Music Banter - Israeli-American Relations

This is sparked by the whole situation with Charles Freeman. I think he would've been great for the position and him with drawling his name is a shame (any insider knowledge of China and the Middle East is welcome in my book, particularly China with with the amount of money owed) but I think it raises a few interesting questions (in regards to the United State's leniency towards Israel and whether or not Obama is going to be critical of Israel.)

In the primaries while Obama was in Israel he made a comment to the effect of "It seems over here they're more willing to discuss how the Israeli government operates than they are in America." Of course when asked if he (or any of the other democratic nominees, e.g. Clinton, Edwards, etc, had any criticism of Israel they were all silent.) This new approach, an invitation to open discussion of Israeli actions, is a positive one and one of change but I think the lack of support Freeman received from Obama was disheartening (Freeman wasn't some anti-Zionist wacko or anything, keep that in mind.) Freeman was unfairly attacked and it was complete political character assassination.

For more on what happened with this situation see here.

WARNING: Freeman has to be the most boring speaker on the planet.

I don't think I need to talk about United State's leniency towards Israel's attacks. Even with the Gaza thing we just sat back and let others do the criticizing. There seems to be this unwillingness, globally, to realize that Palestinian Arabs have suffered a historical injustice (not on the level of the holocaust but two wrongs don't make a right and all that) and I think the demands placed upon them are fundamentally wrong and hypocritical. Ehud Olmert appeared before Congress and received a standing ovation when he declared that Israel's "historic right" to the land was beyond question and asserted that the Palestinian people had to accept Israel's right to exist...yet they refuse to accept Palestine's same right to existence. Funny how that works.