Bush is not directly responsible the attacks by Israel and Hezbollah. However, his hands-off tilt toward Israelis and his misplaced focus on Iraq has done little to create a workable diplomatic solution to the Israel- Palestine problem. The result has been to promote a policy preference in Israel in which violence is the first resort and not the last.The two-state solution of Israel and Palestine was at best a promise and at worse a hope when Bush entered the White House. It is now dead as a door nail. Future historians will mark his term as the point in which his Neocons promoted a permanent detour of the 'road map' into the direction of a one-state solution, with Palestinians relegated to two fenced-in 'reservations' so confining that they are rendered incapable of founding either a state or an economy.
Putting it in the best light possible, my interpretation of our alliance with Israel was thyat it was predicated on a purpose to exert some element of restraint on Israel's using its conventional and nuclear capability for massive retaliation against its foes. But Bush's post 9-11 obsession with Iraq seemed to vacate this traditional U.S. responsibility. Future historians will resolve whether this neglect was benign or willful. What is apparent to all, the result has become a historic catastrophe.
Bush, the self-anointed apostle of democracy for the Middle East, has become the fifth horse of the apocalypse. The ruins of Iraq and Lebanon will be his legacy.
For decades, settlers on the West Bank have been the tail to wag the dog of Israeli foreign policy; and for decades Israeli foreign policy has been the tail to wag & dog American foreign policy.
ReplyDeleteCall the vet?
The Fifth Horse of the Apocalypse. How fitting. By the way I am MAD about what happened to America since this fool became the boss. If the U.S. can return to its former greatness it will be with a different congress. Remember November. Great site by the way....
ReplyDeleteP.S. Messenger I agree wholeheartedly....
ReplyDeleteHands up those who think this round of kill a Jew/an Arab is going to end in everyone just getting along. Nah, neither did I.
ReplyDeleteIs it just me but, this sorry state of affairs is looking more and more like a kindergarten play area where you have multitude of todlers doing their thing. There is the agressive, big for his age one (USA), using his overdeveloped muscles to sort out anything and everything to get his way. There is this pale, under-nourished kid from the local trailer court (Palestinians) with hostility in his heart for his neglecting parents and for everybody using authority over him. Then there is a spoiled little brat (Israel) that has been brought up with a sense of getting away with everything because his parents think he is so special, and the rich uncle overseas will pay the occassional bills caused by his temper tantrums.
These babies we are talking about, though, with their bombs and rocketts, are not even a least bit cute. How this kindergarten behaviour can go on and on? Isn't there, after some 40-50 years, adults somewhere who could do some spanking and rewarding and get these little devils in line?
Thanks for backing me, Mike.
ReplyDeleteAs a footnote on my comment above, read What British Jews think of Israel:
It's not a coincidence that most of the hard-line Gush Eminem [settler] movement speaks with an American accent.