WarSclerotic

‘Hamas arrests two in connection with Gaza rockets’ | JPost | Israel News.

Obama and Netanyahu: Closer… but still far apart | JPost | Israel News.

‘CIA feeding intel to Syrian rebel forces’ | JPost | Israel News.

Steinitz: Obama Won’t Interfere in Defense – Defense/Security – News – Israel National News.

Minister Yuval Steinitz

Flash 90

International Relations Minister Yuval Steinitz is optimistic that U.S. President Barack Obama will not interfere if Israel chooses to attack Iran’s nuclear sites.

Speaking to Channel 10 News on Thursday, Steinitz referred to Obama’s remarks during his visit to Israel and said that the President’s visit is “very important and very good”, adding that Obama said in meetings with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu that just as Israel does not interfere with the White House’s decisions, he will not tell Netanyahu how to act when it comes to matters concerning Israel’s security.

Steinitz, who took part in the closed door the meeting between Obama and Netanyahu on Wednesday, before the two held a joint press conference, said that the Israeli media exaggerated in its predictions about Obama’s attitude towards Israel and Netanyahu during his second term.

“Three months ago we heard about the disconnect and the coolness between Obama and Netanyahu,” he said. “I sat there for three hours and tried to find a hint of that, but couldn’t. The atmosphere was very good and the conversation was very open.”

“Obama told the Palestinians, ‘Do not demand preconditions or a settlement freeze in exchange for negotiations.’ He implied that it was only a Palestinian excuse to avoid negotiations,” added Steinitz, referring to Obama’s press conference in Ramallah on Thursday.

Netanyahu said on Wednesday that Israel “will never hand over the right to defend ourselves, even to our best friend – and we have no better friend than the United States.”

He added, “Sanctions on Iran have not succeeded in stopping the nuclear move, and you know that a credible military threat must be added to the sanctions.”

Obama said, “We do not have a policy of containment when it comes to a nuclear Iran,” Obama said. “We prefer to resolve this diplomatically, and there is still time to do so. The international community will continue to increase pressure on Iran, and we will continue to consult closely with Israel.”

Obama’s Israel visit wins over Jews at home | The Times of Israel.

Every side of the American Jewish debate over Israeli-Palestinian peace found something to cheer about

By Haviv Rettig Gur March 22, 2013, 11:52 pm

US President Barack Obama delivers a speech at the Jerusalem Convention Center, March 21 (photo credit: Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama’s much-lauded speech Thursday before a crowd of young Israelis earned widespread praise across the American Jewish ideological spectrum.

The speech dealt with the broad sweep of issues on the US-Israel agenda, giving a wide range of American Jewish groups something to cheer about.

Obama’s criticism of both past Palestinian rejectionism and of their resort to terror earned him high praise from the Anti-Defamation League, among others.

The influential group praised the president for recognizing “the risks Israel has taken for peace, steps often not met with reciprocity from the Palestinians.”

That was the only mention of the Palestinians in the group’s Thursday statement, which went on to thank Obama for emphasizing “the millennia-old connection the Jewish people have to the land of Israel” and “the grave security challenges facing Israel, including terror threats from Hamas, and the dangers posed by a nuclear-armed Iran.”

In a statement Friday, AIPAC “saluted” Obama for the security agreements announced on the trip and his call on the Palestinians to drop preconditions to peace talks.

That tone was echoed in a statement by Jewish Federations of North America board chair Michael Siegal, who praised Obama Friday for having “underscored America’s unshakable bond with the Jewish State at a critical time and expressed a profound understanding of the challenges Israel faces.”

More conservative groups were also broadly supportive of the speech.

The Orthodox Union’s Nathan Diament, head of the organization’s public advocacy arm, told the Times of Israel Friday that the group was “very pleased with [Obama’s] explicit embrace and acknowledgement of thousands of years of history of the Jewish people in the land of Israel. We’re very appreciative of the support, the clear and strong policy, toward Iran obtaining nuclear weapons and the security of Israel.”

When it came to Obama’s call for establishing a Palestinian state in the West Bank, Diament was noncommittal. “The president laid out his view,” he said, but added: “What was important was that [Obama] made it very clear that whatever the details, whatever is going to be decided regarding borders and everything, it’s ultimately going to have to be decided by the parties in negotiations. It can’t be imposed from the outside.”

For their part, left-wing groups seemed thrilled by the speech, which they said forcefully laid out the case for peace.

J Street’s Jeremy Ben-Ami praised Obama for “making the two-state solution a top priority for his administration.”

In a conversation with the Times of Israel Thursday, he pointed to the moment in the speech when Obama told Israelis, “the only way for Israel to endure and thrive as a Jewish and democratic state is through the realization of an independent and viable Palestine.”

“What I saw as the point of the speech was [Obama’s] laying out clearly and starkly the crossroads Israel is at,” Ben-Ami said. Obama spoke of US-Israeli friendship, of Jewish ties to the land of Israel, and then explained to Israelis “that all of that is at risk, the entirety of Israel is at risk, without peace,” Ben-Ami said.

In an email to J Street supporters, Ben-Ami wrote that the speech represented “our moment — our time to lead! Never has anyone expressed with greater clarity and with greater conviction everything that our movement fights for and holds dear.”

The left-leaning Israel Policy Forum, in an email that quoted the same line from Obama’s speech, said simply, “We could not agree more.”

One US Jewish official who asked not to be named offered a reason for the widespread praise the speech garnered.

While Obama emphatically and passionately called for peace talks, he separated the issue of peace from the issue of security, the official said. “Security is something Israel needs fundamentally, and Obama has secured it for them regardless of peace. All the tangible things that were announced were on Iran and security. He could have announced new talks. He could have announced that [Secretary of State John] Kerry would host a meeting of the sides. There was nothing like that. No deadlines, nothing.”

So while Obama issued perhaps the most impassioned call for peace yet in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, “his position is that ultimately the two sides have to figure it out themselves.”

Obama Israel Speech: A Big Breakthrough | New Republic.

Thursday’s speech may have singlehandedly repaired a rocky relationship

BY YOSSI KLEIN HALEVI

Barack Obama came to Jerusalem to win over the Israeli people, and with a single speech he did. It happened when he addressed an audience of several thousand young people in Jerusalem and delivered what may have been the most passionate Zionist speech ever given by an American president.

Of course, his embrace had an explicit message for Israelis: Don’t give up on the dream of peace and don’t forget that the Palestinians deserve a state just as you do. But as the repeated ovations from the politically and culturally diverse audience revealed, these are messages that Israelis can hear when couched in affection and solidarity. After four years of missed signals, Obama finally realized that Israelis respond far more to love than to pressure.

Until that speech it was easy to be cynical about the visit. Everyone seemed to be trying too hard. “An Unbreakable Friendship,” proclaimed the government posters on the streets, sounding more anxious than celebratory. And Obama’s affirmation of Israel’s three thousand year history, delivered moments after he stepped off the plane, was a transparent attempt to get it right.

By contrast, his speech to the students was no string of sound bites but a sustained argument for Israel—its legitimacy, its faith, its fears. Obama acknowledged—no, he deeply affirmed—the well-earned right of Israelis to be skeptical of appeals to peace. You held out your hand in friendship and made a credible offer for peace and that was rejected, he told us. You withdrew from Gaza and got missiles in return. And when you look around the region, you see instability and wonder how peace can possibly come.

One could sense the gratitude—the relief—in the audience: Finally, an acknowledgment of the Israeli narrative for the absence of peace.

And when Obama urged us to nevertheless not despair of peace, he was appropriately cautious. No, there were no guarantees that peace will happen even if we resume negotiations, but we need to keep trying.

Yes we can—maybe.

Obama’s goal in coming to Israel was to establish a relationship of trust with the Israeli people—to enlist our support for a renewed peace process with the Palestinians. But for Israelis, the least credible part of his talk was when he tried to convince us that Mahmoud Abbas is ready to make peace—or that the Arab Spring has created an opening for reconciliation with the Middle East. That’s hardly the reality we see emerging around us. There was something deeply unsettling, almost cruel, in trying to reawaken our suppressed hopes for normalcy—for a new Middle East, in the language of the Oslo peace process.

In one sense Obama did succeed. Next time the Israeli government announces a settlement expansion, there will likely be widespread opposition, rather than indifference, among the public. Obama has reminded us that, even in the absence of peace, we have a responsibility not to take steps that will make an eventual peace all the more difficult.

Obama’s biggest misstep in the speech was urging Israelis to pressure their government. That was an ungracious and inappropriate moment. Worse, it was unnecessary. Many Israelis already got the point: When the President of the United States come here to demonstrate his friendship, we shouldn’t respond by expanding settlements.

Obama’s more subtle goal in trying to connect with the Israeli public was to convince us to trust him on Iran—to give up the option of a unilateral Israeli strike. But it’s doubtful whether Israelis will trust anyone with their security on an existential threat. When Obama said that he has our back on Iran, Netanyahu’s pointed response was that Israel can defend itself. That’s exactly what many of us want to hear from our prime minister.

Obama’s achievement is to have ended the debate here about whether or not he is a friend of Israel. But that was always the wrong question. The real question is whether Obama’s policies—on Iran, on Syria, on Egypt—are helping create a safer or more dangerous region. When the impact of Obama’s embrace inevitably fades, we will be left with the fear that, for all his affection for us, this President still doesn’t understand how to deal with the Middle East.

Yossi Klein Halevi is a contributing editor of TNR and a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem. His forthcoming book is Like Dreamers: The Paratroopers Who Reunited Jerusalem in the Six-Day War and the Divided Israel They Created.

Poll: 64% of Americans would support U.S. strike to prevent Iran’s nuclear program – Diplomacy & Defense – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

New Pew Research poll, released ahead of Obama’s Israel visit, finds support for strike is higher among Republicans and lower among Democrats. A plurality among Americans believe Obama pursuing ‘balanced’ course in Middle East.

By Chemi Shalev | Mar.19, 2013 | 6:28 PM | 21

The Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran. Photo by AP

By Rabbi Eric H. Yoffie | Mar.19,2013 | 6:28 PM | 6

A solid majority of the American public would support a U.S. military action against Iran in order to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons, according to a new poll published in Washington on Tuesday by the Pew Research Center.

According to the poll, 64% of Americans believe it is “more important to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, even it means taking military action” compared to only 25% who think that it is more important to “avoid military conflict, even if Iran may develop nuclear weapons.”

The poll, carried out between March 13-17 among 1501 American adults, finds that support for a military strike is strongest among Republican voters (80%) compared to Democrats (62%) and Independents (59%). The poll reflects a rise in American support for such a strike, if warranted, from 58% a year ago to 64% today.

The poll is one in a series of new polls released in advance of President Obama’s visit to Israel, which starts Wednesday. Though the absolute numbers vary, the polls point to a strong preference for Israel over the Palestinians. The polls also show that this support for Israel is stronger among older, conservative Republicans and weaker among younger, liberal Democrats.

In the Pew poll, 49% say that “in the dispute between Israel and the Palestinians” they sympathize more with Israel, compared to 12% who side with the Palestinians and 39% who either support neither or support both sides equally. The strongest support comes from white Evangelical Protestants (72%) and the weakest from Democrats (39%) and those aged 18-29 (36%).

The poll also finds that a plurality of 41% believe that Obama is “striking the right balance” in “the Middle East situation,” compared to 21% who maintain that the President is “favoring the Palestinians too much” and 9% who think that he favors Israel too much. 39% of Republicans believe that Obama favors the Palestinians, compared to only 7% of the Democrats.

Obama reassures Israel, while taking a step back from the Middle East – Obama visits Israel Israel News | Haaretz.

The region is still important to the United States, but less so than it was a decade or two ago; meanwhile, Israel’s dependence on the U.S. continues to grow.

By Aluf Benn | Mar.21, 2013 | 5:06 AM | 22

Obama, Netanyahu and Peres listen to the national anthem at Israel’s airport. Photo by AFP

By The Associated Press, Reuters and Barak Ravid

Mar.21,2013 | 5:06 AM | 28

U.S. President Barack Obama said Wednesday his visit to Israel was meant to be a reassuring one. He is here to make it clear to Israelis that America stands behind them and will ensure their security, even though the neighborhood has become tougher.

What President Shimon Peres and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to hear was Obama making a firm commitment to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and to cushion the shock waves that could result from Syria’s disintegration.

It is premature to assess whether Peres and Netanyahu were satisfied by the promises made by the visitor, who asked for time for diplomatic negotiations with Iran and demanded that Syrian President Bashar Assad guard his chemical weapons.

The visit comes at a time when the United States is withdrawing from its deep involvement in the Middle East, amid the growing fear of Israel and other regional allies that America will abandon them to radical Islamic forces.

America entered the region with all its might, as its dependence on oil imports increased. But following the development of new oil and natural gas production methods in North America, the United States is gradually freeing itself of reliance on external energy sources.

In a few years it will become an oil exporter. The Middle East is still important, but it is less vital than it was a decade or two ago.

America has tired of the wars in the Middle East that consumed its resources and robbed its attention in the past decade, without resulting in a decisive victory. Obama has already pulled the U.S. Army out of Iraq, and will take it out of Afghanistan this term. The old regional order, with its reliance on secular military dictatorships and pro-American monarchies, has collapsed under the revolutions of the Arab Spring and the strengthening of the region’s Islamic movements.

The United States has discovered it cannot control these upheavals, and it doesn’t want to get involved in civil wars like the one in Syria. It prefers to stand by and see who wins.

Under these circumstances, pressure on Israel will increase. Until now, Israel has benefited from American safeguards in the region that have bolstered its deterrence capability, helped to safeguard the peace accords with Egypt and Jordan, and protected it from distant regional powers like Iran and Iraq. And when Israel is worried, or when it feels that its security concerns are not being given the attention they deserve in Washington, it has a tendency to take risks and use military force to perpetuate the strategic status quo.

Obama is projecting very different images domestically and overseas: He is trying to draw his country inward while telling his allies in the Middle East that, despite what they may be witnessing, the United States is just as committed to them as ever.

This attitude is reminiscent of Richard Nixon. In 1969 Nixon laid out the American foreign policy strategy that came to be known as the Guam Doctrine or the Nixon Doctrine, which made it clear that Washington would no longer undertake the defense of the free nations of the world. That was the first step toward an eventual American withdrawal from Vietnam, and Nixon, who had to sell the idea to his allies in Asia, assured them that everything would be fine.

The best way for Israel to ensure that the Americans remain committed is to threaten some unilateral action that would drag in the United States. That’s exactly what Netanyahu did Wednesday in his public appearances with Obama. He kept on talking about Israel’s right to defend itself. In rough translation from diplo-speak, that means, “If you don’t take action to get Iran to thwart its nuclear project, we will be forced to act alone − and you’ll suffer the consequences as much as we will.”

In the meantime, Obama has no clear-cut solution to the Iranian problem, or to the disintegration of Syria. He’s also finding it hard to bring his influence to bear on the political crisis in Egypt and to assuage Israeli concerns that the Muslim Brotherhood is planning to annul the Israel-Egypt peace treaty. So he’s playing for time by reassuring Israel, by whispering sweet nothings of unconditional love and support into the ears of the Israeli people, and by publicly referring to the prime minister by his nickname.

And there’s a good chance it will work. With every passing day, Israel becomes less capable of taking out Iran’s nuclear facilities by itself, while its dependence on the United States for military superiority just keeps growing.

Barack Obama has a dream, and we should listen – Opinion – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

No American president or Israeli statesman has ever delivered a speech like this. It deserves to enter the history books – and Israel’s textbooks.

Obama in Jerusalem

By Debra Kamin | Mar.22,2013 | 4:12 PM | 1

It was worth it. It was worth listening to the first (and slightly embarrassing) part of the speech; it was worth the thousands of miles that were crossed to get here and the thousands of sweet words showered upon our heads; the removal of the suit jacket and the demonstration in Ramallah; the reference to “Eretz Nehederet;” Obama’s Hebrew declaration “Ah-tem lo lah-vahd” (you are not alone); Osher Twito; the Holocaust; the Seder night and Herzl, and all the other shtick. Every bit of it was worth it to get to the second part of this great speech.

It was the speech of justice. If there are still historical speeches, then this speech from Barack Obama’s can be classified as one of them. No American president has ever delivered a speech like this, nor has any Israeli statesman. American presidents and even Israel prime ministers have talked about two states; but no one spoke of natural justice the way Obama did, a concept that should be obvious; obvious to every decent citizen in the world today; and which should serve as a beacon for every Israeli citizen with a conscience.

What began as a speech that could have been given before AIPAC soon evolved into a speech by Martin Luther King. If Martin Luther Obama’s Cairo speech resonated deeply and sparked revolutions (which didn’t always start well), then maybe this speech at the Jerusalem Convention Center will also resonate deeply and spark revolutions. The president of the United States took a step toward the fundamental value: justice. Now it’s Israelis’ turn to do so.

It won’t happen immediately – Israeli society is too preoccupied with shallow things – but maybe the seed has been planted. Perhaps at the end of a busy day considering the “universal draft law,” Israelis will also listen to these powerful statements about occupation and deportation, Palestinian children and settlers, freedom for all and peace as the only path to true security.

Obama is back to being Obama, big time. The exciting promise he displayed on that election night in Chicago four years ago, that has since disappointed, was awakened last night last night to the sound of Israeli students’ applause. But in the aftermath of the applause, will people internalize what he said? Obama took the Zionist narrative – the one that Benjamin Netanyahu and his ilk tried to preach to him – and skillfully turned the tables completely. Passover reminded him of slavery in Africa, the Palestinian girls he met in Ramallah reminded him of his daughters, and the subtext is: No to slavery, no to apartheid, and no to the occupation. Maybe Israelis will finally – and not just fleetingly – put themselves in the shoes of the Palestinians, just as their greatest friend in modern times exhorted them to do yesterday. Yes, Obama is a true friend, one that tells the truth, even when it hurts.

Obama’s visit put things in perspective. He showed the Israelis how feeble, insignificant and small their leaders were. Next to this great man, Netanyahu was tiny – and he dwarfed those so-called instigators of Israeli change, Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett. This speech should have been made by one of them; but they will probably never make it. Now this speech should enter the history books, as well as Israel’s textbooks. Listen and make sure you pay attention: this is the voice of justice, and it is calling for change and for tikkun.

After two whirlwind days, Haaretz contributors weigh in on Obama’s visit – Obama visits Israel Israel News | Haaretz.

Remarking on a trip jam-packed with pomp, circumstance and one stirring landmark speech, Haaretz writers and columnists examine several angles of a very busy presidential visit.

President Barack Obama, left, puts his hand on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as they walk out together following their joint news conference in Jerusalem, Israel,Wednesday, March 20, 2013

By Judy Maltz, Anshel Pfeffer, Barak Ravid and Haaretz

Mar.22,2013 | 3:26 PM | 7

Obama’s visit is a royal visit of love, says Ari Shavit, referencing the poem by Israel Pincas. Here the president displayed in his actions a heart yearning for peace, with perhaps a touch of naivete, while his speech in Jerusalem served as a softly admonishing wake-up call for Israelis to enact a promising future.

Sometimes it takes someone from the outside, says Yossi Verter, to tell it like it is. Leading up to the heart of his speech with narratives of sympathy for Israel’s plight, Obama changed tone to urge Israelis to recognize Palestinians’ equal right to freedom and a land to call their own. While he is undoubtedly a supporter of Israel, his words belied that he is no blind follower either.

After Obama’s visit, it will be more difficult for his rivals to claim that he has Israel’s worst interests at heart, says Chemi Shalev. Obama’s speech, delivered directly to Israeli citizens in a carefully crafted mix of support, concern and leveled calls for responsibility, might be seen as an attempt to wipe the slate clean for a new beginning, making way for better relations between the United States, Israel and her neighbors in the Middle East.

The diverse crowd of young students present for Obama’s speech reacted, to the surprise of many, with widespread positivity to his statements about ending Palestine’s occupation by Israel, says Ilene Prusher, though not all showed signs of support. Much of the crowd seemed to appreciate his honesty and willingness to see things from an Israeli perspective. One comment, which specifically cited the need to end counterproductive settlement activity, proved to be divisive however.

Debra Kamin recalls the emotion of being at Obama’s first presidential acceptance speech in Chicago in 2008. Now, as a dual Israeli-American citizen at his address to the public in Jerusalem, she ruminates on the personal meaning of nationhood and the pride, despite sometimes feeling like a stranger, in being able to sing the anthems and hear the leaders of two countries she can call her own.

Whether or not you agreed with Obama’s speech, it’s impossible to remain indifferent, says Barak Ravid. Obama’s chilling address touched all the right notes. He demonstrated an understanding of Israel’s heritage, culture and history. He spoke with an earnest desire to solve its current regional troubles and begin to pave the way for peace. The only question is if Israelis will get on board.

Elections are over, says Aluf Benn, and both leaders acknowledge the importance of working together at this point. Recognizing the threat Iranian nuclear power would impose, Obama is tasked with preparing a military option, the timetable for which he and Netanyahu do not agree on, while striving toward diplomatic negotiations. Getting closer on a personal basis will make relations easier, but doesn’t solve their dispute over the West Bank.

An expose released by The New York Times casts doubt on Iron Dome’s effectiveness, says Alan Dershowitz, with claims that its success rate is significantly lower than what has been said. Whether true or not, this will change the perception of the Iron Dome’s efficiency. The good news remains that Israeli and Palestinian leadership are closer to negotiations.