Israel and the US

Commentary By Ron Beasley

As you can see below Israel's supporters on the right are all over Obama.

But is it Obama that Israel and it's supporters should be worried about?  According to Mark Perry writing at FP it's the Pentagon.

The Petraeus briefing: Biden’s embarrassment is not the whole story

On Jan. 16, two days after a killer earthquake hit Haiti, a team of senior military officers from the U.S. Central Command (responsible for overseeing American security interests in the Middle East), arrived at the Pentagon to brief Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Adm. Michael Mullen on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The team had been dispatched by CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus to underline his growing worries at the lack of progress in resolving the issue. The 33-slide, 45-minute PowerPoint briefing stunned Mullen. The briefers reported that there was a growing perception among Arab leaders that the U.S. was incapable of standing up to Israel, that CENTCOM's mostly Arab constituency was losing faith in American promises, that Israeli intransigence on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was jeopardizing U.S. standing in the region, and that Mitchell himself was (as a senior Pentagon officer later bluntly described it) "too old, too slow ... and too late."

The January Mullen briefing was unprecedented. No previous CENTCOM commander had ever expressed himself on what is essentially a political issue; which is why the briefers were careful to tell Mullen that their conclusions followed from a December 2009 tour of the region where, on Petraeus's instructions, they spoke to senior Arab leaders. "Everywhere they went, the message was pretty humbling," a Pentagon officer familiar with the briefing says. "America was not only viewed as weak, but its military posture in the region was eroding."

[........]

"This is starting to get dangerous for us," Biden reportedly told Netanyahu. "What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan. That endangers us and it endangers regional peace." Yedioth Ahronoth went on to report: "The vice president told his Israeli hosts that since many people in the Muslim world perceived a connection between Israel's actions and US policy, any decision about construction that undermines Palestinian rights in East Jerusalem could have an impact on the personal safety of American troops fighting against Islamic terrorism." The message couldn't be plainer: Israel's intransigence could cost American  lives.

While AIPAC is a powerful lobby is it powerful enough to take on the Pentagon.

While commentators and pundits might reflect that Joe Biden's trip to Israel has forever shifted America's relationship with its erstwhile ally in the region, the real break came in January, when David Petraeus sent a briefing team to the Pentagon with a stark warning: America's relationship with Israel is important, but not as important as the lives of America's soldiers. Maybe Israel gets the message now.

Israel's support in the US is already declining and the suggestion that Israeli actions are endangering US troops will only accelerate that decline.

via Josh Marshall

Update

Via geoff in comments, more here.

Comments

[John Ballard]

Excellent post, Ron.
The Biden snub was either the "mistake" (as Bibi tries to argue) or deliberate.
Either way it reveals a terrible tin ear for diplomacy. It's time for Israelis to smell the coffee.
(OTOH, I wish there were some way to facilitate a rapprochement of Hamas and Fatah. As long as Palestinians are divided Israel will continue to have the upper hand.)

[geoff]

I agree with John's last point if the Palestinians could unite it might give them a better hand to play.

Re the FP item Paul Woodward followed up with a few more questions to Perry which he answered: http://bit.ly/cljMd2

Also the madness of Law-fare - rebranding Israel and attacking groups and organisations that would have fought against real anti-Semitism in the past - seems to have landed on North American shores: http://bit.ly/9HCUMa. I think certain segments of Israeli society might be feeling threatened. So I expect lots & lots of pressure on Obama's administration & a kiss and make up scene coming soon which, of course, will mean even more proof to some that Israel runs the US or its foreign policy anyways. I keep waiting for the last straw but it never comes.

[Ron Beasley]

Thanks geoff, good links

[Bernard Finel]

I gotta say, I don't like Petraeus' role in this. Even if he is right, it is a fundamental challenge to civilian control when generals begin driving major issues like this.

[Ron Beasley]

Bernard
While I share your mistrust of Petraeus and the military I’m not sure it applies so much in this case. If he feels that Israeli policy is threatening the welfare of his troops or the completion of his mission he has the responsibility to go Mullen and the White House. This is not something he said on CNN – it was “leaked”. He may have arranged to have it leaked but if he has political aspirations going against Israel wouldn’t make a lot of sense.

[HyperIon]

You wrote: "Everywhere they went, the message was pretty humbling," a Pentagon officer familiar with the briefing says.

Unpossible. US citizens (particularly members of the military) CANNOT be humbled. It's in the constitution. Or the Bible.