How to Unite a Divided Arab & Muslim World

Say you looked around the Arab and Muslim world and saw a civilization at war with itself.

Sunnis killing Shi'ites.

Persians at loggerheads with Turks who are at loggerheads with Arabs.

Say you saw the Palestinian Arabs divided as usual – Hamas against Fatah; the West Bank against Gaza.

Egypt against Hamas.

Say that Muslims and Arabs – while paying lip service to their hatred of Jews and Israel were just too busy to act on it in any concerted manner.

Now, what can you do to unite the Muslims and Arabs – to get them to put their differences momentarily aside?

Simple. Make them think the Jews are about to oust them from the Temple Mount.

Start by having more and more prominent Jewish personalities visit the Mount.

Have Knesset members insist Jews ought to pray on the Mount.

In short, send a clear message that Jews are making a move to change what is admittedly an unfair "status quo" in which Jews don't assert their rights to the shrine.

Well, that's just what messianic Jews of an apocalyptic bent are doing.

They are uniting a fragmented Muslim world and a divided Arab polity.

And since there are no shortage of Arab fanatics – the behavior of the Jewish messianics hardly needs to be distorted by much in the Arab media and on Arab social media to elicit "lone wolf" terror attacks.

That's exactly what's been happening.

Doesn't saving a Jewish life mean anything?

When you know your actions will cause Jews to die -- not just in Israel but perhaps in the Diaspora -- shouldn't that make you think twice about asserting Jewish rights to the Temple Mount just now – what the Middle East is already burning.

For myself, I am not hankering after Temple III and for animal sacrifices.

But even for those who are – howabout waiting a bit. Now is not the time to go up to the Temple Mount.

It's not clever. In fact, it's downright reckless.  

Obama Plans to Circumvent Congress on a Bad-for-Israel Iran Nuke Deal

President Barack Obama will not seek Congressional approval for any deal his negotiator Wendy Sherman might reach with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Teheran's nuclear weapons program,  The New York Times reported.

The U.S. is negotiating with Iran as part of the P5+1 talks— the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain, and Germany— in Vienna that are scheduled to conclude on Nov. 24.

A spokesman for EU foreign minister Catherine Ashton-- who is not known for her Zionist sympathies -- said the talks had reached a critical point. 

On Sunday, Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that a prospective agreement might leave Iran with the capacity to build nuclear weapons on short notice. "This is a threat to the entire world, and first and foremost to us. This threat is far more serious than that posed by the Islamic State,"  Haaretz reported.

The anti-Netanyahu tabloid Yediot Aharanot claimed there was no basis to Netanyahu's concerns. That's because no one at Yediot read the Times story and because their dislike for the mercurial Netanyahu clouds their ability to report the news. 

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has insisted that Iran must expand its nuclear enrichment program.

Any Iran deal would likely involve the gradual lifting of sanctions. Obama can do this without congressional approval. "We wouldn't seek congressional legislation in any comprehensive agreement for years," a senior official told the Times.

Sherman has been briefing key congressional committees on the talks, the Times reported.

New Jersey Democratic Sen. Robert Menendez, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, said that "If a potential deal does not substantially and effectively dismantle Iran's illicit nuclear weapons program, I expect Congress will respond. An agreement cannot allow Iran to be a threshold nuclear state," the Times reported.

If no agreement is reached by Nov. 24, Menendez has proposed tightening sanctions on Iran.

"Congress will not permit the president to unilaterally unravel Iran sanctions that passed the Senate in a 99 to 0 vote," in 2010 said Republican Sen. Mark Kirk of Illinois, the Times reported.

The president's goal "between now and 2017" is to avoid having to bomb Iran or having Teheran announce that it has an atomic bomb, said Karim Sadjadpour of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. The talks are expected to be extended should no agreement be reached, according to the Times.

I've been saying for years that the U.S. would not take out Iran's nuclear facilities. A large part of the reason is that Washington exhausted itself in Iraq. A war with Iran is not something American public opinion would tolerate. 

Obama's tenure has been a disaster for Israel though on Iran -- given the mess George W. Bush left in the Middle East -- I doubt a Romney presidency would have been any different.  

The British Street

The British Ambassador to Israel Matthew Gould has just been on Army Radio to say that yesterday's vote in the British Parliament was a reflection of the mood on the British Street and that Israelis should be worried.

The vote – a nonbinding resolution to give diplomatic recognition to a Palestinian state – was a lopsided Ayes 274, Noes 12 ... which suggests the Parliament is becoming more like the UN General Assembly.

An automatic anti-Zionist majority.

Israel's "friends" in Parliament and its enemies voted together. The friends are "tired" of defending us against popular opinion.

"The conflict in Gaza over the summer, the announcement on settlements since the summer, have had a big impact. And I think that this parliamentary vote is a sign of the way that the wind is blowing in public opinion," said Gould.

Reading between the lines, Gould is saying that if Israel were to permit Hamas in Gaza to bombard its territory with impunity and not attempt to deter such behavior, Israel could begin to win back the British Street.

Somehow, I doubt it.

Of course, Israel would still have to pull back to the 1949 Armistice Lines because "settlements" in Jerusalem and in Judea and Samaria are another reason why we've lost the British Street.

The Palestinian Arabs would then establish a Muslim state in the West Bank. 

How much longer afterwards it would still be comfortable to live in a truncated Israel is something we'd soon discover.

When would mortars let alone rockets make air travel from our only airport all but impossible?

For if the events in Syria/Iraq -- the ISIS advance on Baghdad -- prove anything it is that territory and strategic depth not airpower or nuclear weapons is what matters on the ground.

Would Palestine be controlled by Fatah? By Hamas? By a Palestinian offshoot of al-Qaida or ISIS?

That's of no particular concern to the British Street.

They'll be some MP's who will claim their vote is for Israel's own good and others who well know what they are doing will only bolster the Arab side.

The Arabs are engaged in a zero sum game. 

All of them. All of them that matter.

The British Street – including its 2-3 million Muslims – are fine with the Palestinian Arabs getting their way without having to make concessions at the negotiating table.  Without having to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

It is so convenient to buy into the mantra that the settlements are the problem. 

So lazy to blame Palestinian violence, intransigence, and victimization on Israel.

So easy for "friends" to say they've lost patience with the Jewish state.

What amazes is that there are 12 MPs who – for whatever the reason –  some perhaps even out of principle – did not jump on the anti-Israel or "save-Israel-from-itself" bandwagon.

Demographics and Good News as Israel & the Jewish People Head into the Jewish High Holidays

So here is the good news for the Jewish New Year 5775.

The population of Israel stands at 8,904, 373

The Jewish population is around 6,135,000

176, 230 babies were born since last Rosh Hashana

Some 24,801 people came to live in Israel

75,848 couples got married

The most popular boy's name was Yosef (probably in memory of Ovadya Yosef)

Next comes Daniel, Uri, Etai, and Omer

For girls the most popular name is Tamar, followed by Noa, Shira, and Edel

Wishing all my readers and Twitter followers a year of health, creativity, and peace.

א גוט געבענטשט יאָר

Barack Obama as Sal Tessio and Just as Unconvincing

Sal Tessio: [to Hagen] Tell Mike it was only business. I always liked him.

Tom Hagen: He understands that. 

As regular followers of this blog know I have never been one to single out President Barack Obama for opprobrium.

I've said that Israeli governments have had profound differences with all previous U.S. administrations and that we should not make a big deal about the troubled Netanyahu-Obama relationship.

Who can forget the set-up photo in the White House cabinet room of president Ronald Reagan glaring (if looks could kill) at the diminutive Yitzhak Shamir, foreign minister at the time, on one of his visits to the White House.

Now, though, I am beginning to be swayed to the view that Obama is giving Jimmy Carter a good run for level of presidential antipathy toward the Zionist enterprise.

Today's Wall Street Journal – heavily and sympathetically sourced to unnamed White House officials – carries a long piece – a bill of particulars – explaining why Obama has lost patience with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.

The writer wants it known that U.S.-Israel relations are at their lowest point since Obama took office.

Who can quantify low?

Of course, Obama torpedoed the relationship from Day 1 (with an ignoble assist from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton) by pushing for a "settlement freeze" and forcing Mahmoud Abbas to do so also.

Obama made it impossible to Abbas to even speak to Netanyahu without a settlement freeze in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

Talk about a non starter.

That amateurish stunt essentially sabotaged the status quo and made things worse. Much worse. It raised Palestinian expectations. 

Later, Obama gave a speech in Cairo in which he got just about everything about the Arab world wrong. To top it off, he clumsily justified Israel's existence on the basis of the Holocaust. As if the Jewish connection to Eretz Israel dated back to World War II and no earlier.

He went on to mishandle the Arab Spring.

He fumbled the Egypt crisis. Libya. The Iraq pullout (pullout good - way he did it bad).

It's a long list. 

Fast forward to today.

Obama has now instructed that future Israeli requests for weaponry including ammunition be approved by him at the White House.

The implication is clear.

The president was reportedly taken aback to learn that the Pentagon had routinely authorized Jerusalem to tap into a pre-positioned weapons stockpile in the Jewish state. Like he didn't know we were fighting Iran's proxy, Hamas and needed those supplies.

The re-op undercut White House and State Department efforts to pressure Israel into halting its military campaign against Hamas in Gaza.

In other words, before anyone in Israel, me included, complains that Netanyahu is not crushing Hamas – let's understand that the president of the US is working to save Hamas. Just like Reagan saved Arafat and the PLO in the 1982 Lebanon War.

And bank this:  U.S. guarantees and international  guarantees are only as good as the occupant in the White House. Only as good as that day's goodwill. 

Israeli restraint but good will. Israeli withdrawals - like from Gaza buys goodwill. And this goodwill has the shelf life of a container of fresh milk left out I the Middle East sun.

At least Reagan's heart was in the right place, or so say his supporters, and he was overwhelmed by Caspar Weinberger ("Why won't anyone believe me that I am Episcopalian -- my grandparents converted! I can prove it") and Reagan dumped the pro-Israel Al Haig for two-faced George Shultz.

So Reagan gets a pass from some.

Me thinks, Obama's dislike for things Israeli is of a different order altogether.

The president considers Netanyahu to be reckless and not to be trusted. 

Now, let's face it – our premier is a political chameleon and a backstabber – just like most politicians. So I am not suggesting there is no merit in the claim.

But Obama is angry at him for substantive reasons not because Bibi is, well, Bibi. He's angry about Bibi's principles - principles shared by most Israelis when it comes to Hamas, the Pakestinian Muslim Brothethood.

Israeli officials characterize the president and his team as naïve, the newspaper said.

That's putting it politely.

And it is not far from what most Americans think -- and I mean those who try to think well of Obama.

But is Obama only naïve or is there some kind of visceral refusal to "get" Israel. Even as a candidate he wanted Israel to pull back to the 1949 Armistice Lines.

The Netanyahu government has been counting on military-to-military ties and backing from the U.S. Congress as a workaround to White House animosity. It has basically given up on the White House.

But let's face it – how practical is this approach with some two years more to go in this administration?

One could count on one hand the number of high level officials simpatico to Israel in this administration  -- and still have five fingers left over.

Supposedly, goes the Journal piece, the administration believes that Israel is not been doing enough to limit civilian casualties in Gaza risking a humanitarian catastrophe. A position that parallels the Euro-Left and is about as naïve as naïve gets.

It willfully ignores Israeli efforts to limit collateral damage. Just naïve ?

Could the US do any better under identical conditions? I don't think so.

Obama is angry because his efforts to bring about a ceasefire have been undermined by Israeli opposition to giving Qatar and Turkey roles in the process. Left unsaid is that Egypt and israel are on the same page. 

Qatar (paymaster of Al Jezerra) and Turkey are the primary backers of Hamas. Turkey's president for life ran for election on an anti Zionist platform calling Israelis worse than Nazis.

Turkey has gone over the edge but NATO doesn't have the guts to face up to the fact that the current regime in Ankara has nothing in common with the Turkey that was admitted to the alliance.

Turkey is a stalking horse for the wrong side in The Long War. Separate story.

Supposedly, the Obama administration was particularly incensed when on July 30 a U.S.-supplied Israeli shell struck a United Nations school in Gaza, so the Journal reported. The Israeli army has again and again explained that Hamas is shooting from schools, mosques, and hospitals.

The evidence is available to the president on YouTube.

And there have been not a few cases when such school explosions turned out to be caused by Hamas misfiring at Israel. 

  

The administration was further riled when on Aug. 2 Netanyahu telephoned U.S. ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro to say that he didn't want the Obama administration "to ever second-guess me again" about how to deal with Hamas. The White House accused Israel of leaking the conversation.

Now, here I have to say that Netanyahu may have overplayed his hand.

If so, it reflects the frustration of having Shapiro (who speaks good Hebrew) make like he is a friend of Israel while representing a policy that is hostile to Israel's fundamental interests.

The relationship between Obama and Netanyahu has reached a nadir.

Obama is holding up access to the bullets, bombs, and ordinance Israel needs to overcome Hamas.

I can't read his mind or his heart but it is as if wants us in a war of attrition so that Israel will make concessions to the Palestinians of Hamas or the Palestinians of Fatah ( six of one, half a dozen of the other).

He is even holding off transfer of the additional $225 million in funding for the Iron Dome anti-rocket system that was approved by Congress.

Pretty clear it's both business and personal.

It's  gonna be a bumpy two years until Obama leaves the White House.