It’s a presidential election year and President Obama wants another four years in the White House, so his promise that he “has Israel’s back” should be taken with a grain of salt. His flowery rhetoric and reassuring smiles during Monday’s public meeting at the White House with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu should be viewed as nothing more than campaign rigmarole. What counts is what Obama has actually done to protect Israel, especially with regard to stopping Iran’s nuclear program and preventing Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad from ever trying to make good on his maniacal threats to “wipe Israel off the map.”
It is difficult to find anything in Obama’s actions since taking the oath of office to reassure Israel — or its millions of supporters here in America — concerning the credibility of the president’s word. As the Jerusalem Post’s Caroline Glick notes, Obama’s favorite talking point in portraying himself as Israel’s friend is the supposedly unprecedented military cooperation between America and the Jewish state. But how was that cooperation advanced when then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates called Israel “an ungrateful ally” or later when Gates’ successor, Leon Panetta, said it was time for Israel “to get back to the damned table” with the Palestinians. Those same Palestinians, by the way, have never affirmed Israel’s right to exist and remain committed to its obliteration.
Obama would also have Israel and Americans find reassurance in his continual claim that “all options remain on the table” and that “I mean what I say.” But Obama so far has chosen only two options, talking the Iranians out of their nukes and applying weak economic sanctions against them. Ahmadinejad and the ayatollahs who control him pointedly ignored Obama’s conversational openers. As for sanctions, Obama opposed the stronger version approved last year on a bipartisan basis by Congress and has since rejected imposing yet stronger sanctions that could bring Iran’s international oil transactions to a screeching halt.
So, what about the military option that Obama claims is still on the table? Only the U.S. has the B-2 stealth bomber that Iran likely cannot stop from penetrating its airspace. Only the U.S. has conventional bunker-busting bombs capable of penetrating Iran’s hardened underground nuclear facilities. Only the U.S. has the military muscle in theater and elsewhere to counter the likely Iranian retaliatory attack. But, given Obama’s actions toward Israel since taking office, Netanyahu would be irresponsible to gamble that the U.S. really does have Israel’s back whatever the consequences might be. Netanyahu prudently must assume the worst from the U.S., even if that means he has no choice but to launch an Israeli military strike on Iran’s nukes. Conversely, Iran likely views Obama’s attitude toward Israel as evidence the U.S. will not defend Israel if it is attacked. All of which is to say, Obama’s actions toward Israel during the past three years have made war in the Middle East more, not less, likely.
