The most telling moment in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress today was when he offered America’s leaders the first public opportunity to celebrate the death of Osama bin Laden: “Congratulations America, Congratulations, Mr. President. You got bin Laden. Good riddance!”
The chamber erupted. Netanyahu had “spiked the football” in a way Americans have longed, and deserved, to do.
It was a long-overdue celebration that President Barack Obama had denied the nation–yet reserved for himself, in carefully choreographed media appearances and crafty campaign messages.
In one simple gesture, in plain language, Netanyahu highlighted the common emotional bond between the people of Israel and the American people, and drew a powerful, if implicit, contrast with the post-modern, “post-American” Obama.
Netanyahu also presented Israel’s case clearly and convincingly.
He offered generous territorial concessions to a Palestinian state in return for genuine peace. Yet he insisted that the Palestinian leadership reject Hamas, and reminded them that there will be no return to the 1967 lines, there will be no Palestinian “right of return” to Israel, and there will be no divided Jerusalem. Congress applauded each of these points enthusiastically.
Netanyahu also hinted–subtly, but effectively–at where President Obama’s policy had gone astray. He noted, for example, that Congress had backed sanctions on Iran that were “even tougher” than those Obama had supported at the UN. He declared Israel would not negotiate with a Palestinian Authority that included Hamas. And he repeated that the 1967 lines were “indefensible,” and an inappropriate starting point for negotiations.
The Israeli Prime Minister discharged his duty in Washington, leaving others to make three important choices:
1. The Palestinian Authority must choose to accept a Jewish state and reject Hamas;
2. President Obama must choose to follow Congress’s lead in supporting Israel, and standing up to Iran and its proxies;
3. Democrats must choose to distinguish their views on Israel from Obama’s, which are both unpopular and wrong.
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