I wonder how many American Jews are getting mighty uncomfortable about the way Israel has become politicized this election year. I do not mean that Israel should not be discussed in the context of a campaign. Of course it should be. Any foreign policy issue that affects U.S. national interests should be discussed and argued about. Israel is no different, especially when there is no consensus on what our policies should be.
The only consensus is that Israel has the right to exist in peace, with U.S. aid to guard its security. But that is it.
The specifics of U.S. support are not anything the country agrees upon, or, I would guess, even talks about. But why not? Even the most popular domestic program, Social Security, is argued about in elections with candidates differing on how to "save" it from the imagined or real threat of insolvency.
Nothing is off-limits in elections or, more precisely, nothing should be. Israel should be politicized, like everything else. As is the case with every other issue, that is how democracies make decisions. Or should.
This year the argument that Israel not be politicized is coming almost exclusively from Democrats who, as supporters of the incumbent president, vehemently oppose making Israel an issue. (They feel differently when the Republicans hold the White House).
Democratic Party chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz said last month that presumed Republican presidential nominee, Mitt Romney, is "playing politics with America's bipartisan support for Israel...."
He certainly is but no more than President Obama does when his campaign surrogates declare that Obama is the best friend Israel has ever had.
The difference between Romney and Obama is that Obama has never suggested that he would allow the Israeli government to make key decisions on Israel for him, rather than decide himself based on U.S. national interests. Romney has.
On Iran, Romney's spokesman said during the governor's recent visit to Israel that whether or not Israel bombs Iran is up to Israel. "If Israel has to take action on its own, in order to stop Iran from developing that [nuclear] capability, the governor would respect that decision."
In other words, even though an Israeli attack would undoubtedly affect U.S. interests in the entire Middle East (including our men and women in uniform) and the world economy and even though it might result in an Iranian attack on a U.S. vessel, bringing us into the war, Romney would simply defer to the Israeli government if it decides to prevent an Iranian nuclear capability.
Then there is the question of Jerusalem. Every president since Lyndon Johnson has avoided moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem not because they did not recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital but because doing so would almost certainly cause the Arab and Muslim world to erupt in (perhaps violent) opposition. (Jerusalem is holy to Muslims and Christians as well as Jews, so any change in the status quo must be taken with great sensitivity).
Romney says that he would not necessarily move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem on his first day in office but would "select the timing in accordance with the government of Israel." Of course, timing is at the root of the whole issue; Israel wants the U.S. to move the embassy today if not yesterday. But Romney says the decision is up to Israel even though American lives could be at stake if others view Israel's choice of timing (i.e, now) as incendiary.
So here is the difference between Romney and every other candidate who has politicized Israel. He is the very first to say that on at least two critical policies, he would simply defer to the government of Israel -- even though American interests and lives would be at stake. Obviously, the same standard would apply to other Israel-related issues like borders, arms sales, relations with the Arab states, etc. After all, if Romney would defer to Israel on matters as volatile as Iran and Jerusalem, wouldn't he do the same with other less sensitive issues?
It's crazy. The United States has never contracted out its foreign policy to any foreign country.. Even when our closest ally, the United Kingdom, was fighting for its life against Nazi Germany, President Roosevelt made his policies based on his perception of U.S. interests, not Prime Minister Churchill's. (Churchill would have had us join the war against Germany in 1939, long before we were ready).
As an American, Romney's statements strike me as shockingly out-of-step with the American tradition since George Washington (who warned against the dangers presented by a "passionate attachment" to any foreign country in his Farewell Address).
As a Jew, it strikes me as deeply offensive. Does Romney really believe that this is what Jewish voters want? Is he unaware that his super-donor and adviser on all things related to Israel, Sheldon Adelson, is so right-wing that he broke with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) because he considered it too sympathetic to the Palestinians? Does he think that Adelson who says he regrets serving in the U.S. rather than the Israeli army is typical of American Jews? Or that his wish that his 13-year old son become "a sniper for the IDF" is in any way representative of us?
The fact is that Romney has crossed the line from pandering to American Jews to insulting us. The insult is his belief that the way to gain support from Jews is by promising to make the policies of our country subservient to those of Israel. Mitt Romney is not hostile to Jews, far from it, but if he was, he could not be more offensive.
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When something is obvious, and there is strong public support (as there is for Israel), it doesn't need to be fought over. You are in the extreme minority on this one.
Public sentiment regarding Israel has turned chilly in Republican voters and hostile in Democrats, no matter what the crooks in election time tell you ... time for a change.
Because there are two vastly disparate histories being trafficked. There are also two very different readings of international law. Most people see that as a recipy for a nasty argument, with few redeeming qualities.
Obama has taken many positive actions for Israel including: rejecting the Goldstone report that criticized Israeli actions in the war in Gaza; asking Congress to approve a $205 million package to help Israel build a new anti-missile defense system; successfully advocating for Israel’s admission into the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development; giving a speech in the heart of the Arab world, in which he told his listeners that they need to recognize the legitimacy of a Jewish state; stating to the UN General Assembly clearly and unequivocally that “Israel is a sovereign state and the historic homeland of the Jewish people” and “It should be clear to all that efforts to chip away at Israel’s legitimacy will only be met by the unshakeable opposition of the US.”
On September 22, 2011, Prime Minister Netanyahu heaped additional praise on President Obama for his talk at the United Nations, in which Obama expressed opposition to U.N. recognition of a Palestinian state, and indicated that he would veto a resolution supporting that recognition in the U.N. Security Council. Netanyahu indicated that Obama deserved a “badge of honor” for that talk.
I expect President Obama to be tough on Israel. While I support Israel in her right to statehood and safety, I do not agree with many of her foreign policies under BN. Romney is apparently very happy being a puppet to Israel purely for the J.ewish vote. And to make happy the war-mongers in the US who are the ONLY ones who benefit from war. Because it sure as heck isn't the American people on the whole.
President Obama understands the difference.
Oh come on MJ--everything that does not support the agenda to destroy Israel and the US offends you.
FAIL
Maybe if we perceived "our closest ally", Winston Churchill, instead of Time Magazine naming Hitler Man of the Year in 1938, we could have avoided the genocidal Holocaust. I guess that was not in the "perception of U.S. interests". Perhaps it is not in the interest of Liberal American Jews today either...
With respect, that answer is somewhat simplistic. 64 years ago, the then UN consisting mainly of a handful of European nations plus America, passed a resolution to establish a state of Israel in the center of the Muslim Middle East to accommodate refugees from the Nazi domination of Europe. All those states directly affected voted against the motion and vowed to go to war to prevent it. The state was established and the Arab nations did go to war, but lost. If you were a Muslim Arab in 1948, what would you have done, then and subsequently?
what yu fail to mention or even recognize is the fact that jews have always had a presence in the ME…they are indigenous to that region, and most of the jews that came to israel from europe were coming back, after having been driven from the region by arabbs. over 850,000 jews were run out of the ME by arrabbs….a fact that yure ilk likes to ignore or excuse.
as for 'If you were a Muslim Arab in 1948, what would you have done, then and subsequently?'
i would have accepted my own state when offered and concentrated on moving forward. the majority of the land was awarded to arabbs, but it wasn't enough…it was/is never enough until the jews are driven out once again….but it won't happen. no longer will we lay down and be submissive to arrabbs or anyone else.
if the arabbs spent as much time concentrating on themselves and their future, rather than concentrating on warrr and the jenoside of jews…..everyone would be better off. think how far they could have come by now….had they chosen peace rather than warrr.
Ignoring the illiteracy, when has Israel been "submissive'' to anyone?
Land that Arabs had lived on for many hundreds of years was suddenly handed to Islam's nemesis.
And you clowns expect the Arabs to "lie down and be submissive"?
That was long, long ago. In just about 2000 years, there have been few Jews in Palestine. But, they have built this "fantasy that God gave it all to them".
Until now Obama has had you hand cuffed in the middle of the desert bent over a boulder while your backside was bathed in vasiline and stuck in the air. The only thing worse than that was him sticking around and telling you, "it is for your own good, I am your best friend and you should praise me for doing this."
Look I don't like Mitt but i like him way more than the thing called Obama. I am not jewish at all, I am a christian. If you truely think Obama is the answer though and you are jewish, you migh want to stop listening to what you are told to think, get away somewhere you can be alone and spend some time just considering ........well, everything.
F&F.