by Elliot Abrams
-- my point here is not about Brexit, it is about the hypocrisy of Obama and his acolytes last year in feigning outrage about Netanyahu's conduct.
Elliott
Abrams is a senior fellow for Middle East Studies at the Council on
Foreign Relations. This piece is reprinted and can be
found on Abrams' blog "Pressure Points".
Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu's speech to Congress last year about the Iran nuclear deal was
viewed by U.S. President Barack Obama as an outrageous intervention in
what should have been an Americans-only internal decision.
It was true, of course, that
Obama did not have the votes in Congress for his deal, which is why he
did not submit it as a treaty. And it was true, of course, that Israel's
fate, its security, perhaps its existence, was in its prime minister's
eyes at risk in the nuclear deal.
With that background in mind it
has been quite something to see Obama insert himself into the decision
of the British people on whether to leave the EU. Not only did he offer
an opinion, as Netanyahu did, and not only did he fly to the U.K. to
offer that opinion, as Netanyahu flew to Washington, but he did
something Netanyahu did not do: He threatened the U.K. proponents of
"Brexit" argue that the U.K. can after leaving the EU negotiate free
trade agreements with the EU and U.S., so that British trade is not
harmed. While in London, Obama said the U.K. would go "to the back of
the queue" and was anyway too small for a free trade agreement with the
U.S.
The latter point is silly; the
U.S. has a free trade agreement with Oman. The "queue" point is an empty
threat -- both because Obama is leaving office soon and will not be in
charge of that queue, and because it is blindingly obvious that such an
agreement would be in the interest of the United States and we would
seek one quickly.
But my point here is not about
Brexit, it is about the hypocrisy of Obama and his acolytes last year in
feigning outrage about Netanyahu's conduct. We have a Congress whose
speaker invited Netanyahu to speak about an issue of major national
security concern to us and even greater import to his country. He spoke,
making a straightforward argument. Now Obama goes to the U.K. to speak
about an issue that affects our country far less than Iranian nuclear
weapons affect Israel, and he adds threats to his arguments, and that's
supposed to be fine?
Ahh, but there's a big
difference, Obama's defenders will say: British Prime Minister David
Cameron invited him. To which I would answer, that is a fine defense of
his visit to London (though not of the tone and content of his remarks).
But it is not a defense of his outrage when Netanyahu entered our
debate at the invitation of the speaker of the House. Congress is a
separate branch of government, unlike the British Parliament. It is
simply unpersuasive to argue that in Washington, the party in power in
the White House can ask foreign leaders to weigh in on a domestic debate
but the party in power in Congress cannot; and it is fine for our
president to intervene in referenda abroad, but for a foreign leader to
express views about our own decisions is absolutely out, even when
Congress invites him to do so.
What's sauce for the goose, as
the saying goes, is sauce for the gander. Perhaps this kind of foreign
leader's intervention is a bad idea and has little positive impact, and
Netanyahu should have stayed home. Perhaps, and if so, Obama should have
stayed home too.
From "Pressure Points" by Elliott Abrams. Reprinted from the Council on Foreign Relations.
Elliot Abrams
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=15895
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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