Column One: Obama's war on Israel By CAROLINE GLICK The Jerusalem Post
19/03/2010 15:56
www.jpost.com/Opinion/Columnists/Article.aspx?id=171364

Obama claims he's launched a political war against Israel in the interest of
promoting peace. But this claim, too, does not stand up to scrutiny.
Talkbacks (4)Why has President Barak Obama decided to foment a crisis in US
relations with Israel?

Some commentators have claimed that it is Israel's fault. As they tell it,
the news that Israel has not banned Jewish construction in Jerusalem - after
repeatedly refusing to ban such construction - drove Obama into a fit of
uncontrolled rage from which he has yet to recover.

While popular, this claim makes no sense. Obama didn't come to be called "No
drama Obama" for nothing. It is not credible to argue that Jerusalem's local
planning board's decision to approve the construction of 1,600 housing units
in Ramat Shlomo drove cool Obama into a fit of wild rage at Prime Minister
Binyamin Netanyahu.

Obama himself claims that he has launched a political war against Israel in
the interest of promoting peace. But this claim, too, does not stand up to
scrutiny.

On Friday, Obama ordered Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to present
Netanyahu with a four-part ultimatum.

First, Israel must cancel the approval of the housing units in Ramat Shlomo.

Second, Israel must prohibit all construction for Jews in Jerusalem
neighborhoods built since 1967.

Third, Israel must make a gesture to the Palestinians to show them we want
peace. The US suggests releasing hundreds of Palestinian terrorists from
Israeli prisons.

Fourth, Israel must agree to negotiate all substantive issues, including the
partition of Jerusalem (including the Jewish neighborhoods constructed since
1967 that are now home to more than a half million Israelis) and the
immigration of millions of hostile foreign Arabs to Israel under the rubric
of the so-called "right of return," in the course of indirect, Obama
administration-mediated negotiations with the Palestinians. To date, Israel
has maintained that substantive discussions can only be conducted in direct
negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian officials.

If Israel does not accept all four US demands, then the Obama administration
will boycott Netanyahu and his senior ministers. In the first instance, this
means that if Netanyahu comes to Washington next week for the AIPAC
conference, no senior administration official will meet with him.

Obama's ultimatum makes clear that mediating peace between Israel and the
Palestinians is not a goal he is interested in achieving.

Obama's new demands follow the months of American pressure that eventually
coerced Netanyahu into announcing both his support for a Palestinian state
and a 10-month ban on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria. No previous
Israeli government had ever been asked to make the latter concession.

Netanyahu was led to believe that in return for these concessions Obama
would begin behaving like the credible mediator his predecessors were. But
instead of acting like his predecessors, Obama has behaved like the
Palestinians. Rather than reward Netanyahu for taking a risk for peace,
Obama has, in the model of Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, pocketed
Netanyahu's concessions and escalated his demands. This is not the behavior
of a mediator. This is the behavior of an adversary.

With the US president treating Israel like an enemy, the Palestinians have
no reason to agree to sit down and negotiate. Indeed, they have no choice
but to declare war.

And so, in the wake of Obama's onslaught on Israel's right to Jerusalem,
Palestinian incitement against Israel and Jews has risen to levels not seen
since the outbreak of the last terror war in September 2000. And just as
night follows day, that incitement has led to violence. This week's Arab
riots from Jerusalem to Jaffa, and the renewed rocket offensive from Gaza
are directly related to Obama's malicious attacks on Israel.

But if his campaign against Israel wasn't driven by a presidential temper
tantrum, and it isn't aimed at promoting peace, what explains it? What is
Obama trying to accomplish?

There are five explanations for Obama's behavior. And they are not mutually
exclusive.

First, Obama's assault on Israel is likely related to the failure of his
Iran policy. Over the past week, senior administration officials including
Gen. David Petraeus have made viciously defamatory attacks on Israel,
insinuating that the construction of homes for Jews in Jerusalem is a
primary cause for bad behavior on the part of Iran and its proxies in Iraq,
Afghanistan, Lebanon, Syria and Gaza. By this line of thinking, if Israel
simply returned to the indefensible 1949 armistice lines, Iran's centrifuges
would stop spinning, and Syria, al-Qaida, the Taliban, Hizbullah, Hamas and
the Iranian Revolutionary Guards would all beat their swords into
plowshares.

Second, even more important than its usefulness as a tool to divert the
public's attention away from the failure of his Iran policy, Obama's assault
against Israel may well be aimed at maintaining that failed policy.
Specifically, he may be attacking Israel in a bid to coerce Netanyahu into
agreeing to give Obama veto power over any Israeli strike against Iran's
nuclear installations. That is, the anti-Israel campaign may be a means to
force Israel to stand by as Obama allows Iran to build a nuclear arsenal.

For the past several months, an endless line of senior administration
officials have descended on Jerusalem with the expressed aim of convincing
Netanyahu to relinquish Israel's right to independently strike Iran's
nuclear installations. All of these officials have returned to Washington
empty-handed. Perhaps Obama has decided that since quiet pressure has failed
to cow Netanyahu, it is time to launch a frontal attack against him.

This brings us to the third explanation for why Obama has decided to go to
war with the democratically elected Israeli government. Obama's advisers
told friendly reporters that Obama wants to bring down Netanyahu's
government. By making demands Netanyahu and his coalition partners cannot
accept, Obama hopes to either bring down the government and replace
Netanyahu and Likud with the far-leftist Tzipi Livni and Kadima, or force
Israel Beiteinu and Shas to bolt the coalition and compel Netanyahu to
accept Livni as a co-prime minister. Livni, of course, won Obama's heart
when in 2008 she opted for an election rather than accept Shas's demand that
she protect the unity of Jerusalem.

The fourth explanation for Obama's behavior is that he seeks to realign US
foreign policy away from Israel. Obama's constant attempts to cultivate
relations with Iran's unelected president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Ahmadinejad's
Arab lackey Syrian dictator Bashar Assad, and Turkey's Islamist Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan make clear that he views developing US
relations with these anti-American regimes as a primary foreign policy goal.

Given that all of these leaders have demanded that in exchange for better
relations Obama abandon Israel as a US ally, and in light of the professed
anti-Israel positions of several of his senior foreign policy advisers, it
is possible that Obama is seeking to downgrade US relations with Israel. His
consistent castigation of Israel as obstructionist and defiant has led some
surveys to claim that over the past year US popular support for Israel has
dropped from 77 to 58 percent.

The more Obama fills newspaper headlines with allegations that Israel is
responsible for everything from US combat deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan to
Iran's nuclear program, the lower those numbers can be expected to fall. And
the more popular American support for Israel falls, the easier it will be
for Obama to engineer an open breach with the Jewish state.

The final explanation for Obama's behavior is that he is using his
manufactured crisis to justify adopting an overtly anti-Israel position
vis-à-vis the Palestinians. On Thursday,The New York Times reported that
administration officials are considering having Obama present his own "peace
plan." Given the administration's denial of Israel's right to Jerusalem, an
"Obama plan," would doubtless require Israel to withdraw to the indefensible
1949 armistice lines and expel some 700,000 Jews from their homes.

Likewise, the crisis Obama has manufactured with Israel could pave the way
for him to recognize a Palestinian state if the Palestinians follow through
on their threat to unilaterally declare statehood next year regardless of
the status of negotiations with Israel. Such a US move could in turn lead to
the deployment of US forces in Judea and Samaria to "protect" the
unilaterally declared Palestinian state from Israel.

Both Obama's behavior and the policy goals it indicates make it clear that
Netanyahu's current policy of trying to appease Obama by making concrete
concessions is no longer justified. Obama is not interested in being won
over. The question is, what should Netanyahu do?

One front in the war Obama has started is at home. Netanyahu must ensure
that he maintains popular domestic support for his government to scuttle
Obama's plan to overthrow his government. So far, in large part due to Obama's
unprecedented nastiness, Netanyahu's domestic support has held steady. A
poll conducted for IMRA news service this week by Maagar Mohot shows that
fully 75% of Israeli Jews believe Obama's behavior toward Israel is
unjustified. As for Netanyahu, 71% of Israeli Jews believe his refusal to
accept Obama's demand to ban Jewish building in Jerusalem proves he is a
strong leader. Similarly, a Shvakim Panorama poll for Israel Radio shows
public support for Kadima has dropped by more than 30% since last year's
election.

The other front in Obama's war is the American public. By blaming Israel for
the state of the Middle East and launching personal barbs against Netanyahu,
Obama seeks to drive down popular American support for Israel. In building a
strategy to counter Obama's moves, Netanyahu has to keep two issues in mind.

First, no foreign leader can win a popularity contest against a sitting US
president. Therefore, Netanyahu must continue to avoid any personal attacks
on Obama. He must limit his counter-offensive to a defense of Israel's
interests and his government's policies.

Second, Netanyahu must remember that Obama's hostility toward Israel is not
shared by the majority of Americans. Netanyahu's goal must be to strengthen
and increase the majority of Americans who support Israel. To this end,
Netanyahu must go to Washington next week and speak at the annual AIPAC
conference as planned, despite the administration's threat to boycott him.

While in Washington, Netanyahu should meet with every Congressman and
Senator who wishes to meet with him as well as every administration member
who seeks him out. Moreover, he should give interviews to as many television
networks, newspapers and major radio programs as possible in order to bring
his message directly to the American people.

Obama has made clear that he is not Israel's ally. And for the remainder of
his term, he will do everything he can to downgrade US relations with Israel
while maintaining his constant genuflection to the likes of Iran, Syria, the
Palestinians and Turkey.

But like Israel, the US is a free country. And as long as popular support
for Israel holds steady, Obama's options will be limited. Netanyahu's task
is to maintain that support in the face of administration hostility as he
implements policies toward Iran and the Arabs alike that are necessary to
ensure Israel's long-term survival and prosperity.