The N.Y. Times reports that Hillary Clinton has accepted Barack Obama’s invitation to be his secretary of state. This development will no doubt rankle some on the left who campaigned hard for Obama’s election. I’m concerned too. I wonder which Hillary will be secretary of state: the bellicose, saber-rattling presidential primary candidate who threatened to wipe out Iran; or the pragmatic, flexible Hillary we’d prefer to see fill that position.
The Times notes my special concern regarding her views on the Israeli-Arab conflict:
On Israel, the other chronic foreign policy issue that will bedevil the next secretary of state, Mrs. Clinton would bring baggage as well. She is seen as fiercely loyal to Israel, which can be both a plus and a minus, Middle East experts say.
While her pro-Israel record as a senator from New York might cause her to be viewed with suspicion in the Arab world, it could give her credibility to ask Israel to make tough choices for peace.
The argument is the same as the one made in favor of Rahm Emanuel’s appointment. Because of his pro-Israel bona fides when he called upon an Israeli prime minister or defense minister to stop settlements Israeli pols couldn’t dismiss him as a Johnny-come-lately naive American pol. He would be a force to be reckoned with.
So which Hillary will we get? The one who never met a Separation Wall she didn’t like? The one beloved of Aipac? Or the one who can jawbone with the best of ’em, including top IDF brass? I believe she could be a very good secretary of state if she can distance herself from her campaign jingoism. But the jury is definitely out on this one.
Hillary should be our president, but I know she will be a good Sec. of State for us!
Credibility with Israel is great, but it’s interesting that US negotiators are never picked for their credibility with the Palestinians. Perhaps that explains why Israel-Palestine peacemaking has been such a great success.
I wouldn’t place too much weight on statements Hillary made while she was Senator from New York or while she was running for President in trying to decide what her attitute towards Israel is. She needed the Jewish vote and she said things the Jews wanted to hear. At the beginning of the Presidential campaign, the New York Times interviewed a Palestinian-American living in Chicago who runs a web site called “Electronic Intifada” (I don’t recall his name). He said in the 1990’s Barak Obama was very sympathetic to the Arab cause, but then he said Obama became aware of the political power of the Jews in Illinois and he shifted his position. Mr Electronic came to the conclusion that Obama was an opportunist. It is possible that Hillary is the same the other way. Don’t forget that during the heyday of Oslo in the 1990’s she visited Israel and had a meeting with Suha Arafat. Suha stated that Israel was poisoning the Arab’s water supply. Hillary got up and hugged her after she said that. So who knows what Hillary’s real attitude is?
However, the bottom line is that it makes no difference where the interlocuter’s synpathies lie….there is no possibility of reaching a peace agreement since the positions of the two sides are too far apart (Yossi Alpher- a veteran Oslo person wrote this on 4 October in the Jerusalem Post. He stated that contrary to the conventional wisdom that “everyone knows the outlines of the agreement-withdrawal to the pre-67 lines and Israel’s “symbolic” acceptance of the Palestinian RIght of Return”, there aren’t ANY agreements on any of the major issues).
Mr Burns…it is Israel that is being asked to give up tangible assets, the holiest places of the Jewish people and territories valuable to the security of the state. Many of the Palestinians and other Arabs say very clearly that any Jewish state of any size is illegitimate and even if Israel withdraws the struggle to eradicate will continue, so Israelis, even “progressives” are nervous about making the concessions demanded. That is why they are the ones who need reassurance.
The ability of Zionists to project their own deeds on their enemies continues to astound. Israel isn’t “asking” the Palestinians to give up tangible assets, it is actually taking them. Israel has never acknowledged the right of the Palestinians to a state nor will Goldberg et al ask it to. Palestinians have absolute insecurity in their homes and yet somehow Israelis are the ones who need reassurance.
If Hillary sees herself as a future candidate for president, it’s easy to guess what kind of secretary of state she will be. Sorry Richard.
Rabbi Lerner has said (approximately) that she has the right inclinations, but that she fears the expenditure of her ‘political capital’.
Lebanon’s ex-Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed in a car bombing arranged by Israel’s Mossad
October 24, 2006 — A senior French DGSE — Direction générale de la sécurité extérieure — intelligence officer has told WMR [Wayne Madsen Report]that Lebanon’s ex-Prime Minister Rafik Hariri was killed in a car bombing arranged by Israel’s Mossad. The revelation from French intelligence is significant as the French government of Jacques Chirac joined the Bush administration and the neo-con policy establishments in Washington and Israel in blaming Syria for the attack. According to the DGSE officer, Israel and its American backers wanted to blame Syria for the assassination of the popular Lebanese leader in order to blame Syria for the attack thus forcing the popular Lebanese revolt that saw the withdrawal of Syrian forces. That left Lebanon defenseless for the “Clean Break” attack launched by Israel, with US support, against Hezbollah and Lebanon’s infrastructure…..
ENTIRE ARTICLE – http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/johnlewisdickerson/gGxtlf
ORIGINAL SOURCE –
http://www.waynemadsenreport.com
FIVE FOR FIGHTING LYRICS
“World”
Got a package full of Wishes
A Time machine, a Magic Wand
A Globe made out of Gold
No Instructions or Commandments
Laws of Gravity or
Indecisions to uphold
Printed on the box I see
A.C.M.E.’s Build-a-World-to-be
Take a chance – Grab a piece
Help me to believe it
What kind of world do you want?
Think Anything
Let’s start at the start
Build a masterpiece
Be careful what you wish for
History starts now…
Should there be people or peoples
Money, Funny pedestals for Fools who never pay
Raise your Army – Choose your Steeple
Don’t be shy, the satellites can look the other way
Lose the Earthquakes – Keep the Faults
Fill the oceans without the salt
Let every Man own his own Hand
What kind of world do you want
Think Anything
Let’s start at the start
Build a masterpiece
Be careful what you wish for
History starts now…
Sunlight’s on the Bridge
Sunlight’s on the Way
Tomorrow’s Calling
There’s more to this than Love
What Kind of world do you want
What Kind of world do you want
What Kind of world do you want
Think Anything
Let’s start at the start
Build a masterpiece
History Starts Now
Be careful what you wish for
Start Now
[NOTE – Verizon workers fired over breach of Obama’s cell phone records. Was it Verizon or AMDOCS (of Israel) that was behind it?]
Verizon fires workers over Obama cell phone records
(CNN) — Verizon Wireless has fired employees connected to a breach of records from a cell phone used by President-elect Barack Obama this year, a Verizon source said Friday……
Verizon reported the breach Thursday, and Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said the transition team had been notified Wednesday. Gibbs said the president-elect no longer uses that phone, which has been inactive for months…..
The source also said the employees in question could not have read text messages, if Obama sent or received them, and would not have been able to access the content of any voice mail messages, although they would have been able to see whether any had been left…..
Ari Schwartz of the Center for Democracy and Technology said the employees probably had access to the dates and times of calls, the length of calls and the telephone numbers of those Obama spoke with…..[NOTE – EXACTLY THE INFO HANDLED BY ISREAL’S AMDOCS- JD]
Verizon Wireless, meanwhile, has launched a separate internal investigation to determine whether Obama’s information was shared only among employees or whether “the information of our customer had in any way been compromised outside our company, and this investigation continues,” McAdam said in an internal e-mail obtained by CNN.
The company has alerted “the appropriate federal law enforcement authorities,” McAdam said…….
ENTIRE ARTICLE – http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/11/21/obama.cell.phone/index.html
The Mossad decided to ‘trade out’ Hanssen in order to keep the FBI pre-occupied trying to ferret out a mole within their own ranks and take the heat off Rahm Emanuel and the Clinton White House over the knowledge that Israel had penetrated White House communications.
November 20, 2008 — Hanssen’s confessions clued Opus Dei and Mossad in on his espionage for Moscow.
from waynemadsenreport.com
On November 10, 2008, WMR reported on the compromise to Israel’s Mossad of the espionage being carried out on behalf of Moscow by former FBI counter-intelligence chief Robert Hanssen and how that information came to the attention of Bill Clinton’s policy adviser Rahm Emanuel.
We reported: “WMR has learned that Hanssen also spied for Mossad at the same time he was spying for the Russians and that this information was known to Emanuel. WMR has learned that the FBI established that there was a relationship between Hanssen, a Chicago native whose father was a Chicago police officer, and Emanuel, also a native of Chicago. The Mossad decided to ‘trade out’ Hanssen to the FBI’s counter-intelligence division in order to keep the bureau pre-occupied trying to ferret out a mole within their own ranks and take the heat off Emanuel and the Clinton White House over the knowledge that Israeli intelligence had penetrated White House communications and this fact was related by Clinton to White House intern Monica Lewinsky during a phone conversation. Hanssen was convicted of espionage after he was pressured into not going ahead with a jury trial. Hanssen was warned that his wife would be denied his FBI pension if he insisted on a full jury trial. He is serving a life sentence in solitary confinement at the Federal Supermax Prison in Colorado.” ……….
ENTIRE ARTICLE –
http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/johnlewisdickerson/gGxtdB
ORIGINAL SOURCE – http://www.waynemadsenreport.com
@bar_kochba132:
You already wrote this in a previous comment several wks. ago. The next time you repeat yrself in a similar way I will delete yr comment.
Yossi Alpher is not the arbiter of Israeli liberalism. I don’t know or care what he says about the conflict. The consensus is known by all. There is no consensus about the Right of Return, but there IS consensus about all other issues such as 1967 borders & sharing Jerusalem.
You were the one who claimed McCain was going to beat Obama. Now you claim there’s no chance for peace. You were wrong once. You will be wrong again.
What utter narischkeit. Hebron is valuable to the security of the state? What are you smokin’? And btw, no one is insisting that Jews give up their ties to these alleged holy sites. Jews may remain under Palestinian sovereignty if they wish. But would they have the strength of their convictions to remain if the sites mean so much to them?
Ah yes, “progressive” Israelis like Benny Morris, Michael Oren & Jeffrey Goldberg, no doubt are quite nervous. But what about REAL progressive Israelis? Not so nervous it appears. For BK, anyone to the left of Kahane is progressive.
I agreed with the first several sentences of bar kochba’s comment, before it went downhill. I mean that he’s right that you can’t tell with high level successful politicians like Clinton and Obama what they really think. Now on the lower level (like Kucinich, for example), politicians may wear their hearts on their sleeves, but then people like this have no chance of winning (or in Hillary’s case, coming close) the Presidency.
So I’m a bit pessimistic about Obama and Clinton regarding the I/P conflict, but hope that they’ve said the things they’ve said out of (cynical) political calculation and know perfectly well that Israel will need to be pushed to accept a fair deal for Palestinians.