AP: Gaza is a "tiny Palestinian enclave," Bibi is a "hardliner" and Hagel is a "maverick"

 

The Ass. Press "reports" that

• The relationship between Bibi Netanyahu and Barack Obama is "unproductive", "dysfunctional," and "only growing more complex."
• The U.S. "routinely" supports Israel, as when it refrained from criticizing "Israel's bombardment of Gaza ... in retaliation for rocket attacks from the tiny Palestinian enclave."
• Netanyahu is a "hardliner."
• Hagel is a "maverick."
• Netanyahu hosted Romney in Israel "as if he were already a world leader" and even though he denies it, "his words and actions clearly showed favoritism for Romney."

 

If the Ass Press did not already have their Obama-esque worldview cast in stone, we might remind them of what was said and done in September:

 

.... According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Netanyahu sent his defense minister, Ehud Barak, to deliver a goodwill message to Chicago mayor and former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel ...

An aide to Israeli leader said "no comment" when questioned about nature of the meeting and a spokeswoman for Emanuel would only confirm that Barak met with the Chicago mayor Thursday afternoon.

This marks the second time in six days the Israeli leader has sought, either personally or through back channels -- Barak and Emanuel are friends -- to distance himself from the perception he is agitating for the president's defeat in November. Asked by Meet The Press moderator David Gregory on Sunday if he thought "Governor Mitt Romney as President Romney make Israel safer," Netanyahu demurred.

"I'm not going to be drawn into the American election. And what's guiding my statements is not the American political calendar, but the Iranian nuclear calendar," the Israeli leader replied. "I'm talking to [President Obama]. I just talked to him the other day. We are in close consultation. We're trying to prevent that. It's really not a partisan issue. It's a policy issue, not a partisan issue."

 

I wonder, how many American voters are not really morons, but simply well-intentioned folks who believe what they read in the newspaper (and magazines)?

 

 

Comments

[Mannie Sherberg]

I have no quarrel with AP's calling Bibi a "hardliner." Indeed, he IS a hardliner -- and I hope he remains one. A hardliner, as I see it, is someone who puts the security of his people ahead of all else, who isn't taken in by sweet talk or empty promises, who insists on telling the truth even when no one wants to listen, and who -- perhaps most important of all -- refuses to be pushed around. If, as expected, Bibi wins the upcoming election by a big margin, it'll be because the Israeli people see him as a hardliner and want a hardliner as their prime minister. Of course, the AP is no doubt using "hardliner" to imply Bibi is unreasonable, inflexible, and obsructionist. But those are exactly the qualities Reagan manifested in dealing with the Soviets. They're simply evidence that -- on certain subjects -- a leader is as hard as nails. Nothing wrong with that. As for Hagel, calling him a "maverick" isn't wrong but it does miss the most important thing about him: he is -- far more significantly than anything else -- a stealth jihadist. Putting him in the Cabinet would be like FDR's naming a member of the German-American Bund his Secretary of War in 1938.