Trump's pick for ambassador to Israel sparks hot debate
Source: Associated Press
NEW YORK (AP) — If President-elect Donald Trump wanted to show he planned to obliterate President Barack Obama’s approach to Israel, he might have found his man to deliver that message in David Friedman, his pick for U.S. ambassador.
The bankruptcy lawyer and son of an Orthodox rabbi is everything Obama is not: a fervent supporter of Israeli settlements, opponent of Palestinian statehood and unrelenting defender of Israel’s government. So far to the right is Friedman that many Israel supporters worry he could push Israel’s hawkish Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be more extreme, scuttling prospects for peace with Palestinians in the process.
The heated debate over Friedman’s selection is playing out just as fresh tensions erupt between the U.S. and Israel.
In a stunning decision Friday, the Obama administration moved to allow the U.N. Security Council to pass a resolution condemning Israeli settlements as illegal. The move to abstain, rather than veto, defied years of U.S. tradition of shielding Israel from such resolutions, and elicited condemnation from Israel, lawmakers of both parties, and especially Trump.
Read more: http://www.salon.com/2016/12/26/trumps-pick-for-ambassador-to-israel-sparks-hot-debate/
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the world against actions by Israel. One point that seems to be ignored by both sides is that the US President and his administration taking such an extreme position is that the US ability to influence other powers in Israel's favor will be minimized. Many are posting elsewhere- all other US message boards and on twitter - against Obama and Kerry because the US abstained on a resolution, that for the most part was US policy since Reagan is that for 8 years. They ignore that the Obama administration has been a moderating force asking especially France to not push resolutions that went further than this did. It was their respect for Obama, Kerry and Clinton and to allow negotiations for a two state solution that held them back.
So much of the coverage has dealt with the reaction in the US and Israel. Ignored is that while we abstained, not agreeing completely with the language, the other 14 countries all voted for it. This includes both Russia and China - countries Netanyahu has been courting recently.
Much as they might want to, given these picks, I doubt the US will have as much influence in the world to help Israel. Gone will be the day when a Secretary of State could get the EU to not support a full out BDS resolution. That happened because the foreign ministers of the EU countries respected and liked Secretary Kerry.
As a Jew, I am saddened that if Israel continues to move in the direction it is moving, there will be no democratic Jewish state. Many people have articulated - as the NYT David Friedman (who likely wants his name back!), not Trump's lawyer articulated decades ago - Israel can only chose two out of these three things - all the land in the "territories", being a Jewish state, and being a democracy that gives equal rights to all. Calling the two state solution a "narrative" (whatever that means - I think he means "fiction"
, he is taking retaining the land. I do not think for any of these right wing Zionists, the answer is that they will accept Israel not being a Jewish state. The question is how the majority of US Jews, a liberal group who have led in all US civil rights fights, could support a country that deprives a large percent of people in the land they control of the same rights as Israelis within the green line.
