by Uzi Baruch, Ari Yashar
Minister Levin strikes back at Obama's criticism of PM, calls on West to wake up and realize 'Israel struggles alone for future of world.'
Tourism Minister Yariv Levin (Likud) responded sharply after US President Barack Obama continued his condemnation of Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu's pre-election comments, in which he said a Palestinian state would not be established on his watch and warned of massive Arab voter turnout.
Striking back at Obama's criticism of Netanyahu's remarks, Levin said, "we have much appreciation and respect for the president of the United States, but there's no place for statements which constitute interfering in the internal affairs of Israel."
The minister continued, "the time has come for leaders of the West to open their eyes and take care of the true problems threatening world peace, with radical Islam at the forefront, and stop the incessant preoccupation with the state of Israel, which is the only democracy in the region and is struggling practically alone for the future of the free world."
In Obama's statements, made in an interview with journalist Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, he said that Netanyahu's warning that large Arab turnout might harm the Likud's chances of forming a nationalist government was "contrary to the very language of the Israeli Declaration of Independence."
Netanyahu's warning added that the Arab voters were being bused to polling stations by V15 and other foreign funded leftist NGOs, with accusations indicating that Obama's hand may have been partially behind the effort to oust Netanyahu.
Obama said that Netanyahu's statements regarding a Palestinian state and Arab voters have "foreign-policy consequences" regarding the US's support for Israel, even despite the fact that Netanyahu later apologized and distanced from both statements.
[Editor: Apparently, Mr. Netanyahu does not feel that he has the luxury of publicly maintaining the positions that are indicated by the two statements that he made during the last few hours before the election.
1) Israel, as a democracy, is obligated to give equal weight to the votes of its Arab citizens. But if the electoral balance is unnaturally shifted, for instance, because foreign bodies are funding a mass effort to get Arabs to vote, expressly in order to cause an artificial electoral situation, then it would be foolish to allow that effort to go unanswered. Mr. Netanyahu may have worded his plea awkwardly, but there was no ethical problem in asking for Jews to counter-balance the attempt to defeat him by unfair means.
2) Increasingly, Israeli Jews are understanding that the "two-state solution" is no solution for Israel. Anyone who is familiar with the PLO "plan of phases" and is aware of the overwhelming evidence provided by the Arabs themselves, that a Palestinian state is nothing but a ruse, a Trojan horse with which to destroy Israel, must reject the idea of establishing a Palestinian state.
3) The endless PA incitement against Israel and Jews should give pause to even the most sanguine advocates of a two-state solution.
Mr. Netanyahu should not back away from his positions, which are ethical and wise.]
Uzi Baruch, Ari Yashar
Source: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/195729#.VWIbG0azd-8
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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