James 1:8 A double minded man is unstable in all his ways...

One cannot continue to hit the ball from both sides of the court with rhetoric alone. Mr. Ignatius got it exactly, and your point regarding raised expectations is the natural result. The chickens are going to come home to roost.

And it is quoting 5 Jewish writers. It is astonishing how you allow yourself to be so dominated in your political debate by members of this small ethnic group. There is also a problem with the name: Mondoweiss, because I think the first part of the name means the world, and tha last part is his own name. To have ones own name connected to the worlds name in this way show an extremely egocentrism, that all honest people naturally must shun. I understand that you in your research for your book got some valuable insights concernenig the workings of the Lobby from him, but it is essential for the rest of us to keep this narcissistic phenomenon at arms length.

To end his speech in Cairo by visiting Buchenwald seems odd, and it is obviously an manoevre to make amends to the Jewish Community after he in Cairo uttered some mild criticism of Israel. It is disgusting that this minority community hold so much sway in the Capital of the land of freedom. A country that have no part or guilt in the persecution of Jews during The Second World War, but without whose effort there would hardly have been any Jew left. The White House PR machine went into high gear to explain that he was following in the footsteps of his great uncle Now the great uncle says this is bogus.

THE TELEGRAPH, 29 May 2009: Barack Obama's great uncle criticises him over Buchenwald visit

Barack Obama faced unprecedented public criticism from a member of his own family when his great uncle said he was only visiting a concentration camp next week for 'political reasons'.

By Alex Spillius in Washington

Asked if his great nephew was following in his footsteps, which the White House has suggested as a reason for the trip, Mr Payne told the German magazine Der Spiegel: "I don't buy that. This is a trip that he chose, not because of me I'm sure, but for political reasons."

Denting the normally smooth-running presidential public relations machine, he added

Summary: Holocaust and Ashkenazi Genocidalism

Now that we have more access to Russian, Polish, and Soviet archives, any discussion of the Holocaust is completely inappropriate unless contextualized by the history of ethnic Ashkenazi financial crimes, sabotage, radical violence, targeted assassinations, mass murder, ethnic cleansing, and genocide.

Forbes: Zionist ethnonational Financial Warfare

Transnational Zionist political economic oligarchs skim a good chuck of that subsidy described above into their pockets in addition to what they suck more directly out of the US economy.

These oligarchs like Saban, Bronfman, Adelson, the Krafts, Peretz, etc. are Netanyahu’s real employers.

If Obama wants to change Israeli behavior. He need only add the IDF to the list of terrorist organizations on the basis of the Gaza rampage — there is more than enough documentation to do so.

Then the US government could start arresting the oligarchs for aiding and abetting Zionist terrorism. Seizing all the oligarch’s assets and all the assets of Israel advocacy organizations would defang the Israel Lobby.

I do not understand why ordinary progressive Jews, who do not have multiple millions of dollars in the bank run interference for the oligarchs, who view ordinary Jews as canon fodder to defend plutocratic revenue streams.

Why Not Remove Zionist Interlopers?

What is sauce for the goose is gravy for the gander.

Because Neocons acting as a Jewish Zionist special interest formulated policies that forced millions to become refugees, an even handed US foreign policy must treat the removal of criminal Zionist conglomeration from the ME as a completely valid option that would stabilize the ME and benefit US interests.

Some of them will conclude that the United States is in fact at war with Islam -- no matter what Obama might say -- and extremists on both sides will be quick to say "I told you so."

No, they won't conclude that, they already know who is in fact at war with Islam. It is all written in an open book.

And Professor you know that they are the State and Obama is in lip-service of the State.

James 2:24: "You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone."

It doesn't say that for the man who is secularist, does it?;->>

Professor, you stick to reality, in fact make it your faith then you'll be alright. When you wake up in the morning, remind yourself saying a few times "I believe in Reality! Reality is my religion/law!".

Grand Sen~or.

An insightful post. Let us not forget that coming out of 9/11, George Bush was a fiery-eyed idealist himself, leading the free world in an existential struggle against international terrorism. The failure of that vision to deliver on its promises cost the Republican party two elections and delivered a blow to the party's credibility, confidence and identity that was devastating if not mortal. Barack Obama embodies a somewhat different set of ideals to be certain, a notion that we can talk our way our of our problems, that if we act justly we shall reap justice. If he fails in this, I imagine not only a great crisis for American credibility abroad, but for the ideological credibility of any political party among American voters.

What would Americans do if it seemed that there were simply no ideals worth holding anymore?

Obama is not going to make much progress with the Muslim world until he slaps the Jewish Zionist world down really hard.

David Shasha, who is Director of the Center for Sephardic Heritage in Brooklyn, N.Y, recently distributed a movie review, which unlike Obama in Cairo focused on the real problem of the dangerous Jewish psychological dynamic (including yes, racism) that has perverted the US process of developing foreign policy:

What Adam Sandler has done [in You Don't Mess with the Zohan] – wittingly or unwittingly – is to bring together Jewish paranoia and Jewish power by dwelling on the symbolic meaning of the sexual act and the way in which the orgasm can serve as a unifying marker of a new-found Jewish assertiveness and aggression that is literally embodied in the Zohan whose dual nature brings together the power of the phallic in both sexual and military terms.

[To read the entire review, click here.]

Ask yourself after reading or hearing Obama's speech, especially the passages on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, what kind of plan you expect he is planning to roll out for ending the conflict. Then ask yourself whether that plan has any greater chance of success than the Oslo process had.

If you follow the logic of his speech--that there is a moral equivalence between the Holocaust and the plight of the Palestinians, then the moral imperative is that we reverse direction on our Israel policy.

Laid out as a logical argument, it would go something like this:

1. The US had a moral imperative to fight against those engaged in the Holocaust.
2. There is a moral equivalence between the Holocaust and the plight of the Palestinians.
Therefore,
The US has a moral imperative to fight against those engaged in bringing about the plight of the Palestinians.

I think the moral comparison he makes is absurd, but the logic is inescapable once you accept the premise; the conclusion to his speech is that we have a moral imperative to declare war on Israel, or, at the least, to take other steps to punish or cease our support for them.

Professor, can you imagine Obama saying to Nazis after visiting Buchenwald:

The U.S. "can't force peace upon the parties," he said, but America has "at least created the space (lebensraum), the atmosphere, in which talks can restart." MSNEWS the word in paranthesis is mine.

Grand Sen~or.

If Obama is unable or unwilling to move beyond speechifying and make some genuine shifts in U.S. policy, he will have unintentionally reinforced Arab and Muslim beliefs that the problem is intrinsic to the United States itself, and not just to a particular period in history (e.g., the Cold War, or the post-9/11 era), or a particular president (George W. Bush).

That is exactly the problem, because America's policies - like those of any country - have not evolved out of thin air or in answer to any one person's whim, they are the product of endless factors: political, material, historical, that have evolved over decades. So, in fact, the problem is "intrinsic to the United States itself". How could it be otherwise?

One overlooked sentence in President Obama’s Cairo speech could be the long-term game changer. He said: “On education, we will expand exchange programs, and increase scholarships, like the one that brought my father to America, while encouraging more Americans to study in Muslim communities.” The US could easily send ten of thousands of US high school students to study abroad in Muslim communities. We do not need to spend more money. We just need to permit states and local school district to use their existing funds to pay for high school students to study abroad. Could 30,000 US high school students studying abroad in Muslim countries each year change the dynamics. Maybe, and that would be just a little over one percent of each graduating class nationwide.

And I'm betting it played even better with broad populations than it did with various elite commentators.

I'm not so certain. Remember that the general populations of the Arab states (with some exceptions) usually have a significantly more negative view of the US than the elites of those countries. Assuming that they even watched or heard the speech at all - while Obama tried to play up the speech as Some Massive Thing, remember that not everything in Egypt revolves around whether or not the US government is going to offer more support to Palestinians. There are other things, particularly soccer games, that are on tv as well.

If Obama is unable or unwilling to move beyond speechifying and make some genuine shifts in U.S. policy, he will have unintentionally reinforced Arab and Muslim beliefs that the problem is intrinsic to the United States itself, and not just to a particular period in history (e.g., the Cold War, or the post-9/11 era), or a particular president (George W. Bush).

Certainly the US needs to establish a better reputation for actually delivering on promises made in that region, and a degree of realism is very necessary (meaning that the US shouldn't raise stakes it can't keep - and considering how volatile Israeli politics can be, those are some tough stakes).

Assuming Obama is really concerned with acting tough on Israel while re-starting the peace process, he would have been more advised to simply start with the settlement pressure, then escalate it to financial pressure - with a way out in the form of new negotiations with the PA, and some type of additional alleviation for the Gazans.

Instead, he decided to give yet another speech. He's quite fond of speeches, or his staff is trying to play to his natural advantage, or (and this is the scariest one) he and his people think rhetoric is immensely important on an issue soaked with good, unfulfilled promises and rhetoric for decades - or all three.

I said it over on Drezner's blog, and I'll say it here - Obama talks too much.

Obama is looking to unite moderates in search of just and workable solutions to the region's many problems, but as Ignatius notes, rejectionists on both sides aren't going to just fold their tents.

This sounds like a seriously flawed worldview on the Arab world, in which there are Arab "radicals" (usually violent islamists) who reject any type of accommodation with the US, and Arab "moderates" who are just looking for a reconciliation beyond getting over the initial "anger" over some past wrong, in some sort of American-like scale ranging from the "radicals" to the "moderates". The truth is that, like in Lebanon, the whole Arab world is shot through with fissures in the forms of various factions and interests, and even the so-called "moderates" often have agendas that only seem moderate because they don't involve grandiose islamic rhetoric.

If America's first black president -- a man with a Muslim name, a cosmopolitan background, and a remarkable capacity to express his awareness of the concerns of those with whom he disagrees

Can we get over this "man with a muslim name and cosmopolitan background" bullshit as if it really means anything? I've yet to see some actual proof that Obama having "Obama" as his last name somehow makes him more "approachable" than Bush - most of the world (and America) is smart enough to keep his association with the institutions that make up the US government in mind.

Some of them will conclude that the United States is in fact at war with Islam -- no matter what Obama might say -- and extremists on both sides will be quick to say "I told you so."

More likely, a lot of them won't get their hopes up to be disappointed.

A video such as this damages the Isreali cause. How can one remain sympathetic to a people who's younger generation so openly display bigotry? Why should I send my money, sons or daughter to defend people who speak in such terms toward my people. These people do not deserve such sacrifice. They are spoiled and ignorant.

On May 20th, Israeli Finance Minister Yehezkel Abrahamoff blocked all funds going to Vatican institutions in the Holy Land -just weeks before Benedict XIV's visit to Jerusalem. (Israel has been attempting for 16 years to shake down the Vatican for more cash and levies a high tax on all Catholic Churches). And this is what Israel does to an institution that is certainly not a terrorist entity.

The ministry later reversed itself, saying there was a "misunderstanding" like when the Mafia firebombs your store saying you didn't pay protection money, then claims it was all a big misunderstanding.

Good luck to Obama getting anything out of the Netanyahu government.

The effort of the President to assuage the Middle East Muslims was a real step forward.
However, it is once again an indication of the domination and Jewish leanings of his advisers when part of the tour, following the Cairo speech, was a visit to Buchenwald. What point does this make? It is a case of one point for the Muslims scorecard and to show we haven't forgotten the Jews either, let's visit one of the Jewish shows from a period 65 years ago. Is this really the same as a visit to the pyramids, albeit, somewhat younger in antiquity?
If one had the ability to assess the factors that influenced that Buchenwald visit, we would probably find one of the reasons why we are never going to progress the Middle East solution with a new President, full of great ideas, so far just rhetoric, who may never provide the climate for a resolution, while he takes such advice.
It puts paid to those incureable optimists who expect the insidious Jewish lobby groups to become more realistic and tempered in their pressure while we have the close advisers scheduling the Jewish show circuit whenever he ventures out in the fresh air, anywhere in the world.
Find that person and you will find a traitor to the US and world peace.

That Blumenthal hate video was not unique. Didn't 100 000 New Yorkers recently turn out to celebrate the IDF and its war crimes? The sentiments expressed in the interviews done there were very similar -- and those people didn't seem to be drunk.

LawrenceofCyberia recently documented dozens of hate graffiti left by Jews in the West Bank and Gaza, "Arabs to the crematoria", "Arabs to gas chambers", "Gas the Arabs", are some of the sentiments.
http://lawrenceofcyberia.blogs.com/news/2009/05/quote-of-the-week-aharon-shabtai.html