Sunday, January 13, 2013

Dropping the Hagel Bomb

   
 
Obama, Israel, and Chuck Hagel’s nomination.
You really cannot, in fairness, blame President Obama for naming “Chuck” Hagel, one of the most clearly anti-Israel, anti-Semitic members of the Senate (or ex-members in his case) to be Secretary of Defense. President Obama has not changed his views on Israel since his first speech at the Democrat convention in 2004, when he made it clear that his sympathies in the Middle East lay with the Palestinians. In a way, you have to admire his consistency. Of course, he has to pay lip service to Israel when he visits Miami Beach, but how he must laugh at the audiences that applaud him.

He is a charter member of the Chicago angry black man entity, and they — including former pals Jeremiah Wright and Minister Farrakhan — have little love for the Jews. So, again, his contempt for Israel and for Jews is not a surprise.
The parts that are so heart breaking are that:
1.) Most American Jews clearly supported Mr. Obama in his bid for President against a GOP that has been an incomparably stronger supporter of Israel than the modern-day Democrat party. If one is to judge from the stony faces at the DNC whenever Israel was mentioned, and the fervent support of Iran on those same faces, one can clearly see who was Israel’s friend and who was not. Never mind, Barack Obama got two thirds of the Jewish vote. That was decisive in Florida, Virginia, and Ohio. Barack Obama’s most productive fund-raisers, especially at the “millionaires and billionaires” level that Mr. Obama supposedly hates so much, were almost unanimously Jews. How they are going to square this with Senator Hagel’s nomination to a post that is of life or death importance to Israel is anyone’s guess.
But here is a clue: the really committed left-wing Jew does not care much about Israel. Jews in many cases have loyalties that trump their interest to Israel. Their support of Mr. Obama is a case in point. Obviously, it is the right of left-wing American Jews to have contempt for the Jewish state. That’s what freedom means.
On orders from Moscow, American Jewish Communists suspended criticism of Hitler during the August 1939-June 1941 period of the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact. Violation of that edict was called “premature antifascism” and men died for it. Not for a moment would I compare Mr. Obama to any of the evil names above in this paragraph. I merely point out that those who think all Jews in America consider Israel a high priority are mistaken. The left-wing group-think party line far outranks Zionism for many, many Jews.
You are going to see this in the immediate future, as Mr. Obama lines up his many Jewish friends and supporters to back Mr. Hagel.
2.) I hope the people who are supporting Chuck Hagel know that by confirming him, they are cementing at 100 percent that odds that Iran will get a nuclear capability without U.S. interference. Whether Israel can survive an Islamic bomb is questionable at best. This means a vote to confirm Mr. Hagel is a vote that expresses no interest in whether Israel survives.
As a student of anti-Semitism in Europe before, during, and after the Holocaust, no amount of hatred and loathing for Jews surprises me. Americans who do love Israel should be aware, though, that it is growing much more likely by the moment that there will be a second Holocaust. The only real friends that Israel has on this earth, evangelical Christians, will take note. Whether anyone else will is a big question.
3.) In a few days, we will mark that 100th birthday of Richard Nixon, the best friend in the White House that Jews have ever had. Even now, if you mention Nixon to Israelis, they tear up with gratitude about how Mr. Nixon saved them in 1973. American Jews have a very different attitude. I suspect that Mr. Obama will get away with his contempt for Israel, and that the same Jews who have always put the party line ahead of Israel will still support him. If Iran kills two million Jews in an afternoon (God forbid!) they will find a way to blame George W. Bush.
Poor Israel, poor beleaguered Israel, abandoned by so many people who call themselves Jewish, so alone, so terribly alone.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills and Malibu. He writes “Ben Stein’s Diary” for every issue of The American Spectator.

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