This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/3914

U.S. - Israeli Relations Grow More Strained, IDF Official Shunned By Obama Administration

March 25, 2009

U.S. - Israeli Relations Grow More Strained, IDF Official Shunned By Obama Administration

By WILLIAM MAYER and BEILA RABINOWITZ

March 25, 2009 - San Francisco, CA - PipeLineNews.org - The already chilled relationship between Israel and the Obama administration turned even colder last week when Lt. General Gabi Ashkenazi, the Chief of the General Staff of the IDF was given the bum's rush in DC in a series of abruptly cancelled meetings, denying him access to senior administration officials at the cabinet level or above.

Ashkenazi came to Washington to counsel against the administration's new make-nice diplomatic campaign directed at Iran. He reportedly bore high level intelligence on Iran's rapidly progressing nuclear weapons program to bolster his argument.

Team Obama was having none of it though, as in quick succession administration decision makers made themselves scarce, parrying that they were only interested in discussing the - deservedly much criticized - "peace process," which is now in shambles as a result of the continuing Palestinian jihad.

Though an Israeli spokesman quickly attempted to paper over the controversy, in an email sent to the WorldTribune.com, "The schedule for the United States visit of the IDF Chief of the General Staff, Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi, was preplanned according to requests made by American officials. Any meetings that were cancelled were substituted with telephone conference calls," the damage to the strained American/Israeli relationship was already done.

In a related development which has gotten precious little media play for obvious reasons, former Fatah security chief Mohammed Dahlan admitted in a March 17 interview carried on PA television that despite claims to the contrary made in some venues, Fatah has never accepted the right of Israel to exist, "This is a big lie...I am telling you for the thousandth time that we are not demanding that Hamas recognize Israel's right to exist. We demand that Hamas not do it, as Fatah itself has never recognized Israel's right to exist. We admit the PLO recognized Israel's right to exist, but that does not obligate us [Fatah] as a resistance movement." [source, Haaretz, http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1073741.html

As these writers noted in Obama/Hillary Visibly Tilting Towards Terrorist Fatah Over Israel, Obama's foreign policy team, fronted by Hillary Clinton, has made a conscious decision to continue the charade that Fatah can be counted on as a serious player in future Middle East peace efforts and that the party of Arafat is somehow different from Hamas, going so far as to appear with PA figurehead Mahmoud Abbas at a Ramallah press conference, where Israel's commitment to the 15 year old, now thoroughly moribund road map to peace, was maligned.

"At a joint press conference held in Ramallah with Mahmoud Abbas leader of Arafat's Fatah Party, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton strongly criticized the Israeli decision to go forward with an archeological project which will require the demolition of a number of homes in East Jerusalem.

Clinton's criticism was pointed, ""Clearly this kind of activity is unhelpful and not in keeping with the obligations entered into under the road map."

In case American Jewry hasn't already gotten the message, both of these developments betray the new administration's hostility to the survival of Israel as a Jewish state which is why it has so clearly signaled its intention to impose a disastrous faux peace settlement regardless of the consequences.

http://www.pipelinenews.org/index.cfm?page=ashkenaziid=3.25.09%2Ehtm

This item is available on the Militant Islam Monitor website, at http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/3914