Michael A. Ledeen - Obamas Betrayal of Israel

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THE LONG-STANDING U.S.-Israel alliance - which U.S. President Barack Obama described as unbreakable as recently as June 2009 - has, in fact, been seriously strained by this administration. The White House likes to blame Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Washingtons longtime whipping boy, for the diplomatic unease that has grown between the two countries. But, in fact, the president, who sanctimoniously forswore meddling in the affairs of Iran during the bloody crackdown on protesters against a corrupt election, has had no such compunction about making clear the concessions he expects from Israel or that he regards its intransigent policies as the major obstacle to peace in the Middle East.

Israelis certainly get the picture. In a recent poll, only 4 percent of Israelis said they thought President Obamas policies are supportive of Israel. And many American Jewish leaders, including some strong supporters of Obama, also see the handwriting on the White House wall.

These leaders were presented with further disturbing evidence of Washingtons distancing of Israel when Obama personally attended the ceremony awarding the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Mary Robinson, the former United Nations official who presided over the Durban conference in 2001 that degenerated into an angry hate rally against Israel, America and Jews. And, above and beyond the presidents political rhetoric, there were significant changes from the policies of the past several presidencies, notably the reduction of American military support for Israel, including bunker buster bombs that could be used in attacks against underground installations, such as Iranian nuclear facilities and terrorist group tunnels into Israeli territory from Lebanon or Egypt, and modern attack helicopters. In April 2009, the United States approved Turkey to provide weapons and military training to the Lebanese Army, despite Israeli objections (the Lebanese Government has threatened military action against Israel).

Even members of the presidents own party have felt constrained to dissociate themselves from Obamas pressure on Israel, especially the pressure to make further territorial concessions to the Palestinians in exchange for confidence-building gestures. The number two Democrat in the House of Representatives, Rep. Steny Hoyer, went to great lengths during a visit to Israel in mid-August to draw a line between the presidents position and that of Congress. At a press conference, Hoyer had no qualms about pointing out that 368 members of the 435 -seat House signed a letter to Obama in May that supported Israel and said that Israel must be free to make its own decisions, and the United States should support those decisions.

The change in the American governments attitude toward Israel is not simply about settlements. Indeed, its not just about Israel. As President Obama has said, at great length and in various settings, he is seeking rapprochement with the entire Muslim world, and if that doesnt please the Israelis, so be it. He says he wants to be fair, by which he means that the Israelis have no special claim on American sympathies. He believes that the Palestinians are equally worthy, and he believes, as Arab leaders have long argued, that if Israel will just permit the creation of a Palestinian state, peace will flow like water in this parched part of the world.

Obama says he wants to be fair,
by which he means that the
Israelis have no special claim
on American sympathies.

Obama has promised to be evenhanded, calling upon both Israel and its enemies to make concessions in the name of peace, as if decades of Israeli concessions and continued Palestinian terrorism, supported by Iran and Syria, did not count. Hes got a set of new scales, and new standards of justice.

As he put it in his celebrated Cairo speech on June 4, 2009:

In Obamas view, the theory that Israeli concessions will be matched by its enemies conversion to peacemaking has not already been tested and failed. Moreover, the idea that the Fatah leadership believes that peace with a secure Israel is in Palestines interest is a pure article of faith. Both the historical record and contemporary evidence strongly suggest the opposite: Palestinian leaders have never accepted the notion that Israel should be secure, and they continue to embrace violence as an acceptable and even admirable method of achieving their ultimate objective, namely, the elimination of Israel altogether.

In the background of this revisionist maneuvering is one looming fact: As he pushes Israel away from the American embrace, Obama has undertaken to make peace with Iran, whose genocidal hatred for America and Israel and bloody war against both requires a very different policy. Sensible Middle East experts understand that there cannot be peace between Israel and the Arabs as long as Iran exercises a decisive influence over the key terrorist organizations. But Obama has willfully ignored this connection in designing his Mideast plans. In August, Israel was told that the American government would push for tougher sanctions against Iran in exchange for Israeli compliance with Obamas call for the shutdown of settlement expansion - as if the primary need for action against Iran was the role it could play in ending Israeli territorial recalcitrance!

As he pushes Israel away from
the American embrace, Obama
has undertaken to make peace
with Iran.

Obamas efforts to wring new concessions from the Israelis, and the respectful language he uses when discussing Palestinians and Iranians, are reminiscent of the last years of the Vietnam War, when Lyndon Johnson, then Richard Nixon, embraced the vision of a negotiated settlement with the North Vietnamese. The appeals to be evenhanded and the studied use of respectful language about Palestinians and the Iranian regime that we hear today from the president and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recall similar calls and similar language about our enemies of the 1960s and 1970s. The similarities extend to the other side as well, for the terrorists and their political arms use many of the same political and military techniques against Israel today that the North Vietnamese used against us 40 years ago.