Obama’s Example for Israel…Change
Israel has a very important lesson to learn from Barack Obama…and it better do so quickly.
I checked out Obama’s official website, Obama For Change, and here’s what’s highlighted:
With the right leadership, and a change of attitude and focus, Barack Obama brings a new viewpoint to discover solutions to the problems at hand.
It’s about time…It’s about change.
Exactly.
Now, I’m a registered Independent voting for John McCain, but certainly my own country needs a good dose of proper change…in how we get energy, as just one example. McCain knows this as well.
Certainly, if this idea is important for America, it is even more so for Israel.
Jews and/or Israel have been undergoing change imposed from the outside for centuries.
In the 19th century, the Reform movement emerged among Jews who–among other things–were determined that the days of the imposed ghetto, degradation, and such (from which Napoleon had freed them) should never return.
Assimilation was the name of the game–to the point of recommendations to change the Sabbath to Sunday. The idea was to rid themselves of their identities as Jews. Henceforth, they would just be Frenchmen, Russians, Poles, Germans, etc. of the (much diluted) Jewish faith…not German or French Jews.
Sounded reasonable–if not a bit pathetically nauseating–no?
Too bad the Germans, Poles, French, and so forth didn’t see things this way.
Modern political Zionism, leading to the resurrection of the state of the Jews, arose because–in perhaps the most enlightened of nations in the 19th century–France–the most vile anti-Semitism proved to be alive and well, targeting even the most assimilated of Jews–whom Alfred Dreyfus, of the infamous Dreyfus Affair, symbolized. And it flourished amongst the intelligentsia as well as the rabble.
Another assimilated Jew, Theodore Herzl, was a reporter from Austria covering Captain Dreyfus’s railroaded trial. Shocked to the core at seeing mobs shouting such things as “death to the Jews,” he later wrote, Der Judenstaat–The Jewish State.
So much for that change…
It was as if G_d was saying, “ Israel will be reborn–whether you Jews like it or not!”
In the Jews’ quest for normalcy, they bent over backwards in the pursuit of modern political Zionism to create a state like all others…somewhat reminiscent of the Reform movement’s motivations, but on a national scale.
Now, don’t get me wrong, not all saw things this way. Religious Zionists saw G_d’s hand in all of this…the Hebraic prophecies unfolding as planned. I agree. And they too had many supporters.
But most of the Zionist leaders who came to rule both pre-state and post-‘48 Israel also deluded themselves into believing that the rest of the world would forget that Israel was the Jew of the Nations.
Well, since Auschwitz, it’s not proper–in at least some circles–to be “anti-Semitic.”
No problem…
Utilize absurd double and moral equivalence standards, and replace anti-Zionism for anti-Semitism, and the age-old animus now remains kosher.
All other peoples can demand national liberation except the one people who needed it the most…the condemned to wandering “G_d-killers” of the Christian West and the “slayers of Prophets and Jew Dogs” of the Arab/Muslim East.
Being the oldest, still existing victims of imperial conquest, the Jews were expected to simply remain that way.
Seeking to gain acceptance in an “Arab” world which sees them as sons of apes and pigs, too many Jews then continued to pursue this change even further in pursuit of a “post-Zionist” Israel.
Again, recall one of the key motivations of the Reform movement…What can we do to change ourselves so we’ll gain acceptance from the Gentiles?
Unfortunately, ignorance of one’s enemies has characterized too many of those who have called the political shots in Israel. The very idea that dhimmi Jews (or Kurds or Berbers or Copts or black Africans, etc.) should demand political rights in what Arabs consider to be purely Arab patrimony and the Dar ul-Islam is laughable to anyone truly familiar with this subject.
Add to post-Zionism a continued movement away from the idea of Israel as a Jewish State, and you have the mess Israel now finds itself in.
So, so much for those changes as well.
Therefore, guess what?
It’s time for Israel to try another type of change…a return to its proud roots.
It’s time for Israel to stop trying to alter itself to be accepted by others.
The values of Jews became the moral guidelines for much, if not most, of the modern world; and, despite its imperfections, Israel is still that light unto the nations the Bible asked it to be.
The national liberation of the Jewish people in the land in which they have thousands of years of continuous history–Zionism–ranks as noble as any of such movements can be. If Arabs can have almost two dozen states–conquered and forcibly Arabized from mostly non-Arab peoples–then why not one resurrected state for Jews?
No, Israel has nothing to cover up for…certainly nothing to revise its very being. If compared with the same set of lenses to the “Arab” world (rarely done), Israel should indeed be canonized. Indeed, as I write this article, black Muslim African refugees fleeing Arabs from Darfur are fleeing to Israel.
What’s needed now is change–but done the right way…
There are Jews in Israel who still have the sense of justice, passion, and compassion of Golda, Ben-Gurion, Jabotinsky, and Begin. Where are they?
Where are the leaders who will insist that Israel no longer trade live, captured, rabid butchers for the bones of dead Jews–regardless of how nice they make it sound? Where are the leaders who will institute a quick death penalty for such “heroes?” Better yet, why are they taken alive?
Where are Israeli leaders who will insist on “peace for peace” instead of “land for peace?” It’s obvious that the latter has not worked…it’s only brought closer to fruition the Arabs post-’67 “destruction in stages” plans for “their” kilab yahud–Jew dogs. Think Gaza…the same will happen after a total Israeli withdrawal from Judea and Samaria, aka, the “West Bank.” Not to mention the Golan. Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Ben-Gurion Airport, the Knesset, and so forth will receive what Sderot gets daily now.
Where is the change which will bring new Israeli leaders who will insist that Israel get a reasonable territorial compromise granting it real borders to replace former, UN-imposed, suicidal Auschwitz/armistice lines a la UNSC Resolution 242? America’s United Nations’ representative in ‘49, Ralph Bunche, openly stated that those lines were never meant to be Israel’s permanent borders.
The Arabs will never play ball, you say…
Of course they won’t. So what?
They don’t accept a 9-mile wide Israel either. Think about what other nations have done thousands of miles away from home in the name of their own national security and interests.
Israel must do what it must do to thrive–not just survive.
Demanding reasonable territorial compromise merely undoes the injustice created by the Arab invasion of a nascent Israel in 1948 and the mostly armistice lines–not borders–which emerged as a result. Those lines simply marked the points at which a half dozen invading Arab armies were turned back. As would become all-too-common later on, the UN only got involved after the Jews turned the tide and had the Arabs on the run…not before, to stop the Arabs’ initial aggression.
Where are the new Israeli leaders who will tell the State Department’s next James Baker or Condi Rice, when he or she insists on such things as Israel supplying its enemies with weapons (which were then used to massacre Jews in yeshivas, etc.), to go fly a kite?
Where’s the change which will bring to the fore proud Zionist Jews who will draw the lines beyond which no further retreat will be allowed–regardless of who is twisting the arms, turning the screws, and increasing the heat from across the sea?
If it means losing American aid, then so be it. My prediction is that such games will backfire big time on any White House which lowers itself this way.
Millions of fair-minded people will not expect the sole, resurrected Jewish State to sacrifice itself on the petroleum greased altar of international hypocrisy so that Arabs can get their 22nd state–and second, not first, in the original 1920 Mandate of Palestine. Jordan sits on almost 80% of that territory.
So, as a solid McCain supporter (despite some concerns ), I’m now hoping that Israelis will do some real soul searching and take a cue from the Obama camp.
Replacing Olmert with someone of similar ilk will accomplish nothing but a continuation of the sort of change we’ve explored earlier…the change that gave Israel its first military defeat, handed over a live Samir Kuntar, and so forth. The latter’s head needed to have been parachuted onto Hizbullah’s headquarters.
That Condi loves Tsipi Livni should send another disturbing signal as well.
Israel must get itself new leaders, at all levels, who will place the overall Zionist forest ahead of individual, parochial trees which hold fragile coalitions together. Olmert should have been dumped long ago.
The change that Israelis must insist upon may very well determine if the Jews’ long-awaited, reborn state will continue to even exist.
Hamas and Fatah’s Abbas refuse to recognize a Jewish Israel. Abbas’s “moderates” just sung praises to a returning butcher–Kuntar–who murdered a father while his 4-year old daughter watched and then beat her skull in with his rifle butt against a rock until she too was dead.
In short, the type of change that Israel must have will bring forth leaders who will know how to better address such things. And for those who care, it’s time to do all that’s legally and humanly possible to see to it that this happens sooner rather than later.
on July 31st, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Are you going to report on Palestinian phone banks working for Obama?
http://www.townhall.com/columnists/AmandaCarpenter/2008/05/13/palestinians_phonebank_for_obama
on August 6th, 2008 at 5:31 am
Obama should mett with the leader of Iran and have nice dialogue. Perhaps a nice meeting will convince him that the 6 million jews really didn’t die and Israel should be allowed to survive. C’mon….McCain is a proven friend to Israel.
on September 10th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
McCain is not to be trusted my friends, he changed his position to every issue since the 2000 elections. He just says what people want to hear, no telling that he will do what he says. In Republican circles he is known as a backstabber, for promising one thing then cross the aile to the Democratic side when it comes to a vote. That is why he is so mistrusted in his own circle!
And worse still, Miss Palin visits a church where (while she was in attendence) David Brickner from the extreme Christian organisation Jews for Jesus was invited as a speaker. He believes that terrorists attacks against Jews are God’s retribution for them not being Christian and he wants to convert all Jews. And Palin didn’t distanced herself from the comments, she didn’t walk out, she just attendent without protest!! Her Church is known for these kind of radical thoughts and she is still attending without criticism!! However the mainstream media doesn’t report it, but it must be published! She must distance herself from these comments! Spread the word!
on September 11th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
Hi Simon, I’ve been factchecking your story and to my surprise it is true. In fact it is even worse, she also met with Pat Buchanan. But there is more in the article from politico I added. I thought that this was just some Liberal attack but it is very real, there are even audio recordings of the speech and Palin’s pastor confirmed she was there…
on September 17th, 2008 at 6:47 pm
I think it is very important for the jewish community to learn about this disturbing information about McCain. Please see these websites and do you own research on McCain’s friend Gordon Liddy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGRvo6LWuaY
http://www.charlestoncitypaper.com/gyrobase/Content?oid=oid%3A45282
on September 18th, 2008 at 6:53 pm
I cannot believe that any Jew would vote for Mc Cain and Palin! He showed incredible lack of judgment picking this particular woman, who has virtually no education and no experience. Additionally, she has been shown to be anti-semitic in her relationship with others and in her beliefs, she actually believes what her FAR RIGHT church preaches, that we are less than because we are not Christian. McCain showed what he was made of when he pandered to the Religious Right, and appointed any person with X chromosomes! The man is 72 years old, which means if they win, she just could be stripping our rights away from the White House within 4 years! Wake up! McCain/Palin are not our friends!
on September 18th, 2008 at 11:30 pm
Those who still have an open mind may find this interesting. It was written by Shmuel Rosner, Chief correspondant, Haarretz.com.
“Israeli experts on American politics said in recent weeks that a campaign between Obama and McCain will place Israel at center stage and will require extreme caution on the part of Israel. McCain is hoping to attract Jewish American votes, both because of his many years of support for Israel, and also as a result of the endorsement he received from Senator Joe Lieberman.
Lieberman is often mentioned as a possible member of the McCain administration, possibly as secretary of defense.
One reason why McCain can draw Jewish votes is that he is free of the burden of George Bush, who in spite his support for Israel, cannot easily attract Jewish voters because he is a conservative evangelical. McCain, on the other hand, has adopted moderate policies domestically, and will allow Jewish voters to choose him with greater ease.
Douglas Bloomfield, a former lobbyist and now a columnist in Washington, believes that McCain is “the Republican with the best chance of returning his party to the Reagan-era level of at least 30 percent of Jewish voters.”
on September 19th, 2008 at 10:08 am
I’m a Jewish 49 year old mom who has always supported Barack Obama, even in the primaries. To quote David Bornstein from the Heritage Florida Jewish News:
“I see Obama not as a patsy for the oppressed, but as someone who is intellectually deep, compassionate, and inherently fair. I would rather that kind of man be in office than the blindly supportive leadership who claims their mission comes directly from God.”
I’ve always been a democrat and have a hard time seeing why Jews and other democrats could not vote for Obama. He is extremely supportive of women’s issues and is protective of social security and medicare. He is very supportive of Israel, with many of his top advisors being Jewish, including his closest advisor – David Axelrod. Obama plans to reduce the cost of prescription drugs and take away taxes for seniors making under $50,000. I strongly feel that we need a democrat, Barack Obama, in the White House. The face of our country could change horribly if we have four more years of a conservative right-wing Republican administration. My nine-year old daughter goes to a public school and already asks why there are Christmas trees in school and not Chanukah menorahs. I try to explain to her about separation of church and state, etc. She wants to write a letter to Obama and tell him her feelings. My father used to be an ardent McCain supporter until his recent pick of Sarah Palin for VP nominee. She scares him and she scares me. I would have been happier if McCain chose someone like Elizabeth Dole who is more moderate. But McCain chose someone who is so similar to George W. Bush, it’s frightening. It appears like his choice was made just to get elected and reign in the support of the Christian right. Aren’t people smarter than that? G-d forbid if Sarah Palin was elected and ever became President. We need the leader who has always been for change and for what is right (or should I say left :).
Toby Rosenbaum
on September 20th, 2008 at 10:32 am
For Toby…
Here’s another viewpoint from the Jeruslaem Post…
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1214726181011&pagename=JPost/JPArticle/ShowFull
In case url doesn’t open…
Why more Jews won’t be voting Democrat this year
Jul. 1, 2008
JENNIFER RUBIN , THE JERUSALEM POST
Defenders of Barack Obama, and sometimes Obama himself, seem frustrated that some American Jews refuse to assume their traditional role of support for the Democratic presidential nominee. The Obama defenders are irked that not all Jews accept at face value Obama’s expressions of devotion to Israel and commitment to her security.
Why can’t these contrarians just take Obama at his word (he is a Zionist, he really is, they insist)? The answer is “1973.”
But the explanation starts in 2008. Many Jewish Obama doubters are convinced that Israel faces a true existential threat unlike any in 35 years. From nation states like Iran, which threaten to destroy Israel, to Hizbullah and Hamas terrorists, Israel may in the next decade be pushed to the brink of its existence. Israel’s failure to defeat Hizbullah in 2006 demonstrated the limits of Israel’s historic military advantage.
With the spread of nuclear weapons and other deadly technologies a second Holocaust - that is, the annihilation of a substantial portion of world Jewry - is not out of the realm of imagination.
THESE OBAMA skeptics recall a similar time, 1973, when Israel also faced extermination. Prime minister Golda Meir had miscalculated Anwar Sadat’s willingness to go to war and decided against a first strike against Egypt. The Arab nations attacked in October 1973, and within days Israel was facing defeat.
The Israelis went to president Richard Nixon with a request for a massive infusion of arms. The Defense and State Departments squabbled. Our European allies, who feared an oil embargo (and would refuse us bases to refuel our planes), inveighed against it, and the Soviets blustered. Many on Nixon’s staff wanted to deny the request, or offer only token assistance. Don’t antagonize the Arab states, they counseled.
Nixon persisted and, according to some accounts, doubled the amount of aid Israel had requested. Riding herd on the bureaucrats, Nixon repeatedly intervened to push the transports along. Informed about a dispute regarding the type of air transportation, Nixon at one point exclaimed in frustration: “Tell them to send everything that can fly.” Over the course of a month US airplanes conducted 815 sorties with over 27,900 tons of materiel.
Israel was saved due to this massive infusion of military aid. Meir referred to Nixon with enormous affection for the rest of her life. Nixon, despised by many in the US, was hailed as a hero in Israel. And Nixon (who had garnered a minority of the Jewish vote in 1972) received little or no political benefit at home for his trouble, leaving office the following year.
SO WHAT does this have to do with Obama? The Obama skeptics do not for a moment believe that Obama, in the face of domestic and international pressure similar to what Nixon faced, would rise to the occasion at a critical moment in Israel’s history and “tell them to send everything that can fly.”
In every significant interaction in Obama’s adult life with those who distain and vilify Israel - from Rashid Khalidi to Reverend Jeremiah Wright to Louis Farrakhan - Obama has demonstrated passive resignation and indifference.
He did not stand up to his friend Khalidi, the Palestinian activist, professor and former Palestinian spokesman whom Obama honored at a farewell dinner, and object to Palestinian invectives that Israel was an apartheid state. He did not recoil, until Wright insulted him at the National Press Club, from Wright when he learned that Wright considered Israel a “dirty word” and postulated that Israel had invented an “ethnic bomb.”
He did not heed (or was oblivious to) public pleas from Jewish organizations to avoid the Million Man March that Farrakhan organized; nor did he years later leave his church when it honored Farrakhan. It took a hateful rant from another wide-eyed preacher against Hillary Clinton, just when Obama needed to cool intra-party animosities, to do that.
AND IF any further proof were needed, Obama’s actions with regard to the Kyl-Lieberman Amendment, the measure to classify the Iranian National Guard as a terrorist organization, should settle the question of Obama’s intestinal fortitude when it comes to Israel. An issue presented itself: a choice between, on the one hand, taking a stance against Israel’s most vile enemy, Iran, and, on the other, appeasing the far Left of his own party.
Obama chose to satisfy the MoveOn.org crowd and opposed the amendment. The amendment would have been “saber rattling” and unduly provocative, Obama argued at the time. Senators Dick Durbin, Harry Reid, Hillary Clinton and three quarters of the US Senate voted for the amendment.
Once his nomination was secured, Obama told those assembled at the AIPAC convention that he supported classification of the Iranian National Guard as a terrorist organization, a move he well understood was important to Israel’s security and to AIPAC’s members. Yet under just a smidgen of political pressure during the primary race, he had not been able to muster the will to support a modest measure which inured to Israel’s benefit.
IS THERE anything in all this to suggest that in a potential crisis, when much of the world would be pressuring him to let Israel die, Obama would push all the naysayers aside and demand to “send them everything that can fly”? There is not a shred of evidence to suggest that he would be beyond persuasion when it came down to Israel’s survival. In fact, all the available evidence indicates that the opposite is true.
That does not mean Obama will not carry the majority of the Jewish vote. Jews are overwhelmingly Democratic, and it is certainly the case that for many American Jews the secular liberal agenda takes precedence over everything else in presidential politics.
For these voters, then, “1973″ is not uppermost in their minds. Their devotion to liberalism is controlling, and for their own peace of mind they are willing to accept Obama’s generic expressions of warm feelings toward Israel.
Indeed the temptation to believe in Obama’s bland promises of support for Israel is a tempting one for liberal Jews. If they can convince themselves that he will be “fine on Israel,” no conflict arises between their liberal impulses and their concern for Israel. The urge to believe is a powerful thing, especially when the alternative is an intellectual or moral quandary.
It is also the case that some American Jews simply do not believe Israel is in peril, or that “1973″ is remotely relevant. They imagine Iran is merely spouting nonsense, that Hizbullah and Hamas lack the organization or competence to threaten Israel’s survival, and that Israel will muddle along indefinitely.
BUT SOME Jews are incapable of deluding themselves that Obama would be the most resolute candidate in defending Israel. In quiet moments of contemplation and in noisy debates with family members and friends, they worry about the tenuous nature of Israel’s existence and the dangers which lurk from within and outside Israel’s borders. These Jews cannot imagine a world without Israel and could not countenance election of a president who, in Israel’s moment of peril, could well falter.
And that is why these obstinate Obama skeptics, some even after a lifetime of Democratic voting, will not pull the lever for him. For them some things rank higher than even the top items on the liberal political agenda. The risk is, in their minds, too great that when Israel needs help the most, Obama will buckle and Israel will be crushed.
Many, albeit not all and likely not even most, American Jews will therefore decline to vote for Obama. They know that if the majority of their co-religionists had their way and George McGovern, rather than Richard Nixon, had been in the White House in 1973, Israel might not have survived.
A few barbs from their fellow congregants, amazed they would not vote for a Democrat for president, are a small burden to bear as they cast their vote for the candidate who - they are certain - when the chips are down, will send everything that can fly.
The writer blogs at Commentary Magazine’s CONTENTIONS Web site and is a regular contributor to Weekly Standard, New York Observer, Human Events, American Spectator and other print and online publications. She lives in Northern Virginia.
on October 7th, 2008 at 2:01 am
I’m urging all Jewish Americans to speak up and speak out against Barack Obama’s claim that it is alright to forgive and forget Bill Ayer’s terrorist activities because they took place 40 years ago. Bill Ayers bombed the Pentagon, the Capitol, a New York Police Station and his group also committed the famous “Brinks Robbery”. Barack Obama continues to deny his involvement with Bill Ayers on the Anneberg Challenge in which Obama funneled 100 Million dollars to this organization betweem 1995-1999.
If I’m not mistaken, Hitler’s Nazi leaders that exterminated Jewish people were and are still being tracked down for their war crimes. Some of these men that have been captured were well into their 80’s.
Time does not diminish the significance of horrific crimes, and we must all speak out for our freedom and
democracy.
If you truly believe in our democracy I urge you to contact all your friends and relatives to investigate for yourself what the candidate of your choice really believes in. Hitler was charismatic and fooled the most intelligent people. It’s up to you to seek out and learn the true character, integrity, honesty, and love of country of the candidate you choose. Don’t let anyone fool you ever again.
Beth