Guardian: Jewish groups accuse Obama of promoting 'ethnic cleansing'

[Scurrilous]

Pro-Israel lobby says White House demands over settlements should be viewed as anti-semitic and a danger to security

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/aug/23/obama-jewis...

<snip>

"Hardline pro-Israel groups in the US have been confronting President Barack Obama's demands for a halt to settlement expansion by accusing him of promoting the ethnic cleansing of Jews and jeopardising Israel's security.

Members of Congress allied with Israel and powerful lobby groups in Washington are also trying to shift the focus of administration policy from the Jewish settlements, arguing they are not an obstacle to peace, to demands for Arab governments to recognise Israel.

The strategy, intertwined with a similar campaign by Israeli politicians and officials, has taken on added urgency because of Obama's demands, first laid down during a testy meeting in May with the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, that Israel freeze all settlement construction in the West Bank.

Netanyahu arrives in London tomorrow for a series of key meetings, including four hours of discussions on Wednesday with the White House's special envoy, George Mitchell. He is also due to see Gordon Brown on Tuesday.

The visit comes amid signs that an agreement will eventually be reached for a settlement freeze for up to a year."

[IrishBuckeye]

1. Expanding settlements on stolen land aren't "obstacles to peace"??

These settlements are cancer, not only does the expansion need to be stopped but they must be removed.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. It's begging the question whether the land belongs to Israel or whether it

should be returned or used to establish an independent sovereignty.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

3. And note that this response isn't even to settlements being removed.

If even asking that illegal settlements on Palestinian land *stop expanding temporarily* - not be removed, not be reduced, not even stop where they are permanently, but temporarily pause in increasing the amount of land they illegally occupy - is so controversial in Israel, I don't see any hope of a consensual peace.

[Howardx]

4. where are the american jews?

why arent they condemning these attacks on their president?

[Ken Burch]

6. Some do.

Michael Lerner and the Tikkun community. Grass roots American Jewish supporters of Mideast peace and a real two-state solution do. It's just that the U.S. press only covers AIPAC and the self-appointed right-wing "mainstream" Jewish leadership.

There is a much more open debate on what Israel does among American Jews than there was in the past. The loudest and most sanctimonious "pro-Israel" posters here on DU do not represent majority opinion in the American Jewish community.

[Igel]

7. Ooh, I like that.

Haven't heard that particular one for a while.

I assume you ask the same about Muslim, Mexican, and African Americans when there's a protest aginst the US president in Muslim countries, Mexico, or Africa. Otherwise, I agree with Chomsky: Asymmetries are great clues as to underlying, er, structure.

Then again, perhaps it only sounds like innuendo.

[Howardx]

9. thanks for reminding me

i meant to put you on ignore

[LeftishBrit]

10. You obviously haven't looked very hard. Here for example...

www.ameinu.net/perspectives/current_issues.php?articlei...

www.jstreet.org/campaigns/a-freeze-means-freeze

www.forward.com/articles/109563/

www.peacenow.org/entries/special_from_danny_seidemann_o... (Danny Seidemann is Israeli, but the site promoting him here is American)

[stranger81]

5. oh for pete's sake . . . . .

It is no more anti-semitic to insist Israel stop building settlements in the Occupied Territories than it is anti-semitic to insist that Israel refrain from building settlements in China, India or Arkansas.

[bemildred]

8. The usual complete lack of any sense of irony.

Not the sharpest knives in the drawer.