The ongoing heartburn over Israel's announcement that they would approve permits for some 1600 housing units in East Jerusalem caused even 'the great' Tom Brokaw during Sunday's Meet the Press to guffaw. He referred to the announcement during VP Joe Biden's meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu as an 'act of audacity'. Apparently, the Messiah and his cronies have the final word in the internal affairs of all other nations. I'm sure this is news to Israel and probably caused them 'great concern'.
The fact is it may well have been a piece of gamesmanship on the part of the Israeli government which has tried, for months, without success to convince the US to take a far stronger stand against Iran. The problem is that this administration has made it clear that any hostile move against any Muslim nation will be viewed as, well, unfriendly and in this current period in our history we don't want to appear, well, unfriendly - at least to Muslim nations.
Even General Petraeus announced his desire to have the Middle East placed under his 'wing'. He expressed frustration over Israel's apparent unwillingness to play nice with their neighbors and then went further saying that Israel's actions were endangering our Warriors. Huh; Based on our obsession the whole 'winning hearts and minds' thing (at the cost of the lives of our Warriors) I didn't think that was a problem.
The interesting thing is that while we are engaged (somewhat) in the affairs of Afghanistan and Iraq, for national security reasons of our own, we find it unpalatable that the Israeli's would dare to act in kind on their own behalf. I have always held to the belief that this country should act unilaterally to protect our borders and our Constitution. I have little patience and zero respect for elected officials and their crony appointees who seek permission from other nations to do so and then act only with half measures. It is the very definition of arrogance to expect others to act on your behalf at their own peril. It is immoral not to act on behalf of our own country with whatever means at our disposal to defend ourselves and our interests.
Israel has a healthy understanding of their enemies because they have a healthy understanding of the history of those enemies and their attitude toward them. Their enemies are centuries old and relentless. Even though there has been a concerted effort to obliterate historical evidence of the holocaust and an all but successful effort to eliminate the atrocities against them by the Muslim world community over the centuries, they remember. One would think that this country's government with it's rich Judeo-Christian history and with men with memories of WW II still alive, that we would re-double our efforts to help secure Israel's friendship. Instead, we push them away and reach out to the single religious ideology that wants us as dead as they want Israel. Curious.
That General Petraeus would dare to suggest that Israel's actions were somehow detrimental to the health and well-being of our Warriors would be laughable if he himself wasn't actively supportive of an unwinnable strategy in Afghanistan and it's brutal ROE. If the good General is truly concerned about the health and well-being of the Warriors under him, he might reconsider the present strategy and clean out his own house before castigating one of the smallest nations in the world for daring to secure their own people and land.
Semper Fidelis;
John Bernard
