Letter to the Editor

Obama is No Friend of Israeli Security or American Honor

The NY Times published an op ed on 9/5 by Saban stating why he thought Jews should vote for Obama. Below is the op ed I submitted in response, but was not printed.

To the Editor:

Saban’s lengthy (900 word) Op-Ed portraying President Obama as a faithful friend of Israel omitted important facts, and distorted others. Below is my submission as a timely Op-Ed response, providing the other side of the argument.

I am a radiologist in Long Island. I was the co-chair of VIPAC (Virtual Israel Political Action Committee) for many years, and am the author of the novel Bar Mitzvah Lessons, published by Aleph Type and Design.

Martin Elsant, MD

There are so many examples of Obama’s animosity to Israel and Judaism that it is hard to pick just one.

There was the open microphone with Sarkozy where the American and French Presidents were heard trading insults of Israel’s Prime Minister. There was the March 1, 2011 White House meeting where President Obama lectured the assembled Jewish leaders that: “ You must speak to your Israeli friends and relatives and search your souls to determine how badly do you really want peace.” http://www.zoa.org/sitedocuments/oped_view.asp?opedID=2179 There was Senator/Candidate Obama’s July 2008 Berlin speech where he listed places all around the globe that had suffered from terrorist attacks and somehow Israel did not make it on to his list. And, of course, there is Obama’s current snub of Israel’s Prime Minister who is still being refused a face to face meeting about the threat of an Iranian nuclear holocaust. But I will consider in detail just one instance, perhaps the most perfidious.

On May 19, 2011, President Obama delivered his Middle East policy speech at the State Department, and said the following: “The United States believes that negotiations should result in two states, with permanent Palestinian borders with Israel, Jordan, and Egypt, and permanent Israeli borders with Palestine. The borders of Israel and Palestine should be based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps. “

There are three things wrong with President Obama’s position. First, the 1967 lines put Israel at a terrible strategic and military disadvantage. Second, the historical and Biblical heartland of Israel, including the Temple Mount and the Western Wall, are beyond the 1967 lines. Third, and the one that most closely approaches complete betrayal of the Jewish State, is that President Obama’s position on this matter fundamentally contradicts the executive letter President George W. Bush gave to Israel’s Prime Minister Sharon on April 14, 2004.

The context and contents of that April 14, 2004 letter have to be reviewed carefully to understand how profoundly President Obama betrayed Israel with his Middle East speech. The first item to note, in terms of context, is that President Bush sent his letter to Prime Minister Sharon in response to a letter Sharon had sent Bush on that same day.

Prime Minister Sharon had written to President Bush: “I attach for your review the main principles of the Disengagement Plan... According to this plan, the State of Israel intends to relocate military installations and Israeli villages and towns in the Gaza Strip, as well as other military installations and a small number of villages in Samaria.

In response, President Bush wrote the following: “We welcome the disengagement plan you have prepared... The United States appreciates the risks such an undertaking represents. I therefore want to reassure you on several points...

“Third... The United States is strongly committed to Israel’s security and well being as a Jewish state. It seems clear that an agreed, just, fair, and realistic framework for a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue as part of any final status agreement will need to be found through the establishment of a Palestinian state, and the settling of Palestinian refugees there, rather than in Israel..... In light of new realities on the ground, including already existing major Israeli population centers, it is unrealistic to expect that the outcome of final-status negotiations will be a full and complete return to the armistice lines of 1949. (technical term for the June 1967 lines) ... .”

There clearly was a quid pro quo here. Prime Minister Sharon agreed to make risky concessions --withdrawing from Gaza and abandoning several villages in Samaria -- in exchange for a list of reassurances from President Bush. These American reassurances included the following two points: a) that any resettlement of Palestinian refugees occur outside of Israel. And b) that major Israeli population centers beyond the 1967 lines become part of Israel, without requiring Israel to “swap” any of its own land. (See: Bush Erases the Clinton Parameters - Dore Gold .)

lsrael did its part, even though this meant forcing thousands of its citizens from their homes, destroying factories, farms, synagogues and cemeteries. The United States then became fully obligated to stand by the reassurances it had offered Israel. That is why all the criteria for a classic double-cross were met when President Obama, with Israel’s concessions safely in his pocket, withdrew those reassurances.

This act of treachery by President Obama was bad enough, from a moral standpoint. But there is another deeper, darker dimension to President Obama’s deception.

The reassurances President Bush offered Prime Minister Sharon were formally endorsed by both houses of Congress. On June 22, 2004, the Senate and the House of Representatives passed a concurrent resolution stating that Congress “strongly endorse[s] the principles articulated by President Bush in his letter dated April 14, 2004, to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.”

Further, M. Halberstam, a professor of international law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, who served as counselor on international law in the U.S. Department of State, Office of the Legal Adviser, points out the following: although presidential letters are not full-fledged treaties, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled multiple times over the last 70 years that executive agreements have binding legal consequences and share some aspects of formal treaties. (US support for ‘67 lines would break ... JPost - Opinion - Op-Eds)

Now we can clearly understand the dismal depths of President Obama’s perfidy. Our president is not only betraying Israel. He is also betraying America.

When Obama says there must be “mutually agreed land swaps” before Israel gains sovereignty over Jewish cities in Judea and Samaria, he is violating the Bush letter. When Obama omits explicitly insisting on settlement of Palestinian refugees outside of Israel’s borders, he is violating the Bush letter. And when Obama is violating the Bush letter, he is not just abandoning Israel. He is sullying American honor and violating American law and custom.

America is morally and legally bound to the establishment of Israeli sovereignty over Jewish population centers beyond the 1967 lines without land swaps. America is committed to the resettlement of Palestinian refugees outside of Israel’s borders so they don’t destroy the Jewish character of the Jewish state. President Obama’s May 19th speech, denying the former and ignoring the latter, makes him no friend of Israel’s security or American honor. That is why I am voting for Romney/Ryan this November.