Here is a collection of recent articles on various events relating to the Middle East.
Yesterday the Jerusalem Post reported that the United States had vetoed a United Nations resolution calling for a halt to all settlement building in Israel.
The article reported:
"Republican and Democratic House leaders took a rare bipartisan stand of unity praising the administration for its veto.
""Moving forward, we must continue to make it clear that peace cannot be imposed; it must be negotiated directly between Israelis and Palestinians," said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer in a statement released after the vote. "It is high time that the Palestinians return to the negotiating table, rather than skirt the peace process by bringing biased, unproductive resolutions to the United Nations."
"Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, also lauded the decision, but took issue with the Obama administration for considering backing a presidential statement that would have reprimanded Israel over settlements and not clearly staging in the days leading up to the vote that it would veto the resolution."
However, the vote did not necessarily agree with all the voices in the Obama Administration.
According to ABC News, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the Israeli settlements illegitimate shortly before the United States vetoed the United Nations resolution.
Friday's Chicago Sun Times posted the speech Susan Rice, the U. S. Representative to the U. N. made to explain the veto. Ms. Rice stated:
"Our opposition to the resolution before this Council today should therefore not be misunderstood to mean we support settlement activity. On the contrary, we reject in the strongest terms the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlement activity. For more than four decades, Israeli settlement activity in territories occupied in 1967 has undermined Israel's security and corroded hopes for peace and stability in the region. Continued settlement activity violates Israel's international commitments, devastates trust between the parties, and threatens the prospects for peace."
How come no one ever mentions the rockets that rain down on Israeli civilians on a regular basis as a threat to peace?
Meanwhile, Niall Ferguson, a Harvard Professor and Newsweek columnist, was interviewed by Morning Joe and had some rather harsh words for President Obama's foreign pollicy. He stated very clearly that he felt the Obama Administration had totally missed the boat on the Egyptian protests.
Professor Ferguson also stated:
"With his guns-blazing anti-Obama assessment, Ferguson concluded "the President regards making touchy-feely speeches as a substitute for having a strategy" and if he does have any strategy, it only is "I'm not George W. Bush - love me." By the end, Scarborough seemed somewhat convinced that Ferguson did reflect Obama's foreign policy, however Brzezinski was still optimistic about the situation in Egypt despite Ferguson's warning that "most revolutions lead not to happy clappy democracies.""
Please follow the above link to hear the entire interview. It has some rather amazing comments from a Harvard professor.
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