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(IsraelNN.com) Lt.-Col. (ret.) Ralph Peters, military analyst and author of a book on Middle East politics, says Obama apparently has a chip on his shoulder against Israel – and it’s not “helpful to our civilization.” Peters, who wrote “Endless War: Middle Eastern Islam vs. Western Civilization,” was asked to explain why he felt American-Israeli friendship appears to have been derailed so dramatically. “The answer is two words,” he said. “President Obama.” “Obama’s treatment of [Prime Minister Binyamin] Netanyahu [during their recent meeting in Washington] was disgraceful and shameful,” Peters told FoxNews. “We treat our enemies with greater courtesy! In addition,...

Why is President Obama so obviously humiliating Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu? Why is Secretary of State Clinton negating everything she said when she represented New York state and piling on the Jewish state? They want Benjamin Netanyahu out. Specifically, they want him to feel such pressure that he dumps his right-wing coalition partners and forms a new government with the center-left party Kadima headed by former Prime Minister Tzipi Livni. Livni, who thinks nothing of trading land for peace, no matter how flawed the peace might be, will then hold Netanyahu's government hostage and force it to bend to...

It is not every day that Human Rights Watch (HRW) comes out with a report that accurately highlights Hamas war crimes against Israel, but in the case of the Thai worker killed by a Gaza rocket on March 18, 2009, HRW did just that.The tragic story of Manee Singmueangphon , a Thai migrant worker who was killed when a rocket struck an Israeli greenhouse north of Gaza on Thursday March 18, was barely given any in-depth coverage in the mainstream media. Most news reports simply stated that a Thai migrant worker was killed in a rocket attack, not even giving...

Two Israeli soldiers were killed in a gun battle with Gaza militants in some of the fiercest fighting in the territory since Israel's military offensive there more than a year ago. The deaths were the first for the Israeli military in Gaza since January 2009. Four militants died in the clashes and in another exchange of fire nearby. Gaza's Islamic Hamas rulers announced that their gunmen were involved — marking a shift from the group's tendency over the past year to avoid confrontation with Israeli forces. The outbreak of violence in Gaza, which subsided by early evening, highlighted the region's...

United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Friday that the Obama administration's decision to ramp up pressure on Israel over construction of Jewish homes in East Jerusalem was bringing results. In an interview with BBC television, Clinton was asked whether escalating the tone with Israel had paid off. She said: "I think we're going to see the resumption of the negotiation track and that means that it is paying off because that's our goal." Advertisement Over the past two weeks Israel has sought to cool American ire over plans for 1,600 new homes in Ramat Shlomo, a Jewish...

Obama himself claims that he has launched a political war against Israel in the interest of promoting peace. But this claim, too, does not stand up to scrutiny. On Friday, Obama ordered Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to present Netanyahu with a four-part ultimatum. First, Israel must cancel the approval of the housing units in Ramat Shlomo. Second, Israel must prohibit all construction for Jews in Jerusalem neighborhoods built since 1967. Third, Israel must make a gesture to the Palestinians to show them we want peace. The US suggests releasing hundreds of Palestinian terrorists from Israeli prisons. Fourth, Israel must...

Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, has refused to buckle to US pressure to scrap a Jewish building project in East Jerusalem in a crucial telephone conversation with America's top diplomat. Mr Netanyahu ceded little ground to Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, as he finally responded to a series of conditions she set out to end a 10-day standoff between Israel and its superpower patron. The Israeli leader gambled that the Obama administration had lost its appetite for a prolonged diplomatic row by accepting just one of Mrs Clinton's demands in full as he agreed to make a...

Phew. We can breathe easier now that the Obama administration has taken a tough-as-scimitars line with Israel, whose existentially threatening architectural blueprints for new housing, the administration says, pose a dire threat to U.S. troops and interests. Or, as Vice President Joseph Biden put it, referring to a new housing project in Jerusalem, as reported by Yedioth Ahronoth: "This is starting to get dangerous for us. What you're doing here undermines the security of our troops who are fighting in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan." In other words, maybe it's not the Muslim-made IED planted in the roads of Helmand Province...

No, you can't, Obama. If your temper tantrum over some houses means that you intend to give the terrorists part of Jerusalem, think again. There is nothing to negotiate with savages who riot when a synagogue is reopened. No sooner did the Obama Administration denounce Israel for its building activities in Jerusalem when hordes of violent Palestinian thugs took to the streets of holy Jerusalem. As always, the Arabs show the world how sacred Jerusalem is to them by filling it with violence. They rioted to demand that Jews be prohibited from opening a synagogue that had been destroyed by...

WASHINGTON — The United States has diverted a shipment of bunker-busters designated for Israel. Officials said the U.S. military was ordered to divert a shipment of smart bunker-buster bombs from Israel to a military base in Diego Garcia. They said the shipment of 387 smart munitions had been slated to join pre-positioned U.S. military equipment in Israel Air Force bases. "This was a political decision," an official said. In 2008, the United States approved an Israeli request for bunker-busters capable of destroying underground facilities, including Iranian nuclear weapons sites. Officials said delivery of the weapons was held up by the...

"Israel is one of our closest allies and we and the Israeli people have a special bond that's not going to go away," said President Barack Obama to Fox News Wednesday, March 17, after denying any crisis in the relationship. debkafile's Washington sources note that denial makes a lot of sense for the president because it lets him off the hook for dealing with it. However, in Jerusalem, prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu called his inner cabinet into its second session on the crisis that same night. The seven ministers were asked to review the situation after President Obama and secretary...

Attack from Gaza is third in 24 hours, after two rockets land near Sderot; comes on same day as visit to Strip by Europe's top diplomat, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. Attack from Gaza is third in 24 hours, after two rockets land near Sderot; comes on same day as visit to Strip by Europe's top diplomat, EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. A Thai greenhouse worker was killed on Thursday afternoon when a Kassam rocket fired by Gaza terrorists hit the Netiv Ha’asara area. The man, in his 30s, was evacuated to Ashkelon’s Barzilai Hospital, where he was...

If the Obama administration continues to betray Israel, will any ally ever trust us again? We've been viewed as a fickle (if mighty) partner at least since the 1970s, when we abruptly dumped allies from Saigon to Tehran. Now the White House not only delights in insulting our closest traditional ally, Britain, but has intensified its diplomatic pogrom against Israel -- our only respectable ally in the Middle East. President George W. Bush was mocked for shooting from the hip, but this administration fires with its eyes closed. Obama's unbalanced actions shrivel confidence among allies around the globe -- partners...

Inner cabinet meets after Israel reportedly pressured to respond to Washington demands. While Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu convened his six senior ministers on Wednesday night to discuss the crisis with Washington, US President Barack Obama on Wednesday said the US-Israeli relationship is not in crisis over the approval of an east Jerusalem building plan during US vice President Joe Biden's visit to Israel,. Obama told Fox News Channel that the new housing units "weren't helpful" in carving out a peace between Israelis and Palestinians, but that Washington remains a committed ally for Israel. The expansion of Ramat Shlomo was a...

President Obama's health care plan is swirling the drain. Americans don't like it -- the latest Rasmussen poll has just 43 percent of Americans in favor, with 53 percent opposed -- and that dislike has the Obama administration suggesting that polls don't actually mirror the will of the American people. "They're waiting for us to act," Obama told a crowd in Ohio on Monday. "They don't want us reading polls. They want us to look and see what is the best thing for America." This is paternalism of the highest order -- he knows what's better for us than we...

Amazing as it would seem, by all appearances the Obama Administration is angrier at Israel for building houses for Jews than it is at Iran for building a nuclear weapon intended to kill Jews. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is undoubtedly grinning from ear to ear. And why shouldn't he? When he and the Mullahs crushed the streets protests after last year's fraudulent Iranian elections; President Obama proclaimed it wasn't America's place to meddle. Meanwhile, Israel doesn't need to fire a single shot. It doesn't even need to break ground. All Israel had to do was to merely announce plans to build new...

The Hurva Synagogue was the premier Jewish place of worship in Jerusalem's Old City in the 19th and early 20th Centuries -- until Jordanian troops destroyed it in 1948. On March 15, after several years of painstaking restoration, it came to life again -- an exact replica of the old Hurva. In the week before its reopening, however, the Palestinian Authority unleashed a vicious conspiracy campaign that falsely claimed that reopening the Hurva was a prelude to Israel's intent to destroy Al-Aqsa Mosque on Temple Mount to make room for the Third Jewish Temple. Palestinian officials called on Arabs to...

The papers are full of reports about the startling criticism of Israel by the Obama administration — a criticism of a type not used by Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton against many human rights abusing-governments the world over during the past year. (Who cares, for example, that 50,000 Muslim Burmese refugees are on the verge of starvation in Bangladesh, when you can bash Israel day after day, as the Obama administration did last week?) The Los Angeles Times noted that “Hillary Rodham Clinton’s harsh words stunned Israel.” The Wall Street Journal reported that “Clinton levied a blistering rebuke of Israel”...

Palestinians fueled by anger over what they see as Israeli expansions into Palestinian-dominated areas clash with police in East Jerusalem. Rising political and religious tensions in Jerusalem spilled into the streets Tuesday with a string of clashes between Palestinians and Israeli police that left more than 100 people injured. In scenes reminiscent of past uprisings, dozens of Palestinian youths, some with scarves masking their faces, pelted police with rocks, blocked roads and burned tires in half a dozen neighborhoods around East Jerusalem. Israeli police, who have been on high alert for days, responded with tear gas, rubber bullets and stun...

Clinton dismisses suggestions of crisis in Israel ties; U.S. envoy Mitchell postpones visit to region.. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared on Tuesday that Israel had proven its commitment to peace before both in words and actions, after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urged Jerusalem to do more to prove it was serious about the Middle East process. "The State of Israel appreciates and respects the warm words said by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton regarding the deep bond between the U.S. and Israel, and on the U.S.' commitment to Israel's security," Netanyahu's office said in a statement. "With regard...