Monday, August 30, 2010
This is the problem with overreaching at home and appeasing abroad. You lose the credibility necessary for getting people to roll the dice with you. In this case, many Israelis have already seen what it's done to America over the past two years: Obama, we're not suckers
Op-ed: Obama may mortgage America's future, but we won't let him do the same to Israel
This past week, the cat was out of the bag and the American president's infinite arrogance came bursting forth. Unlike his European colleagues, whose statements made sure to minimize their involvement to "ending the occupation of 1967," President Obama (via a State Department spokesman) revealed his intention to bring an "end to the conflict."
Does Obama really know how to "end the conflict?" We got the answer two days later, when a document published in the media revealed the US Administration's intention to secure a final-status agreement within a year, while implementing it within 10 years. In other words, Obama wishes to win all the glory while mortgaging the future (our future, not his.)
After all, this is Obama's specialty. The president "saved" the US economy by printing more than $3 trillion, most of which were poured into the American economy via the acquisition of inflated mortgage-backed securities. He's leaving the bill for his successors.
Americans may be willing to clean after Obama and believe that he saved them from collapse (they will find the fractures and skeletons in a few years,) but the State of Israel cannot take such chances. We live in the present and not in promises for a rosy future; hence, the US president would do well to show a little modesty: Learn about the roots of the conflict, understand why there is no solution for it at this time, and most importantly, premise any proposal for an interim agreement on realities on the ground.
If Obama wishes to use the "implementation in 10 years" card to shove a "deal" premised on the types of dreams he's selling to his own people down our throats, we have news for him: We're not your highness' suckers. If you wish to propose something that would be implemented in 10 years, you're invited to come back for a visit nine years from now. Any attempt to look even just one year into the future is dangerous in our neighborhood...[More.]
Reminiscent of Stalin era maps of Moscow and other Soviet cities, wherein the maps in question depicted not the state of things on the ground, but rather reflected how things were planned to be in the future, in five or ten years time.
Maps, in the future indicative mode; the media's and Obama's narcissism cum ideological supremicism, in the future indicative (and present credulous) mode.
Notice how most of the comments that disagree with Trengo attack him as a racist, or as an ingrate who viciously attacks America's president, or as a defender of a country that supposedly stole land from the Palestinians, or as an advocate of violence. I found nothing in Trengo's columns to support these changes, and none of those attacking him even tried to show that the Arabs are sincerely ready to make peace with a Jewish state of Israel.
At the recent Arab League meeting, where the Arabs could have played a helpful role by calling for Abu Mazen to enter peace talks without all the unreasonable demands the PA uses excuses, the Arab they threw the ball back in Abbas's court, perhaps not wanting to take responsibility. Abu Mazen continues to stall, continues the message of "From the River to the sea" in PA media and schools and continues to honor terrorists.
Abbas might well feel that to do otherwise would be his death sentence, as it was for Anwar Sadat, though it's not at all clear that this guy who's PhD (Soviet equivalent) is in Holocaust Denial is really inclined to make peace.
That Abu Mazen would want to have the Arab League back him up is telling. The AL created the PLO, the signatory to the Oslo Accords and now indistinguishable from the PA, but they long ago tried to disengage from Arab-Israeli affairs saying that it was all up to the "Palestinians" and the PLO, their sole, legitimate representative—an invented nationality whose leadership was selected by others. Arafat, whose Fatah milita was the largest faction, and the other warlords were installed not for their ability to lead but their capability to wage war.
So, just who are these Arabs who are ready for peace? Wishing and hoping and praying, even when you can for the moment be sanguine about what you see in the tea leaves isn't enough.
Where's the beef?