On Israeli TV, Hillary makes the choice for Trump clearer than ever
Hillary Clinton appeared on Channel 2 News late last week. She had the opportunity, once and for all, to distance herself from the views of Max Blumenthal, George Soros and her other far-left anti-Israel supporters, and to offer a change of course from President Barack Obama. Needless to say, she didn’t.
Clinton did little more than repeat her often-mentioned but even more often-violated platitude regarding the unbreakable bond between the United States and Israel. She failed to note how she single-handedly broke that bond in 2009 when she took office as US secretary of state and unilaterally ripped up the written commitment of George W. Bush – a promise made by the president to prime minister Ariel Sharon in connection with Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza – recognizing that the US no longer expected Israel to contract to the indefensible armistice lines of 1949. She also failed to note how she broke that bond again just a few months later when she demanded that Israel immediately freeze any and all construction within Judea and Samaria, notwithstanding that the Palestinians were offering nothing in exchange for such a drastic concession. Oddly enough, she took great credit in the interview for implementing this freeze, something even Democrats now consider to be a mistake.
Clinton did not, because she could not, attempt to defend her well-established record of favoring the Palestinians against the Israelis. Clinton offered no explanation for the receipt of massive payments from theocratic Arab nations by the Clinton Foundation and herself personally, and did not attempt to distinguish her policies and practices from those of Barak Obama. Indeed, she hailed those policies and promised to continue them.
Clinton took great pride in her role in achieving a nuclear agreement with Iran. Notwithstanding her acknowledgment that Iran is the world’s chief state sponsor of terrorism, she inexplicably proclaimed that the world is a safer place now that Iran has been enriched by billions of dollars, has acquired sophisticated anti-ballistic missiles and has been granted an unrestricted runway to nuclear capability. According to Clinton, we are all better off for having traded billions of dollars and crippling sanctions for a piece of paper adopted by a rogue nation that, even if fully complied with, makes Iran a nuclear power in a decade.
Ironically, as Clinton was speaking, Iranian military boats were provoking US warships in the Persian Gulf.
Because she has no record of achievement on Israel, her remarks to Yonit Levi, by necessity, focused on her criticism of Donald Trump. If there is still a line that can be crossed in American politics, she crossed it. Clinton accused a full half of Donald Trump’s supporters – roughly a quarter of the population of the United States – of being “deplorable.” With no substantiation, she attributed to these unidentified people the ugliest of motives, from bigotry to misogyny to anti-Semitism. What a horrible thing to say about the nation she hopes to lead. The truth is that the fringe elements that support Trump are minuscule and unequivocally disavowed by the candidate. Clinton cannot say the same of the agitators on the Left who are rabidly anti-Israel and who form a core constituency within her campaign. In keeping with the Democrat playbook of the modern era, Clinton reflexively plays the “race card” whenever the questioning gets tough.
But of all the dumb things said by Clinton on Channel 2, her explanation for refusing to acknowledge the enmity of radical Islam takes the prize. Even though the word “Islamic” forms a part of the name of Islamic State, she won’t refer to Islamic terrorism by its name. Like her former boss, Barack Obama, she posits that identifying the enemy provides them with a means to recruit more terrorists. Perhaps if we just call them something else, maybe something flattering, we will have them on the run.
Can you imagine Winston Churchill or FDR refusing to identify the Nazis by name for fear of bolstering their recruiting? And yet in this world war of the 21st century, Clinton is falling right in line with the failed approach of Obama – the Neville Chamberlain of our time. Clinton even went so far as to say that jihadists are “praying” for Trump to win (as if she were privy to jihadi prayers). What complete nonsense. Jihadists seek to impose Sharia law on the entire world and their greatest fear is someone like Trump – a leader who would seek the immediate destruction of ISIS with overwhelming force, not politically correct speech or psychological babble.
In contrast to many other nations who seek from America unbalanced trade, open borders or US troops for their defense, Israel doesn’t ask much of the US: support at the UN Security Council, military cooperation and related strategic aid (very much a two-way street), no public airing of disagreements, no attempts to impose a settlement of the Palestinian issues against Israel’s will and recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s eternal capital. Trump emphatically endorses all these points, and other pro-Israel measures, as being in the collective best interests of both Israel and the US. Hillary Clinton is at best adrift on these issues, and, in all likelihood, just Barak Obama 2.0.
Many thanks to Channel 2 and Yonit Levi for helping to clarify the stark differences between the candidates.
The writer advises Donald Trump on US-Israel relations.