The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has expressed deep concern about the Obama Administration over numerous, recent incidents of bias against and hostility to Israel. It has also called on President Obama to name, condemn and fire the Administration official who was quoted by the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, who is understood to have excellent contacts within the Obama Administration, as saying of Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu, “the thing about Bibi, is he’s a chickens..t.”
Obama Administration officials were also reported by Goldberg to have expressed “red hot anger” at Mr. Netanyahu for his construction policies in a largely Jewish neighborhood of Jerusalem, calling this is provocative and very upsetting to the Palestinian Arabs. Would President Obama ever have said, had he been alive in the pre-Civil Rights era, that African-Americans should not move into white suburban neighborhoods because it is provocative and deeply upsetting to the whites who live there?
The ZOA notes that, while the Administration regularly condemns Israel for building in areas of eastern Jerusalem and Judea/Samaria which will surely remain part of Israel under any conceivable peace agreement, it is silent about the far greater Palestinian Arab construction in truly disputed areas of eastern Jerusalem and Judea/Samaria.
The ZOA regards this as indicative of astonishing bias, discrimination and hostility to our greatest ally, Israel, on the part of the Obama Administration, given that President Obama and his officials have not expressed “red-hot anger,” nor proclaimed that the PA, despite the PA’s pro-terror, anti-peace actions and statements, is not serious about peace –– as he often says about Israel –– nor indeed expressed any condemnation of dictator Mahmoud Abbas (last election in 2005) and his Hamas/Fatah Palestinian Authority (PA) for:
- Refusing to negotiate with Israel for almost of the past 6 and a half years
- Signing a unity government agreement with the U.S.- and European Union-listed terrorist organization, Hamas, which calls in its Charter for the destruction of Israel and the murder of Jews
- Delivering last March three no’s in his meeting with President Obama –– no acceptance of Israel as a Jewish state; no renunciation of the legally baseless so-called ‘right of return,’ whereby Palestinian refugees of the 1948-9 war and their millions of descendants would be repatriated to Israel; and no end to conflict and claims against Israel, even if a peace agreement is signed by both sides and a PA state established
- Calling the terrorist murderer in Jerusalem last week of two Israeli civilians, including a baby who was an American citizen, who also injured seven others, including her America-Israeli parents, a “heroic martyr”
- Ignoring the Obama Administration’s policy of seeking a negotiated peace settlement by going to the United Nations to obtain non-member status for ‘Palestine’
- Saying during the recent Gaza war that “No one in the world will live in safety and stability while the children of Gaza, Jerusalem, [and] the West Bank, and Palestinian children everywhere, do not live in safety and stability. Praise and eternal life to our brave martyrs”
- Welcoming blood-soaked, convicted and jailed Palestinian terrorists freed by Israel with the words, “We welcome our heroic brothers who come from behind bars”
- Conferring the Star of Honor, the highest honor awarded by the PA, on the slain PLO terrorist chieftain, Khalil Al-Wazir (Abu Jihad), who was responsible for the murder of at least 125 Israelis in numerous terror attacks that he planned, including the 1975 terrorist assault on Tel Aviv’s Savoy Hotel, in which Al-Wazir’s men murdered eight hostages
- Paying stipends to convicted and Palestinian terrorists jailed in Israel.
- Does not show Israel on its official maps, emblems, atlases and stationary.
In contrast, in recent weeks, the Obama Administration:
- Criticized Israel for announcing a construction project of homes for Jews in the eastern part of Jerusalem and publicly doubting its concern for peace, the State Department’s Jen Psaki saying, “if Israel wants to see – wants to live in a peaceful society, they need to take steps to reduce tensions and to avoid steps that are going to be incompatible with peace.
- Snubbed Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon who, while meeting with his counterpart Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, was refused meetings with Vice President Joseph Biden, Secretary of State John Kerry and National Security Advisor Susan Rice during his trip to the United States this month; and
- An unnamed Administration official called Mr. Netanyahu a “chickens..t”
- Put on hold, in the midst of the Gaza war, routine and pre-arranged resupply of Hellfire missiles to Israel
- Withheld vital FBI assistance in locating an Israeli soldier during the fighting.
ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, “It is clear that the pro-terror, anti-peace words and actions of Mahmoud Abbas and the PA do not attract the ire and condemnation of President Obama and his Administration.
“However, whenever Israel builds homes for Jews in Jerusalem or Judea/Samaria, the Obama Administration is afflicted with ‘red-hot rage.’
“In his speech to AIPAC on May 22, 2011, President Obama said that ‘we will hold the Palestinians accountable for their actions and for their rhetoric.’ But he never has.
“Indeed, President Obama told a meeting of American Jewish leaders at the White House, which I attended, that we needed to search our souls and ask our Israeli relatives and friends to search their souls to see if we are all sincere about peace, while telling us that the PA’s Mahmoud Abbas was serious about peace.
“Despite saying that the Israeli/U.S. relationship is ‘unbreakable,’ President Obama seems to never miss an opportunity to try and break it.
“Some will try and explain away this hostility by saying that at least some of this is understandable pique on the part of the Obama Administration citing, for example, that Defense Minister Ya’alon was snubbed because, earlier in the year, he made critical remarks (in private, which were however leaked –– for which he later apologized) about Secretary of State John Kerry, calling him ‘obsessive’ and ‘messianic.’
“This sort of reasoning doesn’t hold water. No-one said Israel should snub American officials because President Obama was overheard in 2011 disparaging Mr. Netanyahu in a conversation with then-French President Nicholas Sarkozy.
“We clearly see a disturbing pattern of Obama officials making outrageous remarks hostile to Israel, which make headlines around the world –– and then making a weak statement that fails to retract them, after the damage is done. This is nothing but a form of bias and hostility towards Israel.
“The ZOA calls on President Obama to name, condemn and fire the official who called Prime Minister Netanyahu a ‘chickensh..t.’”