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Tom Gross is a former Jerusalem correspondent for the (London) Sunday Telegraph and (New York) Daily News. He has also written for a broad range of other publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Financial Times and National Review. He has appeared as a guest commentator on Mideast affairs on CNN, NPR, and other stations.
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By Tom Gross
February 5, 2008
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Excerpted from today's dispatch at Tom Gross Media
Just in case anyone doesn't know, today is "Super Tuesday," when voters in 24 American states go to the polls in a series of primaries and caucuses. The Democratic race is particularly tight with Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton running neck and neck.
Among the five major candidates remaining in the Democratic and Republican Party races, Barack Obama is the only one that raises serious concerns when it comes to foreign policy.
Obama may be articulate, charming and charismatic on television and in public rallies, but -- as far as we can see -- his policies for the Middle East may very well set back the interests of America, of Muslim democrats and liberals, of Israel, and of peace and freedom in general.
In an interview with Paris Match (January 31, 2008) Obama said one of the very first things he would do once elected is "to organize a summit in the Muslim world with all the heads of state... We must also listen to their concerns."
In other words, Obama will listen to the "concerns" of these despots and dictators, including (he has made clear) the regimes in Damascus and Teheran, rather than to the pro-west opposition movements struggling to bring democracy to the Muslim world.
Many of these heads of state actively promote terrorism and anti-Semitic incitement in their state-controlled media.
We know that one of the prime "concerns" of these dictators is Israel's existence.
Nowhere in the Paris Match article does Obama condemn the repeated terrorist strikes and incitement against Israel -- the only stable democracy in the region.
Furthermore Obama has said he will swiftly withdraw from Iraq, come what may, leaving the poor, suffering civilian population there at the mercy of al-Qaeda -- who last week tricked two Down Syndrome women into becoming suicide bombers.
Obama has appointed ardent critics of Israel as his foreign policy advisors. They include:
* Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter's national security adviser;
* Robert Malley, a relentless apologist for Yasser Arafat;
* Samantha Power, who has also called for the elimination of foreign aid to Israel and its redirection to "Palestine".
Among the conservatives Obama has said he may call upon to advise him are (according to an interview Obama gave in the February 4, 2008 issue of Newsweek) Senators Dick Lugar and Chuck Hagel, possibly the most anti-Israel figures among Senate Republicans.
When asked by Newsweek "Would you have Republicans in your cabinet?" Obama replied, "No decisions, but Dick Lugar embodies the best tradition in foreign policy. Chuck Hagel is a smart guy who has shows some courage, even though we disagree on domestic policy."
Among their record on foreign policy:
On July 24, 2001, the Senate voted 96 to 2 to renew the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act to help deny Iran and Libya money that they would spend on supporting terrorism or acquiring weapons of mass destruction. The only two senators who opposed the measure were Lugar and Hagel.
On November 11, 2003, the Senate voted by 89 to 4, to pass the Syria Accountability Act, which authorized sanctions on Syria for its support of terrorism and its occupation of Lebanon. Hagel refused to vote for it.
On April 6, 2001, 87 members of the Senate sent President Bush a letter saying Yasser Arafat should not be invited to meet with high-level officials in Washington until he renounced terrorism against Israel. Lugar and Hagel declined to sign the letter.
The hardline Iranian government-controlled Fars news agency writes positively here of Barack Obama. It seems they hope that Obama would serve the Ahmadinejad regime's interests better than John McCain, Hillary Clinton or Mitt Romney.
Views expressed by the author do not
necessarily reflect those of israelinsider.
 
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