. The Orthodox organizations are still strangely, sadly silent. The land of Israel is under attack, and the people of Israel – and its leaders – have been marked by this administration as global enemy number one. How will those Jews respond? With cowering and double talk, or with pride and outspokenness?

If the latter, then the Netanyahu re-election could not only be good for Israel but it could also spark a revival of Jewish identity and a deeper connection with Israel among all Jews, especially those whose bonds with Jewish life are fraying. That itself could hasten the process of redemption, the only clear and certain way out of the morass.

Until then, let POTUS be POUTUS – but let Jews state firmly and unequivocally that the land of Israel was given to the people of Israel by the G-d of Israel, and no president or prime minister can change that.