Obama Watch: Israel & The Middle East

“We outlasted Pharoah and we will outlast Obama.”
Knesset Member Dr. Michael Ben-Ari


At his recent speech at the University of Cairo, President Obama declared, “Denying the Holocaust and threatening Israel with destruction is wrong.” He then went on to say that “On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people have suffered in pursuit of a homeland and have suffered for sixty years of displacement.” He accused Israel of being responsible for the humiliation of Arabs and insisted that Israel must stop building communities on their own land and accept a Palestinian State. As we have witnessed in the past, Israel is once again under pressure from the world community to grant land concessions without an equal demand for reciprocity from the Palestinians, especially the call for accountable and responsible leadership, but much more importantly, the complete renouncement of terrorism and the recognition of Israel’s right to existence.

In 1947, the UN partitioned the land called Palestine, a name given to the region by the Romans, which translates as “land of the Philistines.” There was never a country formally recognized in the world as Palestine. Before the UN partition in 1947, the region was controlled by Great Britain. The majority of inhabitants were Jews, Christians and Muslims. The Jews accepted their portion of the divided land and in 1948, Israel, the Jewish State, was born. The birth of modern day Israel was the most significant piece of Biblical prophecy fulfilled since the coming of the Messiah Yeshua.

Meanwhile, the Arabs rejected their half of the partitioned land, and not long after Israel was declared a nation, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria attacked them. Like David vs. Goliath, tiny Israel emerged victorious against the giant of combined Arab armies. The Arabs attacked Israel again in the 1967 Six Day War and in 1973 during Yom Kippur, or The Feast of Atonement to destroy Israel and her people through heinous acts of guerilla warfare and terrorism. It was not until November, 1977 when one Arab leader, the late Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, decided to extend the olive branch to then Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and made his historic trip across the border to Israel. For the first time, people in this troubled region of the world began to hold cautious hope that one day, the descendants of Abraham, Ishmael, and Isaac might actually live side by side in peaceful co-existence. Although Israel and Egypt have maintained a tentative acknowledgement of each other, their truce did not come without a price. President Anwar Sadat was assassinated in 1981 by members of an Islamic extremist group known as the Muslim Brotherhood.

Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas recently declared once again that he will never accept Israel’s right to exist. Furthermore, the PA, as well as Hamas, have never changed their charters calling for the destruction of Israel.
President Obama seems more concerned with demanding that Israel stop building in Judea and Samaria and to give up more land to their enemies while refusing to deal with the issue of terrorism. He won’t even say the word. His silence on this issue may definitely return to haunt him some day. For it is the very issue of terrorism, nuclear or otherwise, and those in the Middle East who advocate and practice it that remains at the very heart of the problem.