Schmuck With Earflaps Goes Nuclear On Netanyahu

[The Guesser]

Of course there SHOULD BE a regional force. DUH! But THAT isn't the world we live in, and that is what you fail to grasp, every single time. The US is the leader of the free world. The hesitant and weak look toward us. That's the REAL WORLD. It is American might that must lead the way when terrorists try to fill a vacuum and create and expand a terror state. When we slink back our enemies are emboldened. I wish Israel could join that fight as well, but we keep tying Her hands.

It is my views that are mainstream as much as you try to paint a picture. You and your ilk are on the fringe, especially in the Jewish world. You guys just talk a lot, and too loudly. But your views are EXTREME LEFT. I do not blindly hate Obama. My Dad (may he rest in Shalom!) and I were on the phone when Obama announced OBLs death. We were cheering, and loudly. Obama himself has taught me he cannot be trusted or truthful. Bibi does what is best for Israel, not himself. His life proves it, but your blindness to it doesn't surprise me. Nor does your blindness to what happens to Israel when the Israeli Left holds sway, proven by the body count. Obama, Israel's best friend? You are warped beyond belief. Please feel free to either stop or continue repeating this drivel. The only difference between you and Conrad is you haven't squealed "Free Palestine!" yet.

Absolutely not true. It is your views that are thankfully extreme among Jews here and elsewhere. Obama got 74% of the Jewish Vote in 2008, and 69% in 2012. The majority of Jews in Israel do not support Bibi.

U.S. Jews, choose Obama over Bibi

Is Congress truly dependent upon the wisdom of Israel's premier to decide what to do about Iran? And does antagonizing the very world leaders Israel is most dependent upon to stop Iran serve Israel's interests or Bibi's electoral ambitions?

By Don Futterman 21:53 25.01.15

10

Jewish-American leaders must choose U.S. President Barak Obama over Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It is time for them – together with Jewish leaders around the world – to acknowledge what much of the Israeli electorate already knows: Netanyahu is bad for the Jews.
American Jews have always been careful to show respect to the Office of the President of the United States, even when they were less than enamored with the Middle East policies of the person holding it. They must now find the courage to acknowledge that an Israeli prime minister who insults both the office and the president is no friend of American Jewry. Netanyahu's vendetta against Obama is particularly galling, because Israelis and Jewish Americans have rarely had a friend in the White House as committed, generous and reliable in his support for them as the current president.
Jewish-American leaders should find themselves in an uncomfortable position when Netanyahu addresses Congress against the wishes of the president. An Israeli politician who makes common cause with one American political party over the other damages bi-partisan support for Israel, regardless of whether politicians from both sides of the aisle give Netanyahu ovations, as they have in the past. An Israeli leader who works actively with the Republican Party to discredit the Democratic Party is spitting in the face of the American Jewish electorate, which has given 64 to 90 percent of its vote to the Democratic presidential nominee in almost every election for the last 50 years.
I do not envy Jewish-American leaders, who have to distinguish between the office of the prime minister as the leader of State of Israel, and Benjamin Netanyahu, a jingoist politician who always puts his personal political ambitions first. Netanyahu knows that appearing to stand up to foreign leaders plays well to his voter base, who revel in the illusion that their strong leader won't let anyone tell Israel what to do, and that after six years of Likud-sponsored attacks on Obama, many of Netanyahu's followers mistakenly believe that Obama is not a friend of Israel. Rather than welcoming Israel’s prime minister with the usual fanfare and adulation, Jewish-American leaders should signal him that his grandstanding is not appreciated when it gratuitously thrusts American Jews and Israel between two branches of U.S. government.

Ostensibly, Netanyahu will speak to Congress to express Israel’s desperate need to stop Iran’s nuclear program. Like most Israelis, I believe that Iran poses an existential threat to our future. Jews everywhere are right to feel endangered by Iran. The apparent assassination last week of prosecutor Alberto Nisman in Argentina, just before he was to present evidence of a cover-up of Iran’s involvement in the 1994 bombing of the Buenos Aires Jewish Community Center, brings home the immediacy of the menace and the long arm of our opponent. But I do not think that the U.S. Congress needs Benjamin Netanyahu to explain again his well-publicized opposition to the current negotiations or the dangers posed to the Western world by Iran’s subversive global activities.
Over the last several years, Netanyahu has sounded the alarm about the Iranian threat repeatedly and with consistent urgency, if with intermittent timing. The result has been for Netanyahu to turn himself into the boy who cried wolf. Unlike the situation in the United States, only some European leaders acknowledge the danger, but too many cannot abide the messenger. The Charlie Hebdo and kosher supermarket massacres brought home this risk more than ever; Europeans have long stopped listening to Israel’s prime minister. This state of affairs is tragic, and it is Netanyahu’s fault.
A responsible leader would have worked overtime to strengthen the alliance with Israel's most important allies – the U.S. president and the heads of Europe – for a united campaign against Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Instead, Netanyahu has made a practice of insulting our most important partners, most recently when he antagonized the president of France and other European leaders by his self-aggrandizing behavior at the Solidarity March in Paris.

And the Paris incident, of course, was minor compared to the enmity toward Israel that Netanyahu’s consecutive governments have cultivated among European leaders by expropriating Palestinian land and expanding settlements. Netanyahu acts as if the Israeli right need never compromise to assuage our allies; the world will recognize the justice of their cause, and if it doesn't, its criticism can be exploited for political gain. This is a terrible miscalculation.
More than three quarters of Israeli voters rejected Netanyahu’s party in the 2013 elections, and current polls forecast similar results in 2015. While Netanyahu was able to form the government due to Israel’s factional parliamentary system, the vote hardly represented an overwhelming mandate for a man who fancies himself the Leader of the Jewish People. I cannot resist pointing out that more Jews voted for Obama than Netanyahu.
It is time for American Jewish leaders to pluck up the courage to say "no" to an Israeli prime minister who uses a feud between the Democratic president and the Republican- dominated Congress for a stunt to boost his television ratings back home. It is time for Jewish-American leaders to say "no" to Benjamin Netanyahu.
Don Futterman is the Program Director for Israel for the Moriah Fund, a private American Foundation, working to strengthen civil society and promote democracy and peace in Israel. He can be heard weekly on TLV1’s The Promised Podcast.

 

[ScottL]

^^^The guy is begging. Obama has LOST US Jews, which says a lot for a democrat. The writer is a bitter political loser trying to summon other losers to his cause.

"More than three quarters of Israeli voters rejected Netanyahu’s party in the 2013 elections, and current polls forecast similar results in 2015."

Misleading - America has 2 major political parties. Israel has a dozen. Israel also has Arab parties in Parliament openly seeking to overthrow the State. I'm sure they're in your author's count.

"Like most Israelis, I believe that Iran poses an existential threat to our future. Jews everywhere are right to feel endangered by Iran."

Thanks FutterFuck, that's all you really needed to say. Because after Iran acquires the bomb you gonna call the PM "the boy who cried wolf" again.

Meanwhile Iran need not do a thing except delay. They know Obama won't use military action no matter what (some warmonger eh). And the end result is they'll either get the bomb, or a bad deal with no teeth which will ultimately lead to them getting the bomb. And after that, this:
https://flashtrafficblog.wordpress....-says-mahdi-will-soon-reign-over-whole-world/

 

[ScottL]

Netanyahu: Iran Deal Will Allow Production of Dozens of Nukes
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Monday: "The greatest challenge to our security is the attempt by Iran to arm itself with nuclear weapons. In this regard, the agreement now being formulated between the major powers and Iran is unacceptable to Israel. This agreement is dangerous to Israel, to the region and to the world. It leaves Iran the ability to produce the necessary material for a nuclear bomb within a few months and afterwards, to produce dozens of nuclear bombs. Therefore, Israel adamantly opposes this agreement....We will do everything in order to prevent the arming of Iran with nuclear weapons capabilities." (Prime Minister's Office)

 

[Dave007inVegas]

I’m surprised he didn’t assume this position.

 

[ScottL]

Democrats Give Obama Two Months to Reach Iran Deal - Burgess Everett
Senate Democrats, led by Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), said Tuesday that they will give President Obama two months to reach a deal on the country's nuclear program before they vote for new sanctions. At least 10 Senate Democrats wrote the president Tuesday that they will not support final passage of a sanctions bill until March 24. That will allow the U.S. and other Western powers time to reach a framework for a deal scaling down Iran's nuclear program.
In their letter, the Democrats defended the forthcoming sanctions legislation as "reasonable and pragmatic," given that the economic penalties would kick in only if negotiators fail to reach a final agreement by June 30. They added, "Considering Iran's history in nuclear negotiations and after two extensions of the Joint Plan of Action, we are concerned that Iran is intentionally extending the negotiations to improve its leverage at the negotiating table....[We] look forward to working with you to achieve our shared goal of reversing Iran's ability to develop a nuclear weapon capability." (Politico)

 

[The Guesser]

[h=3]Middle East[/h] [h=1]Netanyahu Talk Stirs Backlash in Israeli Race[/h] By JODI RUDORENJAN. 27, 2015





Michael B. Oren, who spent four years as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ambassador to Washington, has called on Mr. Netanyahu to cancel his speech to Congress about Iran. Amos Yadlin, a former military intelligence chief who frequently briefed the Israeli prime minister on security matters, denounced the event as “irresponsible.”

Both men criticized their former boss for politicizing issues vital to Israel’s future. Both also have their own political motives: Mr. Oren is running for Parliament with a new center-right party, and Mr. Yadlin is the defense-minister designee of the center-left party Zionist Camp.


If Mr. Netanyahu imagined that the speech, scheduled for two weeks before the March 17 elections in Israel, would bolster his status as statesman, the undiplomatic way it was arranged has instead given his challengers an opening to undermine his main campaign platform. The backlash, not only from the White House but also from congressional Democrats, has reverberated in Israel, where maintaining bipartisan support in Congress is considered as crucial as preventing Iran from developing nuclear weapons. On Tuesday Senate Democrats who had been pushing a new sanctions bill against Iran — which Mr. Netanyahu supports — said they would hold off a vote until late March, handing the Obama adminstration a victory.

As in America, conservatives like Mr. Netanyahu tend to have the advantage when election campaigns are about security, and so far his opponents have emphasized pocketbook issues and corruption. But political analysts say that international isolation is a prime public concern of Israelis, and that attacking Mr. Netanyahu for deteriorating relations with Washington, Israel’s main defender on the world stage, could be a winning message in a tightening race.
“It’s a huge miscalculation,” said Eytan Gilboa, a professor at Bar Ilan University who specializes in political communication and Israeli-American relations. “People are now questioning his judgment. If the opposition would not just focus on economic and social issues, but also argue against his claims on security and foreign policy, I think this exercise might backfire.”

The invitation to address a joint meeting of Congress to make the case for new sanctions on Iran came from the House speaker, John A. Boehner, a Republican. Mr. Boehner did not consult either the Obama administration or his Democratic counterparts, something several veteran diplomats described as unprecedented. The White House responded with its own snub, announcing that President Obama, who has promised to veto any new sanctions, would not meet with Mr. Netanyahu while he was in town.
Senate Democrats who had been pushing the new sanctions bill said Tuesday that they would hold off a vote until late March. And while officials on both sides say the underlying security and intelligence cooperation between the United States and Israel will continue, some political analysts close to the Obama administration say it may not work as hard to rally its allies to Israel’s side in critical forums like the United Nations.
Mr. Netanyahu, who has made the Iranian nuclear program a mainstay of his career, insists his motivations are not political and declared on Sunday: “I will go anywhere I am invited in order to enunciate the state of Israel’s position and in order to defend its future and its existence.” Ron Dermer, the Israeli ambassador to Washington who orchestrated the invitation with Mr. Boehner, said at an event in Florida that speaking out on Iran was the prime minister’s “deepest moral obligation” and “most sacred duty.”
Yaakov Amidror, Mr. Netanyahu’s former national security adviser, said that “about the issue of Iran he is willing to go very far.”
“He is ready to do everything to prevent it from being signed, what he thinks is a bad agreement, to risk many things,” Mr. Amidror said of Mr. Netanyahu. “It is only because from his point of view he should prevent something that is so critical to be materialized that he allows himself to make moves that otherwise he would not.”
Experts on Iran said they did not see any new developments in the continuing nuclear negotiations, or in the differences between Mr. Obama and Mr. Netanyahu, that might explain the timing of the speech, or what appeared to be the willingness to risk the repercussions of its unorthodox arrangement. Some critics of the prime minister fear that the whole episode is strengthening Iran’s hand.

Israeli and American commentators have described a toxic mix of political considerations in both countries — a touch of pre-election panic by Mr. Netanyahu meeting up with Mr. Boehner’s opportunism. Many have called it self-promotion with a high cost, clumsy at best, if not cynical.

“It’s proven again that what we export best as Israelis is chutzpah,” said Mitchell Barak, a Jerusalem political consultant and pollster. Nahum Barnea, a leading Israeli columnist, said Mr. Netanyahu “lost the major benefit” of the speech because “the whole idea is now contaminated.”
“If it’s really all about Iran, then make it all about Iran,” said Mr. Makovsky, who worked for Secretary of State John Kerry on the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks that collapsed last spring. “I understand why he wants to make his case, but let him do it after the Israeli elections. Iran and bipartisan U.S.-Israel ties are too vital to be politicized.”
Mr. Netanyahu, whose relationship with Mr. Obama has been rocky from the start, was also accused of meddling in the 2012 presidential campaign by embracing the Republican challenger, Mitt Romney, in Jerusalem. The appointment of Mr. Dermer, who grew up in Florida and once worked for a Republican pollster, has hardly helped.

With Israeli polls showing Mr. Netanyahu’s Likud Party and the Zionist Camp running about even, candidates were quick to make hay of the congressional controversy, which dominated headlines in Israel for four days.
Isaac Herzog, the leading challenger for the premiership, said on Army Radio, “What Netanyahu is doing with this violent behavior is to harm the security interests of Israel.” Mr. Herzog’s partner in the Zionist Camp, Tzipi Livni — a former foreign minister who has made her relationships with foreign leaders a prime campaign point — called the speech “gravely irresponsible.”

Yair Lapid of Yesh Atid, a centrist faction focused mainly on economic issues, warned, “This damage will take a long time to mend.”
Yehuda Ben Meir, an expert on public opinion at the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv, said surveys had consistently shown that Israelis see a decrease in American support and a nuclear-armed Iran “as the two most serious threats, almost equal in severity.” Israelis are highly critical of Mr. Obama, and may appreciate Mr. Netanyahu’s standing up to him, but losing congressional Democrats, Mr. Ben Meir said, would play differently.
“Most people in Israel feel or think or believe that mainly this was done for internal political reasons,” Mr. Ben Meir said. “His base may say he went because of the Iranian issue, but those swing voters — and what’s important is always the swing vote — it could among certain parts of the electorate harm him. It might be that he didn’t properly estimate the fallout.”

 

[The Guesser]

[h=1]The Netanyahu Disaster[/h] [h=5]By Jeffrey Goldberg[/h]
Benjamin Netanyahu believes he has just one job, and that is to stop Iran from getting hold of nuclear weapons. He might argue that this description of his mission as Israel’s prime minister is too limiting, though such an argument would not be particularly credible. Israel’s very existence, he has argued, consistently, and at times convincingly, is predicated on stopping Iran, a country ruled by a regime that seeks both Israel’s annihilation and the means to carry it out.
Netanyahu’s options are limited. A country possessing scientific knowledge, material resources, and the will to cross the nuclear threshold is very difficult to stop. One way for Netanyahu to stop Iran, or to slow down its progress toward a bomb, would be to launch a preventative attack on its nuclear facilities. He has threatened to do so (credibly, according to officials of the Obama administration) but he has not yet done it, perhaps because American warnings against such a strike have been dire; perhaps because he understands that such an attack might not work; or perhaps because he is by nature cautious, despite his rhetoric.
Whatever the case, the only other way for Netanyahu to stop Iran would be to convince the president of the United States, the leader of the nation that is Israel’s closest ally and most crucial benefactor, to confront Iran decisively. An Israeli strike could theoretically set back Iran’s nuclear program, but only the U.S. has the military capabilities to set back the program in anything approaching a semi-permanent way. And only the United States has the throw-weight to organize sanctions regimes of lasting consequence.
For several years, Netanyahu and President Obama, despite their mutual loathing, worked more or less in tandem on this issue. Netanyahu traveled the world arguing for stringent sanctions, and Obama did much the same. In fact, Obama used Netanyahu’s tough posture to America’s advantage: On several occasions, Obama and officials in his administration played good cop/bad cop, telling other world leaders that toughening sanctions on Iran would be the only way to forestall an Israeli attack, and this line of argument often proved effective.

---

[h=4]Related Story[/h]
The Crisis in U.S.-Israel Relations Is Officially Here

---

Obama, who has argued that a nuclear Iran poses a “profound” national-security threat to the U.S., believed that pressure was a means to an end—the end, of course, being negotiations. A negotiated neutralization of the Iranian nuclear threat would be in the best interests of the U.S. and its Middle East allies, he argued, and he has worked assiduously to keep Netanyahu from taking precipitous action against Iran’s nuclear facilities, even as he used the threat to his advantage.
Netanyahu does not appear to believe that negotiations will bring about an end to the Iranian threat. He believes that any settlement agreed to by Ayatollah Khamenei, the Iranian supreme leader, would necessarily be, from the Israeli perspective, hopelessly weak. There is good reason to be sympathetic to this argument. Doubts about Iranian intentions are warranted, as is skepticism about the zeal with which the West is seeking such an agreement. But there is good reason to sympathize with Obama and his negotiators as well. They believe that a negotiated settlement that promises to keep Iran perpetually a year or more from the nuclear threshold, and provides for intrusive inspections of Iranian facilities, is far from perfect, but better than the alternative, which is eventual confrontation.
Thus, a conundrum, one with greater consequences for Netanyahu and his country than for Obama and his, because of Israel’s small size, relative lack of power, and close physical proximity to Iran.
Faced with this conundrum—an American president who he believes is willing to strike a flawed deal with Iran—Netanyahu has made the second-worst choice he could make. He has not attacked Iran, which is good—an Israeli attack holds the promise of disaster—but he has decided to ruin his relations with Obama.
To be sure, the Obama administration does not make it particularly easy on Netanyahu. For instance, early in Obama's first term, senior officials in his administration were quasi-openly rooting for Tzipi Livni to replace him as prime minister.
But, unfortunately for Netanyahu, it is incumbent upon the junior partner in the Israel-U.S. relationship to maintain an even keel in the relationship. Netanyahu, grappling with a fear that Obama will go wobbly on Iran, could have tried a long time ago to create a discreet, continuous, and respectful dialogue in advance of the conclusion of negotiations, in order to try to shape the president’s thinking, and—this is important—to work with Obama on issues that interest the United States (advancing the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, for instance, by taking the initiative once in a blue moon) in order to make the American side understand that his government is interested in giving, not merely in taking.
Instead, Netanyahu chose to make a desperate-seeming end-run around the president and attempted to appeal directly to Congress to oppose a decision Obama has not yet made. In a plan concocted by Ron Dermer, who serves as Netanyahu’s ambassador to the U.S., the speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, invited Netanyahu to address Congress on the dangers of a nuclear deal and the need for tougher sanctions, without first informing the White House.
The flaws in this approach are many. Obama administration officials have already felt disrespected by Netanyahu (recall his condescending, and public, Oval Office lecture to the president), and so this latest violation of protocol set their teeth on edge. Another flaw: The Obama administration is trying to create conditions so that if the negotiations do collapse, it will be the Iranians who get the blame, not the Americans. Legislating new sanctions—even delayed, triggered sanctions—would give the Iranians the excuse to quit negotiations and blame the U.S. Such a situation would not help Obama maintain the strong international sanctions regime that has stayed in place through the past year of talks. (Actually passing legislation now also seems superfluous; only the most obtuse Iranian leader would fail to realize that a failure in the negotiations process would lead to more sanctions.)
An even more obvious flaw: John Boehner is not the commander-in-chief, and does not make U.S. foreign policy. Netanyahu might find Boehner’s approach to Iran more politically and emotionally satisfying than Obama’s, but this is irrelevant. Yes, Congress can pass new sanctions against Iran, but it is the executive branch that drives U.S. Iran policy. Barack Obama will be president for two more years, and it makes absolutely no sense for an Israeli leader to side so ostentatiously with a sitting American president’s domestic political opposition.
Netanyahu appears to believe that his mission is singular, but Israeli prime ministers, in fact, have two main tasks. The first is to protect their country from existential threats. The second: To work very hard to stay on the good side of the president and people of the United States. Success in accomplishing this first task is sometimes predicated on achieving this second task.
Israel has been, for several decades, a bipartisan cause in Washington. Bipartisan support accounts for the ease with which Israeli prime ministers have historically been heard in Washington; it accounts for the generous aid packages Israel receives; and it also explains America’s commitment to maintaining Israel’s qualitative military edge.
Netanyahu’s management of his relationship with Obama threatens the bipartisan nature of Israel’s American support. His Dermer-inspired, Boehner-enabled end-run has alienated three crucially important constituencies. First, the administration itself: Netanyahu's estrangement from the Obama White House now appears to be permanent. It will be very difficult for Netanyahu to make the White House hear his criticisms of whatever deal may one day be reached with Iran.
Netanyahu has also alienated many elected Democrats, including Jewish Democrats on Capitol Hill. One Jewish member of Congress told me that he felt humiliated and angered by Netanyahu’s ploy to address Congress “behind the president’s back.” A non-Jewish Democratic elected official texted me over the weekend to say that the damage Netanyahu is doing to Israel’s relationship with the U.S. may be “irreparable.”
A larger group that Netanyahu risks alienating is American Jewry, or at least the strong majority of American Jews that has voted for Obama twice. Netanyahu’s decision to pit U.S. political party against U.S. political party—because that is what his end-run does—puts American Jewish supporters of Israel in a messy, uncomfortable spot, and it is not in Israel's interest to place American Jews in a position in which they have to choose between their president and the leader of a Jewish state whose behavior is making them queasy.
Why doesn’t Netanyahu understand that alienating Democrats is not in the best interest of his country? From what I can tell, he doubts that Democrats are—or will be shortly—a natural constituency for Israel, and he clearly believes that Obama is a genuine adversary. As I reported last year, in an article that got more attention for a poultry-related epithet an administration official directed at Netanyahu than anything else, Netanyahu has told people he has “written off” Obama.
I should have, at the time, explored the slightly unreal notion that an Israeli prime minister would even contemplate “writing off” an American president (though I did predict that Netanyahu would take his case directly to Congress). I still don’t understand Netanyahu’s thinking. It is immaterial whether an Israeli prime minister finds an American president agreeable or not. A sitting president cannot be written off by a small, dependent ally, without terrible consequences.
As Ron Dermer's predecessor in Washington, Michael Oren, said in reaction to this latest Netanyahu blow-up: "It's advisable to cancel the speech to Congress so as not to cause a rift with the American government. Much responsibility and reasoned political behavior are needed to guard interests in the White House."
Oren, though appointed ambassador by Netanyahu, is now running for Knesset on another party's line. When he was in Washington, he worried more about the state of Israel's bipartisan support than almost any other issue. He recently criticized Netanyahu, albeit indirectly, for risking Israel's relations with the U.S.: "Today, more than ever, it is clear that Israel-U.S. relations are the foundation of any economic, security, and diplomatic approach. It is our responsibility to strengthen those ties immediately."
There is hypocrisy in the discussion of the Netanyahu-Boehner end-run. It is not unprecedented for foreign leaders to lobby Congress directly; the Arab states opposed to Iran do it all the time, and the British prime minister, David Cameron, lobbied Congress earlier this month on behalf of Obama’s Iran policy, and against the arguments of the Republicans.
But the manner and execution and overall tone-deafness of Netanyahu’s recent ploy suggest that he—and his current ambassador—don’t understand how to manage Israel’s relationships in Washington. Netanyahu wants a role in shaping the Iranian nuclear agreement, should one materialize. His recent actions suggest that he doesn't quite know what he's doing.
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/global/archive/2015/01/the-netanyahu-disaster/384849/

 

[Acebb]

^ Why does this ass clown continue to paste these full articles nobody will or wants to, read?

What a moron.

 

[Acebb]

[h=1]White House unhinged over Netanyahu speech[/h]
After days of whining that Netanyahu’s appearance was not cleared with the White House, U.S. officials have taken to the press to anonymously screech and moan, accusing the Israeli ambassador — gasp! — of furthering the prime minister’s interests at the expense of his relations with the administration.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2015/01/29/white-house-unhinged-over-netanyahu-speech/

What a pathetic bunch of thin skinned lightweights these people are.

 

[duckhunter]

^ Why does this ass clown continue to paste these full articles nobody will or wants to, read?

What a moron.

How can you make informed opinions if you don't read articles stating the other point of view??? Oh, I forgot......you don't have to read other views.....Israel can do no wrong, regardless of what the other views are.

 

[Acebb]

How can you make informed opinions if you don't read articles stating the other point of view??? Oh, I forgot......you don't have to read other views.....Israel can do no wrong, regardless of what the other views are.

The point is that the resident fluffer doesn't have to paste the entire article.

 

[duckhunter]

The point is that the resident fluffer doesn't have to paste the entire article.

Ok, cool, lol.............Guesser does have valid points though.

 

[LENBO]

Jew hate and evil go together.

Afghan Taliban are not terrorists.
What a fucking joke this clown is.

 

[ScottL]

^ Why does this ass clown continue to paste these full articles nobody will or wants to, read?

What a moron.

I read the article, and Oren's views as well. I respect them both and I don't mind Guesser posting them. The key issues here are, did the Israeli PM do a deliberate end run around Obama? If so, why? IMO if he did it's because he knows two things - Iran will stop at nothing to get the bomb, which is intolerable not just for Israel but the world. And Obama no matter what intends to do nothing to stop them. All this - he said this he did that - shit doesn't mean anything. All that matters is a homicidal/suicidal regime is prevented from getting a nuke. How it happens I don't care. Unfortunately Israel itself cannot do enough damage to the Iranian nuclear program. It's going to have to be us. The clock is ticking.

 

[ScottL]

January 29, 2015

Why Netanyahu, The Churchill Of Our Time, Must Speak Before Congress

Steve Forbes. FORBES
It is fitting and proper–indeed essential for our very security–that Speaker John Boehner has extended an invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu to address Congress on Iran and its efforts to develop nuclear weapons and the missiles to deliver them anywhere in the world.

The invitation has bipartisan support because many members on both sides of the aisle recognize the fundamental threat to world peace that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose. Like Winston Churchill in the 1930s with Nazi Germany, Netanyahu has been sounding the alarm about Iran’s ominous nuclear and terrorist activities.

It’s a message much of Europe and even segments of the US, particularly in the Obama administration, don’t want to hear. The President has made clear his intense dislike of Israel’s prime minister and his refusal to keep quiet about Obama’s desire to conclude a Neville Chamberlain-like deal with Teheran. In a flagrant interference in another country’s election, Obama operatives are working hard in Israel to help bring down the courageous Prime Minister.

Congress needs to hear first-hand the truth about what Iran is doing and the dreadful implications of those activities.

Thanks to US leadership, the ever-harder sanctions imposed over the years had taken a politically damaging toll on the Iranian economy. The mullahs agreed to sit down with the US and Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany to come up with an agreement ostensibly to get Iran to back off its nuclear ambitions. Iran’s agenda was simple: get the sanctions eased, and then with a loophole-ridden treaty, get them removed altogether.

The basic problem is that the Obama administration wants a deal–any deal–with Teheran and the other parties to the talks are willing to go along in order to snag business contracts with Iran, oblivious to the implications of a radical regime that will be in the position to get the Bomb any time it wants.

Appeasers argue that containment will work with a nuclear-armed Iran just as it did with the old Soviet Union during the Cold War and thus there is nothing to really worry about. Israel and other Mideast nations know better.

The Iranian government, despite the immense corruption of many of its leaders, is a revolutionary regime. Its actions over the years demonstrate that the rhetoric of its officials is more than just hot air. Iran is terror central. It bankrolls and provides arms to Hamas, Hezbollah and all sorts of Islamic terrorists organizations. If the US tacitly concedes its resignation to Iran becoming a nuclear power, then other countries will follow suite in creating their own nukes, including Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

That kind of proliferation enormously increases the chances of a nuclear war. We saw in 1914 how the then-center of civilization plunged into a catastrophic war. Even during the Cold War, Washington and Moscow went to the brink of a nuclear holocaust during the Cuban Missile Crisis. (President John Kennedy was acutely aware during those fraught days of how events in 1914 ran away from European leaders.) With nukes in so many unstable hands, a disaster is almost a certainty. Moreover, the widespread knowledge of how to make the Bomb will certainly fall into terrorist hands, which is why the US must prevent this nuclear proliferation in the first place.

Ominously Iran has apparently developed an intercontinental ballistic missile that can reach not only Israel but also Europe. It won’t be many years before the mullahs can aim nuclear tipped missiles against the US. No surprise, the current negotiations don’t cover Iranian missile development.

Another factor Obama and his appeasement-minded minions willfully ignore is the existential threat Iran poses to Israel. Given the size of the Jewish state, it has no room for error. A nuclear-armed Iran will put Israeli leaders in a dangerous, hair-trigger situation. Israel is a crucial US ally, strategically and morally. It is the only durable democracy in the Mideast.With only 8 million people, Israel has surpassed the European Union, with a population of over 400 million, in high technology, rivaling Silicon Valley. It was born from the ashes of the Holocaust. The destruction of Israel would mean, ultimately, the end of Western civilization; the moral rot that would permit such an event would be just about impossible to surmount.

It is not only Israel that is appalled by what Iran is up to. When Israel very nearly undertook preemptive action against Teheran in 2012, countries such as Saudi Arabia were remarkably open about their support for Israeli military actions that would destroy or cripple Iran’s nuclear facilities.

President Obama is either oblivious to all this or feels that in his perverted worldview, these things don’t much matter. Iran knows Obama desperately wants an agreement. It figures that the more it refuses to accept Obama’s willingness to surrender, the more concessions he will offer.

And spin to the contrary, an agreement will be a surrender. For all intents and purposes, Iran will be allowed to make a nuclear device any time it wishes. Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry will proclaim that if Teheran goes to make the Bomb, the US will have plenty of time to stop them before the Iranians can actually do it. Nonsense. It is has already crossed a very difficult threshold on uranium enrichment. The mullahs are moving ahead on the plutonium front. Teheran has brazenly blocked the International Atomic Energy Agency from access to its nuclear installations.

Congress is considering legislation proposed by Sen. Robert Menendez (D., NJ) and Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.) that would impose stiff sanctions on Iran if an agreement is not reached by the deadline of June 30. Twice before, negotiation deadlines have been extended. This would effectively tell Iran, put up or shut up.

Obama is naturally opposed. He wants nothing that might jeopardize his dangerous course of abject appeasement of an evil regime. The President outrageously dragooned British Prime Minister to play the role of unregistered lobbyist to call Senators to block the Menendez-Kirk bill.

Which gets to why Speaker John Boehner was well within his bounds to extend that invitation to Netanyahu. Such a momentous treaty with Iran as desired by Obama must, under the Constitution, be submitted to the US Senate for ratification. Obama has trampled on the Constitution time and again–making laws and changing laws at will–and wants no Congressional involvement precisely because the resultant debate would glaringly show what a dangerously miserable deal he had cut.

The ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Robert Menendez, recently declared: “The more I hear from the Administration and its quotes, the more it sounds like talking points that come straight out of Teheran.” When President Obama declared in his State of the Union Address that Iran has “halted the progress of its nuclear program and reduced its stockpile of nuclear material,” the guffaws could be loudly heard from every intelligence agency in the world.

Congress is a separate branch of government. Hearing directly from Netanyahu is well within its prerogatives, especially on a matter as critical as this. By the way back in 2011, Speaker Boehner attempted to coordinate a Netanyahu invitation with the White House. Naturally Obama gave Boehner the back of his hand by ignoring this courtesy.

 

[The Guesser]

Israeli Ambassador Throws John Boehner Under The Bus After Disrespect Of Obama Backfires

By: Sarah Jones more from Sarah Jones
Friday, January, 30th, 2015, 1:43 pm

46

15

The fingers of blame are already pointing in the Netanyahu speech debacle.
In an attempt to justify and mitigate Prime Minister Netanyahu’s acceptance of an invitation to speak to Congress, Ron Dermer, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ambassador to the U.S., basically threw Speaker Boehner (R-OH) under the bus.
Responding via email to questions posed by The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, Dermer tried to backpedal for their egregious end-run around the U.S. President by blaming John Boehner for failing protocol.
In an article entitled, “Israeli Ambassador: Netanyahu Never Meant to Disrespect Obama”, Jeffrey Goldberg started off by asking, “It is widely believed (by, among others, me) that you and your government were making an end-run around the White House. Is this not the case?”
To this, Ambassador Ron Dermer rather desperately tried to appeal to the public, “The survival of Israel is not a partisan issue.” And then he got right to the point of tossing the hot ball at the U.S. House Speaker.
From The Atlantic:

Now let me tell you the facts. The speaker’s office initially reached out to me regarding the idea of the prime minister giving a speech less than two weeks before an official invitation was sent. We said that we were open to making such an address and went back and forth with the speaker’s office to see if there were potential dates that could work for the prime minister’s schedule and the congressional calendar. The final decision to invite the prime minister was made by the speaker’s office the day before he was invited—and I was informed of it that afternoon.
It was also made clear to me that it was the speaker’s responsibility and normal protocol for the Speaker’s office to notify the administration of the invitation. That is why I felt it would be inappropriate for me to raise the issue with the administration, including in my meeting with the secretary of state, until the speaker notified them.
The speaker’s office apparently informed the administration about it the morning of the announcement, around two hours before it was publicized. After it was publicized, we were in contact with administration officials, both here and in Jerusalem. We informed them that we wanted to move the date to March 3 so that it could be combined with a visit to AIPAC that the prime minister was also considering. Once that date was cleared with the speaker’s office, the prime minister officially announced that he would accept the invitation to come and speak.
​

Asked why his Prime Minister is so sure Obama will strike a weak deal with Iran, Dermer had no good answer, “Israel does not know whether there will be a deal with Iran but we are very concerned about where things are headed.”
Oh. Well, the thing to do about that isn’t to run an end game around the fellow who runs the country and has provided huge support, upon which you are relying.
And while it wasn’t partisan before, Netanyahu just made it partisan. He just cut out all of the Democrats who support Israel and spit in their face by trying to use Speaker John Boehner’s bad judgment as a weapon against the President.
So now Dermer is tossing Boehner under the Netanyahu speech bus, claiming the end run around protocol was not committed on their end, but on the Speaker’s end.
This fiasco reveals the craven politics of Prime Minister Netanyahu and Speaker John Boehner. Boehner, who is suing President Obama a second time, has made attacking the President his only cover for his inability to govern. He has embarrassed himself suing the President over things all sane legal scholars tell him he can’t win and has no case over. Facing his prolonged legislative impotence, Speaker Boehner reached around the world for a leader as desperate as he and found that person in Netanyahu. Ambassador Dermer was the assist.
Netanyahu and Dermer cannot blame Speaker Boehner. In fact, this should be a lesson to world leaders and diplomats everywhere– when John Boehner tries to use you for his own failed agenda, run in the other direction. But Netanyahu is no innocent victim of John Boehner’s politics of desperation.
Netanyahu is sort of the Chris Christie of Israel, and his bullying is getting old. He tried to play BMOC against Obama, in an attempt to puff himself up back home as he faces an increasingly challenging election, but this too is looking like a miscalculation.
There isn’t a bus big enough to save Speaker Boehner or PM Netanyahu from this one. President Obama has been overly generous with both men, in spite of their previous bad behavior. But this is a slap in the face that won’t be forgotten. Obama is not the type of leader to abuse his power by withholding aid or causing suffering to innocents over a slight and this confuses those who do operate that way; they misread Obama’s character as weak.

The President didn’t get elected twice by being “weak”. President Obama will target each of these men individually in a political fight they can ill afford.

 

[The Guesser]

This has become such a disaster for Boner and Bibi, the only way out would be for Bibi to voluntarily withdraw. Hopefully, he'll come to his senses and will. Obama can't unify the Dems, but Boner and Bibi sure did.

Democratic Rage Grows Over Planned Netanyahu Address To Congress

By: CHARLES BABINGTON, DEB RIECHMANN (AP) Friday, January, 30th, 2015, 7:15 pm

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi is still peeved over Republicans’ decision to ask the leader of Israel — an archenemy of Iran — to address Congress in March right in the middle of delicate negotiations with Tehran over its nuclear program.
Asked Friday if Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would be well-advised to speak out in favor of heavier sanctions on Iran somewhere other than a joint meeting of Congress, Pelosi said “the opportunities are great,” and noted that the Israeli leader often appears on Sunday talk shows in the U.S.
She also was asked if most House Democrats would attend a Netanyahu speech to Congress. “I don’t know,” Pelosi replied.
“With all the respect in the world for the prime minister, and all the love in the world for the state of Israel, I don’t know that even everyone in Israel is supportive of the invitation,” she told journalists at a Democratic retreat in Philadelphia.
Netanyahu has been an outspoken critic of the international efforts to negotiate a deal with Iran, which does not recognize the Jewish state, and supports anti-Israeli militants like Lebanon’s Hezbollah and Palestinian Hamas.
He’s sensitive, though, to Israel’s important relationship with the United States.
This week, Netanyahu called Pelosi, Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, the Senate Democratic leader, and New York Sen. Chuck Schumer, the third-ranking Democrat in the Senate, in hopes of blunting their opposition to the invitation he got from House Speaker John Boehner to address Congress.
Congressional aides say the calls so far have not changed the minds of the senior Democrats, who think the invitation turns sensitive international negotiations to reach an agreement that would prevent Iran from having the capability to develop a nuclear weapon into a partisan ploy.
They say none of the Democratic leaders who spoke with Netanyahu on the phone asked the Israeli leader not to speak to Congress on March 3.
The timing of the speech is at issue too.
March 3 is just 21 days ahead of when the U.S. and its international partners are supposed to have reached a framework agreement with Iran — one that would provide an outline for a more comprehensive deal set to be finalized by the end of June.
Senate Democrats this week offered to withhold their support for legislation that would levy more sanctions on Iran until after March 24, and only then if it doesn’t look like a final deal is going to materialize. Netanyahu’s speech, in which he likely would reiterate his opposition to Iran, would be broadcast from Capitol Hill just as negotiators were trying to wrap up the framework.
Boehner has defended his decision, saying the House is an equal branch of government and has the right to invite the Israeli leader to “talk to the members of Congress about the serious threat that Iran poses and the serious threat of radical Islam.”

 

[SheriffJoe]

Sen. Ted Cruz is going after the Kenyan traitor over his handling of America's staunchest ally AND possible illegal activity of meddling in Israel's elections with US tax dollars!

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Congressman Lee Zeldin, R-NY-1, today sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry asking for information regarding media reports that U.S. taxpayer dollars are being used to fund efforts to influence upcoming elections in Israel.

“Has President Obama launched a political campaign against Prime Minister Netanyahu and his representatives?” Sen. Cruz asked. “This administration’s relentless harassment of Israel is utterly incomprehensible. The Islamic Republic of Iran is pursuing the deadliest weapons on the planet, and there can be no doubt that their first target will be Israel, followed by the United States. This administration should be focusing its animosity on the very real enemies we face, not on our staunch allies.”

“It is completely unacceptable to use U.S. tax dollars to influence the elections in Israel,” said Rep. Zeldin. “State Department grants should never be given to entities working to overthrow strong allies like Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. We have great allies around the world, but Israel is our strongest, and a beacon of freedom in a region filled with radical Islamic extremists and state sponsored terrorism. Today, I join with Sen. Ted Cruz in calling for a U.S. Department of State investigation into this important matter.”

As specified in the letter, a recent article in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports that a U.S. taxpayer-funded non-profit organization called OneVoice is actively working with a campaign operation called Victory 2015 (V15) in an effort to influence the upcoming elections in Israel on March 17, 2015.

As a result, Sen. Cruz and Rep. Zeldin request answers to the following eight questions:

• How much funding has the U.S. Government provided to OneVoice, PeaceWorks Network Foundation, and any connected initiatives, projects or subsidiaries?
• Who approved providing such funds?
• What is the oversight and accounting process for how these funds are being spent?
• How often and on what dates has such funding been provided?
• What were the specific reasons and terms for providing funds, and how are these funds specifically being spent?
• Can the Department of State guarantee that none of these funds have been or will be used in the endeavor detailed above, namely the partnership with V15, or any similar effort to exert undue influence over the Israeli political process?
• Was there any knowledge from the State Department or other U.S. government officials of the partnership with V15 prior to providing funds to OneVoice?
• Does OneVoice’s work with V15 violate its 501(c)(3) status (or the status of the PeaceWorks Network Foundation) as a tax-exempt organization and should such status be revoked?

In the letter, Cruz and Zeldin write, “Of course private American citizens are free to engage in political activities according to their inclinations, but given the overtly partisan nature of this particular case, we are deeply concerned by the relationship that also exists between OneVoice and the U.S. Department of State.”

Full text of the letter is available here.
​

 

[SheriffJoe]

 

[The Guesser]

[h=1]Something's in the wind in Israel: A change for the better[/h] [h=2]When Netanyahu's running scared, he doesn't run smart. Even Israel Hayom's lead columnist calls his planned trip to address Congress 'grievous,' motivated not by concern for Israel, but for electoral gain.[/h] By Bradley Burston | Jan. 30, 2015 | 9:09 AM |

In Israeli politics, it often seems, nothing ever changes.
Until it does.
It's a little like the weather. One of the many quietly extraordinary properties of the Holy Land is that, with a glance at the horizon, you can often see a change in the weather long before it actually reaches you.
So it is, as well, with the fortunes of Israeli leaders. When there's a drop in his political barometer, people can sense it at once.
Now, with less than two months to go before the election, the political climate here feels like it's beginning to shift. Something's happening to the prevailing wind. It feels like it's just starting to change direction. A change for something better.
On Monday night, an opinion poll showed Isaac Herzog and Tzipi Livni's Zionist Camp widening a lead over Netanyahu's Likud by a margin of 26 seats to 23.
For the time being, struggling to check his slide in popularity, Netanyahu has been banking on a worsening security situation in the north, coupled with growing disarray in rival right-wing parties, to turn the tide. Likud strategists traditionally view military threats as a circle-the-wagons diversion from Netanyahu's Achilles heel, domestic social and economic woes.
The prime minister's rightist rival parties have indeed played into his hands of late. Once the Likud's chief right-wing competitor, the ultra-Orthodox Sephardi Shas party, has bitterly splintered in two, and neither half is now guaranteed enough votes to clear the minimum required to enter the next Knesset.
Netanyahu's newer political frenemy, Naftali Bennnett's powerhouse Bayit Hayehudi, took an unexpected hit just this week. Bennett, looking to tap new veins of support, support, shocked his own party by unveiling a secret aimed at the very heart and gut of generations of nothing-but-Likud voters: Beitar Jerusalem soccer icon Eli Ohana, catapulted by Bayit Bennett to the coveted 10th spot on the ultra-hardline party’s patchwork dream team.
The move came at a time when the Likud’s traditional power base, the once-unassailable Fortress Beitar, has already been badly eroded. The base is already shorn of both its pro-democracy wing (Reuven Rivlin, Benny Begin, Dan Meridor - all exiled by Netanyahu to insulting effect, with Begin recalled as a last-minute campaign stopgap); and of much of its anti-democratic, often openly racist far-right flank, many of whose fiercely tribal activists and soccer hooligans have defected to Bennett.
Almost at once, the third-place Bayit Hayehudi rose in the polls, improving its projected Knesset strength to 16 seats from 15. But, in a move which left the Ashkenazi-dominated Bayit Hayehudi open to stinging charges of racism against Mizrachim (Ohana is of Moroccan descent), party leaders staged an unprecedented mutiny against Bennett, demanding that he rescind the nomination. On Thursday, to Netanyahu's relief, Ohana announced that he was quitting the race. In other internal battles, additional prominent Bennett hopefuls, like senior settlement official Danny Dayan, quit this week as well.
For Netanyahu, nonetheless, the blessing is decidedly mixed. The more the right is seen by its supporters as dysfunctional, Likud strategists fear, the more prospective Likud voters are likely to decide that they have no one to vote for, and sit out the election altogether.
At the same time, the distress of another right-wing party, Avigdor Lieberman's Israel Beiteinu, may prove to present Netanyahu with a thorny new problem. Gutted by a raft of corruption charges, Lieberman's party has plunged in the polls to dangerous lows.
This presents a huge incentive to Israeli Arab voters, whose turnout in the past has been tepid. Stated simply, if the vote for the new joint Arab list is high enough, it could help eliminate Lieberman's vocally anti-Arab party from the Knesset. In a particularly Israeli irony, it was Lieberman's party which proposed the electoral threshold law (parties which win the equivalent of less than four seats are dropped from the Knesset) - a bill originally aimed at removing Arab lawmakers from parliament.
Netanyahu knows that if Arab citizens - who represent fully one out of five Israelis - turn out in large numbers, they could also effectively topple him from the premiership and swing the election to Labor's new incarnation, the Zionist Camp.
The prime minister faces other challenges as well.
Consider, for example, the fracas surrounding Benjamin Netanyahu's scheduled speech before a Republican-dominated Congress, just two weeks before election day in Israel. The betting in the Prime Minister's Office and the Israeli Embassy in Washington had it that playing the Machismo Card – the scrappy little guy sticking it to the big man in the White House - would go over well with Israelis.

Now consider the view of Dan Margalit, premier columnist of the strongly pro-Netanyahu Israel Hayom newspaper, speaking this week about the planned address to Congress:

"I believe that this trip is grievous," Margalit told Channel 10. "I believe that this trip is cynical. I believe that this trip is not being taken for the sake of the interests of the state of Israel, rather for the needs of Benjamin Netanyahu and the Likud, for the Likud election campaign."

Going behind Barack Obama's back was a move that was nothing short of "pasul," Margolit continued, using a word which connotes something abjectly unseemly, unfit, unacceptable, defective. Netanyahu should "certainly" cancel the trip, he said, adding "I don't ever remember anything resembling this."

"This is a rift not only with the White House, where Obama will be sitting for a long while yet to come, but a rift also with wings of the Democratic Party which are very important to us. This is unacceptable behavior. Things like this must not be done."

The polling numbers indicate that Netanyahu may have made a miscalculation much more serious electorally than the Congressional speech. Although he sorely needs to capture votes from Israeli centrists, his ferocious near-daily attacks on Herzog and Livni may be backfiring.

Far from projecting a statesmanlike image of a prime minister for all Israelis, Netanyahu has opted for machismo chest-beating and semaphore racism.

Try as he does to fight it, the guy can't help it: When Benjamin Netanyahu's running scared, he doesn't run smart.

He has relentlessly waved away Herzog as a loser, a nebbech, a henpecked lightweight, a child, not man enough for the big leagues (This from perhaps the most famously henpecked man in Israeli politics).

Netanyahu has pilloried the running mates of the centrist-to-a-fault Herzog and Livni as extreme radical leftists and "Anti-Zionist" - an astonishing characterization of the party of scions of Israel's two houses of political royalty, socialist Labor Zionism and rightist Revisionist Zionism.

In so doing, Netanyahu has put Israel on notice that anyone who, like Herzog and Livni, wants to see a two-state solution and opposes blanket support for settlements – that is to say, the majority – is Anti-Zionist.

By extension, of course, Netanyahu has also made the vast majority of American Jews into overnight Anti-Zionists.

This, then, is Netanyahu's direct message to an Israeli public which fights his wars, pays his taxes, suffers his disintegrating health and educational systems, bears his inaction on the housing crisis, endures his anti-democratic bills, despairs at his preference for settlements over negotiations: You have no place in my Israel, and no future here.

In the end, the Anti-Zionism charge may prove Netanyahu's undoing. Last week, after Bennett and Netanyahu suggested that only their own supporters love Israel, unlike other Israelis, Labor MK Stav Shafir, the youngest of Israel's lawmakers, took them on.

"Day to day, keeping each other safe, that's what it is to be Israeli, that is Zionism, to be concerned about the citizens of this country, in the hospitals, in the schools, on the highways, with welfare, that is Zionism. And you're taking it and destroying it," she declared in a Knesset speech which went viral.

"You forgot about the Negev and the Galilee, in order to transfer NIS 1.2 billion to the settlements in bonuses. You forgot Israel. You lost Zionism a long time ago."

Shaffir ended her speech with a plea for a politics of hope, having as its goals peace and equality of rights and resources, a politics "which believes that every single Israeli citizen deserves an equal portion, deserves to live a truly good life. That's real Zionism."

In all the many years Netanyahu has been in office, with all the enemies he has warned of and railed against, he has only managed to decisively defeat one of them: hope.

But even that victory may prove fleeting.