Barack Obama

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/j an/04/obama-gaza-israel

Looks like the honeymoon period is over for Obama even before he unpacks his bags.

[123everton]

Whatever you say and do in the middle east they'll be people screaming blue murder.
He's best keeping his powder dry until he's in power, the countries that are doing the moaning will still need to deal with him.
If he can deliver peace and stability they'll soon forget all about this.

[Gormless]

Barack Obama is apparently a committed Christian? Let's hope he sticks to those beliefs.

If the US abandons its support for Israel, however tacit that may be, then heaven help the Middle East, and ultimately the whole world. Israel is an advanced democracy about the size of Wales, surrounded by hostile Arab states, whose technology and democracy has got them - well, where?

God speed Israel, I'm with you all the way mate. How come you are the only civilised democracy out there and aren't jibbering and jabbering on a prayer mat 8 times a day, oppressing womein, executing gays, hanging teenagers from cranes, and beheading people in public.

Shalom.

[R1Geezer]

well as a muzzy I'd imagine that BHO is a little confused!

[Gromit]

Maybe this is a reality check. Obama isn't going to solve the middle east. The US will never abandon Israel, and if there are people who think they will, then they need to know it will never happen, even if this is before Obama takes office.

Israel is a failed state and economy. Without the many billions of dollars bailout it gets from the US taxpayer every year, the country would collapse. Remember, those are American planes bombing markets and Universities in Gaza. The missiles are American, and they were given to Israel just as avidly under Clinton's Democrat Presidency, as under Bush.

There will be no major change in foreign policy under Obama, he seems even to be planning a build up in the unwinnable war in Afghanistan.

[jno]

foreign policy moves from the hawkish Condoleezza Rice to the hawkish Hillary Clinton, so expect support for Israel to be unstinting, at least for a while. Obama is currently busy trying to find a new commerce secretary; his first choice has quit before he even started

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7810 777.stm

[123everton]

Israel is'nt a particuarly good democracy it's highly unstable in it's governance requiring constant coalitions.
It denies resident Israeli Arabs (who never fled) the vote, it also abandoned the Bedouin who helped them in the early wars.
Israel survives because we need it to, they are our only reliable friends in the region.
We can (and have) used Israel to prosecute our foreign policies by proxy.
If America wants to attack Iran it will use Israeli jets to bombs it, and then enter to protect Israel's borders.

[rov1200]

Isn't Israel the 53rd state of the USA?

[R1Geezer]

so who are the 51st and 52nd then Rov?