How Netanyahu Helped Obama

Netanyahu came, saw and lost. With his speech to the U.S. Congress, Israel’s prime minister could have distinguished himself as a statesman of caliber. But he failed — and thereby played into Obama’s hands.

It couldn’t have gone better for Barack Obama. First, the Israeli prime minister speaks before Congress, then the Republican Party ends its uprising against financing the Department of Homeland Security, the agency that secures the borders and fights terrorism. The problem with amnesty for illegal immigrants will be solved later. The law is now ready for the president’s signature. Both may have more to do with each other than one would think.

Learning to speak without saying anything: Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu came, saw and lost. He had the chance to distinguish himself as a world diplomat and statesman of caliber, and he has failed. He lost by using positions before Congress that everyone had heard a hundred times before. He didn’t fail, wherever possible, to bring up World War II and that Iranians around the world kill Americans whenever possible. Note: The Iranian government was evil, is evil and will always be evil. Negotiations, therefore, are meaningless.

His position on the current political debate is thereby sufficiently described. The worst thing that could happen is Iran obtaining nuclear weapons, he says. There is hardly anyone in the Western Hemisphere who doesn’t see it the same way. To this point, then, came the populist thesis that “no deal with Iran is better than a bad deal.” And yes, what Barack Obama negotiated is a bad deal. He put it so surely, saying, “Iran could soon be armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear bombs.”

It’s breathtaking the sort of incompetence and shortsightedness that Netanyahu presumed about Obama, without even an iota of contribution to solving the problem. This is exactly as it would have been had his speech been made at a campaign rally at the cost of American tax payers subsidizing a speech from a world leader: a demonstration of an alternative.

One Couldn’t Be Further from Reality

However, this has no place in this wood-framed, black and white picture. He simply wants to finish the final phase of negotiations. He paints a picture of the Islamic State and Iran as close allies on the way toward world domination. One couldn’t be further from reality: Iranian troops are in Iraq fighting the Islamic State group hands-on.

Let us not forget that, at the time, world leader Netanyahu had been enthusiastically for the war in Iraq as a panacea that would bring peace to the region. Saddam gone, all would be well. And that couldn’t be further from reality as we know it today.

Now he says Obama and the nations dealing with the issue should just stoke the fire and “increase pressure.” How? He doesn’t say. He merely thinks it and lets others worry about it. The ends of these means are a war between Israel and Iran if the Iranians don’t give in and scrap their nuclear program.

According to Netanyahu’s speech, organized by Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner — who bypassed the White House — there was again only one man of action in Washington: Barack Obama. Perhaps this is the reason Boehner had no desire to stand as a barrier against financing the Department of Homeland Security. First, no solution to the Iran issue while being fundamentally against President Obama’s direction; then, the threat to close a department that oversees border patrol by holding immigrants at bay and thereby getting rid of them.

On Friday, the House of Representatives had only approved emergency financing for a week. But the Republicans have given in and ended the blockade against financing for the Department of Homeland Security.

After Netanyahu’s speech, Boehner wanted to at least be a man of action — even if he wasn’t successful.