Washington up in arms over Michael Oren’s Obama remarks
Israel Hayom | Washington up in arms over Michael Oren’s Obama remarks.
( Mike Bornstein was my friend at Columbia College and grad school. Together with Dore Gold who helped me found a Jewish communal house at Columbia all made Alliah at the same time in 1979. Mike changed his last name to “Oren” while mine became Wouk Bar-Ze’ev.
Gold served as Ambassador to the UN and has now been appointed Director General of the Foreign Ministry. Mike wrote the definitive work on the 6 day war, “Six Days in June.”
As Ambassador to the US he was derided as being too “lefty” for simply doing his job as a diplomat. Today he is showing us what REALLY was going on beneath the smiles.
I couldn’t be PROUDER of his courage and forthrightness. God bless you, Mike. – JW )
After the Kulanu MK sparks storm by saying President Obama intentionally damaged U.S.-Israeli relations, Israeli officials asked to dissociate themselves from the remarks • Source close to PM says no comment from Netanyahu because Oren is not in the cabinet.
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Former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. and current Kulanu MK Michael Oren
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Photo credit: KOKO
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The political storm surrounding Kulanu MK Michael Oren continues to simmer, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declining to comment on Oren’s controversial comments.
Oren, a former ambassador to the U.S. who was elected to the Knesset in the March election, sparked a firestorm on Tuesday by saying that U.S. President Barack Obama has deliberately damaged U.S.-Israel relations. U.S. Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro spoke with senior Israeli officials and has asked them to dissociate themselves from Oren’s claims.
Sources close to the prime minister said Netanyahu was refusing to issue an official statement on the matter because Oren is not a member of the cabinet. The Prime Minister’s Office also chose not to address the issue.
The storm broke out after Oren, who served as Israel ambassador to the U.S. from 2009-2013, wrote a memoir about his time in Washington titled “Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israeli Divide,” slated to be published in the U.S. next week.
In an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal titled “How Obama Abandoned Israel” Oren accused Obama of violating the “two core principles of Israel’s alliance with America,” which, according to Oren, are “no daylight” and “no surprises.”
Following the book and the article, Shapiro slammed Oren in an interview with Army Radio on Wednesday and referred to Oren’s version of events as imaginary. Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon, head of the Kulanu party, apologized for Oren’s claims, however, and sent a letter to Shapiro saying Oren’s views did not represent the party.
Strategic Affairs Minister Gilad Erdan (Likud) also criticized Oren, saying, “Oren’s statements do not correspond with reality. He is mistaken to accuse President Obama of malevolent intentions against Israel.”
“The president [Obama] has prevented harmful decisions from being carried out against Israel at the U.N. and worked diligently to strengthen security cooperation between the two countries. Saying that Obama has abandoned Israel is a detached statement,” Erdan said.
“There are fundamental disagreements between the two countries and we are going to defend our positions, but the U.S. has always been, and still is, our greatest ally that largely contributes to Israel’s economy, security and strength,” he said.
WarSclerotic 
June 21, 2015 at 8:05 PM
The Michael Oren Trilogy
http://www.madisdead.blogspot.co.il/2015/06/the-michael-oren-trilogy.html
Congratulations to Michael Oren for presenting the case for Israel in such a masterful way. This should have been done years go. As the Iranian nuclear threat looms over our future, Israelis have come to the conclusion that the truth must be told.
From “Why Obama is wrong about Iran being ‘rational’ on nukes’:
Both nations’ technical estimates on Iran largely dovetailed. Where the two sides differed was over the nature of the Islamic Republic. The Americans tended to see Iranian leaders as logical actors who understood that the world would never allow them to attain nuclear weapons and would penalize them mercilessly — even militarily — for any attempt to try.
By contrast, most Israelis viewed the ayatollahs as radical jihadists who claimed they took instructions from the Shiite “Hidden Imam,” tortured homosexuals and executed women accused of adultery, and strove to commit genocide against Jews. Israelis could not rule out the possibility that the Iranians would be willing to sacrifice half of their people as martyrs in a war intended to “wipe Israel off the map.”
As famed Middle East scholar Bernard Lewis once observed, “Mutually assured destruction” for the Iranian regime “is not a deterrent — it’s an inducement.”
From “How Obama Opened His Heart to the ‘Muslim World’”
Obama’s boycotting of the memorial in Paris, like his refusal to acknowledge the identity of the perpetrators, the victims, or even the location of the market massacre, provides a broad window into his thinking on Islam and the Middle East. Simply put: The president could not participate in a protest against Muslim radicals whose motivations he sees as a distortion, rather than a radical
interpretation, of Islam. And if there are no terrorists spurred by Islam, there can be no purposely selected Jewish shop or intended Jewish victims, only a deli and randomly present folks.
From: “How Obama Abandoned Israel”:
Finally, in 2014, Israel discovered that its primary ally had for months been secretly negotiating with its deadliest enemy. The talks resulted in an interim agreement that the great majority of Israelis considered a “bad deal” with an irrational, genocidal regime. Mr. Obama, though, insisted that Iran was a rational and potentially “very successful regional power.”
June 23, 2015 at 8:13 PM
“When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall. Think of it–always.”
― Mahatma Gandhi
June 23, 2015 at 11:53 PM
Nice guy
Gandhi said (see Wikiquote, for example) in May 1940: “I do not consider Hitler to be as bad as he is depicted. He is showing an ability that is amazing and seems to be gaining his victories without much bloodshed.” Also some would question whether this other Gandhi quote, “Hitler killed five million [sic] Jews. It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AMahatma_Gandhi/Gandhi_and_the_Jews%3A_Whether_he_was_%27Racist%27
June 24, 2015 at 3:12 PM
I’m merely repeating the message. To me, it makes a valid point.