By Josh Gelernter , NRO — June 13, 2015
Last week, President Obama said that he is “the closest thing to a Jew that has ever sat” in the Oval Office. Which means, he said, that when people say he’s “anti-Israel,” “it hurts.”
Since taking office, Mr. Obama has said many noxious things. Mostly overlooked was something he said at a meeting with Senate Democrats early this year: that he understood why the senators were opposing his deal with Iran, because (according to the New York Times) “he understood the pressures that senators face from donors and others.”
Needless to say, Obama was referring to the so-called Israel lobby, and to the general notion that support for Israel comes not from conviction, but from rich Jewish power-brokers. New Jersey senator Bob Menendez — who has opposed Obama over Cuba as well as Israel and Iran — stood up and told the president that he was out of line; Menendez said he took “personal offense” at Mr. Obama’s remark. (Menendez was later indicted by Eric Holder’s Justice Department.)
Several times, Obama has said he has “done more for Israel” — “more to ensure that Israel can protect itself” — than any previous president. This week, the Supreme Court ruled that only the president has the power to recognize nation-state sovereignty; despite congressional legislation, Mr. Obama’s State Department can choose — and has chosen — not to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.
In 2008, Mr. Obama said: “Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided.” So remember: Obama says a lot of things.
So have past presidents, of course. Israel is a subject that predates 1948. And note that although a Jewish presence in North America predates 1789 by almost 300 years (Columbus’s interpreter was a Jew), the American Jewish community didn’t reach 1 percent of the national population until 1900.
In 1819, when there were fewer than 5,000 Jews in the United States — and no Israel lobby at all — John Adams wrote a letter to a friend of his, a Jew who had been a major in the colonial army. Adams wrote that he wished his friend “had been at the head of a hundred thousand Israelites . . . marching with them into Judea . . . and restoring your nation to the dominion of it. For I really wish the Jews again in Judea an independent nation.” On the subject of Jews, Adams added, in a letter to Thomas Jefferson: “I will insist that the Hebrews have done more to civilize man than any other nation.”
Abraham Lincoln said to a Canadian Christian Zionist named Henry Monk that he felt a renewed Jewish homeland in Israel was “a noble dream, and one shared by many Americans.” Lincoln added that he had a Jewish doctor “who [had] so many times put [him] upon [his] feet” that he would be pleased to give his doctor’s co-religionists “a leg up.”
Woodrow Wilson credited ancient Israeli society with being “a divine precedent for a pure democracy,” and said that it was “distinguished from monarchy, aristocracy or any other form of government” in depending on “the principle, ‘that rebellion to tyrants is obedience to God.’” “The pioneer Americans,” said Wilson, “held up . . . the Hebrew Commonwealth as a model government.”
In 1967, Soviet premier Aleksei Kosygin asked LBJ why the United States sided with tiny Israel over 80 million Arabs. Johnson said, “Because it is right.”
In 1967, Soviet premier Aleksei Kosygin asked LBJ why the United States sided with tiny Israel over 80 million Arabs. Johnson said, “Because it is right.” Johnson was the first president to give the Israelis large-scale military support.
I could go on. In fact, you could argue that Israel’s best-ever friends in the White House were Reagan and the second Bush. None of the men quoted here supported Israel because of pressure groups. Most of these past presidents were deeply religious; those who weren’t were deeply thoughtful, and supported Israel as a matter of conscience, not of politics.
Something that could be said of most Americans throughout our history — in fact, Americans have historically liked to think of America as a new Israel (as William Blake, for instance, did of England). Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin went so far as to propose that America’s national seal be an image of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea to a new land of freedom.
Anyway, the question remains: Which of our presidents came closest to being a Jew?
Criticize Dear Leader, go directly to jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200. There must be no disparaging of Hope And Change.
Ironically enough, Hope And Change never seems to change:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DFNUdCtMXWE
A Muslim with, at the very least an African Muslim parental… origin, raised in a violently inimical environment, “pastored” by rabid anti-American and anti-Semitic “clergy”. Why would anyone suspect the specimen is anti-Semitic. Because of the repeated assaults from him against our elected officials? His and his associates brutal attack against our election process? The item leaving PM Netanyahu in limbo and going to have lunch with his tribe? Because of his criminal acts against Jews born in Eretz Israel?
His attack dogs menacing violently Ambassadors of ours?etc?
Only renegade unJews could possibly align with such creature.
The fact is that such element was elected twice and voted in by 80% of the disgraces passing as Jews over there.
The present administration is dangerous for all of us and the Americans there as well. Yet, it is their choice and if they like that element, they can keep it… far away from Eretz Israel.