The NYT makes this sound like a bad thing: Mideast Sees More of the Same if Obama Is Elected
“What we know is American presidents all support Israel,” said Muhammad Ibrahim, 23, a university student who works part time selling watermelons on the street in the southern part of this city. “It is hopeless. This one is like the other one. They are all the same. Nothing will change. Don’t expect change.”
Across the border, in Israel, Moshe Cohen could not have agreed more. “Jews there have influence,” Mr. Cohen said, as he sold lottery tickets along Jaffa Road in Jerusalem. “He’ll have to be good to Israel. If not, he won’t be re-elected to a second term.”
And of course to the NYT, that’s a bad thing.
Mr. Obama, who will be here on Tuesday, has promised change. He has offered to begin dialogue where the current president has refused, in places like Syria and Iran. But when he stepped into the Middle East, he walked into a region where public expectations were long ago set. The Bush years have supercharged those sentiments, especially in the Arab world, where there is little faith that the United States can ever again serve as a fair broker between the sides.
How about a different reason for supporting Israel: it actually has more in common with the United States than any Arab state or nation.
For example there’s an effort to pardon Ahmad Dakamseh in Jordan.
In the wake of Israel’s release of despicable murderers of Jewish children, prominent Jordanians are asking King Abdullah to do the same.
And we know that even the reformist March 14th coaltion in Lebanon welcomed back Samir Kuntar – with honors.
The “March 14” movement is a political vehicle for Lebanon’s liberals, democrats, free-market capitalists, human rights activists, and those who want an exit from the seemingly endless war with the “Zionist entity.” Unfortunately, that is not all it is. It’s also a political vehicle for hard-line Sunni Arab Nationalists and other political retrogrades who only oppose Hezbollah and the Syrian Baath regime because they hate Shias and Alawites as much as they hate Jews.
And of course the “moderate” Mahmoud Abbas also sent a congratulations to Kuntar’s family and condolences to Hezbollah. And his government. And his “moderate” Fatah faction named a summer camp after a terrorist whose body was returned last week.
In the meantime an Israeli soldier who didn’t kill an Arab but violated the army’s procedure for dealing with suspects is being investigated by Israeli authorities.
And of course, whatever the Times reports about perceptions in the Arab street and how disappointed they are with the United States belies the fact the the United States is pushing Israel to make more and more concessions even in the light of undiminished Arab enmity and threats:
And then there is Israel. We learn today from Haaretz
that U.S.-Israel relations are being strained by the State Department’s busy-body routine on behalf of all manner of Palestinian complaints, such as Hanan Ashrawi’s daughter’s desire to receive special treatment from the Israeli government over her residency paperwork (Ashrawi’s whining to Rice apparently caused David Welch, the assistant secretary of state, to snap to attention and harass Israeli officials).
. . .
Ah, so the American general doesn’t like the security posture that the Israeli military has determined it must assume in order to protect Israeli lives. And he doesn’t like it that the IDF doesn’t take seriously the Palestinian Authority security services, which are dangerously incompetent, but which the United States has been deeply involved in training. Question for General Jones: Would you put the PA security services in charge of protecting American lives from Hamas?
(That’s a rhetorical question, but as I recall the U.S. sent troops to Ramallah to protect the president and didn’t rely only on the PA security services.)
This leads Daled Amos to comment:
The US is so used to trampling over Israeli interests and needs, that apparently stuff like this is becoming second nature, while still maintaining that everything is normal.
Over and over again we hear from the Arabs and their cheerleaders that the United States can’t be an “honest broker” because it favors Israel even while the Arabs show an undiminished level of hostility to Israel. The United States finds some pretext to pressure Israel in the name of “confidence buliding.” Israel, unwilling to buck its main benefactor relents and allows concessions that are often inimical to its security.
Israel and the United State end up on the defensive, unwilling to justify their alliance.The Arabs get their way without paying a price or giving any credit. And the media (and assorted peace processors) act like an injustice has been righted and that peace is now closer at hand.
Crossposted at Soccer Dad.
