Now that the 2 candidates, McCain and Obama, for US president are clear, it is time to consider their respective policies.
The Israel lobby group AIPAC is presently holding its annual conference in Washington. All the movers and shakers are dutifully trooping to the podium to deliver speeches the delegates want to hear.
Both McCain and Obama have made speeches, Obama only a few hours ago. McCain spoke the other day and Daniel Levy, writing on The Huffington Post, analyses the McCain speech:
"Senator McCain gave the keynote address at yesterday's opening of the annual AIPAC Conference and promised that the same vision of perpetual warfare served up by Bush, and offered as an option to Americans in November, would also be available to his Israeli friends were he to become the next occupant of the White House. If I may speak for a moment from my Israeli perspective--I found the enthusiastic response to the unappetizing fare proffered by McCain, while not surprising, thoroughly distasteful. The speech of the Republican presidential hopeful was so utterly devoid of anything positive for the future, that he even managed to find precious little to say about Israel's achievements of the past 60 years (yes I am all too aware of Israel's shortcomings, but given the occasion, one would have at least expected an uplifting take on the positive side of the Israel story--but then McCain does not do uplifting). What was most remarkable though was how shallow and devoid of context McCain's understanding of the region proved to be. He is indeed positioning himself as the true inheritor of the neoconservative mantle.
McCain's speech ran to just under 3000 words. Exactly half of that was devoted to Iran and Iraq. If one removes the tops and tails--his flowery references to visiting Israel, the obligatory name check to his buddy Senator Lieberman, and reference to Henry "Scoop" Jackson (a none-too-subtle bow to the neocons), then just 725 words of that speech remained for such trivialities as Israel's relations with its neighbors, al-Qaeda, the Gulf, etc.; not surprising then that these barely got a mention.
In McCain's world the Middle East is reduced to Iran, Iraq and some terrorists running around in Gaza and Lebanon. Egypt and Jordan, the two neighbors with which Israel has formal peace treaties, and the anchors for Israel's acceptance and peaceful existence in the region, did not merit a single mention. Likewise Saudi Arabia, or any of the Gulf States with whom Israel is keen to formalize links, who were even present at the Annapolis conference and who have mobilized a platform for regional acceptance of Israel in the Saudi Initiative. McCain ain't interested. On the Saudis and the Gulf--nada.
Israel has just launched Turkish mediated proximity talks with Syria. But in a display of McSameness, McCain refused to welcome or refer to these negotiations. He quite simply snubbed the government of Israel and the leadership of its defense establishment, who are strongly behind these peace talks (by the way the Turks, who are brokering these talks, who now have a key regional role, also don't exist in McCain's Middle East)."
The Israel lobby group AIPAC is presently holding its annual conference in Washington. All the movers and shakers are dutifully trooping to the podium to deliver speeches the delegates want to hear.
Both McCain and Obama have made speeches, Obama only a few hours ago. McCain spoke the other day and Daniel Levy, writing on The Huffington Post, analyses the McCain speech:
"Senator McCain gave the keynote address at yesterday's opening of the annual AIPAC Conference and promised that the same vision of perpetual warfare served up by Bush, and offered as an option to Americans in November, would also be available to his Israeli friends were he to become the next occupant of the White House. If I may speak for a moment from my Israeli perspective--I found the enthusiastic response to the unappetizing fare proffered by McCain, while not surprising, thoroughly distasteful. The speech of the Republican presidential hopeful was so utterly devoid of anything positive for the future, that he even managed to find precious little to say about Israel's achievements of the past 60 years (yes I am all too aware of Israel's shortcomings, but given the occasion, one would have at least expected an uplifting take on the positive side of the Israel story--but then McCain does not do uplifting). What was most remarkable though was how shallow and devoid of context McCain's understanding of the region proved to be. He is indeed positioning himself as the true inheritor of the neoconservative mantle.
McCain's speech ran to just under 3000 words. Exactly half of that was devoted to Iran and Iraq. If one removes the tops and tails--his flowery references to visiting Israel, the obligatory name check to his buddy Senator Lieberman, and reference to Henry "Scoop" Jackson (a none-too-subtle bow to the neocons), then just 725 words of that speech remained for such trivialities as Israel's relations with its neighbors, al-Qaeda, the Gulf, etc.; not surprising then that these barely got a mention.
In McCain's world the Middle East is reduced to Iran, Iraq and some terrorists running around in Gaza and Lebanon. Egypt and Jordan, the two neighbors with which Israel has formal peace treaties, and the anchors for Israel's acceptance and peaceful existence in the region, did not merit a single mention. Likewise Saudi Arabia, or any of the Gulf States with whom Israel is keen to formalize links, who were even present at the Annapolis conference and who have mobilized a platform for regional acceptance of Israel in the Saudi Initiative. McCain ain't interested. On the Saudis and the Gulf--nada.
Israel has just launched Turkish mediated proximity talks with Syria. But in a display of McSameness, McCain refused to welcome or refer to these negotiations. He quite simply snubbed the government of Israel and the leadership of its defense establishment, who are strongly behind these peace talks (by the way the Turks, who are brokering these talks, who now have a key regional role, also don't exist in McCain's Middle East)."
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