This man is still a riddle to me. Is there a hidden agenda? Is he as sincere as he seems? An antisemite? A philosemite?
I don't know yet what to think. So I'll simply respond to some of what he said.
First of all, I completely applaud his stated commitment to speaking the plain truth. This approach has the potential to do away with the biggest problem we face here in the M.E., self delusion. Selective filtering of facts to support a policy agenda will never achieve good results in the long term.
Unfortunately, that kind of policy-making rewards politicians in the short term.
The problem with Obama's speech is that he omitted some crucials truths. It was important for him to condemn Holocaust denial to an audience that truly believes is. It was important to tell them to their faces that the demonization of Jews they regularly engage in is a distortion of truth.
And it was a critical error that he failed to point out that the Jewish people has a strong historical and national bond to the Land of Israel. Just as many Arabs deny the Holocaust, many deny Jewish History. The Mufti of Jerusalem claims the whole second Temple era never happened, that Jew's never had a Homeland in "Palestine".
Obama needed to forcefully state that fact. He didn't. His only justification for Jewish national yearning was the thousand years of persecution culminating with the Holocaust.
That was bad. Bad, because the Arabs who say that "because Germany did something or other to the Jews, we have to suffer!". Obama's omission feeds right into that deligitimization of Israel.
Was it intentional? Well, in such a carefully prepared speech, it's hard to imagine it was NOT. So why did he omit this central feature of Jewish history? Either he doesn't accept it, or he was afraid to say it to that audience, or he doesn't want to believe it.
None of these is good, my friends. They are a complete denial of the truth that Obama so convincingly wants to pursue. I hope he will correct this major error.
This historical fact is a game-ender for those who want to see Israel "dismantled". Once they acknowledge Israel's legitimate claim to the Land, based on history and nationality, they can't justify seeking to destroy her. If Israel only exists because the German's did not nice things, then they have justification for saying, "so why must we pay?".
Another thing Obama didn't say is that there NEVER was an independent Arab state in Palestine/Israel. Never. That's clear historical record. Since the last Jewish independent state, it was a province of foreign empires (Roman, Byzantine, Mamluk, Crusader, Ottoman and British).
We in Israel will be open to the truth, if the Arab world is as well. And Obama can't give partial truth and claim to be candid and open. He can't omit the most central features without grossly misleading and encouraging the very hatred he wants to change.
