Public concerned about domestic/foreign policy

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has stated that yesterday’s Congressional election result indicates a sweeping rejection of President Obama’s domestic, economic and foreign policy. Many polls indicate Americans’ dissatisfaction with President Obama’s handling of the Arab/Israeli situation. This election further validates that part of the message sent yesterday to President Obama to cease pressuring Israel to make further, unreciprocated, one-sided concessions to the Palestinian Authority (PA) of Mahmoud Abbas and Salaam Fayyad, which promotes violence and hatred towards Jews. In results so far, the Democratic Party has lost at least six Senate seats, but appear likely to retain a small Senate majority, while in the House of Representatives, the Democratic Party has lost its majority to the Republican Party, by an astonishing loss of over 60 seats.

ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, “By common consent, the strong swing against the Democratic Party in these Congressional elections reflect the unease and disapproval of the American public for the policies and performance of the Obama Administration in both domestic and foreign policy.

“In foreign affairs, the American public has certainly been upset and unnerved by such things as President Obama bowing before foreign despots, like the King of Saudi Arabia; his return of the gift of a famous bust of Winston Churchill to Britain, a long-standing ally, after refusing to display it anywhere in the White House; offering open-ended negotiations and lots of carrots but no sticks to Iran over its nuclear weapons program, only to be ridiculed; the wasting of two years before allowing largely ineffective anti-Iran sanctions to pass, during which time Iran has moved even closer to acquiring nuclear weapons; letting down of our Czech and Polish allies by discontinuing plans to install missile defense systems on their territory; the bullying pressures exerted on small, democratic Honduras to reinstate a lawless president favored by Latin American despots like Hugo Chavez and Daniel Ortega; the humiliation of his repeatedly apologizing abroad for U.S. actions; his erasure of the terms ‘radical Islam’ and ‘Islamism’ from government use; the renaming of ‘terrorism’ as ‘man-made disasters’; his support for civilian, rather than military tribunals to deal with foreign terrorists; and, last but not least, his policy towards Israel.

“This policy has consisted of the recurrent, harsh criticism, including public condemnation, of the U.S.’ best ally in the Middle East, Israel; pressure exerted upon it to make more one-sided concessions to the Palestinians, including a 10-month freeze on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria; a refusal to state that the U.S. will veto any U.N. Security Council action to support establishing a Palestinian state; support for the so-called Arab Peace initiative, which demands Israeli withdrawal to the indefensible 1949 armistice lines; the flooding of Israel with Palestinian refugees of the 1948-9 war and their millions of descendants, and the leaving of 600,000 Jews in limbo in what would become Palestinian territory; as well as Obama’s failure to visit Israel since becoming president, despite two visits to the Middle East; and his not taking up Prime Minister Netanyahu’s invitation to visit Israel before the end of the year, to which President Obama responded that his schedule did not permit it. Moreover, President Obama publicly condemned Israel building in eastern Jerusalem, something that violated no existing U.S.-Israeli agreement and which in fact Israel had stated would continue. Now, he is exerting pressure on Israel to reinstitute the freeze on Jewish construction in Judea and Samaria.

“This is not merely a matter of conjecture. An April 2010 Quinnipiac University survey, for example, found that 44% of the American public disapproved of the Obama policy towards Israel and the Palestinians, whereas only 35% approved. Moreover, two-thirds of people questioned in the survey said that President Obama should be a strong supporter of Israel but, by a 42% to 34% margin, said he is not. Also, last year, when President Obama was strongly pressuring Israel to bar Jews, and only Jews, from building and moving into homes in Judea and Samaria and parts of eastern Jerusalem, a September 2009 Israel Project poll found that Americans supported by 72% to 23% Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s statement that ‘Israel must be allowed to accommodate natural growth of existing settlements.’ Clearly, the American public overwhelmingly disapproves of President Obama’s policy to stop Jews living and building in these areas.

“Indeed, even American Jews, who vote overwhelmingly Democratic, oppose Obama’s policies towards Israel – a July 2009 Global Marketing Research Services poll of American Jewish Democratic supporters found that they backed growth and construction in existing Jewish communities in Judea and Samaria by 52% to 37%; that a plurality of 44% believed that ‘Obama is naive in thinking he can make peace with the Arabs’; and that only 27% believed he is right that a Palestinian state’s establishment would bring peace, whereas 55% disagreed, believing the Palestinians would use such a state to attack Israel.

“The conclusion is obvious: any continuation of President Obama’s policy of pressure on Israel to make further one-sided concessions to the Palestinians is contrary to views of the majority Americans and American Jews, including the overwhelming part of American Jewry that supports the Democratic Party. President Obama lacks support for any such policy.”