By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Obama Shows His True Pro-Arab Colors
by Earl Cox
I'm sad and even ashamed to say it, but US President Barack Hussein Obama, in his first 100 days in office, has clearly and unmistakably shown the world and Israel his true colors. And they are not pro-Israel.
Let's start with his bow to the Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abdul Aziz
when they met recently at the G20 summit in London. Almost every American and Israeli, especially conservative and evangelical Christians, took this as a serious insult.
How could the leader of the world's greatest democratic, Judeo-Christian nation bow to the leader of the world's leading Muslim dictatorship? And then, how could he demean himself by denying that he bowed, when the video coverage we all saw made it clear that he had? Would he bow before the Jewish president or prime minister of Israel? Don't bet on it!
A few days later in Istanbul, Obama sent another diplomatic punch Israel's way by endorsing the 2002 Saudi Initiative as the Arab idea of peace between Israel and the Palestinian Arabs. (Never mind the five so-called peace agreements that the Palestinian leadership previously agreed to, signed and then promptly violated.)
The Saudi Plan dictates that Israel should give the Arabs all of Judea, Samaria, Gaza, Golan, East Jerusalem and the Temple Mount for virtually nothing in return. The plan also demands that Israel welcome more than 1 million so-called Arab "refugees" into the Jewish state with full citizenship rights. ("Refugee status" has now become hereditary for the first time in human history.)
Is it any wonder that the Saudi plan has had no acceptance in Israel? Yet Obama fully endorsed it.
Before he left on his trip to Europe, Obama held a press conference in Washington, D.C., during which he was asked "how realistic those hopes [of peace] are now, given the likelihood of a prime minister who is not fully signed up to a two-state solution and a foreign minister who has been accused of insulting Arabs?" Obama replied: "It's not easier than it was, but I think it's just as necessary....the status quo is unsustainable, that it is critical for us to advance a two-state solution where Israelis and Palestinians can live side-by-side in their own states with peace and security." He further added that he believes in the powers of persistence in pressing for a Palestinian State: "That whole philosophy of persistence, by the way, is one that I'm going to be emphasizing again and again in the months and years to come as long as I'm in this office. I'm a big believer in persistence." [For the full transcript of the press conference, click here]
Since then, Obama has sent US Special envoy to the Middle East, former Sen. George Mitchell, to Israel to press Netanyahu on a two-state solution.
In response to Obama's endorsement of the Saidi Plan, Environment Minister and Likud MK of the entire Israeli government and nation, I believe, when he responded in early April, "Israel does not take orders from President Obama!" He added, "In voting for Netanyahu, Israel has decided not to become the 51st US State."
When IDF Chief of Staff Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi made a trip in mid-March to share fresh intelligence on Iran's nuclear facilities, he was snubbed by the Obama administration in a most humiliating way. He wasn't allowed to see the Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Defense Secretary Robert Gates or even his own counterpart Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He was only allowed to meet with a lower-level assistant to the national security advisor and had to cut his visit several days short.
The Obama administration also initially denied a visitor's visa to the US for PM Netanyahu's national security advisor Dr. Uzi Arad. Incredibly, US officials said that Arad "is suspected of being an intelligence risk." Arad was eventually granted a visa but one has to wonder how deep and wide the negativity of the Obama administration is toward the new Israeli government.
Obama followed up these serious diplomatic snubs by declaring a shift in US policy toward Iran. He announced that he would drop the previous US insistence that Iran cease development of nuclear facilities and that he would opt for face-to-face talks and negotiations instead. This, of course, is a complete reversal of the policies of previous US administrations and a strong slap in the face to Israel.
Obama does not seem to take seriously the Iranians' threat to "wipe Israel off the face of the map." He doesn't seem to understand that nuclear bombs in the hands of the belligerent and apocalyptic Iranian ayatollahs would be a certain existential threat to the nation and people of Israel.
Add to all this Obama's skirting the US Congress and signing a presidential order in February to give $900 million to Gaza to the delight of Hamas, supposedly for the purpose of rebuilding the infrastructure that the Israelis damaged during the recent defensive action. Never mind that the Palestinians have squandered millions of dollars in aid from many sources to build up their military capabilities rather than spend the money to improve the lives and living conditions of their beleaguered people. The US taxpayers are just expected to "pay up, and shut up."
Before that massive sum, Obama had pledged a special gift in late January of $20 million for relief purposes that some believe was meant to provide for several thousand Palestinian Arabs to leave Gaza and resettle in the United States. Apparently, unlike Dr. Arad a Fulbright Scholar and Princeton University Ph.D. none of the Palestinians are considered to be "risks," even though they elected the terrorists who've fired hundreds of rockets into Israel and have vowed to destroy it.
Who can determine a sane rationalization for such an action as this? Doesn't it look strangely like rewarding terrorism? What are Israelis supposed to think about such a move, if true?
I know what we evangelical Christians think about it along with all the other recent Obama statements, decisions and actions. It's obvious he's showing his true colors. And they are not pro-Israel. And while we are at it, not pro-Christan either.