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U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem, Constitutional Carry Vetoed, Media’s Middle East Bias

June 18, 2018 by GregC


Jim and Greg are both on vacation this week.  They will be back June 25th.  There will new episodes with guest hosts Thursday and Friday of this week.  Today, please enjoy an encore presentation of the Three Martini Lunch.

Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America welcome the opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem after three previous administrations acknowledged Jerusalem as the Israeli capital but refused to move the embassy.  They also wince as Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin vetoes legislation that would allow residents to carry guns without a permit, leading Jim to wonder whether the anti-gun backlash after Parkland is making GOP officials more timid.  And they roll their eyes as the media condemn Israel for defending its borders against thousands of Palestinians specifically sent to the border to instigate a response from Israel.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: constitutional carry, embassy, Fallin, Hamas, Israel, Jerusalem, media, National Review, Oklahoma, Three Martini Lunch

‘The Palestinians Use Any Excuse to Riot Against Israel’

May 15, 2018 by GregC

http://dateline.radioamerica.org/podcast/5-15-gabriel-blog.mp3

Hamas, the media, and many nations are blaming President Trump decision to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem for inflaming Middle East passions and Israel for the scores of deaths along its border with Gaza this week, but a terrorism expert who grew up in the region says the embassy is just an excuse, radical groups are looking for any reason to paint Israel as the villain, and the media are perfectly willing to oblige.

For days, mainstream media outlets have shown side-by-side images of the ceremony opening the American embassy in Jerusalem and the deaths of Palestinians in Gaza.  While critics of Trump and Israel suggest this loss of life was inevitable if the embassy was moved, Act for America President Brigitte Gabriel says there’s no real connection.

“Palestinians use any excuse to riot against Israel.  As a matter of fact, these riots have been building up for weeks to culminate today – in what is celebrated across the Islamic world as the ‘Day of Catastrophe,'” said Gabriel.

“So what is the catastrophe that they are celebrating, that they dedicate a day to remember every single year?  The establishment of the state of Israel.  This Palestinian rioting is about hatred.  It’s not about us moving our embassy or the occupied territories,” she added.

Gabriel, who is also the author of “They Must Be Stopped: Why We Must Defeat Radical Islam and How We Can Do It,” also pushed back on the widespread reporting that the Palestinian demonstrators were peaceful or “mostly peaceful.”

“It is not peaceful at all.  I have seen background footage of Hamas rallying up their people to come to the border.  They are showing up at the border with Molotov cocktails, even launching kites to help them set fire to the Israeli farms,” said Gabriel.

Among the dozens of Palestinians killed in the fighting was an eight-month-old baby, whose lifeless images have been broadcast around the world as evidence of Israeli repression.  Gabriel says there’s much more to the story.

“Why would a mother bring an eight-month-old child where Molotov cocktails are being launched?  Why are they doing that?  They’re doing it because Hamas is willing to sacrifice the lives of its own children in order to get worldwide publicity against Israel,” she said.

That sort of thing is rarely, if ever, reported in the mainstream media.  But why not?  Gabriel says it’s a combination of Arabs and Palestinians rewriting history and feeding the misinformation to reporters and scholars who are largely alumni of institutions with a strong bias against Israel.

“Our universities have been influencing young minds because of all the money from the Middle East pouring into Middle East study departments and political science departments and appointing Arab professors who are anti-Israel and anti-America to basically brainwash the students,” said Gabriel.

Gabriel also asserts that giving up land does not lead to peace for Israel.  Then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon withdrew Israel from Gaza in 2005.  Subsequent elections places Hamas in charge.  Gabriel says the Palestinian people live in squalor while Hamas officials live in sprawling mansions on the Mediterranean coast and hire their family members to high-ranking positions at very generous salaries.  Much of the rest goes to purchasing weapons and training fighters.

In addition, Hamas destroyed the very lucrative flower and greenery industry deliberately left behind by Israel to provide an economic boost inside Gaza.

“They gave all that to the Palestinians.  A businessman in New York gave $14 million so the Palestinians could start immediately in Gaza with an industry.  Within 24 hours, Hamas in Gaza destroyed the greenhouses to the point they broke down the copper pipes and took them home.  This is self-destruction,” said Gabriel.

And she says as long as the hatred for Israel rages, there will be no change in the region.

“The Arabs and the Palestinians cannot tolerate Israel in the Middle East and that’s what’s driving the hatred.

“Until the Palestinians learn to love their children more than they hate the Jews, that’s when we’ll have peace in the Middle East,” said Gabriel.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: Brigitte Gabriel, embassy, Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Jerusalem, media, news

U.S. Embassy in Jerusalem, Constitutional Carry Vetoed, Media’s Middle East Bias

May 14, 2018 by GregC


Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America welcome the opening of the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem after three previous administrations acknowledged Jerusalem as the Israeli capital but refused to move the embassy.  They also wince as Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin vetoes legislation that would allow residents to carry guns without a permit, leading Jim to wonder whether the anti-gun backlash after Parkland is making GOP officials more timid.  And they roll their eyes as the media condemn Israel for defending its borders against thousands of Palestinians specifically sent to the border to instigate a response from Israel.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: constitutional carry, embassy, Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Jerusalem, Mary Fallin, media, National Review, NRA, Oklahoma, Palestinians, President Trump, Three Martini Lunch

Bolton: Trump’s Jerusalem Move Sends Clear Message to the World

December 8, 2017 by GregC

http://dateline.radioamerica.org/podcast/12-7-bolton-blog.mp3

Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton says President Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is a very good move that aids the pursuit of peace, does not concern our closest Arab allies and tells the world Mr. Trump will do what he says.

On Wednesday, Trump announced the United States was formally recognizing Jerusalem as the capital, noting it was simply a confirmation of reality.

Bolton agrees.

“We’ve been living in a delusion by not acknowledging the fact that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital,” said Bolton.  “Israel is probably the only country in the world where the American embassy is not in the capital city of the country to which our diplomats are accredited.  What Trump did was nothing more or nothing less than making Israel the same as every other country where we’ve got an ambassador.”

Bolton says in the seven decades of the modern Israeli state, it’s clear where the center of government is, but adds that Trump left room open for the Palestinians to still get some of what they want.

“West Jerusalem has been Israel’s capital ever since the creation of the new state.  Trump was very careful in his statement that putting the embassy in West Jerusalem, where it’s obviously going to be, doesn’t prejudice discussions about the borders of Jerusalem or the borders of Israel itself,” said Bolton.

Bolton says the fate of Jerusalem has been debated since the aftermath of World War II.  Originally, the United Nations wanted the city to be under its control and not part of a Jewish state or an Arab state.  The Arab nations rejected the deal, but ever since the status of Jerusalem was thought to be a major negotiating point towards a two-state solution.

Nonetheless, Trump is getting substantial blowback from Democrats, U.S. allies and the American foreign policy establishment, even though presidents and lawmakers from both parties have overwhelmingly endorsed recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital for decades.

So what’s changed now?

“Political talk is cheap and there’s a lot of cheap talk in Washington.  What Trump has done here is throw all of that into perspective.  He not only said he was going to do this on the campaign trail.  He has actually set it in motion,” said Bolton.

Bolton expects Trump to reap some domestic political benefit for keeping the promise, but suspects the greater impact will be other world leaders observing what Trump has done.

“This guy actually does what he says he’s going to do.  So when he says on North Korea, ‘My only acceptable result is denuclearization,” he may really mean it.  So I think it builds his credibility domestically and internationally and distinguishes him from his predecessors in the White House and a lot of other American politicians,” said Bolton.

But Bolton says it wasn’t just cheap talk that delayed this recognition for so long.  He says the U.S. was effectively bullied into never following through on the issue.

“What this has really boiled down to for a long time is the threat of using brute force to intimidate the United States not to acknowledge the reality of where Israel’s capital is.  Unfortunately, I think the lesson has been that the threat works.  The intimidation works.  We didn’t move the embassy to Jerusalem,” said Bolton.

In the wake of Trump’s announcement, Palestinian leaders have called for “days of rage” and the lead Palestinian negotiator says the goal of a two-state solution is now dead and only a one state solution is now viable.

Bolton is hopeful the protests will not be overly violent and says lashing out will not accomplish anything for the Palestinian cause.

“People, whether they’re Palestinians or citizens of other Middle East countries, or people around the world, ask yourselves what violence would do at this point that has any possibility of changing the situation,” said Bolton.

While the Palestinians and other Trump critics fear Wednesday’s actions could damage the peace process, Bolton says there’s not much of a peace process happening right now at all.

“The peace process was already in very difficult shape.  Honestly, if moving a building from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem end the peace process, then I have to say it was a pretty delicate snowflake to begin with,” said Bolton.

Conversely, Bolton believes the U.S. action could actually facilitate peace talks.

“Those who really want a durable, secure peace have to base it on realistic foundations.  You can’t base it on illusions.  And Trump’s decisions cleared away a lot of debris from the past.  When people calm down, and they will in a few days, they’ll see that it’s really a step toward a possible Middle East peace, not something that’s going to interfere with it,” said Bolton.

The timing of Trump’s action is also of concern to some, given the cooperative roles that Egypt, Jordan and increasingly Saudi Arabia play in our regional policy and the effort to prevent Iran from deploying nuclear weapons.  All of those nations urged Trump not to recognize Jerusalem, but Bolton is not worried that our relationships will fray as a result.

“They’re just as realistic in private as the president was in public.  They don’t have any interest in destructive demonstrations in their country.  The leaders understand Israel is a permanent fact of life in the Middle East, that it does have a capital and it’s in Jerusalem just as the president said,” said Bolton.

However, he says those same leaders will publicly condemn the move to achieve solidarity with their people while working behind the scenes to move on.

“There are always situations where politicians are playing to their domestic audiences.  So this move will be criticized in public.  But in private, I think the leaders will be doing everything they can to tamp down the demonstrations and hopefully do what they can to make sure they don’t turn violent,” said Bolton.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: capital, Israel, Jerusalem, John Bolton, news, Palestinians, peace, President Trump, recognition

Dems Turn on Franken, Dem Hypocrisy Over Jerusalem, U.S. Wavering on Olympics?

December 7, 2017 by GregC


Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America serve up all crazy martinis today.  First, they wonder why no Senate Democrats demanded Al Franken’s resignation after six allegations of misconduct but 33 suddenly decided that a seventh accuser was the last straw.  They also get a kick out of Democrats who have long called for the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital but are now outraged that President Trump actually did it.  And they scratch their heads as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley says it is an “open question” as to whether the United States will participate in the Winter Olympics in South Korea next year due to security concerns.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: Al Franken, Israel, Jerusalem, Middle East, National Review, Nikki Haley, North Korea, President Trump, resignation, Senate Democrats, sexual misconduct, South Korea, Three Martini Lunch, Winter Olympics

Israelis Cheer Trump Recognition of Jerusalem as Capital

December 6, 2017 by GregC

http://dateline.radioamerica.org/podcast/12-6-ben-onn-blog.mp3

President Trump Wednesday became the first U.S. president to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and announced the process would begin to move the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, a move hailed in Israel as a stepping stone to peace but fiercely condemned by the Palestinians.

“Today, we finally acknowledge the obvious, that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital.  This is nothing more or less than a recognition of reality,” said Trump during a White House statement Wednesday afternoon.

He also said recognizing Jerusalem as the capital means the U.S. will be moving its embassy there.

“Consistent with the Jerusalem Embassy Act, I am also directing the State Department to begin preparation to move the American embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem,” said Trump.

Retired Israeli Brigadier General Elihu Ben-Onn is now a radio talk show host in Jerusalem.  He says Trump’s announcement is of great historical significance.

“For us, it’s a very important day,” said Ben-Onn.  “I’m very happy with the announcement of President Trump.  This is history after all.  Now, for the first time in 70 years, we hear that the President of the United States declaring that Jerusalem is the capital of of the state of Israel.”

Ben-Onn says Israeli claim on Jerusalem does not just date back to the creation of the modern state of Israel following World War II, but thousands of years.

“I live in Jerusalem.  I was born in Jerusalem, and all my family is in Jerusalem.  Also, I know that King David was here 3,000 years ago.  King David and the Jewish people were here for so many years, so many decades.  It is clear to everyone that Jerusalem is the capital of the state of Israel and the Jewish people,” said Ben-Onn.

The Old Testament dates the connection back several centuries before David, beginning with God’s call for Abraham to get up and go to the land of Canaan.

Given that historical connection, Ben-Onn hopes Trump’s decision will be followed by the decision of many other nations to move their embassies to Jerusalem.

“All Israelis believe that Jerusalem is our capital.  The government is here.  The parliament is here.  All the embassies are in Tel Aviv but they go every day to Jerusalem.  What kind of game is this?  Maybe today this game and this hypocrisy will end,” said Ben-Onn.

He says there were some embassies in Jerusalem decades ago.  However, following the 1973 Yom Kippur War, in which Ben-Onn served, pressure from Arab states compelled those nations to move their installations to Tel Aviv.

In his announcement, President Trump also argued that recognizing Jerusalem as the Israeli capital is an important step in the peace process.  Ben-Onn agrees.

“If you do not recognize my capital city, how can you sign a peace treaty with the state of Israel.  Peace is like marriage.  It’s like a wedding.  The two sides have to recognize the rights of the other side for the right to exist,” said Ben-Onn.

“As long as the Palestinians and the Arabs before that didn’t recognize the state of Israel and the capital of Jerusalem, wee couldn’t go forward.  Now I believe President Trump opened a new direction for peace,” said Ben-Onn.

That’s not how the Palestinians see it.  Those leaders are calling for three “days of rage.”  Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas says this action eliminates the United States as a credible mediator in the peace process and will lead to “endless wars.”

Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat is taking it much further.  He tells Haaretz that Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem means the Palestinians are no longer seeking a two-state solution but a future in which Israel does not exist.

“President Trump has delivered a message to the Palestinian people: The two-state solution is over. Now is the time to transform the struggle to one of one state with equal rights for everyone living in historic Palestine, from the river to the sea,” said Erekat.

While concerned about the immediate reaction, Ben-Onn hopes the Arabs and Palestinians see Wednesday’s developments as a major opportunity.

‘I believe the Arab states will not do anything but maybe the radical Palestinian groups will try.  But I’m sure that they will stop because they have more to lose than to win if they start violence,” said Ben-Onn.

If a two-state solution is still on the table, how will Israel deal with the Palestinian demand that the capital of a Palestinian state be East Jerusalem?

Ben-Onn says with the compressed geography of the region, the Palestinian capital could be very close to Jerusalem.

“Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is a clear fact.  Everybody knows that.  Which part, North or South, Ramallah, Bethlehem, Abu Dis to the east, will be the future capital of the Palestinian state if they will agree to accept that,” said Ben-Onn, noting Bethlehem is just five minutes from Jerusalem and Ramallah is just over 10 minutes from the city.

Ben-Onn says both sides need to realize the conflict will never end until they try to reach common ground.

“We are not going to leave this area, and our neighbors, the Palestinians, are not going to leave this area.  The only solution is to go back to the negotiation table and framework and find solutions for the conflicts with the help of the United States and the rest of the world,” said Ben-Onn.  “I’m very optimistic.”

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: capital, embassy, Israel, Jerusalem, news, Palestinians, President Trump

‘Israel Is Here to Stay’

January 13, 2017 by GregC

http://dateline.radioamerica.org/podcast/1-13-haas-blog.mp3

A former Clinton administration official is blasting President Obama for his treatment of Israel over the past eight years and strongly encourages President-Elect Trump to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.

Lawrence J. Haas served as communications director for Vice President Al Gore and is now a senior fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council .  His book “Harry and Arthur” was named one of the top ten non-fiction books of 2016 by the Wall Street Journal.

In a recent column for U.S. News & World Report, Haas makes the case for moving the embassy.  In a subsequent interview, Haas told us the move comes down to one simple and clear message.

“Israel is here to stay,” said Haas, who says that message would drive a stake through the Arab and Palestinian fantasy that Israel can be wiped off the map.

“You hear [the] expression all the time, ‘Palestine: From the River to the Sea.’  Well, Palestine from the (Jordan) river to the (Mediterranean) sea means no Israel.  I think it’s time for the United States to send a very clear message to the world that Israel is here to stay, that Jerusalem is the historic homeland and capital of the Jewish people.  That’s a reality,” said Haas.

“We are not doing anyone any good by ignoring the reality that Jerusalem is always going to be the capital of Israel.  We might as well come to that recognition,” said Haas.

Haas believes the move would also be an important signal to Israel and the world that the Trump administration will approach the Middle East much differently than Obama has, particularly after the December United Nations vote in which the U.S. refused to veto a resolution condemning Israel for its settlements and other disputed lands.

Haas says the non-veto was bad enough, but the Obama administration’s actions behind the scenes was especially galling.

“They not only allowed it to go through but frankly they worked behind the scenes to ensure that there was enough support for it, so that while they were abstaining from it, everybody else was voting yes.  It was beyond the benign action of a simple abstention,” said Haas.

Those actions left Haas livid.

“I reacted very furiously to it.  It seemed to be the final nail in a sense that the administration had nailed into Israel’s coffin over the last eight years.  The theory being that if they were tough on Israel, Israel would make very painful concessions and we would get peace,” said Haas.

He says the Obama strategy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was a flop.

“In the process, they were very tough on our closest ally in the region.  They didn’t really demand anything from the Palestinian side.  As a result, the Palestinians dug in even harder.  We didn’t see negotiations.  The Israelis felt that they couldn’t compromise because they were being pressured so much and the Palestinians didn’t think they needed to compromise,” said Haas.

“It was a formula for disaster and that’s what we’ve had over the past eight years,” Haas added.

Haas rejects the notion that moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem would serve as a spark for even greater tension and instability in the region.  He says that argument is based on two faulty assumptions.

“The Palestinians have never needed a reason to be violent against Israel, whether it is stabbing Jews in Jerusalem or it is shooting them in the West Bank or is ramming soldiers at checkpoints, the Palestinians always find an excuse to try to kill Jews,” said Haas.

He says Israel’s Arab neighbors will only be bothered by an embassy move from a public relations standpoint.

“The so-called Arab Street frankly I don’t think cares very much about the Palestinians.  The Arab governments clearly don’t care about the Palestinians because they don’t do a thing to help them.  They don’t provide any money to the Palestinians .  They use this issue to divert attention from problems within their own countries,” said Haas.

“The reality is that to the extent countries will recognize Israel and work with Israel behind the scenes has to do with their own self-interests.  Do they feel that they get more out of working with Israel or not working with Israel?  This fear of being provocative I just don’t buy.  I think there are larger forces at work that will determine Israeli relations with different Arab countries,” said Haas.

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Filed Under: News & Politics, Podcasts Tagged With: embassy, Israel, Jerusalem, news, obama, Trump

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