Scuds and Obama's Visit to BuchenwaldOn the second night of the Gulf War, when Saddam Hussein launched scud missiles at Tel Aviv, initial reports were that the scuds contained nerve gas.
The world was horrified; Jews again being murdered by nerve gas. Who could forget Deputy Foreign Minister Netanyahu being interviewed while wearing a gas mask?
Thankfully, the scuds did not actually contain nerve gas, and the world went back to demanding that Israel absorb one scud after another so as not to disturb President Bush's coalition with our friends in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, who otherwise would surely prefer to be swallowed whole by Saddam. And Netanyahu and his gas mask were forgotten.
The reaction during those hours illustrated the world's deep support for Jews.
Dead Jews, that is.
President Obama's impending visit to Buchenwald reminded me of that night in January 1991. Obama declares Iran has a right to nuclear energy, displays friendship to our enemies and disdain toward Israel, and - least dangerously but most patronizingly - thinks living Jewish-Americans will be impressed by his paying homage to dead Jews.
Today's pathetic silence of the American Jewish leadership notwithstanding, eventually Obama will discover that most American Jews do not support his hostility toward Israel. True, most are not Orthodox; nor are they particularly interested in real estate development in Judea and Samaria. But nor are they J Street Jews, for whom access to power is the new Jewish religion. At their core, hostility toward Israel's democratically elected government is something that American Jews can sense and will not support.
posted on 6/02/2009
