NJDC Praises Obama’s “Unwavering Support for Israel” and “Incredible Pragmatism”
Listed in: Israel, Other Foreign Policy, Press Releases
WASHINGTON, DC- The National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC) today praised President Barack Obama’s powerful address at the State Department this afternoon, including his strong support for Israel and the pragmatic approach he put forth to resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
NJDC Chair Marc R. Stanley and President and CEO David A. Harris said:
“NJDC is deeply grateful for the unwavering support for Israel shown today by President Barack Obama in this major speech, and the incredibly pragmatic, supportive steps forward he offered to address a decades-old problem facing our closest ally in the Middle East— Israel.
This address was a powerful restatement of the President’s commitment to Israel’s peace and security. From his call to end Palestinian efforts to delegitimize Israel, including at the United Nations; to his repeated insistence that unilateral efforts to achieve statehood and ongoing Palestinian denial of Israel’s right to exist will not succeed; to his pointed observation that Palestinian leaders will have to provide a ‘credible answer’ as to how Israel can and should negotiate with Hamas, the President time and again made clear his powerful support for Israel. As he referred to Israel in his speech, he repeatedly returned to the same framework - the shared values between our countries, our tremendously close partnership, and Israel’s legitimate security needs.
There will be the naysayers who can find something to protest from this address, including what is widely accepted wisdom - that a final resolution will ultimately be based on 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps, which reporters and commentators have already labeled as ‘nothing new;’ or even the continued, decades-old U.S. policy supporting two states itself. But the fact is that this speech and the policies it represents are replete with unwavering, unshakable support for Israel, and for that we are deeply grateful to this President.”
