Morton A. Klein, National President
Daniel Mandel, Director, Center for Mideast Policy
Zionist Organization of America
Is President Barack Obama committed to Israels security? Reassuring
bromides in his recent presidential addresses were nullified by specific
statements that spell out dangerous Israeli concessions and disregard of
Israeli vital interests.
Obama said that Israel must have secure, recognized borders different than
the one that existed on June 4, 1967. Yet this means little when the new
borders are to be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps and
therefore virtually indistinguishable from those lines. Moreover, his
unprecedented call for a Palestinian state to have permanent Palestinian
borders with Jordan would require Israel ceding the Jordan Valley, whose
retention successive Israeli governments have regarded as vital to Israeli
defense. The late Yitzhak Rabin said as much in his last speech to the
Knesset in October 1995. Benjamin Netanyahu just reaffirmed it. Obama
ignores this.
Instead, Obama calls now for a full and phased Israeli withdrawal. He also
has refused to endorse the 2004 George W. Bush letter, stipulating that
delineating a negotiated border must take account of Jewish communities that
have risen over the years beyond the pre-1967 lines.
No previous U.S. president has ever suggested that issues of territory and
security should be agreed upon first, before proceeding to negotiations on
all other matters, including Jerusalem and Palestinian refuges and their
millions of descendants. Upholding Israels basic security would mean
repudiating the repatriation of the refugees and their descendants in
Israel, but Obama did not. To the contrary, he has supported the so-called
Saudi peace plan, which demands not only a return to the 1967 lines, but
also the return of all refugees and their descendants to Israel.
Concern for Israels security would preclude a call for Israel to negotiate
with a PA that has signed a unity agreement with the terrorist organization
Hamas, which calls for a genocide of Jews. Yet Obama demands Israel
negotiate with the PA. Concern for Israel security has not led Obama to
pressure Egypt to close its Gaza border at Rafah, whose recent opening has
enabled the flow of weaponry into Hamas-run Gaza. But he has spoken
previously of the legitimate aims of Hamas and Hizballah.
Concern for Israeli security would not lead Obama to turn a blind eye to PA
incitement to hatred and murder against Israel and Jews. Yet Obama has shown
less interest than his predecessors in doing anything about it. The other
week he reiterated that the U.S. will hold the Palestinians accountable for
their actions and for their rhetoric. But he never has nor does he even
now.
Obama has never identified the PA as responsible for incitement and thus not
penalized it for it.
When, in August 2009, Fatah held a conference in Bethlehem, reaffirming its
refusal to accept Israels existence as a Jewish state, glorifying
terrorists by name, praising armed struggle, insisting on the so-called
right of return, and rejecting an end of claims in any future peace
agreement with Israel, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton astonishingly
claimed that the Conference showed a broad consensus supporting
negotiations with Israel, and the two-state solution. When in 2010, the PA
named a Ramallah square after the terrorist Dalal Mughrabi, Clinton falsely
claimed that this ceremony was initiated by a Hamas-run municipality.
If Obama was genuine about holding the PA accountable, he would be demanding
the disbanding of Fatahs own Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a U.S. recognized
terrorist group. He would demand the abrogation of the PAs unity agreement
with Hamas as a precondition of any future talks. He has done neither. Far
from holding Palestinians accountable, Obama has consistently rewarded
them, massively increasing aid to the PA to almost $1 billion per year.
For a year, Obama prohibited any new U.S. sanctions to stop Iran developing
nuclear weapons the existential looming threat to both Israel and the U.S.
Yet, what further measures must be taken to stop Iran is precisely the issue
Obama left untouched in his recent speeches. While he has insisted that he
will do everything to stop Iran getting the bomb, Obama has ignored his
own deadlines and achieved only limited international sanctions that provide
exemptions for the Russians and Chinese who are actually enabling the
Iranian nuclear program.
Other Obama stipulations on Israeli security prove on inspection to be
groundless. For example, he said that a Palestinian state should be
non-militarized. But no state has ever been subject to this condition, nor
has anyone prevented a state from rearming. Moreover, legally, it is
unlikely anyone could enforce demilitarization, even if it were a provision
in a signed agreement. Worse, Obamas stipulation looks meaningless, when
coupled with his insistence that all states, including presumably a
Palestinian state, must have the right to defend themselves.
Obamas words and deeds not only fail to match his stated commitment to
Israels security they negate it.
Morton A. Klein is National President of the Zionist Organization of America
(ZOA). Dr. Daniel Mandel is Director of the ZOA's Center for Middle East
Policy and author of H.V. Evatt & the Establishment of Israel (London:
Routledge, 2004).
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