I consider myself to be an American patriot living in the best country on earth. In general, I would never criticize my President while my country is at war. But today, apparently our war against terrorism has ended. The terrorists and their backers won. We, the citizens of the democracies of the world, lost in a particularly embarrassing defeat. We were dragged down by the lies and hypocrisy of the Europeans, and further slammed by the misguided political calculations of the Bush administration.
I found it hard enough to believe that President Bush, who stood in front of a joint session of the US House and Senate and said that those who harbor terrorism are considered to be “hostile regimesâ€, has today struck a deal with those very regimes. I distinctly heard the President say that we were fighting the “axis of evilâ€, and that the US was waging a war on global terrorism. Perhaps Israel is no longer on Bush's globe, then, because the US so-called war on terrorism apparently does not include groups conducting terrorism against Israel.
“Either you are with us, or you are against us,†said Bush, and the crowd rose to a standing ovation. What he actually meant to say was more along the lines of “You are either with us, or you have plenty of oil, in which case we will be glad to protect you from defeat at the hands of our Israeli friends.â€
And the Democrats, who have traditionally benefited from Jewish votes and political funding, are not much better than Bush, because nowhere did we hear from the Democrats something like “But Mr. President, how can you turn your back on our Israeli allies and hand the terrorists a victory?†No opposition from the Democrats, indeed.
And so, it now looks like the US has come to the rescue of the Palestinian terrorist groups, even though Israel was making splendid inroads in eradicating the terrorist infrastructure. Interestingly, to rescue the terrorists, the only country in the world upon which the Bush administration found it right to exert huge pressure was not Iran, nor Syria, nor Saudi Arabia from whence the 9-11 terrorists sprang. Instead, in a move that would make Osama bin Ladin proud, Bush turned the entire political and economic might of the US against the only democracy in the region – our ally Israel.
Now, it is true that every country should act in its best interests. Certainly, the US should do so. But I find it hard to believe that rescuing vicious terrorists from defeat is in the best interests of this country. By saving the terrorist machine of the Hamas, Hizbullah and the PA, the US has effectively proven that suicide bombings are highly effective, and will yield prizes from the leader of the free world. And unfortunately, as time will tell, the next stop for the suicide bombers will not necessarily be Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. Rather, it is just as likely to be Philadelphia or Boston, or Washington DC.
Today marks another shameful chapter in the Bush administration’s foreign relations debacle, and a stark warning to all our friends worldwide, that the US may not be there as a friend when it counts most.
To Bush I can say confidently, “We will remember this and vote accordingly in the next elections. Your actions today show that you do not represent the majority of Americans I am familiar with, nor according to the latest official polls. We voted out the Democrats because of moral failure, and we will vote you out, as well, for the same reason.â€
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