De Pro Israel Lobby 132

Dat is de centrale vraag de komende tijd, is de pro-Israel lobby machtiger dan de president van de VS of niet? In Nederland durven mijn collega's die vraag nog niet te stellen, in de VS en Israel wel. In Nederland gaat de vrijblijvende vraag nog over de nazi-Holocaust, in de VS en Israel gaat het over de macht in de wereld.

Can Obama Stop Israeli Settlements?
Sunday 07 June 2009

Now comes the heavy lifting. Barack Obama has spoken in Cairo, calling for a new beginning between the U.S. and the world's one billion Muslims. All the major players have offered their initial reactions, and everyone from Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to the incredibly shrinking Osama bin Laden is asking the same question: Can Obama deliver?

The first and most obvious test will be Israeli settlements on the occupied West Bank. In his speech, Obama drew a rather modest line in the sand. "The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements," he said. "This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop."

Obama did not call for a withdrawal of existing settlements, the tearing down of the separation wall, or the opening of the Israeli-only highways that carve up the Palestinian land and make a viable state impossible. He left these and other life-and-death issues to future negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians.

Even so, Netanyahu and his Likkud-led government said no. "Israel will not heed President Barack Obama's powerful appeal to halt all settlement activity on lands the Palestinians claim for a future state, officials said Friday, a position that looks sure to cause a policy clash with its most powerful ally," the Associated Press reported.

"The government plans to allow construction inside existing West Bank settlements to accommodate for growing families, said the officials."

Columnist Charles Krauthammer and America's whatever-Israel-wants crowd dutifully repeated the "natural growth" argument, finding a humanitarian necessity in helping Israeli families grow and prosper on Palestinian land.

In their eagerness to avoid any suggestion of "moral equivalence" in the suffering of Palestinians and Jews, the American Likkudniks urged Obama to hold off on the settlements until he stopped the Iranian nuclear program, the build-up of Hamas missiles in Gaza, and the threat posed by a newly-strengthened Hezbollah in Lebanon.

And, no surprise, the same voices somehow managed to overlook the Fourth Geneva Convention, which makes it a crime in international law for any country to colonize land it has conquered in war.

One could be forgiven for beginning to see a pattern here.
Lees verder: http://www.truthout.org/060709A