By Ted Belman
The statement issued from the Prime Minister’s Office emphasized that
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“Jerusalem isn’t a settlement” and that it doesn’t “see any connection between the peace process and the building and planning policy in Jerusalem.”
“Jerusalem isn’t a settlement – Jerusalem is the capital of Israel,” “Israel has never put any sort of limits on construction in Jerusalem, where some 800,000 people reside, and didn’t do so during the 10-month settlement freeze in the West Bank either.”
Crowley responded
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“There clearly is a link in the sense that it is incumbent on both parties, as we’ve insisted all along, that they are responsible for creating conditions for a successful negotiation,” “To suggest that this kind of announcement would not have an impact on the Palestinian side I think is incorrect.”
Put another way, Israel says Jerusalem is not on the table and Obama begs to differ.
Netanyahu also said “Only credible Military threat will stop Iran” and “Iran must be made to fear a military strike against its nuclear program.”. In the past he appeared more amenable to sanctions. Gates took issue .
It seems to me that Netanyahu has tacked to the right in light of the Republican gains on Nov 2nd. Look for him to be much more aggressive in his relationship with Obama.
Now if he would only say that Israel has the best historical and legal claim to Judea and Samaria and Israel’s negotiating position will be based on that truth.
anyone believe DEBKA’s strange theory that all of this is a planned distraction (between Obama and Netanyahu) whilst three aircraft carriers etc are staged off the coast of Iran?
OTOH, we can now count the days to see how long it takes Ackerman (NY5) to restate his stirring defense of “Jerusalem is not a settlement” that he made just before the elction, but not coincidentally just after The Jewish Week noted Ackerman’s J-Street fundraiser 🙂
Highly doubtful. He will be somewhat hindered, thus, forced to work with international entities on an end around rather than through Congress. But he will do everything he can against Israel if he thinks he can get away with it.
I didn’t say Netanyahu was a full fledged right winger, just that he leans right more than he portrays to foriegn entities and the media. In fact, he may not lean far enough to the right to do what is necessary for Israel’s survival. That may change at crunch time, but the game BB is playing now to hold things together and balance the left and right is risky. Israel may better be served by truthful defiance on the issues that are really non-negotible. Otherwise, you can buy time and string people along all the while knowing the end result of diplomacy, but your position may be compromised by delay. When diplomacy fails, Israel will have to deal with the aftermath. All the political games to extend the status quo may not be advantageous in the long term.
Jewish Israel gets a reprieve from Obama and the Democrats:
It is interesting that when the Jew-hating Liberal Government in England was replaced by a Conservative government, the british conservatives are seen to be just as big Jew-haters as the liberals.
In America, meanwhile, the Democratic House was replaced by the Republicans. The Republicans ran on a hate-Obama platform, saying that any enemy of Obama’s was a friend of theirs. So the current Republicans are more pro-Israel and anti-islam than ever (at least for the time being).
For the next two years, the Republicans will thus keep Obama from acting too forcefully against Jewish Israel. And as the American economy rushes towards a complete collapse, maybe Obama will even be distracted from his obsession with destroying Jewish Israel.
Randy, I really want to believe that, in fact I will take your word on it. He really needs to get tough.
By the way Randy can you help me out with a couple of winners. After winning the first week of the football pool I have done poorly. The last decent pick I had was 6 of 7 and that gets you a goose egg. This past week I got beat up with Texas, Oklahoma, and Missouri who I figured were sure winners.
This reinforces the view that Netanyahu is further to the right than he lets out when dealing with foriegn entities—that he plays along with liberals, teases them with rhetoric they believe to be ‘hopeful’, but does not intend to give them the prize.
It’s about time.
Obama and his knuckleheads in the administration (Hillary Clinton, Gerogie (the Arab) Mitchell, John (the phony) Kerry) have to be made to understand Jerusalem is the capital of Israel the one and only State in the Holy Land.
It’s high time the Israeli leadership stops listening to Washington, especially these anti-Semites.
By the way is there any doubt that Obama who pretends to be a Christian is by an large an anti-Semite who embraces Islam.
He has been all over the ME and yet has not set foot in Israel. Just maybe that’s good Israel doesn’t need another rock thrower.
Doesn’t the White House have access to mental health workers? “Our” “President” needs therapy for his apartment complex.