RUTHFULLY YOURS

http://www.prudenpolitics.com/index.php/pruden/full_column/the_romance_of_the_empty_rhetoric

“Mr. Obama, with his high regard for his reputation as a man with singular gifts of pretty speech, no doubt imagines he has discharged his obligations to an ally with words (and a few notes of the music). If he were a true student of the Muslim mind, instead of being merely an admirer of the cultural gifts of Islam (such as they are), he would understand that the hard men in Tehran hear his rhetoric not as kindly sentiment but as evidence of weakness and flaccid impotence. That’s why they so eagerly get on with the pursuit of the weapons needed to “wipe Israel off the map.” The Islamic despots understand a thing or two about empty rhetoric.”

Words, words, words. Stonewall Jackson famously told soldiers to “make short speeches, and when you draw the sword throw away the scabbard.”

Barack Obama is obsessed with words, and he never learned to make a short speech, and he’s certainly no Stonewall Jackson. The Israelis understand that, however well-meaning he may be. The president may even believe most of the stuff he hears himself say.

Mr. Obama made another pretty speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, on Sunday that was thrilling only to those who gorge on the romance of rhetoric. Mr. Obama and his teleprompter put on a show of bluffery that was surely the envy of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. “Iran’s leaders should know,” the president said, “that I do not have a policy of containment. I have a policy to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. And as I’ve made clear time and again during the course of my presidency, I will not hesitate to use force when it is necessary to defend the United States and its interests.”

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/153464 Netanyahu: Israel ‘Master of Her Own Fate’ PM Binyamin Netanyahu told US President Barack Obama that Israel’s right to defend itself would not take a back seat to US interests. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asserted Israel’s sovereign right to defend itself at his meeting with US President Barack Obama on Monday. Netanyahu made clear that […]

http://spectator.org/archives/2012/03/05/barrys-phony-bluff

He can’t fool anyone most of the time, certainly not Iran or Israel.When President Obama meets Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu today, he will have only two goals. He may succeed in one and will certainly fail in the other.

Obama’s goals are simple. First, to avoid a repeat of the televised lecture by Netanyahu immediately after the two met. Before Netanyahu’s arrival last year, Obama harshly criticized Israel and demanded peace talks based on the pre-1967 war borders with the Palestinians. In what was supposed to be a friendly televised chat after their Oval Office meeting, Netanyahu politely but firmly took Obama to school and bluntly rejected the 1967 baseline. It was a public relations disaster for Obama that he can prevent this time by just refusing another such event. He may even deny Netanyahu the side-by-side press conferences common to meetings with other nations’ leaders.

Second, Obama wants Israel to commit that it will not attack Iran this year. His administration has been frantically trying to persuade Israel to delay any attack, and has been met with quiet opposition and growing silence from the Israeli side.

Obama’s two goals are based only on avoiding damage to his campaign. If there is another public break with Israel or if — as is most likely — Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear facilities, Obama’s campaign will be distracted and damaged. Any resemblance between Obama’s goals and America’s national interest is purely coincidental.

Obama is playing for time. He wants the world’s nuclear cauldron — Iran, North Korea, Pakistan et al. — not to boil over before his election. That is the primary reason that we’ve — again — filled the North Korean begging bowl to cease nuclear production. This is, what, the third or fourth time we’ve done this? And this time, like every time before, we’ll deliver the bribes (fuel oil, food, whatever) which will be used to prop up the Norks’ regime, their people will continue to starve, and they will go on with their nuke program. But nothing will be noisy until after the election.

http://www.timesledger.com/stories/2012/9/mohammadbirthday_jh_2012_03_01_q.html A Jackson Heights imam has started a campaign to make April 26, the birthday of the Prophet Mohammad, a national holiday. Mohd Qayyoom, head of the Muhammadi Community Center, at 37-46 72nd St., said he believes having a national celebration for the prophet’s birthday would enable the growing Muslim population in America to have […]

The Middle East’s real apartheid The Jewish State’s supporters find it difficult to agree on the best response to Israel Apartheid Week. http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Op-EdContributors/Article.aspx?id=260582 In light of Israel Apartheid Week, which hit cities and campuses throughout the world recently, supporters of the Jewish state find it difficult to agree on the best response to this hate […]

http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=1484 Addressing the annual AIPAC conference in Washington on Sunday, U.S. President Barack Obama made it clear which side of the Israeli-Jewish divide he was on – that of Israeli President Shimon Peres. Peres, who immediately preceded Obama on the podium, was given a glowing greeting by his partner in preferring diplomacy to all else, […]

http://www.carolineglick.com/?utm_source=MadMimi&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Obama+makes+the+case+of+an+Israeli+strike+on+Iran&utm_campaign=Obama+makes+the+case+of+an+Israeli+strike+on+Iran&utm_term=header8_png In his commentary in Maariv’s Friday news supplement, the paper’s senior diplomatic commentator Ben Caspit laid out a hypothetical lecture that Obama might give Netanyahu when the two leaders meet alone in the Oval Office this afternoon. In Caspit’s scenario, Obama used the one-on-one to set out the law to the Israeli premier. If […]

Dear e-pals: I am delighted that James Kirchick who is a fine and scholarly reporter has exposed the execrable Seymour Hersh…..but it is a tad strange that no attributions are made to Rael Jean Isaac who pioneered the outing of Hersh as a biased soldier of the hard left and an unprincipled enemy of truth. ….so I am recirculating the columns posted by Rael Isaac…..rsk

The Case Against the Israel Lobby [incl. Rashid Khalidi] by Don Casler

The Dartmouth
http://thedartmouth.com/2012/02/07/opinion/casler

http://www.campus-watch.org/article/id/12028

With the primary season heating up and a general election looming, America stands at something of a foreign policy crossroads, having just limped out of Iraq but with boots still on the ground in an increasingly hopeless war in Afghanistan. Unfortunately, one foreign policy issue that is unlikely to be raised by any candidate or party is U.S. support for Israel. Given the strategic and political implications of any issue related to the Middle East, it is vital for Americans to be able to speak freely and seriously about the influence of Israel over our foreign policy decisions.

As political scientists John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt noted in their groundbreaking 2006 essay “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy,” Israel has received generous and special treatment from the United States, even though it lacks both strategic value and a persuasive moral justification for continued American support. Mearsheimer and Walt conclude that the United States’ policy toward Israel is due to the dominance of the Israel lobby, specifically the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee.

Essentially, the United States’ Israel policy is a case of special interest influence taken to an extreme level. The Israel lobby is a classic example of an attentive public, albeit one that has enjoyed extraordinary success in accomplishing its goals. It is a public relations machine that leverages its access to Congress and the executive branch to gain tacit American support for Israeli actions, like the 2006 invasion of Lebanon, and to stifle any debate about American support for Israel.

http://blogs.timesofisrael.com/peter-beinart-leads-new-literary-assault-on-israel-and-zionism/
Almost two years ago, Peter Beinart wrote an article in New York Review of Books that sent shock waves through the Jewish community. He argued that liberalism was losing out in Israel to a far-right, anti-democratic, and even racist form of Zionism largely rooted in an ultra-Orthodox interpretation of Judaism. Worse still, the organizations of the American Jewish establishment were too reflexively supporting the policies of the Israeli government, and failing to criticize its illiberal behavior. Consequently, young American Jews perceive that there is a conflict between their own liberal values and Israel’s policies, and they are withdrawing their support from Israel and the American Jewish organization that support the Zionist cause.

Beinart has elucidated these ideas in a book, “The Crisis of Zionism,” that’s slated to go on sale in late March. Yet, at least two fawning assessments have already appeared. Jacob Heilbrunn, a senior editor with the National Interest, has a lengthy review essay in the March/April issue of that journal. Roger Cohen devoted one of his New York Times columns to the book. You can expect that the publication of Beinart’s book will spawn many more articles that viciously attack Israel.