Follow on TwitterThe World Moves To Action: ‘Israel Must End Its Illegal Occupation!’
After having cringed through the most recent installment of the Middle East Peace ‘negotiations’, where the Netanyahu government publicly ‘castrated’ US President Barack Obama, the rest of the world appears to have had enough.
Incoming US Majority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA), recently promised Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that he and his fellow Republicans would unite against his own country’s President and vital national security interests, to stand firm with Israel. This appears to have rattled the Obama Administration, who has all but thrown in the towel. This week the State Department announced it was giving up on pressing Israel to slow down its illegal settlement expansion.
The US has proven itself, once again, powerless to apply an iota of pressure to its greatest foreign aid recipient, even when a peace agreement is essential to its own national strategic interests:
In recent months Barack Obama has said that resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was a “vital national security interest of the United States”. His vice-president, Joe Biden, has confronted Netanyahu in private and told the Israeli leader that Israel’s policies are endangering US troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Senior figures in the American military, including General David Petraeus who has commanded US forces in both wars, have identified Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian land as an obstacle to resolving those conflicts.
Former President Bill Clinton recently stated that a Middle East Peace Agreement would “take about half the impetus in the whole world — not just the region, the whole world — for terror away.” He said, “It would have more impact by far than anything else that could be done”.
The first to react to the failure of the US peace initiative were South American countries, including Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil. They announced they now formally recognize a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders. Israel fears that Mexico, Ecuador and El Salvador are about to follow suit. None of these countries were amongst the more than 100 countries to already recognize a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders.
It is now being reported that 26 former European leaders (who held power within the last ten years) sent a strong-worded letter last Monday to each of the governments of the 27 member states and to EU institutions, calling on the EU to punish Israel for its illegal occupation. The EU Observer, which read the letter, reports it recommends the following:
Israel “like any other state” should be made to feel “the consequences” and face “a price tag” for breaking international law by building thousands of new Jewish homes on Palestinian land. [...]
… That the EU: “Will not recognize any changes to the June 1967 boundaries, and clarify that a Palestinian state should be in sovereign control over territory equivalent to 100 percent of the territory occupied in 1967, including its capital in East Jerusalem.”
It also asks ministers to set an ultimatum of April 2011 for Israel to fall into line or see the Union seek an end to the existing US-led peace talks format in favour of a UN solution.
[In addition, The EU] should:
- officially link its informal freeze on an upgrade in EU-Israel diplomatic relations to a settlement freeze;
- block imports of products made in settlements but labeled as made in Israel;
- make Israel pay the lion’s share of aid to Palestine;
- send a high-level delegation to East Jerusalem to back Palestinian claims;
- and reclassify EU support for Palestine as “nation building” instead of “institution building.”
The signatories of the letter include:
Former German chancellor Helmut Schmid, former German president Richard von Weizsacker, one-time Spanish leader Felipe Gonzales, ex-EU commission president and Italian PM Romano Prodi and the UK’s former EU commissioner Chris Patten.
It also represents the first time that the forerunner of EU foreign affairs chief Catherine Ashton, Javier Solana, has come out of the wings to challenge the newcomer.
Apparently, it’s become evident to the world that the US is NOT a fair and honest broker in this conflict. And despite its ‘superpower’ status, its billions of taxpayer dollars in annual foreign aid to Israel, and its long history of vetoing UN Security Council Resolutions against Israel, due to domestic political forces (Read: the Israel lobby), the US is powerless to apply pressure to Israel in ways that would even benefit its own stated strategic interests.
UPDATE (Dec. 14, 2010):
It appears the EU Foreign Affairs Council decided to ignore the letter by the 26 former European leaders cited above. They just released their Official Statement on the Middle East Peace Process.
Ralph Nader: President Obama Will Be Primaried
Though he hasn’t ruled out a 2012 run himself, Ralph Nader reveals to The Hill that he’d prefer to have a fresh new face to challenge the Democratic President from the Left:
“… it’s time for someone else to continue. I’ve done it so many times. When I go around the country, I’m telling people they need to find somebody.”
He cites Obama’s recent deal with the Republicans to extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest 2% of Americans — which would add $700 billion to the national debt — to be the “last straw”.
Nader’s anger seems to reflect that of many from Obama’s own progressive base. Sam Stein of the Huffington Post reports that the House Democratic Caucus passed a motion this morning to reject Obama’s deal with the Republicans. Though the vote is nonbinding, it stands as a clear repudiation of Obama’s broken campaign promise to end Bush’s tax cuts for the very wealthy, as well as his backroom deal making, which always seems to preclude progressives.
Nader states:
“There will be a primary. Just a question of how prominent a person [will run against Obama]. This deal is the last straw.”
“Obama’s position has been that the liberal, progressive wing has nowhere to go, therefore they can’t turn their back on the administration. But a challenge will hold his feet to the fire and signal that we do have somewhere to go.”
Nader goes on to question Obama’s character — now a familiar conversation piece within Progressive circles:
“[Obama] has no fixed principles. He’s opportunistic — he goes for expedience, like Clinton. Some call him temperamentally conflict-averse. If you want to be harsher, you say he has no principles and he’s opportunistic. [..]
“He’s a con man. I have no use for him,” Nader said. [...]
“These are majoritarian positions. The polling shows that. Living wage, single payer, cracking down on corporate crime. … It’s time for someone to continue this.”
It will be interesting to see whether a champion of progressive ideals decides — like Nader — “enough is enough,” to then boldly throw his hat into the ring for 2012. But to do so will mean to taking on the deep-pocketed, establishment wing of the Democratic Party. And this means taking on the entrenched interests Obama has been cutting deals with since his inauguration.
Even with a disapproval rate now at 53%, defeating an incumbent Obama will be no cakewalk.
In India: Obama Flip-Flops On Outsourcing American Jobs
It appears President Obama has two contradicting messages with regards to outsourcing American jobs overseas. The one he chooses to voice apparently depends on whether he’s speaking here at home or to an overseas audience, and whether his statements are made before or after an election.
Here’s a video clip of the President, in May of 2009, criticizing the American tax code for giving financial incentives to corporations who outsource American jobs:
“It’s a tax code that says, you should pay lower taxes if you create a job in Bangalore, India, than if you create one in Buffalo, New York. We will stop letting American companies that create jobs overseas take deductions on their expenses when they do not pay any American taxes on their profits. And we will use the savings to give tax cuts to companies that are investing in research and development here at home. “
Here’s the President speaking to a crowd in Ohio — where 9.6% of its residents are unemployed — on September 9, leading up to the 2010 midterm elections:
“One of the keys to job creation is to encourage companies to invest more in the United States. But for years, our tax code has actually given billions of dollars in tax breaks that encourage companies to create jobs and profits in other countries. I want to change that. Instead of tax loopholes that incentivise investment in overseas jobs, I’m proposing a more generous, permanent extension of the tax credit that goes to companies for all the research and innovation they do right here in America,” he said, with Ohio governor Ted Strickland standing by his side.
“I think if we’re going to give tax breaks to companies, they should go to companies that create jobs in America — not those that create jobs overseas. That’s one difference between the Republican vision and the Democratic vision. And that’s what this election is all about,” Obama said.
Now, shortcut two months later to Obama speaking in India (two days ago) — post-2010 Midterm elections:
“I don’t think you heard me make outsourcing a bogeyman during the course of my visit. In fact, I expressly said during my visit to Mumbai, at the business council, that both countries (India and the US), I think, were operating on some stereotypes that’ve outlived their usefullness,” Obama said.
“In every discussion that I have had with Indian businesses what I have seen is that our countries are matched up in a way that allows us enormous win-win potential,” he said. “Whenever I’m asked about Indians taking away our jobs, I want to say: You know what, they’ve just created 50,000 jobs. But these old stereotypes, these old concerns ignore today’s reality. In 2010, trade between our countries is not just a one-way street of American jobs and companies moving to India.”
He added:
“We’re very proud of our high-tech industries and we think we make some of the best products in the world, and we want to sell them to a growing Indian market. But it turns out some of those same technologies are ones that will allow Indian entrepreneurs to grow and thrive and create jobs right here in India,” Obama said.
President Obama obviously didn’t get the message from Americans who actually bothered to turn out to vote in the Midterm elections: “It’s the jobs, Stupid!”
UPDATE:
Tonight, The Ed Show covered Obama’s outsourcing flip-flop in India. Here’s the video clip with a worthwhile discussion on the outsourcing problem with Teamsters President, James Hoffa:
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