DTN News - ISRAELI DEFENSE NEWS: Setting The Record Straight By Obama And Israel
(NSI News Source Info) TORONTO, Canada - March 4, 2012: When President Obama addresses the annual conference of the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) next week, he will be given an important opportunity to set the record straight on his administration's handling of U.S.-Israel relations. The president's outreach to the Arab and Muslim world, as well as his policy and personal differences with Prime Minister Netanyahu, have led to charges that he is either insufficiently "pro-Israel" or downright "anti-Israel." While these critics are a minority within the American Jewish community -- Obama won 78 percent of the Jewish vote in 2008 and will likely receive similar backing in November -- they and their Christian fundamentalist allies will be present in large numbers at the AIPAC gathering, which tends to disproportionately attract hawks on Israel.
Charges against Obama's pro-Israel credentials are ill-informed but have become all the more pronounced in this election year. GOP frontrunner Mitt Romney alleged that the president "threw Israel under the bus" when he announced last May that the foundation for an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement would be a return to the pre-1967 borders, with adjustments based on demographic changes. Yet Obama's statement was consistent with more than a decade of U.S. policy dating to the Clinton Parameters of December 2000. It also echoed a widely-held view in Israel that was articulated by Netanyahu's predecessor, Ehud Olmert.
Chomping at the bit to take a swipe at Obama, former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum made a similar throwing-Israel-under-the-bus accusation, suggesting that Obama would accept a nuclear Iran in return for a continued flow of oil. Newt Gingrich has likewise entered the fray in an ironic way, accusing the administration of being "out of touch with reality" for its approach to Middle East peace, while, at the same time, repeating the old canard that the Palestinians are an "invented" people.
