AP: “GOP Candidates Overreach on Israel”

Lauren Samet — September 22, 2011 – 10:08 am | Barack Obama | Election 2012 | Foreign Policy | Israel | Stop the Smears Comments (0) Add a comment

The Associated Press called out a number of Republican presidential candidates for making false accusations regarding President Barack Obama’s strong record of support for Israel. While certain GOP hopefuls are attempting to use Israel-based attacks for partisan gain, the AP reminded readers that the Obama “Administration [is fighting] fiercely on behalf of Israel this week,” and that, “some of the Republican claims have strayed well beyond reality.” 

The AP provides a look at some of the statements by the candidates and how they compare with the facts:

MICHELLE BACHMANN: ‘Obama called upon Israel to retreat to its indefensible 1967 borders.’

THE FACTS: Obama’s vision for a two-state solution foresees the Israelis and Palestinians agreeing on a new border, so they would draw the map themselves.

Bachmann and other critics of the president have ignored his reference to ‘mutually agreed swaps’ of land, meaning that Israel’s pre-1967 borders would serve only as a starting point and that the two sides would have to define the boundary themselves. Obama himself has said the 1967 line is indefensible and would constitute an unrealistic aspiration for Palestinians.

Obama’s vision, long a privately articulated part of American foreign policy, has been endorsed by the other major Middle East peace mediators - the European Union, United Nations and Russia. More importantly, it’s backed by the majority of Palestinian and Israeli leaders.

PERRY: ‘The Obama policy of moral equivalency, which gives equal standing to the grievances of Israelis and Palestinians, including the orchestrators of terrorism, is a very dangerous insult.’

THE FACTS: The administration has never said nor suggested that settlement construction in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, or any other Israeli policy, is equally as heinous as Hamas rockets or other attacks aimed at Israeli citizens.

However, Obama officials have tried to give public weight to the grievances of each side, without offering either as a moral justification for harmful deeds.

...The effort at empathy does not extend to terrorists. Obama has maintained the unconditional blacklisting of Hamas in the Gaza Strip and Hezbollah in Lebanon as terrorist organizations and backed Israel’s right to target extremists bent on threatening its security.

To view the article in its entirety, including more debunked statements from GOP candidates, please click here.

The Hill’s Brent Budowsky also reported on the “Middle East outbursts,” made by former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney and Texas Governor Rick Perry:

Rick Perry has as much chance of someday achieving Middle East peace as Pope Benedict does of playing third base for the Baltimore Orioles. Mitt Romney should know better than shooting his mouth off about the Middle East, to keep up with the inexperienced and uninformed Perry.

He explained further:

It is not surprising that Rick Perry would shoot from the hip, and shoot from the lip, and make partisan and ignorant statements about the Middle East, which interfere with a presidential negotiation that is important to both Israel and the United States.

It is surprising and sad that Mitt Romney, who should know better, joins Perry in hurting our country, and hurting Israel, with irresponsible and reckless comments in the middle of an intense and delicate negotiation that they should have the common sense to stay out of.

To view the full article from The Hill, please click here. 

 

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