Posted on 03/02/2015 2:45:29 PM PST by Star Traveler
With the US-Israel train wreck unavoidable on Tuesday, the challenge now is to pick up the pieces and refocus on thwarting Tehran
The prime minister has created the dismal situation whereby even his speech to AIPAC, a day prior to Tuesday’s address to Congress, becomes somewhat problematic. Not only are America’s legislators being asked to choose between their president and the Israeli prime minister, as the veteran administration official Dennis Ross observed at the weekend. But AIPAC’s 16,000-strong, overwhelmingly Jewish audience, in mightily applauding Netanyahu, will be seen by some critics as endorsing a stance against the White House — even though many of those 16,000 have no desire to be torn in this way.
Netanyahu’s handling of this face-off has been staggeringly inept, another activist volunteered, and it follows a pattern of his alienating of world leaders — including but not limited to Nicolas Sarkozy and Francois Hollande and Joe Biden — and of exacerbating problems for Jewish communities — notably those in Europe that he has been urging to immigrate to Israel en masse.
There’s a good deal of truth in these critiques. There’s a great deal of truth, too, in the assertions from critics at home that this trip, this poking of a finger in the eye of President Barack Obama, is a calculated electoral gambit, designed to bolster support for the ostensibly unflinching Netanyahu among right-wing voters back home, to prevent them from defecting to rival parties and denying him victory on March 17. There’s no doubting the political machinations that saw the Prime Minister’s Office release a short clip of Netanyahu [ ... ] filmed at the Western Wall ahead of this trip — co-opting Judaism’s holiest place of worship to his campaign.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesofisrael.com ...
There does happen to be a lot of other voters in Israel who don't want IRAN to have nuclear weapons either, but they are against Netanyahu in how he is going about it. They love and support Israel and know that Iran has to be stopped, but they're not agreeing with Netanyshu's way!
Retired Israeli veterans warn against speech [Netanyahu Congressional Speech]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3263242/posts
“When the Israeli prime minister argues that his speech will stop Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, he is not only misleading Israel, he is strengthening Iran,” Amnon Reshef, former head of the army’s armored corps, said at a news conference Sunday.
— — —
TEL AVIV — Hours after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu set off Sunday for Washington, a group of 180 retired Israeli generals and former top security officials warned that his upcoming address to a joint meeting of Congress on Iran’s nuclear program will cause more harm than good.
It will not only damage Israel’s special relationship with the United States but also undermine military and intelligence ties, they said.
Rather than slowing down Iran’s nuclear project, the former security officials said, Netanyahu’s speech Tuesday will bring the Islamic republic closer to developing a nuclear bomb.
Israel Elections: Zionist Union gains slight edge over Likud in Friday polls
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3263315/posts
Polls published in Israeli media on Friday showed the center-left Zionist Union gaining some ground against its right-wing Likud rivals ahead of March 17’s general elections.
Zionist Union had a slight edge over Likud in two polls: 25-23 mandates in a Maariv poll and 23-22 in an Israel Radio poll. A survey on the Walla news site had the two parties tied at 23, while the website’s poll last week had Likud leading by one seat.
Meanwhile, the Jewish Home party saw a slight dip in the surveys. While four different polls last week placed Naftali Bennett’s national religious party in a solid third place with 13 mandates, Friday’s numbers were less encouraging: Maariv had the Joint (Arab) List as the third largest party with 13 seats, followed by Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid at 12 and Jewish Home at 11. Israel Radio also had the Joint List at 13, with Jewish Home and Yesh Atid tied at 12. Meanwhile the Walla poll kept Jewish Home at 13, but it was now tied with Yesh Atid, followed by the Joint List with 12.
Moshe Kahlon’s Kulanu party received 9 Knesset seats in the Israel Radio poll, 8 in Maariv and 7 in Walla.
Walla and Maariv had ultra-Orthodox parties Shas and United Torah Judaism tied at 7 seats, while Israel Radio gave Shas the lead 8-6.
Next in line were polar opposites Meretz and Yisrael Beytenu. On Israel Radio, Avigdor Lieberman’s party received 6 seats to Zahava Gal-on’s 5. Walla had it 6-4, while Maariv had both parties at 5 seats.
Eli Yishai’s Yachad party had 4 seats according to Israel Radio and Maariv and 5 seats according to Walla.
Although the polls were released on Friday, they were likely conducted before Thursday’s televised debate on Channel 2, which featured the leaders of all the parties except Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, head of the Likud, Zionist Union’s Isaac Herzog and UTJ’s Yaakov Litzman.
Though the Zionist Union leads in the polls, Netanyahu continues to have a better prospect of forming a coalition than Herzog. The nature of the next government will depend on recommendations made to President Reuven Rivlin by senior figures from all parties once the votes are counted. Rivlin will entrust the task of building a coalition with the candidate he assesses has the better chance of doing so.
The past week was a difficult one for Netanyahu, with a new report by the state comptroller released on Wednesday blaming the government for runaway housing costs in recent years.
Between 2008 and December 2013, the real cost for purchasing an apartment rose by a steep 55%, while the average monthly rent rose 30%, according to government figures. The issue of skyrocketing housing prices, amid unmet demand, has risen to the fore in recent years as Israelis have protested over the high cost of living, most notably in the summer of 2011.
The report, coming less than a month before Israelis go to the polls, was seen as having the potential to boost opposition parties looking to unseat Netanyahu by highlighting economic issues.
- Marissa Newman contributed to this report
That would be foolhardy in the extreme.
Telling the facts about Iran is going to hurt ,HUH.
Do lefty’s and nutjobs drink some drink which makes them high all the time or something.
Instead of looking at how fairy boy has acted they attack the man trying to stop Iran getting nukes.
If anyone in this world does not think that the left all work together and have the same talking point sent out around the globe by now then they should wake up.
Joe Biden is a world leader?
Who knew?
Here’s the FULL TEXT of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s AIPAC speech TODAY!
— — —
Thank you. Wow, 16,000 people. Anyone here from California? Florida? New York?
Well, these are the easy ones. How about Colorado? Indiana? I think I got it. Montana? Texas?
You’re here in record numbers. You’re here from coast to coast,from every part of this great land. And you’re here at a critical time. You’re here to tell the world that reports of the demise of the Israeli-U.S. relations are not only premature, they’re just wrong.
Here’s the FULL TEXT of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s AIPAC speech TODAY!
— — —
Thank you. Wow, 16,000 people. Anyone here from California? Florida? New York?
Well, these are the easy ones. How about Colorado? Indiana? I think I got it. Montana? Texas?
You’re here in record numbers. You’re here from coast to coast,from every part of this great land. And you’re here at a critical time. You’re here to tell the world that reports of the demise of the Israeli-U.S. relations are not only premature, they’re just wrong.
You’re here to tell the world that our alliance is stronger than ever.
And because of you, and millions like you, across this great country, it’s going to get even stronger in the coming years.
Thank you Bob Cohen, Michael Kassen, Howard Kohr and all the leadership of AIPAC. Thank youfor your tireless, dedicated work to strengthen the partnership between Israel and the United States.
I want to thank,most especially, Members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans. I deeply appreciate your steadfast support for Israel, year in, year out. You have our boundless gratitude.
I want to welcome President Zeman of the Czech Republic.Mr. President, Israel never forgets its friends. And the Czech people have always been steadfast friends of Israel, the Jewish people, from the days of Thomas Masaryk at the inception of Zionism.
You know, Mr. President, when I entered the Israeli army in 1967, I received a Czech rifle.That was one of the rifles that was given to us by your people in our time of need in 1948. So thank you for being here today.
Also here are two great friends of Israel, former Prime Minister of Spain Jose Maria Aznarand as of last month, former Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird.Thank you both for your unwavering support. You are true champions of Israel, and you are, too, champions of the truth.
I also want to recognize the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Dan Shapiro, for your genuine friendship, Dan,and for the great job you’re doing representing the United States and the State of Israel.
And I want to recognize the two Rons. I want to thank Ambassador Ron Prosor for the exemplary job he’s doing at the U.N. in a very difficult forum.
And I want to recognize the other Ron, a man who knows how to take the heat, Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Ron Dermer.Ron, I couldn’t be prouder to have you representing Israel in Washington.
And finally, I want to recognize my wife, Sara, whose courage in the face of adversity is an inspiration to me.Sara divides her time as a child psychologist, as a loving mother, and her public duties as the wife of the prime minister.Sara, I’m so proud to have you here with me today, to have you with me at my side always.
My friends, I bring greetings to you from Jerusalem, our eternal undivided capital.
And I also bring to you news that you may not have heard. You see, I’ll be speaking in Congress tomorrow.
You know, never has so much been written about a speech that hasn’t been given.And I’m not going to speak today about the content of that speech, but I do want to say a few words about the purpose of that speech.
First, let me clarify what is not the purpose of that speech. My speech is not intended to show any disrespect to President Obama or the esteemed office that he holds. I have great respect for both.
I deeply appreciate all that President Obama has done for Israel,security cooperation, intelligence sharing, support at the U.N., and much more, some things that I, as prime minister of Israel, cannot even divulge to you because it remains in the realm of the confidences that are kept between an American president and an Israeli prime minister.I am deeply grateful for this support, and so should you be.
My speech is also not intended to inject Israel into the American partisan debate. An important reason why our alliance has grown stronger decade after decade is that it has been championed by both parties and so it must remain.
Both Democratic and Republican presidents have worked together with friends from both sides of the aisle in Congress to strengthen Israel and our alliance between our two countries, and working together, they have provided Israel with generous military assistance and missile defense spending. We’ve seen how important that is just last summer.
Working together, they’ve made Israel the first free trade partner of America 30 years ago and its first official strategic partner last year.
They’ve backed Israel in defending itself at war and in our efforts to achieve a durable peace with our neighbors. Working together has made Israel stronger; working together has made our alliance stronger.
And that’s why the last thing that anyone who cares about Israel,the last thing that I would want is for Israel to become a partisan issue. And I regret that some people have misperceived my visit here this week as doing that. Israel has always been a bipartisan issue.
Israel should always remain a bipartisan issue.
Ladies and gentlemen, the purpose of my address to Congress tomorrow is to speak up about a potential deal with Iran that could threaten the survival of Israel. Iran is the foremost state sponsor of terrorism in the world. Look at that graph. Look at that map. And you see on the wall, it shows Iran training, arming,dispatching terrorists on five continents. Iran envelopes the entire world with its tentacles of terror. This is what Iran is doing now without nuclear weapons. Imagine what Iran would do with nuclear weapons.
And this same Iran vows to annihilate Israel. If it develops nuclear weapons, it would have the means to achieve that goal. We must not let that happen.
And as prime minister of Israel, I have a moral obligation to speak up in the face of these dangers while there’s still time to avert them. For 2000 years, my people, the Jewish people, were stateless, defenseless, voiceless. We were utterly powerless against our enemies who swore to destroy us. We suffered relentless persecution and horrific attacks. We could never speak on our own behalf, and we could not defend ourselves.
Well, no more, no more.
The days when the Jewish people are passive in the face of threats to annihilate us, those days are over.Today in our sovereign state of Israel, we defend ourselves. And being able to defend ourselves, we ally with others, most importantly, the United States of America, to defend our common civilization against common threats.
In our part of the world and increasingly, in every part of the world, no one makes alliances with the weak. You seek out those who have strength, those who have resolve, those who have the determination to fight for themselves. That’s how alliances are formed.
So we defend ourselves and in so doing, create the basis of a broader alliance.
And today, we are no longer silent; today, we have a voice.And tomorrow, as prime minister of the one and only Jewish state, I plan to use that voice.
I plan to speak about an Iranian regime that is threatening to destroy Israel, that’s devouring country after country in the Middle East, that’s exporting terror throughout the world and that is developing, as we speak, the capacity to make nuclear weapons, lots of them.
Ladies and gentlemen, Israel and the United States agree that Iran should not have nuclear weapons, but we disagree on the best way to prevent Iran from developing those weapons.
Now disagreements among allies are only natural from time to time, even among the closest of allies. Because they’re important differences between America and Israel.
The United States of America is a large country,one of the largest. Israel is a small country, one of the smallest.
America lives in one of the world’s safest neighborhoods. Israel lives in the world’s most dangerous neighborhood. America is the strongest power in the world. Israel is strong, but it’s much more vulnerable. American leaders worry about the security of their country. Israeli leaders worry about the survival of their country.
You knowI think that encapsulates the difference. I’ve been prime minister of Israel for nine years. There’s not a single day, not one daythat I didn’t think about the survival of my country and the actions that I take to ensure that survival, not one day.
And because of these differences, America and Israel have had some serious disagreements over the course of our nearly 70-year-old friendship.
Now, it started with the beginning. In 1948, Secretary of State Marshall opposed David Ben-Gurion’s intention to declare statehood.That’s an understatement. He vehemently opposed it. But Ben-Gurion,understanding what was at stake, went ahead and declared Israel’s independence.
In 1967, as an Arab noose was tightening around Israel’s neck,the United States warned Prime Minister Levi Eshkol that if Israel acted alone, it would be alone. But Israel did act — acted alone to defend itself.
In 1981, under the leadership of Prime Minister Menachem Begin,Israel destroyed the nuclear reactor at Osirak. The United States criticized Israel and suspended arms transfers for three months. And in 2002, after the worst wave of Palestinian terror attacks in Israel’s history, Prime Minister Sharon launched Operation Defensive Shield. The United States demanded that Israel withdraw its troops immediately, but Sharon continued until the operation was completed.
There’sa reason I mention all these. I mention them to make a point. Despite occasional disagreements, the friendship between America and Israel grew stronger and stronger, decade after decade.
And our friendship will weather the current disagreement, as well, to grow even stronger in the future.And I’ll tell you why; because we share the same dreams. Because we pray and hope and aspire for that same better world; because the values that unite us are much stronger than the differences that divide usvalues like liberty, equality, justice, tolerance,compassion.
As our region descends into medieval barbarism, Israel is the one that upholds these values common to us and to you.
As Assad drops bell bombs on his own people, Israeli doctors treat his victims in our hospitals right across the fence in the Golan Heights.
As Christians in the Middle East are beheaded and their ancient communities are decimated, Israel’s Christian community is growing and thriving, the only one such community in the Middle East.
As women in the region are repressed, enslaved, and raped, women in Israel serve as chief justices, CEOs, fighter pilots, two women chief justices in a row.Well, not in a row, but in succession. That’s pretty good.
In a dark, and savage, and desperate Middle East, Israel is a beacon of humanity, of light, and of hope.
Ladies and gentlemen, Israel and the United States will continue to stand together because America and Israel are more than friends. We’re like a family. We’re practically mishpocha.
Now, disagreements in the family are always uncomfortable, but we must always remember that we are family.
Rooted in a common heritage, upholding common values, sharing a common destiny. And that’s the message I came to tell you today. Our alliance is sound. Our friendship is strong. And with your efforts it will get even stronger in the years to come.
Thank you, AIPAC. Thank you, America. God bless you all.”
— — —
You can verify the TEXT here, if you wish!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45lyp8EeBNs
exactly
So they attack the leader of Israel who is trying to stop Iran while they ignore how fairy boy is helping Iran.
Does not even make sense .
You either want Iran to get nukes then support fairy boy, if you are against Iran getting nukes then you support Bibi.
Pretty frigging easy to understand except the fools who only can see through their left wing eyes and mind.
But AIPAC’s 16,000-strong, overwhelmingly Jewish audience, in mightily applauding Netanyahu, will be seen by some critics as endorsing a stance against the White House
Good ! It’s about time Americas Jews wake the hell up and stop brown nosing Obama , who is no friend to Jews .
I just cannot understand what is wrong with these people . I remember hearing my Jewish lawyer comment at a dinner party one evening “ it is just not possible for a Jew to support a republican “ Why not !??? I wanted to slap him around . But I needed him as my lawyer :^)
You keep beating the drum, that Netanyahu was wrong to accept the invitation.
You’re wrong. You are on the wrong side of this.
If those retired Generals in Israel knew how to handle Iran, it wouldn’t be an issue now, would it?You don’t think Iran is going to blame Bibi’s speech for a whole lotta junk? Who didn’t see THAT coming. Of course they will. It doesn’t matter how Iran perceives it. Iran will blame Israel for every wrong turn the negotiations take. That’s a no-brainer. What will be interesting is to see if Obama and Iran try to offer a similar rebuttal.
NFS! Nobody but nobody makes obozo look like the petulant little clown that he is and then gets away with it unscathed. Nobody in the US anyway. Go for it Bibi, the real America is behind you all the way!!
What is the alternative if Netanyahu is so wrong in speaking to the US Congress. So is he to go to iran and talk with them. The same with ISIL and Hamas. Get real diplomacy will not work. Okay Israel and the Jews want Obama to decide what is best! Really Obama would prefer that all Jews be driven into the sea and be drowned.
a) he believes Israel is an occupier and oppressor of Palestinian muslims
b) has said he believes the world would be better off without American hegemony. What better way to reduce American power than by guaranteeing military parity between us and an aggressive Islamic state?
The fact that Iran promises to 'correct' the Israel problem is a bonus.
Star Traveller has a history of occasionally sounding pro Israel, but is not.
I’m not saying it ... read what I say in the prior thread to this ...
Retired Israeli veterans warn against speech [Netanyahu Congressional Speech]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3263242/posts
My history from the beginning here has always in support of Israel. As I said in this other thread, I’m a Christian Zionist ... :-) ...
Retired Israeli veterans warn against speech [Netanyahu Congressional Speech]
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3263242/posts
You’re asking the wrong person, because I’m not the one maintaining that and so I don’t have an alternative ... :-) ...
“America’s legislators being asked to choose between their president and the Israeli prime minister”
Sad that attending this speech marks you as anti-Obama. Where are the grown-ups?
I believe this kind of confrontation was intentionally set up in order to give “political ammunition” to the opponents of Netanyahu in Israel, so they defeat him in the upcoming elections.
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