Apologists for the Obama administration have been arguing that there is no real difference between his stand opposing Jewish settlements and that of George W. Bush. There was some truth to this when it came to settlements in the West Bank, though this assertion ignores the fact that the Bush administration publicly acknowledged that some of the larger settlement blocs would be retained by Israel in any peace agreement and that building within them was not really an issue. But even the most ardent fans of Obama must understand that there is a major difference between the two presidents when it comes to Jerusalem. Granted, the United States has never formally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital or formally accepted the unification of the city that was made possible by the Six-Day War. As much as the U.S. routinely protested settlement-building in the West Bank, it never made a stink about building homes in Jerusalem. And that’s where Obama parts company with his predecessors.
Though the administration has backed off a bit on its determination to pressure Israel into a total settlement freeze — a policy that only incited Palestinians to be even more intransigent than before — Obama made a point of personally opposing the construction of 900 new apartment units in the southern Jerusalem neighborhood of Gilo. Obama condemned the new housing in an interview with Fox News during which he stated that the apartments could embitter Palestinians in a way that was “very dangerous.”
The president’s decision to speak as if this part of Jerusalem was a “settlement” where Jews had no right to live and build is not just a provocative escalation of the administration’s hostile attitude toward Israel. It also gives the Palestinian terrorists who made the apartment complexes in this neighborhood their personal shooting gallery throughout the second intifada an unexpected boost. Palestinian Authority–backed snipers based in the neighboring Arab village of Beit Jala regularly shot into Gilo during that conflict. Gilo also became more than just a middle-class Jerusalem neighborhood. It assumed the role of a symbol of Israeli tenacity and courage, and the area became a regular stop for visitors to the city. At the time, the United States condemned the attacks on Gilo. The presence of Jewish homes there was not an issue. Even media outlets that were far from supportive of Israel, such as the New York Times, were wont to describe it as a Jerusalem neighborhood, as this report from 2001 by Clyde Haberman during the height of the fighting illustrates. The word settlement is never used once in the article. Today, however, the Times used that word to describe Gilo in the headline of the story about Obama’s broadside.
Though I doubt the White House even thought of it in this context, Obama’s decision to treat as illegitimate Gilo’s existence as a Jewish community is, in a very real sense, a moral victory for those al-Aksa Martyrs Brigade killers whose goal was to make the neighborhood a place where Jews could no longer live. So just as visitors who wanted to bear witness to the determination of Israelis to not yield to terror needed to go to Gilo in 2001, anyone wishing to see just how far the United States has drifted from a position of support for the Jewish state must today go to the same place.
Of course, the NY Times used their end of the year ‘obituary’ magazine edition to highlight
Omar Vera and one other 82rd Airborne trooper who wrote that NY Times Op Ed that cast doubt on the ‘surge’ exactly as it was underway.
“It is truly astonishing how little adjustment leading Democrats have made in their rhetoric or policy prescriptions in light of the changing circumstances in Iraq.”
Huh? Truly astonishing? The Democratic Party has been captured by the dishonest pacifism of George McGovern. American hard-power is almost always perceived to be a bad thing. Violence supposedly only begets further violence. This is why the Democrats cannot be trusted with the defense of America.
Except for the changeling Kucinich, none of the Dems has a principled critique of the Iraq adventure. Hence they have no coherence on the question of what to do now. Theirs is an interventionism lite, preferably uncoupled from real US interests (Darfur, Bosnia), and decorated with internationalist formalities.
Unlike the leftist opponents of the war, I hope for something that passes for a decent outcome in Iraq. That result, if it comes, however, should be followed by a systematic disentanglement from military commitments, disavowal of evangelizing democratism, and a careful reassessment of globalization.
We are unsuited for empire, and pursuing hegemony could easily bring us down.
President Edwards. That’s so cute.
Nothing that John Edwards says should astonish anyone unless it actually made sense.
That would be astonishing.
The thing is that Edwards has no real intention of doing any such thing. He is just pandering to what he thinks is a huge anti-war contingent in Iowa. In the unlikely event he finds himself occupying the White House in January 2009, Edwards would begin to backpeddle from his “get out now” position and eventually announce that, unfortunately, the Pentagon has convinced him that staying and holding the course is in the best interests of the United States.
On purpose of not, George S, talking about the Slickster, said it best: “President Clinton has kept all the campaign promises that he intended to keep.”
It’s worth noting that December was the best month for Coaltion casualties since the beginning of the war. Not second best, but best. I really don’t understand why this isn’t bigger news. The website that you link to makes it much more prominent than the US figure (you don’t, for instance, get average / day deaths for US casualties alone).
As a genuine question, why do you highlite choose to highlite that statistic, rather than the more upbeat one? I don’t doubt your bona fides as one of the good guys, and nor do I doubt that you know more about how to pick your statistics, but while I’m out on the Primary campaign trail, it seems like, if there is a good reason not to pick the Coalition casualty figure, it’d be helpful to know it.
Many thanks.
I’m continually surprised at how surprised everyone is when politicians act this way. People, it’s simple: Today’s politicians are fully focused on one thing and one thing only, getting elected. With very few exceptions in recent years, we have no leaders, no statespersons. And our best potential leaders aren’t running (e.g. Colin Powell).
Why is it surprising that the Dems are still trying to convince us that Bush = War = Failure? Because they want us to vote for them! If it would get our votes, they’d claim the moon landings never happened.
Why are the Republicans waffling on the war? They’re afraid the Dems might be right (actually, they’re left) about the war and they (the Republicans) don’t want to lose votes by being loyal to their party’s incumbent.
“What a bunch of maroons!” Bugs Bunny
Check out WIA numbers. What is really amazing to me is that even as we pursue JAM and AQI while protecting the population, we suffered (from memory here) 36 WIA in December 2007. That indicates not much combat including IEDs and indirect fire, enemies too demoralized to fight back when cornered, and/or enemies too poor to hit us. In addition to the skill of our troops, of course.
I hope this keeps up.
Hurting bin Laden
Despite the claim by Osama bin Laden that al Qaida does not attack innocent muslims, an al Qaida attack in Baghdad killed 32 mourners at a funeral…a man loaded with explosives walked into a funeral tent outside the home of
“Unlike the leftist opponents of the war, I hope for something that passes for a decent outcome in Iraq. That result, if it comes, however, should be followed by a systematic disentanglement from military commitments, disavowal of evangelizing democratism, and a careful reassessment of globalization.”
No so believable. You are exactly like the leftist opponents of the war, of which you are obviously one. Only the left hates democracy so badly that it seeks to disavow its evangelizing. World wide democracy is the nightmare of every good communist, and the dream of every enslaved third world citizen.
Obama delegitimizes Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood…
Jonathan Tobin writes more about how Barack Obama has attacked the legitimacy of Jerusalem’s Gilo neighborhood, home to at least 33,000 people, by describing it as a “settlement”, the MSM’s way of delegitimizing any Jewish residence they oppose, an…