By Donald Macintyre, The Independent

 Obama is not getting anywhere with Netanyahu

The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu yesterday strongly defended Jewish settlement construction in East Jerusalem in the face of US pressure and what one of his own top diplomats described as the worst crisis in relations with Washington for more than three decades.

A defiant Mr Netanyahu appeared to be digging in despite clear indications that the Obama administration is now demanding the scrapping of plans for 1,600 new Jewish homes, whose announcement overshadowed last week’s visit to Israel by the US Vice-President Joe Biden. Mr Netanyahu’s stance appeared to guarantee, after a highly charged week, the protraction of a stand-off in which a full-scale diplomatic row blew up at the start of Mr Biden’s visit and appeared to abate at the end of it. But it was then reignited by demands from Hillary Clinton and an angry White House that Israel make amends for the "insulting" announcement just as indirect negotiations with the Palestinians had finally been arranged.

The US is now said to be demanding substantive concessions from Israel after a warning by the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas that he would not take part in talks if the plan to expand the mainly ultra-orthodox Ramat Shlomo settlement went ahead. The row has appeared finally to bring to a head the year-long tensions between the two governments since Barack Obama tried in vain to persuade the Israeli Prime Minister to agree to a total settlement freeze. He was thwarted by Mr Netanyahu who agreed only to a partial 10-month freeze, which did not include East Jerusalem.

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FOXNews

 It doesn’t look like Biden is helping the relationship much…

U.S.-Israeli relations have hit a 35-year low over a contentious east Jerusalem building project that threatens to derail peacemaking efforts with the Palestinians, Israel’s envoy to Washington was quoted as saying Monday.

Ambassador Michael Oren’s remarks clashed with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s assurances that the political turmoil resulting from the settlement announcement, which the Obama administration slammed as "an insult," was under control.

"Israel’s ties with the United States are in their worst crisis since 1975 … a crisis of historic proportions," the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper quoted Oren as saying to Israeli diplomats in a phone briefing over the weekend.

Israeli officials said that the U.S. is pressing the Jewish nation to scrap the east Jerusalem building project.

Competing Israeli and Palestinian claims to east Jerusalem were feeding tensions in the holy city, where Arabs and Jews maintain an uneasy coexistence and sometimes clash. Police were out in large numbers in the volatile Old City in expectation of renewed clashes.

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By Ted Belman, American Thinker

 Obama and his Anti-Israeli administration are pushing the issue

President Obama has surrounded himself with a host of vehemently anti-Israel advisers including Lee Hamilton, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Samantha Power, Susan Rice, and Gen. Jones, many of whom advocate imposing a solution on Israel.

So it was no surprise that Obama started his term of office by attacking Israel, America’s best and most steadfast ally, and demanding a complete settlement-freeze east of the green line, including Jerusalem. He went so far as to repudiate the U.S. commitment set out in the Bush 2004 letter to then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon. Elliot Abrams and others involved in the negotiations that led to Bush’s letter testified otherwise.

In January 2009, before Obama had gotten his act together, Haaretz reported:

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By Jerusalem Post

Will Obama side with the holocaust denier?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called on the US to choose between Israel and Iran on Tuesday night, according to Iranian state media.

Speaking in Istanbul at the 25th Session of the Standing Committee for Economic and Commercial Cooperation (COMCEC) of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the Iranian president said that it was up to US President Barack Obama to realize his motto of "change".

"The support of both Israel and Iran can’t go hand in hand," he was quoted as saying by IRNA. "No change is made unless great choices are made.

"We would welcome the changes, and wait for big and correct decisions to be made… We will clasp any hand that is extended sincerely toward us, but changes should be made in practice."

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by  Patrick J. Buchanan, Human Events

Obama is facing two crucial decisions in Iran and Afghanistan

Impending today are two of the most critical decisions Barack Obama will ever make, which may determine the fate of his presidency, as well as the future of the United States in the Near and Middle East.

The first is whether to approve Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s request for thousands more U.S. troops he says he needs to prevent "mission failure" — i.e, to stave off a U.S. defeat in Afghanistan.

The second is whether Obama will start up the road of "crippling sanctions" to war with Iran, to prevent Tehran from moving closer to a capacity to produce nuclear weapons.

If Obama approves McChrystal’s request, what will it buy him? Rising costs and casualties, deepening division in his party and his war-weary country, but no light at the end of a seemingly endless tunnel.

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By Brett Stephens, Wall Street Journal

Obama’s do nothing policy towards Iran is forcing Israel’s hand

Events are fast pushing Israel toward a pre-emptive military strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities, probably by next spring. That strike could well fail. Or it could succeed at the price of oil at $300 a barrel, a Middle East war, and American servicemen caught in between. So why is the Obama administration doing everything it can to speed the war process along?

At July’s G-8 summit in Italy, Iran was given a September deadline to start negotiations over its nuclear programs. Last week, Iran gave its answer: No.

Instead, what Tehran offered was a five-page document that was the diplomatic equivalent of a giant kiss-off. It begins by lamenting the "ungodly ways of thinking prevailing in global relations" and proceeds to offer comprehensive talks on a variety of subjects: democracy, human rights, disarmament, terrorism, "respect for the rights of nations," and other areas where Iran is a paragon. Conspicuously absent from the document is any mention of Iran’s nuclear program, now at the so-called breakout point, which both Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his boss Ali Khamenei insist is not up for discussion.

What’s an American president to do in the face of this nonstarter of a document? What else, but pretend it isn’t a nonstarter. Talks begin Oct. 1.

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by Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu, ISrael National News

The only way Iran will not have nukes is if Israel takes action

U.S. President Barack Obama’s policies have left an Israeli attack on Iran the only option in preventing the Muslim country from obtaining a nuclear weapon, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton wrote in The Washington Post Thursday.

In an article headlined “Time for an Israeli Strike?” Bolton answered his own question by stating, “Israel’s decision of whether to use military force against Tehran’s nuclear weapons program is more urgent than ever… Those who oppose Iran acquiring nuclear weapons are left in the near term with only the option of targeted military force against its weapons facilities.”

Iran’s Nuclear Threat “Never in Doubt”

A long-time supporter of Israel and a harsh critic of the U.N., Bolton claimed that the Iranian nuclear threat “was never in doubt“ during the American presidential campaign, but is even more certain following the apparent failure of the resistance movement in Iran.

By Howard Arenstein, CBS News

Israeli TV newscasters Tuesday night interpreted a photo taken Monday in the Oval Office of President Obama talking on the phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as an “insult” to Israel. 

They saw the incident as somewhat akin to an incident last year, when the Iraqi reporter threw a shoe at President Bush in Baghdad. 

It is considered an insult in the Arab world to show the sole of your shoe to someone. It is not a Jewish custom necessarily, but Israel feels enough a part of the Middle East after 60 years to be insulted too. 

Was there a subliminal message intended from the White House to Netanyahu in Jerusalem, who is publicly resisting attempts by Mr. Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to force Israel to stop any kind of settlement activity in occupied territories once and forever? 

By Ken Blackwell, Fox News

Obama is too busy courting the Muslims to stop in Israel

The Washington Post last year admitted that it had “leaned” toward Barack Obama in the presidential race. That’s ridiculous. The Leaning Tower of Pisa leans, but it still stands. The Post and the rest of the liberal media fell over flat for him. Chris Matthews admitted to feeling a tingling going up and down his leg. The rest just wrote like that.

President Obama’s Mideast trip has been hailed as a “new beginning.” Indeed it is. Obama very pointedly did not visit Jerusalem on this his first trip to the region.

Liberal Democrat Harry Truman dared to recognize Israel in 1948 — minutes after the struggling Jewish state was born — and minutes before Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the rest of the Arab world tried to strangle the infant in its crib. Republican Richard Nixon — despised by the liberal media — saved Israel’s life by re-supplying her with arms during the Yom Kippur War in 1973.

The U.S. commitment to Israel has been a constant of both parties — until now. By demanding a halt to the natural growth of Jewish settlements on the West Bank, Obama is applying a tourniquet to Israel’s throat. If she cannot grow, she will die. Which is what Obama’s new-found friends have wanted since 1948.

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By Associated Press

Israeli Settlers are Obama target for policy changes

An Israeli settler spokeswoman has dismissed President Barack Obama’s speech in Cairo as naive and out of touch with reality.

In his speech, Obama called on Israel to halt all construction in West Bank settlements as a step toward reaching peace with the Palestinians.

Aliza Herbst, a resident of the Ofra settlement, says that modern history has shown that the Muslim world is at war with the West. She says Obama’s vision of peace sounds nice but isn’t realistic.

Obama’s address also called for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel — a position Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has refused to support.

The Israeli government had no immediate comment on the speech.