(Originally posted to author’s website, Elder of Ziyon)
Jeffrey Goldberg has just published another long interview with President Obama, and he once again does everything he can to praise him on his stance towards Israel.
For example, he stated that “Obama, when he talks about Israel, sounds like a rabbi in the progressive Zionist tradition.” Goldberg doesn’t seriously challenge the President when he is told again that Obama “has Israel’s back.”
Perhaps most glaringly, Goldberg doesn’t ask a single question about what Obama is demanding of the Palestinians in his desire for peace. He doesn’t ask a thing about Palestinian incitement to violence, about Arab antisemitism (although Obama implies it exists, it wasn’t because of anything he was asked,) he didn’t ask about why Israeli building in areas that are obviously going to remain par of Israel forever is condemned so vociferously, indicating that the US position towards the Green Line has changed significantly under Obama’s watch.
The contrast between a Democrat who pretends to love Israel for the purpose of pushing a bad Iranian deal (which was the main purpose of this interview, and a speech Obama is giving to a “progressive” Jewish synagogue tonight) and a Democrat (turned independent) who truly loves Israel can be seen from a different interview with Joe Lieberman:
Former US Sen. Joseph Lieberman, in an interview with JTA in Jerusalem, surmised that the next US administration would be friendlier with Israel than the current one. He also expressed concern over America’s nuclear negotiations with Iran, saying they are “going in a bad direction,” and urged Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to embrace the long-shelved Arab Peace Initiative.
Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew and the Democrats’ vice presidential candidate in 2000, predicted that if the 2016 presidential election were held today, a higher percentage of Jewish Americans would vote Republican than in past races. But he noted that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the party’s front-runner for the Democratic nod, could reverse that trend through vocal support of Israel.
“I think there will be a friend of Israel in the White House,” he said, noting that both Clinton and the leading Republican candidates all have pro-Israel records. “It will be a new beginning, a new opportunity. Is it going to be better than it has been under President Obama? Probably, yeah.”
Lieberman expressed concern over support for Israel in the Democratic Party. While almost all Democratic lawmakers support Israel, he said, Lieberman worried that younger party activists are more skeptical of the Jewish state.
“It’s something people who care about Israel are really working at,” said Lieberman, a four-term senator from Connecticut, who won as an independent in 2006 after losing the Democratic primary — in part because of his continued support for the Iraq War. “Part of it is to remind people who are liberal Democrats that, without saying everything Israel ever does is perfect, Israel is by far the most liberal country and society.”
Even though I disagree strongly with Lieberman’s attitude towards the possibility of peace and his pushing the Arab Peace Initiative, you can see that he has a real love of Israel. The difference between someone like him and a president who is saying what he needs to say in order to push an agenda is clear.
