Sterile U.S. Policies

After his fiftieth day in office, U.S. polls spotted a clear recession in the popularity of President Barack Obama, due to his reneging on certain promises made during the campaign when faced with the politics that always characterize U.S. policies, especially with respect to Middle Eastern issues. This concern has spread to Arab countries that cheered for him, imagining he would assume a more moderate and unbiased attitude toward the Arab-Israeli conflict, contrary to his predecessor, Bush.

Actually, the first battle, lost to the Zionist lobby, was abandonment of the choice of Ambassador Charles Freedom, old hand in Middle Eastern affairs, security and intelligence, who served as the American Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, to chair the National Intelligence Council. Pressures [against that choice] described Freeman as a controversial personality, due to his consistent, negative assessment of the impact of the Zionist lobby on U.S. policies and the position it takes when confronted with any criticism of Israeli officials.

Overall, the picture looks bleak, with Avigdor Lieberman, head of the political party, “Israel Is Our Home” (Yisrael Beiteinu), taking office in the racist Israeli government. He is the same person who refuses to recognize an independent Palestinian state or to hold talks with Palestinians trusted by the Department of State.

In addition, Washington enthusiastically brought to effect the American-Israeli memorandum of understanding, signed by Livni and Rice, just a few hours before the Bush administration left office. This memorandum clearly focuses on stopping the so-called smuggling of arms to terrorists in Gaza, namely Hamas and other resistance groups.

Washington, leaving no stone unturned, gathered its NATO allies to monitor and prevent weapons smuggling via the Mediterranean, Gulf of Eden, Red Sea and Eastern African, in a meeting held in London, attended by Israeli officials. Although not sharing status with its closest neighbor, Palestine, Egypt demonstrated reservation about this agreement, a clear breach of international law, lacking any comprehensive commitment by Israel, to the views of the Quartet [United States, Russia, the European Union, and the United Nations] regarding the end of aggression and continued settlement activity.

These actions, coming at an indisputably volatile time, during which Egypt has spared neither time nor effort to bring about reconciliation, are nothing but a stab in the back. [They damage] the efforts made to solve disputes and old issues and to push toward peace by establishing a means by which the Palestinian National Authority can pursue peaceful settlement, without ignoring the right of Palestinians to resist occupation, particularly after recent Israeli offensives on Gaza.

In point of fact, these indirect, Western policies are characterized by contradiction. Western parliamentary and political officials flock to Palestine to meet with Hamas members to persuade them of the necessity of recognizing Israel and the resolutions of the Quartet, in return for including Palestinians in peace negotiations. At the same time, Israel unveils its extremist conservative face, the face of a government which adopts none of the resolutions of the Quartet, thanks to the mysterious and biased policies of the U.S., accompanied by countries such as France, Germany and Britain, all proclaiming their hard work toward achieving peace and stability.

For the present, Obama seeks to settle the Afghan situation by secretly contacting Mullah Omar, via Saudi mediation. In spite of all this, U.S. policies will remain between the hammer and anvil of Zionist pressure.