Time for a change
I find it hard to understand the continued high level of support for President Obama among Jews.
While Mitt Romney’s claim that the president “threw Israel under the bus” may be extreme, our president’s support for Israel seems only to go as far as it needs to go to prevent a major Jewish backlash. His administration has been criticized from the beginning as “make nice” to those who are against us and “be tough” with our friends, which he most recently demonstrated by calling for negotiations based on the 1967 boundary instead of recognition of Israel’s right to exist. His enthusiastic support for the Arab Spring without considering that it may lead to more fundamentalist rulers than those ousted shows as little foresight as President Bush’s failure to consider what would fill the power vacuum in Iraq after Hussein. While Mubarak was unsupportable, the current ruling group in Egypt has demonstrated no better policies, especially toward the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty.
The president has repeatedly missed opportunities to influence Arab countries to relax, if not eliminate, their hostility toward Israel. The exposure of the Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi Arabian ambassador should be an opportunity to see if our Saudi allies hate Israel more than Iran, for a joint “strong response.”
As much as we are concerned with Israel, our president’s focus must be on the United States. That record is equally dismal. He has no idea on how to deal with the economy other than to tax and spend. In his three years in office he has shown no leadership, repudiated in practice the openness he campaigned on, and totally failed to bring this country together. His only tactic has been “my way or the highway,” from health care to the present Jobs Bill — a failed idea he couldn’t even get his own party to support.
Ronald Weinger
Berkeley Heights
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