Investors.com / IBD Editorials  |  June 13, 2011

Duping American Jews

Middle East: The president last month promised Jewish Americans the U.S. commitment "to the security of Israel is ironclad." Has one of the Democratic Party's most dependable constituencies been conned?

The White House transcript of President Obama's May 22 speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the voice of our country's staunchest defenders of Israel, indicates that the crowd found reasons for approval.

The president, citing two Palestinian politico/terror groups, declared that "the recent agreement between Fatah and Hamas poses an enormous obstacle to peace." After the applause, he added that "No country can be expected to negotiate with a terrorist organization sworn to its destruction."

When the second round of applause had died, he continued, saying the U.S. will keep demanding "that Hamas accept the basic responsibilities of peace, including recognizing Israel's right to exist and rejecting violence and adhering to all existing agreements." A third round of cheers followed.

Would the crowd have been so happy had it known that less than a month later the U.S. would give Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu an ultimatum to resume talks with the Palestinians based on Israel's pre-1967 borders? Or would it have thought it was being lied to?

Washington Post writer Jennifer Rubin asked the right question Sunday when she wanted to know "what happened to the statements in President Obama's speech to AIPAC that Israel could not be expected to sit down with those who want to destroy it?"

She also pointed out that Hamas has not recognized Israel or renounced terrorism, but Palestinian National Authority President and Fatah party leader Mahmoud Abbas has renounced the previously-agreed-to Oslo Accords on final borders.

Former Assistant Secretary of State Elliot Abrams told Rubin that Obama is "asking Israel to negotiate with a Palestinian side that includes Hamas without Hamas taking one single step away from terror."

Netanyahu eloquently and humiliatingly reminded Obama last month that "before 1967, Israel was all of nine miles wide — half the width of the Washington Beltway. And these were not the boundaries of peace; they were the boundaries of repeated wars, because the attack on Israel was so attractive from them."

Impossible-to-defend boundaries are what the president demands the Jewish state accept — while assuring U.S. Jews of his "ironclad" commitment to Israel's survival.

Original article here.