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Silver Lining or Tin?

Reader comment on item: The Solace of Poor U.S.-Israel Relations

Submitted by John W. McGinley (United States), Apr 13, 2010 at 09:49

From an Historical perspective your remarks ring true. And I hope your guarded optimism turns out to be accurate. But my gut tells me WATCH OUT. The Players involved constitute a mix which bodes poorly for the well-being of Israel.

First of all there is the bad blood between the head of Kadima and Netanyahu. In fact, if leadership of these parties were different (in either one or both) in these parties the natural coalition would have been between Likud and Kadima. By spurning Kadima Netanyahu had to make an alliance with the "hard" Right which, truth be known, includes the Israeli functional equivalent of the "tea-partiers." Not a happy way to build a coalition. Secondly, it is my perception that Rahm Emmanuel, the President's Chief of Staff, is exhorbantly (and self-interestely) supportive of the Kadima leadership and probably wants the Netanyahu coalition to fail.

Rahm is, all things considered, a very talented man. He certainly has the President's ear and, I suspect, that Obama would not have so publically humiliated Netanyahu unless he had the support of the "in-house Jew" leading him in this direction. Emanual is playing a dangerous game, if my presumption is accurate. For he truly does love Israel (although, if my presumption is true, he is doing a severe disservice to Israel in point of fact). But the man who leans on Rahm for political justification in damaging Israel (I refer to the President) at heart has a fairly vile and negative animus towards Israel, second only to his rather obvious negitve animus to Great Britain. Rahm, then and without paradox, ends up hurting both Israel and our country as well by giving Jew-haters in Amerca (and there are more than one might first guess, especially on the Left) cover for their anit-Israel drum-beat. This facilitates Obama's grand design to bring a revolution in Middle-Eastern alignments whereby Islamic countries and Amerca forge a new coalition.

It's hard to say what the best course of action would be. Although it wouldn't please Rahm, nonetheless a formation of a Likud/Kadima reformation of the Israeli Government, with Netanyahu still on top, would be the best course of action. If that is not to be, Netanyahu should just hang tough and wait out the remainder of Obama's first and only term. And if Obama wins a second term, then prayer is the only answer for Israel. I.e., Such would be a MAJOR disaster for Israel.

Submitting....

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