Schumer: Obama's Israel Policy "Counter-Productive"
AP
Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer on Thursday criticized the Obama administration's approach to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, calling it "counter-productive."
The United States has to maintain a solid standing with Israel, the New York senator said on the Nachum Segal Show, a conservative Jewish talk radio show.
"I told the president, I told [White House chief of staff] Rahm Emanuel and others in the administration that I thought the policy they took to try to bring about negotiations is counter-productive, because when you give the Palestinians hope that the United States will do its negotiating for them, they are not going to sit down and talk," Schumer said.
The United States last month condemned Israel's decision to construct new Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem, which was announced while Vice President Joe Biden was in Israel to try and revive talks between the Israelis and the Palestinians. Biden maintained that the U.S. has "no better friend" than Israel.
Later, however, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "It was insulting not just to the vice president, who certainly didn't deserve that ... but it was an insult to the United States."
Schumer said that many in Washington are "pushing back" against the administration and that some Jewish members of Congress are meeting with President Obama within the next couple of weeks.
"We are saying that this has to stop," he said. "You have to have, in terms of the negotiations, you have to show Israel that it's not going to be forced to do things it doesn't want to do and can't do... And right now there is a battle going on inside the administration, one side agrees with us, one side doesn't. And we're pushing hard to make sure the right side wins, and if not, we'll have to take it to the next step."
Recently 76 senators signed a letter, organized by the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC, urging Clinton to "reaffirm the unbreakable bonds that tie the United States and Israel together and to diligently work to defuse current tensions."
Schumer said that "90 percent of the Senate is overwhelmingly in support of Israel."
Mr. Obama on April 19, the 62nd anniversary of Israel Independence Day, released a statement saying the United States shares an "unbreakable bond" with Israel and he was confident the relationship "will only be strengthened" into the future.
Still, Schumer said, "The only way the Palestinians will sit down and talk is if they know Israel and the United States are as close as could be. And each administration learns it... We are at a crucial moment here, and I am hopeful that administration will see the right way to go. I am working on it."
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Senator Schumer has condoned a breech of international law, collective punishment, that was mentioned no less than eighteen times in the Goldstone Report:
"Not only because Israel has blocked off the border and not let anything into Gaza, and I support Israel in doing that, and it may be tough on the Palestinian people, but when they vote for Hamas they are going to have to suffer the consequences."
In this case, Schumer directly testifies that he believes it is lawful to collectively punish a captive and occupied civilian population to elicit a political result favorable to the occupier country, in this case of course, Israel.
Schumer apparently has little regard for the Geneva Conventions.
Haaretz and others regularly report that the Obama administration is encouraging Israel to at the very least, ease its debilitating siege of Gaza. It appears Schumer is also undermining US policy in this regard as well.
My question: Is it not indeed a war crime to fire rockets into another country? Is Israel breaking international law by responding in any way to rocket fire? Is there a path beyond economic actions that would be more amenable to international law?
It's quite easy to support economic sanctions as being a more humane response than military action.
Notwithstanding your idea of what happened when, because there was after all a failed coup managed by Israel and to be carried out by Mohammed Dahlan, George W. Bush's "go to man" in Fatah, that you pointedly leave out of your story; but then there is a problem when you seem to believe that 'two wrongs make a right' - although every school child learns that is wrong, it seems that Israel's "supporters" forget that axiom when it comes to Israeli policy.
Collective punishment is ALWAYS a war crime when carried out upon innocent civilians who are in essence, charges in the occupier country's care.
Israel is well within its rights to target the rocket squads, and they can and do, often with devastating effect.
And yet STILL they keep Gaza CIVILIANS just like the Germans kept the Warsaw Ghetto.
You might also note that occupation begets resistance. This has always been the case throughout time. If Americans were occupied by some foreign enemy trying to steal our land, I can assure our resistance would make those homemade rockets look like child's play.
For the life of me, I cannot undertaken why ordinary people would not apply such a standard to themselves, but they expect the Palestinians to be raped by the Israelis of their land and resources and they are just supposed to sit there.
Really? We can negotiate peace with by taking a stand like that?
>>Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said, "It was insulting not just to the vice president, who certainly didn't deserve that ... but it was an insult to the United States."
I have to agree with that. Are we going to be taken seriously by either side if we let Israel slap us around, then smile and say thank you sir, may I have another?
I know no one that believes giving the terrorists more land to launch bombs into Israel will bring peace.
Our govt is doing 2 wars and buddying up to some real nasty people just to keep the oil flowing from the middle east.
We loose that oil and the Tea Party people will not be able to drive those big million dollar RV's to the Tea Party meetings ! ! !
While we are at it, since when has a foreign government had their own lobbyists in Washington. Even if they claim to be representing a group of Americans, they are ultimately all part of a foreign government. Get rid of APAC. They have no right to be putting pressure on our representatives. Of course the representatives that are swayed by APAC should leave also.
16. Then it shall be, when he maketh his sons to inherit that which he hath, that he may not make the son of the beloved firstborn before the son of the hated, which is indeed the firstborn:
17. But he shall acknowledge the son of the hated for the firstborn, by giving him a double portion of all that he hath: for he is the beginning of his strength; the right of the firstborn is his.
That book has caused more death adn destruction that any other. This is a land dispute started in 1948 It has nothing to do with the Bible or Religion.
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Chuck-
That all depends on whether you want progress or the status quo.
Let us quit supporting a country that is not willing to negotiate. Let Israel go on their own and let us support the Palestinians through their suffering.
Remember when the kids from Florida went to Israel and the Palestine govt would not let them leave ? They got free but it was not easy !
It was because their dad was "Palestinian".
That means they are Palestinian and so have the duty to stay and be human shields.
They wanted the USA kids to stay and be human shields ! ! !
Where is the protest that Hamas is holding millions of people as human shields and brainwashing the kids. They make the kids read the Koran over and over until they are ready to strap a bomb on.
Why in the world would the USA support that kind of child abuse ? ? ?