Joel B. Pollak
Breitbart.com
Big Peace
21 Mar 2013
President Barack Obama visit to Israel was going well until a speech to students in Jerusalem Thursday. The speech itself was a success until Obama chose to lecture Israeli students about having empathy for Palestinians:
And put yourself in their shoes. Look at the world through their eyes. It is not fair that a Palestinian child cannot grow up in a state of their own — living their entire lives with the presence of a foreign army that controls the movements, not just of those young people but their parents, their grandparents, every single day.
Lack of Israeli empathy is not the problem, nor is “fairness.” Palestinians suffer today because of the poor decisions of their leaders, the manipulations of Arab rulers, and the basic lack of empathy by Palestinians and the world for Israeli civilians.
Israeli empathy for Palestinians led Israelis to seek peace at great risk in the 1990s. If Obama’s words might have been appropriate then, they are certainly inappropriate today, after a decade of suicide bombings, rocket attacks, and de-legitimization.
What seems to bother Obama the most is that Israel has found military means to protect itself from Palestinian terror: “It can be tempting to put aside the frustrations and sacrifices that come with the pursuit of peace, particularly when Iron Dome repels rockets, barriers keep out suicide bombers, there are so many other pressing issues that demand your attention.”
Obama, like many on the left, would evidently prefer a weakened Israel, more eager to make concessions…
The article continues at Big Peace.
Related: Obama quotes Alinsky in speech to young Israelis
In his address in Jerusalem today, President Obama channeled Saul Alinsky, citing the radical community organizer’s defining mantra as he urged young Israelis to “create change” to nudge their leadership to act.
Obama told a crowd of college students at Jerusalem’s main convention center that Israel “has the wisdom to see the world as it is, but also the courage to see the world as it should be.”
One of Alinsky’s major themes was working with the world as it “is” to turn it into the world as “it should be.”…
Weasel Zippers reminds readers, “Fact: Former Israeli PM Ehud Olmert offered the Palestinians land equaling 100% of the West Bank and Abbas still said no.”
Obama compares Israeli-Palestinian conflict to arguments between U.S. and Canada
Those pesky Canadians and their Molson Molotov Cocktails, and all those hockey puck attacks on the side of the highway.
‘Reset’: How Netanyahu Stood up to Obama–and Won
…Netanyahu has convinced Obama to back away from pressuring Israel to offer deep concessions to the Palestinians; to accept the efficacy of missile defense, at least in Israel and the U.S. homeland; and, above all, to accept the possibility of an Israeli pre-emptive strike on Iran.
What is more impressive is that Netanyahu achieved all of this without the help of the so-called “Israel lobby” in the U.S., which was silent and sycophantic…
Netanyahu has convinced Obama to back away from pressuring Israel to offer deep concessions to the Palestinians; to accept the efficacy of missile defense, at least in Israel and the U.S. homeland; and, above all, to accept the possibility of an Israeli pre-emptive strike on Iran.
What is more impressive is that Netanyahu achieved all of this without the help of the so-called “Israel lobby” in the U.S., which was silent and sycophantic…
President Barack Obama, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and others, pose for a group photo while touring the Iron Dome Battery defense system, Wednesday, March 20, 2013, at Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)
USA Today: Obama’s Middle East policy in tatters. U.S is now less popular in the region than at the end of the George W. Bush administration.
Update: Bethlehem rioters set fire to pictures of Obama
Palestinians in Bethlehem set fire to pictures of US President Barack Obama on Monday, saying he was not welcome in their city.
Scores of protesters gathered near Manger Square and threw shoes at a US diplomatic vehicle as it arrived at the scene as part of preparations for Obama’s visit to the city later this week…
