Isi Leibler: Obama is seeking a confrontation with Israel
Yes, there is constant tension and endless recriminations bouncing between the US administration and Israel. And according to Goldberg, there is now even the threat that the US “may actually withdraw diplomatic cover for Israel at the United Nations.”David Horovitz: Obama and Netanyahu: A fractured alliance becomes open conflict
The government has made every effort to avoid aggravating the situation, but Israel is a sovereign democratic nation and there are occasions when it must reject unrealistic or dangerous demands from the US.
Netanyahu should be commended for his extraordinary diplomatic balancing act in withstanding the unreasonable pressure from Obama and Kerry, avoiding outright confrontations and in so doing, retaining the support of American public opinion and Congress.
Israel is a small country and its people are aware that the US is crucial to their survival. But does that oblige us to forfeit our self-respect or sovereignty and fawn on an administration that repeatedly displays its contempt for us and humiliates us? We should display unity by supporting our prime minister’s policy of rejecting further territorial concessions until the Palestinian leaders separate from Hamas, engage in negotiations and display flexibility to enable us to achieve our security requirements. We will not be denied the right to construct homes in our capital or in the major settlement blocs, which will remain within Israel. We seek the support of the US but we must retain our sovereignty.
Netanyahu hopes to outlast Obama’s second term, and hopes the administration will be somewhat constrained in the aftermath of the midterm elections — which may be a major calculation since, while Obama might become something of a lame duck president, that could also mean he would have nothing to lose. The Obama administration hopes (however implausibly) that Israelis will sober up and rid themselves of a leadership it deems to have ducked the “very difficult choices” that Obama urged on Netanyahu in a nastily timed interview with Goldberg in March. (That piece appeared as the prime minister was on a plane headed to meet the president at the White House. Notably, there was no similar Obama interview focused on Abbas’s failures when the PA president visited Washington soon after.)Mordechai Kedar: Behind the Attempt to Assassinate Yehuda Glick
Two leaderships, each interested in seeing the back of the other. Two leaderships of nations that certainly still have shared interests, but no longer consistently find common cause in advancing and protecting those interests. Two leaderships of nations that also used to highlight their shared common values, but with a US administration now making crystal clear that it feels Israel under Netanyahu is moving away from those shared democratic, human rights-upholding, peace-loving values.
Truly a dismal state of affairs, with potentially dire repercussions — most especially for Israel, which needs the US far more (diplomatically, militarily, economically, existentially) than the US needs Israel. Truly a fractured alliance.
Why did Islamists target Yehuda Glick? And what does it tell us about Israeli Arab plans for Israel and Jerusalem?
The plan for the attempted assassination of Yehuda Glick is just one phase of the long term struggle for Jerusalem between an Islam that sees itself as the true religion on the one hand, and the very existence of Judaism (and Christianity) - false religions in Islamic eyes - on the other.
In its own eyes, Islam came into the world not in order to stand alongside Judaism and Christianity, but to supplant them, and empty them of substance, assets and founding figures so that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, Jesus and John are all Muslims in Islamic discourse. The Temple Mount has turned into a mosque, and several hundred churches (in Ramle, Damascus, Istanbul, Spain and more) were changed into mosques by Muslim conquerors.
In the view of radical Islamists, several setbacks occurred during the twentieth century: in 1948 the Jews, using military might and aided by the Christians (British) conquered the holy land of Palestine and in1967 they won Jerusalem, and we know the next step, they claim - they will build their temple and Judaism will again become a viable religion. That poses a theological danger to radical Islamists whose raison d'être is the destruction of Judaism (and Christianity). Therefore, the radical Islamist struggle for Jerusalem in general and the Temple Mount in particular is a theological one more than it is a political, nationalist or territorial struggle. He who does not - or will not - understand this, is hiding his head in the sand.