Wednesday, November 06, 2013

Lame Duck Policies and the Mideast

Mike Konrad


What is coming out of the White House concerning Mideast Policy is beyond belief. We are watching a lame duck presidency sliding into the maliciously irrational.

He has reduced funding to Egypt.

For what? For getting rid of a Muslim Brotherhood government which was moving the country to an Islamic dictatorship. Obama declared Mohamed Morsi to have been democratically elected. Yes, Morsi was. So was Hitler; but like Hitler, Morsi soon moved the country toward an authoritarian regime.
General Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's overthrow of Morsi has the support of the Egyptian people, who were getting disgusted with the Morsi's creeping totalitarianism.
Many Egyptians laud Sisi for rescuing the country from ex-president Mohamed Morsi, an Islamist whose opponents felt was trying to rob Egypt of its moderate character. After nearly three years of post-revolutionary chaos, they also see Sisi as the restorer of stability -- The Guardian
Sisi is crushing the Muslim Brotherhood, the bane of Western policy in the Mideast for the last century. General Sisi shut down the tunnels which were used to smuggle weapons to Hamas in Gaza from the Sinai; an action so precipitous that not even the former president Hosni Mubarek attempted it. Now, Hamas is on its knees in Gaza. Israel could not have done any better.
To any sane leader of the West, Sisi would be seen as a gift from the gods. Yet, Obama has accused Sisi of acting undemocratically and cut off military aid. It doesn't matter to Obama that Morsi was the one acting like a tyrant or that most Egyptians support Sisi. Sisi is now considering requesting aid from Russia.
The West was handed a no-cost victory and President Obama has turned it into a defeat.
Then Obama offered to get involved in Syria's Civil War.
Yes, Bashir Assad is a tyrannical pig; but he is infinitely to be preferred over the Al-Qaeda regime that would have followed in his wake. Assad protected religious minorities, including Christians, almost all of whom supported Assad.
Yes, Syria helped Hizb'allah. Yes, that was a problem. However, Syria also kept a peaceful border with Israel for four decades. Assad had been trained in the West. His wife is British born and raised. This was a man who could have been bargained with, if someone in the White House was competent to see an opportunity and exploit it.
The USA should have given Assad conditional support in return for agreeing to come out of the Iranian orbit, and cease support to Hizb'allah. Instead, we supported arming troops who are committed to an imposition of seventh-century Islamic Salafist law. We have driven Assad further into Iranian arms.
To any sane observer, it looks as if Obama has sympathies with Sharia based regimes -- sympathies which cloud his reason.
Then he sent Secretary Kerry over to Israel to impose a peace solution in nine months.
Kerry's plan for a peace deal within nine months might seem to be quite optimistic -- Xinhuanet
Actually, it does not look optimistic. It looks deranged.
Incredible pressure is being put on Israel to make concessions. Netanyahu responded by massively increasing construction in Judea and Samaria. That alone would have clued in a rational president that Israel will not make concessions -- right or wrong. But Obama presses on.
The Israelis have no illusions that this peace deal is being rammed down their throats.
The radio station says the US has informed Israel and the Palestinian Authority that if negotiations between them do not advance, Washington will propose its own solution, that will include a US position on every point that is in contention. In effect, according to the report, this will be an attempt to force the sides to agree on a solution formulated by the US. -- Arutz Sheva, Israel National News
Yes, there are real issues between Israel and the Palestinians. Most of them are in the area of civil rights. If we pressure Israel to do anything, it should be to stop housing demolitions, but under no circumstances should we be telling Israel to divide her land or endanger her security.
By now, it should be apparent that Obama is lacking any judgment. His policies look as if they were written by mullahs from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Now, Obama wants to reduce sanctions against Iran -- just as they are about to collapse the regime -- a policy so insane that even the Saudis would not support it. Now the Saudis want to join Egypt in jumping the Western camp.
In the past two years, the USA has been given diplomatic gifts. Egypt now has a popular, anti-Islamic government. Syria has been brought low to the point where the Assads might have made concessions. Iran is on the verge of economic collapse. Obama could have pressed for a total U.S. victory in the Mideast with almost no cost to the West.
Obama was dealt a winning hand, as if by a beneficent divine fiat. He could have played them rightly and come across as a great president, at least in foreign policy. He could have done nothing and still won. Instead, he is folding.
What is driving this policy?!
It will get worse. After the 2014 elections, there will be nothing to stop Obama.
Congress has to act now.
Every Republican in Congress -- along with any Democrat with self-respect -- should repudiate Obama's policies.
Congress should immediately vote to tighten Iranian sanctions. Congress should vote to support General Sisi. Congress should vote again to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem.
If the Democratic Senate will not stand up, the Republican House must.
Those whom the gods would destroy they first make mad. In Obama's case, the insanity is evident.
We have a president whose foreign policy incompetence will hurt the USA for decades, if we survive it. Congress must act now.
Obama claims to be worried about democratic rights in Egypt, Syria, and Palestine. Let our Congress assert some democratic -- or rather, more preferably, republican rights -- and thwart these dangerous policies.
Time is very short here -- on the order of months. If Israel senses a loosening of Iranian sanctions, she will attack Iran and a world war might start: The famous prophesied biblical war of Gog and Magog, which may start over Syria.
Obama has to be put on notice. If the Democrats will not act, the Republicans must, even if it means losing the next election.
Congress has to act. Immediately!
Mike Konrad is the pen name of an American who is not Arab, Jewish, or Latin. He runs a website, http://latinarabia.com/, where he discusses the subculture of Arabs in Latin America. He wishes his Spanish were better.

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