Hamas female suiciders captured on way to kill Fatah officers

from the DEBKAfile
June 9, 2009

Hamas is escalating its attacks on fellow Palestinians to demonstrate that US presidential envoy George Mitchell's peace talks in the region, starting Tuesday, June 9, were a mission impossible so long as Hamas and Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah were at war.

DEBKAfile's counter terror sources disclose that Monday night, three Palestinian female members of Hamas, one of whom wore a bomb vest, were captured in the West Bank town of Qalqilya on their way to kill Palestinian Authority security officers.

The reappearance of suicide bombers on the West Bank is extremely troubling, say military sources, because of the likelihood that they will next attack their old targets in Israel.

This supposition is well founded. On June 7, DEBKAfile revealed exclusively that the Islamist terror organization had been ordered by Damascus headquarters to unleash a new campaign of violence against PA and Israeli targets alike – a first in Palestinian annals.

Ahead of its foiled triple suicide attack, Hamas circulated the photos of six senior Palestinian security officers in Qalqilya over the caption: "These commanders are sentenced to execution." The most prominent was Hussam Sheik Hamed, who is accused of liquidating several Hamas operatives in the town last month. DEBKAfile's security sources emphasize that as matters stand today within the Palestinian camp, President Obama, the Saudi king Abdullah and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak can forget about making headway in their peace moves.

Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal made this clear to Egypt's intelligence minister Gen. Omar Suleiman who summoned him to Cairo from Damascus Tuesday to try and persuade the rejectionist leader to come to terms with the rival Fatah and give the Obama peace diplomacy a chance.

Meshaal refused point blank to call off Hamas' terror campaign against fellow Palestinians. As a pre-condition for reconciliation, he said the US-trained Palestinian Authority security force must end its crackdown on Hamas gunmen. He totally rejected President Obama's call from Cairo to give up violence, reinforcing the message carried by the Hamas-led massive cross-border assault on Israeli forces from Gaza Monday.

Meshaal had a special message for the Egyptian government too.

Shortly after his conversation with Gen. Suleiman in Cairo, Hamas staged its first ever Qassam missile strike on Egyptian security forces guarding the Sinai-Gazan border. This was Hamas' first missile attack ever against Egypt. It was meant to support a fresh Palestinian attempt to break through the border for the first time since January 2008. The missiles exploded 3 kilometers inside Sinai.

In Ramallah, guards escorting the convoy of Palestinian Authority official Saad al Rahim, opened fire on a vehicle racing at high speed on the same road, certain that a Hamas bomb car was about to ram them.
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Hey Hillary: You're Not Israel's Mommy!

Clinton shreds Bush-Israel settlement understandings, fuels US-Israel row
from the DEBKAfile
Special Analysis

Gloves off, no more legalistic quibbling

US secretary of state Hillary Clinton roughly rejected any secret Bush agreements with Israel on expanding settlements. Her intention was to have the last word and to shut down the Obama administration's argument with Israel over a West Bank settlement freeze. But she only threw fresh fuel on the fire when she stated emphatically on Friday, June 5, that according to the negotiating record which Bush officials turned over to the Obama administration, "There is no memorialization of any informal and oral agreements."

Israel officials have protested that Barack Obama's demand for a total freeze on settlement expansion contradicts a series of understandings – some written, some oral – with Bush officials which permitted expansion under certain conditions. This argument was put forward by prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu in his wide-ranging talks with the US president on May 18 and reaffirmed by Israeli officials when they met US Middle East envoy George Mitchell in London ten days later.

This key understanding referred to was reached in 2004: It provided for Israel's voluntary evacuation of the Gaza Strip and the northern tip of the West Bank (which took place the following year) would be counter-balanced by Washington's acceptance of the need for continuing construction in the large population blocks in other parts of West Bank territory to meet natural growth needs.

This understanding was reached by Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley and his deputy Elliott Abrams in talks with Israeli officials.

At their London meeting of May 28, Mike Herzog, defense minister Ehud Barak's chief of staff, bore witness to Mitchell that he had led the Israeli team at the 2004 talks and that those talks had indeed ended with the two US NSC heads' endorsement on behalf of the Bush administration of continued Israeli settlement construction to keep pace with the natural growth of those communities.

Elliott Abrams is quoted Friday by the Washington Post as acknowledging last week that there had been unwritten understandings between Washington and Jerusalem, as Brig. Herzog affirmed.

By repudiating any such understandings – written and spoken - Clinton has dragged US-Israeli relations into a new trough. It is now a straight issue of word against word, Washington versus Jerusalem's. This is a dark point for restarting any peace process between Israel and Palestinians or other Arab governments for an accord on substantial issues which have defeated every past peace effort.

The "settlements" referred to by Obama in his demand for an end to all construction apply to five Israeli urban centers: its capital, Jerusalem, which the US does not recognize with or without its post-1967 extensions (although successive administrations have pledged to locate its embassy there), Maaleh Adummim just east of Jerusalem, Efrat to the south, Ariel to the north and Modiin Ilit, southeast of Tel Aviv.

Their total population is estimated between 250,000 and 300,000, plus isolated communities which are home to another approximate 180,000 Jewish inhabitants.

These figures do not include the unauthorized outposts over whose removal Israel is not arguing.
Abrams in an article he published on April 8 hinted that the passage in the 2004 Bush letter to Ariel Sharon - "It is realistic to expect that any final status agreement will only be achieved on the basis of mutually agreed changes that reflect these realities" - was an indirect recognition of demographic "changes" (in the Israeli and Palestinian populations over 42 years) and understanding for the "realities" applying to the large settlement blocks, meaning that Israel was entitled to continue their development.

However, DEBKAfile's Washington sources stress, Eliott Abrams has no standing in the new administration. Obama and his team will adopt or dump the understandings reached by his White House predecessors not according to archival evidence but according to whether or not they suit his new international policy directions over which Jerusalem is getting badly worried.

The Netanyahu government is now facing its first real test. In Washington, the gloves are off. If the prime minister holds to his defensive, accommodating posture toward on the settlement issue and fails to punch back with demands that the other side - and the United States itself stand by former accords and commitments - he will find himself inexorably forced back step by step on other vital security interests, including Iran's accelerated nuclear weapons program.

Legalistic quibbling over dead letters will not avail - as Israeli officials will discover when confronted with new pressures for concessions from US envoy Mitchell next week.
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U.S. Sen. Inhofe calls Obama speech "un-American"

from The Oklahoman
By Chris Casteel
Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Jim Inhofe said today that President Barack Obama's speech in Cairo was "un-American" because he referred to the war in Iraq as "a war of choice" and didn't criticize Iran for developing a nuclear program.

Inhofe, R-Tulsa, also criticized the president for suggesting that torture was conducted at the military prison in Guantanamo, saying, "There has never been a documented case of torture at Guantanamo."

"I just don't know whose side he's on,'' Inhofe said of the president.

Rep. Mary Fallin, R-Oklahoma City, said Obama "needs to take a stronger stance against regimes which threaten international peace, sponsor terrorism, brutalize their own citizens and threaten the existence of other nations with the pursuit of weapons of mass destruction."

And Rep. Frank Lucas, R-Cheyenne, said, "When the United States promotes peace around the world, it ensures our own security -- militarily, culturally and economically.

"We should not, however, support any actions or offer any aid to those countries which directly or indirectly support groups that promote the destruction of our way of life. The president has offered the Muslim world an open hand, but we must keep in mind that there are those few who would use his offer against him."
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How To Write An Obama Speech - 13 easy steps

from The Daily Beast
by Benjamin Sarlin
June 5, 2009

How does Obama keep up his hot streak of speeches? The Daily Beast analyzed his most famous speeches to crack the code behind the president's rhetoric. Our step-by-step guide for turning even the most divisive debates into an inspiring call for unity.

President Obama has faced his share of tough issues and audiences over the years, but at every turn he's managed to defuse tension with a well-timed speech. Already he's receiving rave reviews for this morning's address in Cairo, Egypt, on America's relationship with the Muslim world. But how does he do it? We analyzed Obama's most famous speeches to bring you this handy instruction manual.

Step 1. Thanks for having me.

Cairo: "I am honored to be in the timeless city of Cairo, and to be hosted by two remarkable institutions. For over a thousand years, Al-Azhar has stood as a beacon of Islamic learning, and for over a century, Cairo University has been a source of Egypt's advancement." (Egypt)
2004 DNC: "On behalf of the great state of Illinois, crossroads of a nation, land of Lincoln, let me express my deep gratitude for the privilege of expressing this convention." (Democratic National Convention, 7/27/04)

Notre Dame: "To Father Hesburgh, to Notre Dame trustees, to faculty, to family: I am honored to be here today. And I am grateful to all of you for allowing me to be a part of your graduation." (Notre Dame commencement, 5/17/09)

2. Express shock that someone with your life story could ever stand before such a crowd…

Cairo: "Much has been made of the fact that an African-American with the name Barack Hussein Obama could be elected president."

2004 DNC: "Tonight is a particular honor for me because, let's face it, my presence on this stage is pretty unlikely. My father was a foreign student, born and raised in a small village in Kenya. He grew up herding goats, went to school in a tin-roof shack."

Philadelphia Race Speech: "[My] story hasn't made me the most conventional of candidates..." (“A More Perfect Union,” 3/18/08)

3. ...But that's just America for you.

Cairo: "But my personal story is not so unique. The dream of opportunity for all people has not come true for everyone in America, but its promise exists for all who come to our shores—that includes nearly seven million American Muslims in our country today who enjoy incomes and education that are higher than average."

2004 DNC: "I stand here knowing that my story is part of the larger American story, that I owe a debt to all of those who came before me, and that in no other country on earth is my story even possible."

Race Speech: "I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on earth is my story even possible."

4. Pause for audience interruption.

Protester at Notre Dame speech: "Abortion is murder!"

Soldier in Iraq: "We love you!" (Iraq Speech 4/7/09, many others)

5. Have gracious comeback ready.

Notre Dame: "That's all right....We're not going to shy away from things that are uncomfortable sometimes."

Iraq: "I love you back!" (Iraq speech 4/7/09, many others)

6. Pay homage to Founding Fathers and/or quote the Declaration of Independence.

Cairo: "We were founded upon the ideal that all are created equal, and we have shed blood and struggled for centuries to give meaning to those words—within our borders, and around the world."

Race Speech: "'We the people, in order to form a more perfect union ...'—221 years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy."

National Security Speech: "My own American journey was paved by generations of citizens who gave meaning to those simple words—'to form a more perfect union.' I've studied the Constitution as a student, I've taught it as a teacher, I've been bound by it as a lawyer and a legislator." (National Security speech, 5/21/09)

2004 DNC: "Our pride is based on a very simple premise, summed up in a declaration made over 200 years ago: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal...'"

7. Express regret at America’s failures to live up to its founding principles.

Cairo: "9/11 was an enormous trauma to our country. The fear and anger that it provoked was understandable, but in some cases, it led us to act contrary to our ideals.”

National Security Speech: "Instead of strategically applying our power and our principles, too often we set those principles aside as luxuries that we could no longer afford."

Race Speech: "The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery..."

2004 DNC: "This year, in this election, we are called to reaffirm our values and our commitments, to hold them against a hard reality and see how we are measuring up...I say to you, tonight, we have more work to do."

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Newsweek’s Editor: Obama Is "Sort of God" - watch the video

from NewsBusters
By Kyle Drennen
June 5, 2009

Newsweek editor Evan Thomas brought adulation over President Obama’s Cairo speech to a whole new level on Friday, declaring on MSNBC: "I mean in a way Obama’s standing above the country, above – above the world, he’s sort of God."

Thomas, appearing on Hardball with Chris Matthews, was reacting to a preceding monologue in which Matthews praised Obama’s speech: "I think the President's speech yesterday was the reason we Americans elected him. It was grand. It was positive. Hopeful...But what I liked about the President's speech in Cairo was that it showed a complete humility...The question now is whether the President we elected and spoke for us so grandly yesterday can carry out the great vision he gave us and to the world."

Matthews discussed Obama’s upcoming speech marking the 65th anniversary of D-Day and compared it to that of Ronald Reagan. He then turned to Thomas and asked: "Reagan and World War II and the sense of us as the good guys in the world, how are we doing?" Thomas replied: "Well, we were the good guys in 1984, it felt that way. It hasn't felt that way in recent years. So Obama’s had, really, a different task We're seen too often as the bad guys. And he – he has a very different job from – Reagan was all about America, and you talked about it. Obama is ‘we are above that now.’ We're not just parochial, we're not just chauvinistic, we're not just provincial."

Thomas elaborated on Obama as God, patronizingly explaining: "He's going to bring all different sides together...Obama is trying to sort of tamper everything down. He doesn't even use the word terror. He uses extremism. He's all about let us reason together...He's the teacher. He is going to say, ‘now, children, stop fighting and quarreling with each other.’ And he has a kind of a moral authority that he – he can – he can do that." In response, Matthews wondered: "If there's a world election between him and Osama Bin Laden, he's running a good campaign." Thomas agreed: "Yes, he is."

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Barack Obama's 10 mistakes in Cairo

from The Telegraph
By: Toby Harnden

Barack Obama's speech in Cairo was quite a moment. I say moment, but it lasted some 56 minutes and contained more than 6,000 words. Too long. Yes, he said a lot, ensuring to some extent that it could be all things to all people - almost everyone can take something away from it to feel good about.

That doesn't mean, however, that it was an effective speech. It was, of course, very well-delivered and contained many fine phrases. But we know that Obama can do this and he's subject to the law of diminishing returns. The more I think about it, the more potentially problematic I find the speech. Here, for starters, are 10 mistakes he made:

1. "Given our interdependence, any world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another will inevitably fail." With this phrase, Obama dismissed the notion of American exceptionalism, the belief that the United States occupies a special place among nations. Obama clearly doesn't see the United States as a "Shining City upon a Hill" or its history, constitution or way of life giving it special qualities or responsibilities in the world. When asked in Strasbourg whether he reduced "American exceptionalism" - a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville - as mere patriotism. "I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism." By trying to reduce US status to that of just another nation, Obama diminishes the role of American leadership.

2. "I am a Christian, but my father came from a Kenyan family that includes generations of Muslims. As a boy, I spent several years in Indonesia and heard the call of the azaan at the break of dawn and the fall of dusk." While watering down America's status in the world, Obama has consistently sought to elevate his own status to that of a universal, healing symbol as if his very being, his inspiring life story, his Muslim background, his father from Kenya, his childhood spell in Indonesia will square the circle in the Middle East. If only it were as easy as that. This comes across as naive, even pandering.

3. "Around the world, the Jewish people were persecuted for centuries, and anti-Semitism in Europe culminated in an unprecedented Holocaust.... On the other hand..."

Yes, Obama spoke strongly and unequivocally about the six million Jews who were exterminated in the Holocaust. But he immediately appeared to equate this with the suffering of Palestinians who have "endured the pain of dislocation...endure the daily humiliations - large and small - that come with occupation...the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable". This comes dangerously close to moral equivalence.

4. "The U.S. government has gone to court to protect the right of women and girls to wear the hijab, and to punish those who would deny it. I reject the view of some in the West that a woman who chooses to cover her hair is somehow less equal, but I do believe that a woman who is denied an education is denied equality." Probably the worst passage of all. By highlighting the most superficial aspect of women's rights is the Muslim world, Obama dramatically underplayed the oppression women face. It's not people in the West who believe women who cover their hair are less equal, it's countries in the Middle East that dictate that all women are less equal. From the Left, Peter Daou, who grew up in west Beirut, rails against the weakness of Obama's stance on human rights: "With women being stoned, raped, abused, battered, mutilated, and slaughtered on a daily basis across the globe, violence that is so often perpetrated in the name of religion, the most our president can speak about is protecting their right to wear the hijab?"

From the Right, Stephen Hayes, points out: "In Saudi Arabia, women cannot drive. In Iran, they're stoned on suspicion of adultery. In Pakistan, politicians publicly defend 'honor killings' of young girls who have the audacity to choose their own husbands."

5. "I am honoured to be in the timeless city of Cairo..." It's one thing to go to the heart of an autocracy in the Middle East and to deliver hard turths. It's quite another to describe President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt as a "force for stability" and then go to Cairo and soft pedal on human rights abuses there. Many Arabs battling for democracy and freedom in their own countries feel undermined by Obama's choice of venue. Spengler of Asia Times goes even further: "By addressing the 'Islamic world' from Cairo, Obama lends credibility to the Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, and other advocates of political Islam who demand that Muslims be addressed globally and on religious terms."

6. "Unlike Afghanistan, Iraq was a war of choice that provoked strong differences in my country and around the world. Although I believe that the Iraqi people are ultimately better off without the tyranny of Saddam Hussein, I also believe that events in Iraq have reminded America of the need to use diplomacy and build international consensus to resolve our problems whenever possible." In its essence no neo-con from the Bush administration would disgree with this. But the "although" betrays that Obama is trying to have it both ways - he's glad that Saddam's gone but he's against the war that removed him. Yes, it was a choice. Sometimes hard choices have to be made. Yet Obama seems to think that he can just split the difference and please both sides.

7. "No single speech can eradicate years of mistrust, nor can I answer in the time that I have all the complex questions that brought us to this point." No single speech - but perhaps a series of speeches, Obama implied. He later said that "words alone cannot meet the needs of our people" but Obama's preference for words rather than actions is clear. For all its grand vision, this speech contained no concrete proposals.

8. "And finally, just as America can never tolerate violence by extremists, we must never alter our principles. 9/11 was an enormous trauma to our country. The fear and anger that it provoked was understandable, but in some cases, it led us to act contrary to our ideals. We are taking concrete actions to change course. I have unequivocally prohibited the use of torture by the United States, and I have ordered the prison at Guantanamo Bay closed by early next year."
The "just as" is troubling because it goes dangerously close to equating what happened on 9/11 with the alleged alteration of American principles afterwards. Like the "on the other hand", it's sloppy speechwriting. Obama was eager to use the t-word - torture (though not another t-word - terror). By constantly referring to torture - which, even if one concedes that it was used was done so used in very limited circumstances and ended several years ago during the Bush administration - Obama buys into the narrative that America is to blame. Obama conveniently ignores the fact that torture of a far more heinous nature than has ever taken place at Guantanamo Bay occurs almost routinely in countries across the Middle East - and the victims are often more dissidents rather than suspected terrorists. Once again, Obama highlights the closure of Guantanamo Bay - though he has yet to resolve where to transfer its inmates.

9. "I know there has been controversy about the promotion of democracy in recent years, and much of this controversy is connected to the war in Iraq. So let me be clear: no system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other." Obama talked about democracy but he failed to speak about the democratic government of Iraq. Whatever one thinks of the US invasion in 2003, that is a tremendous achievement and one brought about at a massive cost in American and Iraqi lives. It's an achievement that needs to be supported and built on, not least to demonstrate to other Arab countries that democracy in the Middle East is possible. Yet Obama seemed to want to ignore Iraq because he opposed the invasion.

10. "For instance, in the United States, rules on charitable giving have made it harder for Muslims to fulfill their religious obligation. That is why I am committed to working with American Muslims to ensure that they can fulfill zakat."

After 9/11, the Bush administration - with the full bipartisan support of Congress - cracked down on terrorist financing via some groups that posed as Islamic charities. So what's Obama hinting at here? As David Frum puts it: "It is not at all hard for American Muslims to give to legitimate charities. What has been made difficult is giving to terror groups. Is the president suggesting he will relax those restrictions?"

Certainly, there were aspects of the speech that were praiseworthy. Rich Lowry, no Obama fan, summarises some of them: "He extolled America as 'one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known'; pledged we will 'relentlessly confront violent extremists who pose a grave threat to our country'; condemned Holocaust denial as 'baseless, ignorant, and hateful'; said 'it is a sign of neither courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus'; insisted that 'the Arab-Israel conflict should no longer be used to distract the people of Arab nations from other problems'".

There's been lots of breathless commentary today about the "historic" moment and the power of Obama's oratory. In time, however, the speech will probably be remembered, at best, for its high-flown aspirations rather than the achievements it laid the foundations for. Or, at worst, for the naive and flawed approach it foretold.
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Jon Voight: Oppose Obama's wrongminded policy and save Israel

Osama Bin Laden Calls For 'Long War With Infidels'

from Sky News
June 04, 2009

Al Qaeda's leader Osama bin Laden has told Muslims to prepare for a long war against "infidels and their agents".

He warned Muslims against alliances with Christians and Jews, saying it would annul their faith, and urged them to fight.

Parts of the tape were aired on Wednesday, in which he accused US President Barack Obama of planting the "seeds of hatred" towards America among Muslims.
But the full 25-minute audiotape has now been made available - on the day Mr Obama delivered a speech addressed to the Islamic world.

"We either live under the light of Islam or we die with dignity... brace yourselves for a long war against the world's infidels and their agents," the terror group leader said.

Bin Laden was speaking in an audio recording that was posted on an Islamist website.

This is the case of the Pakistani army as it is with America in the same dungeon against Islam. The true folk of Islam should fight them.

Parts of the tape were aired on Wednesday, in which he accused US President Barack Obama of planting the "seeds of hatred" towards America among Muslims.

But the full 25-minute audiotape has now been made available - on the day Mr Obama delivered a speech addressed to the Islamic world.

"If a Muslim became an ally of the infidels and backed them against Muslims, his faith would be annulled and he would become an apostate infidel," bin Laden said.

"Do not take Jews and Christians as allies," the Saudi-born militant went on, adding that fighting Muslim Pakistani soldiers was not sacrilegious, as they were implementing US policies.

"This is the case of the Pakistani army as it is with America in the same dungeon against Islam. The true folk of Islam should fight them," bin Laden said.

The al Qaeda leader also described Pakistani President Asif Zardari as an US ally and said he had ordered his army to fight Muslims at the behest of Washington.

Pakistan's army began battling Taliban Islamists, allies of al Qaeda, in Swat in April.

The offensive followed a militant thrust into a district 100km (60 miles) north west of the capital Islamabad.

The push had raised fears at home and abroad that the nuclear-armed country could slowly slip into militant hands.

Mr Obama chose Egypt to make an address to Muslims in which he tried to dispel resentment inflamed by US involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan after al Qaeda's September 11 attacks

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Obama declares himself "Pharaoh of the World" after speech

Obama calls for new beginning between US, Muslims

from Yahoo News
By Mark S. Smith
Associated Press

CAIRO – Quoting from the Quran for emphasis, President Barack Obama called for a "new beginning between the United States and Muslims" Thursday and said together, they could confront violent extremism across the globe and advance the timeless search for peace in the Middle East.

"This cycle of suspicion and discord must end," Obama said in a widely anticipated speech in one of the world's largest Muslim countries, an address designed to reframe relations after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

The White House said Obama's speech contained no new policy proposals on the Middle East. He said American ties with Israel are unbreakable, yet issued a firm, evenhanded call to the Jewish state and Palestinians alike to live up to their international obligations.

In a gesture to the Islamic world, Obama conceded at the beginning of his remarks that tension "has been fed by colonialism that denied rights and opportunities to many Muslims, and a Cold War in which Muslim-majority countries were often treated as proxies without regard to their own aspirations."

"And I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear," said the president, who recalled hearing prayer calls of "azaan" at dawn and dusk while living in Indonesia as a boy.

At the same time, he said the same principle must apply in reverse. "Just as Muslims do not fit a crude stereotype, America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire."
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Obama Isn't Visiting Israel. WHY?

THE REAL GENUFLECTION TO THE SAUDIS

from Dick Morris.com
By DICK MORRIS & EILEEN MCGANN
June 2, 2009

When President Obama first met the Saudi royals, he seemed to bow at the waist. Either that or he doubled over in pain. Did he bow? Or didn't he bow? That was the topic du jour at the press briefing that day.

But now we have the answer: Obama is, indeed, really bowing to the Saudis as he visits the Middle East this week.

First, he is bypassing Israel. Visiting the Middle East and not going to Israel would be like touring North America and omitted a stop in the United States. It only makes sense if you interpret it as a deliberate slap in the f ace of Jerusalem and a statement to the Arab world that America's pro-Israeli policy is changing.

But as he goes to Saudi Arabia, the United States State Department, head by Mrs. Hillary Clinton, has announced that it has accepted the ground rules for media coverage of the Obama visit to the royal family and its domain. Reporters will only be allowed to cover the actual meetings between the Saudis and Obama and will not be permitted to visit the rest of the country or report on anything else they see during the trip. Those reporters who violate these terms are subject to arrest and imprisonment by the Saudi government!!!

Hillary and Obama accepted these terms.

Since when does the U.S. government act as the assistant to the Saudi monarchy in charge of controlling the media? And since when would an American president permit this shackling of the media and still proceed with the diplomatic visit without a murmur of protest?

Since when? Since Obama became president determined to appease Iran, Saudi Arabia, the Palestinian Authority, Hamas, and all of the extremists while slighting Israel and turning his back on democracy.

Obama is outraged at those horrible Israeli settlements. They have to go! They are the major threat to Mid-East peace! Not the Iranian development of nuclear weapons or its subsidization of Hamas and Hezbollah or the Saudi royal subsidies for these terror organizations or welfare payments to the families of suicide bombers. No, it's those damn settlements.

It isn't enough if Israel promises not to build new ones. It can't be allowed to build new homes for family members who already live there! If junior gets married and has a family, he'd better move out back to Israel. He can't be allowed to build his own home in the settlements. The threat to world peace is just too grave to permit it.

The Obama Mideast policy is turning our priorities on their head. It is painful to watch and it is likely to get worse until Americans get a fundamental point: Obama is determined to end sixty years of support for Israel and this trip to the Middle East is the start of it.

Obama has crossed the line - It's not the 'settlements' stupid, it's the fact that Israel exists

Here's a great comment regarding this post:

Poor use of Terms
I think if way back when, if Israel would have used more appropriate terminology when defining 'settlements', to instead have called them neighborhoods like any other in Israel, they wouldn't be in this dilemma. This is simillar to the term 'occupied territories', what nonsense, land won in battle is considered occupied, since when? What other country has this stupid notion of 'occupied territory'. Is the State of Texas or New Mexico, won in a war with Mexico, considered occupied? No. Israel's very poor use of terms such as these are causing many problems for themselves.

Joe Brooke - USA (06/03/2009 07:46)

from The Jerusalem Post
Jun 3, 2009
by GIL HOFFMAN

Barack Obama's administration's criticism of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's policies has crossed the line into interfering in Israeli politics, top Likud ministers and MKs said Tuesday.

Kadima officials responded to the allegations by disagreeing that the US was meddling but expressing concern that such a perception by the Israeli public would harm their party and end up strengthening the prime minister. They accused Netanyahu's associates of portraying Obama as an enemy of Israel in order to unite the public behind him.

The charges of American interference began April 16 when Yediot Aharonot quoted Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel telling an unnamed Jewish leader: "In the next four years there is going to be a permanent-status arrangement between Israel and the Palestinians on the basis of two states for two peoples, and it doesn't matter to us at all who is prime minister [of Israel]."

Likud Minister-without-Portfolio Yossi Peled said Tuesday that the statement was inappropriate and was just one of many examples of American interference in Israeli politics since Netanyahu's election in February.

Vice Premier Moshe Ya'alon, also of the Likud, has accused Israeli Leftist groups of coaching Obama's administration on how to handle Netanyahu.

Netanyahu himself appeared to endorse that assertion when he told a Likud MK over the weekend: "What do they want from me? Do they want my government to fall?"

Israeli diplomatic officials were quoted in Ma'ariv on Tuesday accusing the Obama administration of attempting to force Netanyahu to bring Kadima into his coalition and adopt its policies on the Palestinian-state issue.

"They are pressuring Livni to retreat from her opposition to joining Netanyahu's government, so she can enter it and prevent the worsening of relations with the US," a diplomatic official was quoted as saying.

Likud MK Danny Danon, who has close ties with Evangelical leaders in the US, was most blunt in his criticism of Obama. He said Obama refused to admit that the public in Israel chose a different direction, just like America did.

"The American administration thinks that there were only elections in the US," Danon said. "Any attempt to intervene in Israeli politics only strengthens Netanyahu, who has the support of the public, especially after this interference."

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Osama Doesn't Like Obama

image by rees

Bin Laden: Obama plants seeds of Muslim hatred for United States

from the DEBKAfile Report
June 3, 2009

Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden warned Americans "to be prepared to receive the consequences of the Obama and Bush administrations."

In a new recorded audiotape aired by Arabic Al Jazeera TV Wednesday, June 3 - as Saudi king Abdullah greeted US president Barack Obama on his arrival in Riyadh - bin Laden said Obama had planted the seeds for "revenge and hatred" toward the United States in the Muslim world.

The warning was issued the day before the US president was to deliver a speech to Muslims from Cairo.

Tuesday, bin Laden's deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, called on Egyptians to confront the "criminal" Barack Obama whose "bloody messages" to Muslims have been received… and would not be covered by "public relations campaigns or theatrical visits or polished words."

Zawahiri called the US president "that criminal who came seeking with deception to obtain what he failed to achieve on the ground after the mujahidin ruined the project of Crusader American in Iraq Afghanistan and Somalia."

Also on June 3, it was discovered that Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb had on May 31 put to death in Mali Edwin Dyer, a Briton taken hostage in Niger near the Mali border with a Swiss citizen and two other tourists.

Al Qaeda had demanded the release of the Jordanian-born Palestinian terrorist Abu Qatada, who is waiting in a British prison for extradition to Jordan where he received a jail sentence in absentia for terror. A Spanish judge has identified Abu Qatada al Qaeda's top lieutenant in Europe.
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Obama invites Iranian envoys to July 4th Parties

from The Jerusalem Post
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
SAN PEDRO SULA, Honduras

In a new overture to Iran, the Obama administration has authorized US embassies around the world to invite Iranian officials to Independence Day parties they host on or around July 4th.

A State Department cable sent to all US embassies and consulates late last week said that US diplomats could ask their Iranian counterparts to attend the festivities, which generally feature speeches about American values, fireworks, hot dogs and hamburgers.

The notice, sent on Friday, said that the posts "may invite representatives from the government of Iran" to the events, a State Department official said Tuesday, quoting from the document. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an internal communication.

It was not immediately clear how many embassies and consulates would actually invite Iranian diplomats to the July 4 parties or whether any Iranians would accept the invitations.

The cable was first reported by The New York Times.

The move comes amid the administration's ongoing efforts to engage Iran in variety of venues, including formal diplomatic meetings over its nuclear program, violence in Iraq and the situation in Afghanistan.

But Iran has given mixed responses to the overtures, which began early in the administration when President Barack Obama recorded a videotaped greeting to the Iranian people and its leaders for their new year.

Since then, the administration announced that it would be a full participant with Iranian officials in six-nation talks aimed at getting Iran to address concerns about its suspect nuclear program. The US and others accuse Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons.

Iran maintains it is only interested in a civilian atomic energy program and has refused to accept a package of incentives offered by the US and its partners to get it to stop enriching uranium, a process that can produce the fuel for a nuclear weapon.

The US also ensured that Iran was invited and attended an international conference on Afghanistan at which US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke and an Iranian official had a brief exchange with a senior American diplomat.

During that meeting in The Hague, U.S. delegates passed an informal note to Iranian officials seeking information about three Americans then missing or detained in Iran.

Last month, Iran released one of the Americans, Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, who was tried and convicted of spying for the United States.

Obama and other US officials have said they do not expect to see much movement from Iran until after the country holds presidential elections in the middle of the month, but have sketched a rough deadline of the fall by which they hope to see positive responses to their overtures.
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Obama: U.S. is "one of the largest Muslim countries in the world"

from Jihad Watch
June 2, 2009

What planet is he on?

"Obama Says U.S. Could Be Seen as a Muslim Country, Too," by Jeff Zeleny for the New York Times Caucus Blog, June 2 (thanks to Randall):

HAHN, Germany — As President Obama prepared to leave Washington to fly to the Middle East, he conducted several television and radio interviews at the White House to frame the goals for a five-day trip, including the highly-anticipated speech Thursday at Cairo University in Egypt.

In an interview with Laura Haim on Canal Plus, a French television station, Mr. Obama noted that the United States also could be considered as “one of the largest Muslim countries in the world.”...

Was that an observation or a wish?

“What I want to do is to create a better dialogue so that the Muslim world understands more effectively how the United States, but also how the West thinks about many of these difficult issues like terrorism, like democracy, to discuss the framework for what’s happened in Iraq and Afghanistan and our outreach to Iran, and also how we view the prospects for peace between the Israelis and the Palestinians,” Mr. Obama said.

The president said the United States and other parts of the Western world “have to educate ourselves more effectively on Islam.”

I'm all for that. And I hereby offer my services to assist in this great effort.

“And one of the points I want to make is, is that if you actually took the number of Muslim Americans, we’d be one of the largest Muslim countries in the world,” Mr. Obama said. “And so there’s got to be a better dialogue and a better understanding between the two peoples.”...

Here is a 'What-Is-Obama-Smoking?' Alert:

Indonesia: 200 million Muslims. India: 156 million Muslims. Pakistan: 150 million Muslims.

United States: 2.3 million Muslims (according to the Pew Research Center).

“I think the most important thing I want to tell young people is that, regardless of your faith, those who build as opposed to those who destroy I think leave a lasting legacy, not only for themselves but also for their nations,” Mr. Obama said. “And the impulse towards destruction as opposed to how can we study science and mathematics and restore the incredible scientific and knowledge — the output that came about during centuries of Islamic culture.”...

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Zawahri urges Egyptians to reject "criminal" Obama

from The Star.com
Wednesday June 3, 2009

DUBAI (Reuters) - Al Qaeda's second-in-command urged Egyptians to reject U.S. President Barack Obama's planned visit, seen as a charm offensive towards Muslims angered by his predecessor's policies, and called him a "criminal".

"Obama ... is not welcome in Egypt," Ayman al-Zawahri, an Egyptian al Qaeda leader, said in a recording posted on an al Qaeda-linked Islamist website on Tuesday.

"Does (a group of) people in Egypt, who are raging flames and fuel, hear my cry," Zawahri said reciting a poem composed during the British occupation of the Arab country.

Obama is trying to improve the United States image in Arab and Muslim countries after former president George W. Bush outraged millions of Arabs and Muslims with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as support for Israel.

Obama's "bloody messages have been received and are still being received and they will not be covered by public relations campaigns or theatrical visits or polished words", Zawahri said.

"O' Egypt's free, righteous and honourable people and mujahideen; stand united in the face of this criminal."

Obama "came seeking, through ploy, to win what he had failed to acquire in the battlefield. After the mujahideen foiled America's crusader projects in Iraq, Afghanistan and Somalia".

Listing famous Egyptian Islamic and national figures and militants, Zawahri included one of the 19 al Qaeda suicide bombers who carried out the 2001 attacks on U.S. cities and the assassin who killed Anwar al-Sadat, the Egyptian President who signed Cairo's peace deal with Israel.

Caution: Bloody Century Ahead - A Disturbing Prediction

from Pajamas Media
June 1, 2009
by Matt Patterson

The West, which invented and maintains the political and economic institutions that underpin the modern global system, is experiencing demographic, economic, spiritual, and military contraction. The result may be a bloody 21st century.

Consider first demographics: As Mark Steyn and others have extensively documented, European birth rates have plummeted. Playgrounds and day cares are ominously empty all over the Continent. Many countries, like Italy and Spain, have entered the demographic point of no return and are now unable to replace their populations. (The United States is in much better demographic shape. It assimilates its immigrants better and generally holds a birth rate slightly above the replacement level, which is roughly 2.1 children per woman.)

But plunging birth rates are only the beginning of Europe’s troubles. Brussels, Paris, London, and cities all across the Continent teem with large, resentful, entirely unassimilated immigrant communities, some of whom occasionally riot and set fire to entire towns. Europe is in a deadly catch-22; it needs these immigrants to fund their lavish welfare states, yet refuses to assimilate them out of cultural cowardice.

As the West wastes away demographically, it also languishes spiritually, largely as a result of crushing nanny states which deliver comfort at the expense of liberty and self-reliance. The United States was once the sole hold-out against this Western trend — no more. President Barack Obama, openly and with popular support, has pledged to move America towards the welfare statism favored in Europe.

Economically, the entire West is on the precipice. Militarily, Europe is a eunuch, with only token forces meagerly and ineptly deployed. The U.S. military still strides the globe — for now. But how our armed forces will fare in the face of Obama’s multi-trillion dollar deficits is not hard to predict. Something will have to give way for the president to pay for his promised universal health care, and the Defense Department will prove an irresistible temptation for him, as it always does for Democratic presidents.

These symptoms of Western ill health, of course, intertwine and reinforce each other: welfare state economic policies drug populations into submissive languor, and drain resources from defense budgets; plummeting birth rates deepen economic woes by depriving governments of tax revenues, etc.

Our adversaries have taken note of this Western contraction and are hastening to fill the power vacuum. Russia invades Georgia with no consequence whatsoever and bullies and threatens other neighbors with equal impunity. North Korea fires ballistic missiles over Japan (a U.S. protectorate) and now, God help us, has openly tested a nuclear weapon. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda and the Taliban regroup in Western Pakistan, and Iran plows forward in its nuclear ambitions and claims to have recently test-fired a long range surface to surface missile.

Given these trends, the following scenarios are not hard to imagine. Some are likely, others certain, but all are possible in the coming decades:

1) The mad mullahs of Iran gain a nuclear weapon and follow through on their threat to erase the Jewish state from the map. The Iranians see weakness in the West and foresee minimal retaliation. Perhaps they are wrong in this calculus; either way, seven million souls vanish from the planet and the West is complicit in another Holocaust.

2) Russia, seeing no push back from its invasion of Georgia and seeing the United States all but renounce its missile defenses, begins to swallow its former slave states — Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, et al — one by one. It shuts off fuel supplies to Western Europe and blackmails them into accepting this Soviet-light expansionism.

3) European society, no longer under any credible American protection and threatened from without by the encroaching Russia and from within by its increasingly violent immigrant population, crumbles. As has happened so often in the past, a dictator steps in to restore order.

4) Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, segments of the American population resist the sudden and convulsive socialization of their republic — peacefully first, then more forcefully. China refuses to buy any more of our debt, and trillion dollar deficits finally overwhelm the greatest economic engine the world has ever seen. The U.S. economy fails, dragging the entire world down into depression, sparking global violence and chaos. China moves on Taiwan and the North Koreans push south, both confident that the United States is in no position to stop them.

Do these scenarios seem far-fetched? Since the first draft of this column was written and submitted, North Korea has announced its withdrawal from the 1953 armistice which ended the Korean War and threatened to attack United States and South Korean vessels, while Iran brazenly deploys warships into international waters.

Buckle up. Bloody century ahead.

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Crisis nears as U.S. slams Israeli settlement policy

June 1, 2009
from Haaretz
By Barak Ravid and Natasha Mozgovaya

Tensions between the Obama administration and Benjamin Netanyahu's government are nearing crisis levels after senior American officials harshly criticized the prime minister and his policies yesterday.

"The Israelis apparently wanted to check if we are serious on settlements, and they found out that we are," a senior official told Haaretz. "This has nothing to do with the speech in Cairo, and it's going to be our position after the speech in Cairo, because we believe it's in Israel's long-term security interests."

Last night Defense Minister Ehud Barak met in New York with the U.S. special envoy to the Middle East, George Mitchell. The American told Barak that the U.S. was no longer willing to return to the understandings between the Sharon and Olmert governments and the Bush administration, which allowed continued settlement construction.
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Mitchell said the administration was particularly unhappy about the Netanyahu government's unwillingness to recognize the principle of two states for two peoples.

Mitchell also emphasized that the U.S. does not accept the concept of "natural growth" for the settlements.

"We did not hear from the Bush administration about any of these so-called understandings with Israel on the settlements - all of which were supposedly oral understandings between different people every time," said one senior American official. "But we've never heard a thing about them - they certainly weren't formal agreements between our governments. "The Israelis want us to commit to oral understandings we have never heard about, but at the same time they are not willing to commit to written agreements their government has signed, like the road map and commitment to the two-state solution."

The disagreement over the understandings concerning the settlements produced an embarrassing encounter in London last week during a meeting between Mitchell, Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor and a number of Netanyahu's advisers.

At the meeting, the Israelis claimed there was a letter between former president George W. Bush and former prime minister Ariel Sharon stating that the settlement blocs would remain in Israeli hands, so construction is permitted there. Mitchell showed the Israelis that one of the letter's sections discusses the principle of two states for two peoples. "That is also written in the letter - do you agree to that?" he asked.

Despite the growing American pressure, which also came out in the leak to the New York Times that the U.S. intended to end its support for Israel in UN debates, Netanyahu continues to say he will not agree to a total freeze of construction in the settlements.

In a meeting of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee yesterday, Netanyahu said that "we will agree not to take any new territory, but we will not agree to freeze life in the settlements."
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Obama Is Destroying Our Relationship With Israel

Obama’s Foreign Policy Experiment Goes Up In Smoke - again

Abbas’s Three No’s
from Commentary Magazine
Eric Trager

Three months after Syria, Jordan, and Egypt lost substantial territory during the 1967 Six Day War, the Arab League convened in Khartoum and issued its infamous “three no’s”: no peace with Israel; no recognition of Israel; and no negotiations with Israel. Yesterday in Cairo, an uncharacteristically defiant Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas offered an updated version of these no’s: “No amending the Arab peace plan; No normalization without withdrawal; and no to the Jewishness of the Israeli state.”

You may wonder where a feckless, powerless, and unpopular leader of a non-state entity gets off setting the ground rules for future negotiations with the elected government of a regional power. As Jonathan has pointed out, the Obama White House has thrown its support so strongly behind Abbas - and issued such a strong condemnation of Israeli settlement expansion - that the Palestinian leader can hardly contain his newfound confidence.

Let this be a lesson to those who insist that a more “even-handed” approach to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would produce faster peace dividends. If anything, Abbas’s sudden bravado indicates that tilting against Israel makes its adversaries less compromising and makes peace prospects more hopeless. Consider for a moment that two of Abbas’s three no’s - his refusal to amend the Arab peace plan and vocal opposition to Israel’s Jewish character - can be collapsed into one: an insistence on Palestinians’ “right of return” to Israel proper. This is a stipulation that no Israeli government would ever accept, while Obama rejected the “right of return” explicitly as “not an option” during his presidential campaign.

In short, chalk up another failure for President Obama’s ongoing experimentation with American foreign policy.
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Obama rallies the World against Israel

Saudis to push Obama to get tough with Israel
Jun 01, 2009 at 16:06

Saudi Arabia will seek assurances that Washington is ready to get tough with Israel in Middle East peace talks when U.S. President Barack Obama makes his first visit to the Muslim kingdom on Wednesday.

After working since January to revive its 2002 Arab peace initiative, Riyadh wants to confirm that Obama is willing - unlike former president George W. Bush - to put muscle into efforts toward a two-state peace pact between the Israelis and Palestinians, analysts said.

"The only thing that can move the Israelis is the Americans," said Mansour al-Mansour, director of the Centre for Strategic Studies in Riyadh.

"If the U.S. is determined to do it, with a strong president, they can do it," he told the news agency AFP.

The Saudis say they are hopeful of sealing a budding partnership with Obama's administration after what some call the "lost years" of Bush.

"Obama and his team are coming with a lot of credibility," said a Saudi government policy advisor. "We are on the same wavelength."

But the way ahead for the world's leading superpower and a leader of the Arab bloc remains fraught with challenges.

The United States has to wrestle with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's refusal to accept the two-state solution or halt expansions of Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank.

And Obama is likely to press Saudi King Abdullah to make diplomatic overtures toward Israel and to add juice to efforts to pull rival Palestinian factions together, diplomats and experts in Riyadh said.

While strongly backing peace efforts, the Saudis have been weak at on-the-ground follow-through, such as uniting Palestinian factions in talks, a task which has been left to Egyptian mediators.

On the regional front, both the Americans and Saudis are struggling to come up with a workable strategy to deal with Iran, Riyadh's Gulf rival which is suspected of seeking nuclear weapons.

Both sides agree, though, that a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians is a keystone to hemming in Tehran, the policy advisor said.

Obama will arrive in Riyadh on Wednesday for discussions and a meal with Abdullah, before heading to Cairo for a long-promised major address to the world's Muslims.

The Saudis have warmed to Obama after relations became strained with Bush over the U.S. "war on terror" and the 2003 U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.

They have been impressed with Obama's appointment of former Northern Ireland peace negotiator George Mitchell, who has made two "listening visits" to Riyadh so far this year, as a special envoy for Middle East peace.

Abdullah has actively sought to be certain he can trust Obama, even making a point of asking visiting Brazilian President Luis Inacio Lula da Silva about the U.S. leader's character at a May 17 meeting, a Lula aide said.

Riyadh expects the Cairo speech will reiterate U.S. backing for the two-state solution set out in the Arab peace initiative, for which the Arab League renewed its commitment at a March summit.

The initiative offers blanket Arab recognition of Israel in return for the creation of a Palestinian state based on pre-1967 borders, with both sides sharing Jerusalem for their capitals.

Saudi foreign ministry spokesman Osama Nugali said it is too early to get excited about a possible peace deal, given Netanyahu's defiance during his meeting with Obama last month in Washington.

"What we have been seeing is negative statements coming out of Israel, which are of great concern for the whole peace of the region," Nugali said.

Obama and the king are also expected to address security issues, as well as Saudi-Iraqi relations, Pakistan, oil prices and the more than 200 remaining Guantanamo detainees.

Washington, which aims to remove all U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of 2011, has been perturbed by Abdullah's refusal to embrace Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and to open an embassy in Baghdad, diplomats said.

Riyadh worries that Maliki is too close to Iran, and that when U.S. troops withdraw the two countries could become a powerful Shi'ite Muslim bloc in the majority Sunni region.

"We don't believe that Iraq is viable without a substantial American presence," said the Saudi government advisor.

Obama is also expected to urge Abdullah to accept some of the roughly 100 Yemeni detainees at Guantanamo into the Saudi rehabilitation programme for Islamist militants.

Officials of the programme have been reluctant, stressing that its success in turning former militants into productive citizens is deeply rooted in Saudi family culture.

"It's a bad idea, because they didn't grow up there," said Christopher Boucek, an expert at the Carnegie Endowment in Washington who has studied the programme.
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