Mitt Romney: Democrats threw Israel under bus

Mitt Romney on Wednesday slammed the Democratic Party’s initial decision to remove from its platform a passage affirming Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, calling it just “one more example of Israel being thrown under the bus by the president.”
By MACKENZIE WEINGER

Romney — in an interview filmed before the Democrats restored both the word “God” and the passage about Jerusalem to the platform — told Fox News’s Carl Cameron that the omission of Jerusalem was a “very troubling development.”

“The president and his party have now changed their position. They now say that they’re not certain what the capital of Israel might be,” Romney said. “I find that one more example of Israel being thrown under the bus by the president. I think it’s a very sad day.”

The Republican presidential nominee told Fox the removal of the passage “will be recognized for what it is by people across America and across the world.”

“When we have our best friend in the Middle East, a nation which shares our values, a nation now under extraordinary threat and distress when nations around it like Syria and Egypt are going through tumult of their own, for us at a stage like this, to take an action of that nature, to cease calling Jerusalem the capital of Israel — this is a very troubling development and I think one which will be recognized for what it is by people across America and across the world,” Romney added.

Romney also said the removal of any reference to God in the initial 2012 version of the platform “suggests a party which is increasingly out of touch with the mainstream of American people. I think this party is veering further and further away to an extreme wing that Americans don’t recognize it.”

Obama Attacked Over Party Platform on Jerusalem

By Jared A. Favole

CHARLOTTE, N.C.–The Democratic Party platform doesn’t state that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel, a change from prior years that could provide fuel to critics who say President Barack Obama’s commitment to Israel is weak.

“President Obama and the Democratic Party maintain an unshakable commitment to Israel’s security,” begins the 70-page platform in a section titled “The Middle East.” The three-paragraph section details the Obama administration’s support for Israel—including boosting security assistance—but says nothing about Jerusalem.

Such an omission provide an opening to Mr. Obama’s rival for the presidency, Mitt Romney, as Jewish voters—particularly in the battleground state of Florida—are key to the election.

“It is unfortunate that the entire Democratic Party has embraced President Obama’s shameful refusal to acknowledge that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital,” Mr. Romney said in a statement. He added, “Four years of President Obama’s repeated attempts to create distance between the United States and our cherished ally have led the Democratic Party to remove from their platform an unequivocal acknowledgment of a simple reality. As president, I will restore our relationship with Israel and stand shoulder to shoulder with our close ally.”

A spokeswoman for the Democratic National Committee, Melanie Roussell, said the Obama administration’s policy toward Jerusalem mirrors that of previous administrations. “As the White House said several months ago, the status of Jerusalem is an issue that should be resolved in final status negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians – which we also said in the 2008 platform. We will continue to work with the parties to resolve this issue as part of a two state solution that secures the future of Israel as a Jewish state and the homeland of the Jewish people.”

Traditionally both the Republicans and Democrats have called during election-year campaigns for Jerusalem to be the capital of the Jewish state. Mr. Obama stated this in a 2008 campaign speech in front of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Washington most powerful pro-Israel lobby.

But once in office, presidents from both parties have made little effort to implement such a policy, in part, because such steps would undercut efforts to forge a peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians.

For years, both parties’ official platforms have mentioned that Jerusalem is the capital of Israel as part of an effort to show unflagging support to the country (and to garner support with Jewish voters). In 2008, the Democratic Party’s platform said “Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations. It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.”

The Republican Party’s platform for 2012 says “We support Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state with secure, defensible borders; and we envision two democratic states—Israel with Jerusalem as its capital and Palestine—living in peace and security.”

The GOP’s platform also omits details about Israel that it had in its 2008 platform. In 2008, the GOP said “We support Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel and moving the American embassy to that undivided capital of Israel.”

This year’s platform makes no mention of moving the embassy. Mr. Romney in July said the U.S. embassy should be moved to Jerusalem and that he’d consult with the Israel about how to do it. Moving the embassy could inflame tensions in the region because Palestinians believe it should be their capital.

Mr. Obama has had a shaky relationship with Israel and its leaders. In 2011, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu delivered a rare public rebuke of Mr. Obama at the White House over the president’s comments that peace negotiations should resume based on Israel’s borders before it gained new territory in the 1967 Six Day War.

Mr. Netanyahu, speaking before reports with the president in the Oval Office, turned to face the president while telling him Israel “cannot go back to the 1967 lines” that are “indefensible.”

Olmert’s acquittal qualifies him to lead a new left-of-center bloc

DEBKAfile Exclusive Analysis

Ehud Olmert leapt agilely from deep pit of disgrace straight into the political limelight Tuesday, July 10 as a potential political game-changer. After living under the cloud of corruption for four years, he was cleared for lack of proof “beyond reasonable doubt.”by the Jerusalem District Court of the two most heinous counts which forced his resignation as prime minister.  Surrounded by political allies and friends, he smilingly warned reporters: “You’ll soon be seeing plenty of me around.”

He moved so smoothly that it was hard to remember that he was convicted of one of the three charges: breach of trust while serving as Minister of Trade and Industry; or that he still faced trial for graft in the big Holyland case while Mayor of Jerusalem.

Olmert clearly expects to land on his feet as the great unifier of a left-of-center political bloc. He sees himself as the only man capable of merging an amorphous assortment of left-wing, socialist, protest and otherwise angry groups and parties, which are too small, weak and fragmented to form a viable opposition to the broad right-of-center government coalition headed by Binyamin Netanyahu and his Likud.

Aside from being a remarkably slick politician, Olmert has another qualifier: Before his forced resignation in 2008, he was the Israeli prime minister who came closest to a deal with the Palestinians by offering uniquely generous concessions.

As such, Olmert is in a position to attract the dwindling far-left Meretz, the fledgling Yesh Atid (There is a Future) and Socialist Labor, although Labor’s Shelly Yachimovitch will fight hard for her dream of restoring Labor to its old preeminence.

He would be able to rally factions in the Kadima party he once led, who are disgruntled with their current leader Shaul Mofaz for joining the Netanyahu government as deputy prime minister.

Olmert could also provide a home for anti-Likud, out-of-work, dovish ex-security and army heads like the former Mossad director Meir Dagan, former chiefs of staff Gaby Ashkenazi and Meir Halutz and ex-Shin Bet Director Yuval Diskin.

The burgeoning social protest movements may also be swept up in the unifying momentum, particularly as most of them draw their ideas and funding from the same, often foreign, sources and share the same hankering to overturn the government in power.

All these groups and figures would temporarily throw their differences to the winds in their rush for a place in a new left-of-center coalition - however short-lived it may be. The long-stalled negotiations with the Palestinians would provide a handy political slogan for factional fusion.

Even before this nascent process takes off, the politicians who succeeded Olmert as leaders of Kadima: Tzipi Livni and the man who beat her to the top, Shaul Mofaz, look like shadows.

As foreign minister in the Olmert government, Livni will not be forgiven for conniving with (the then and now) Defense Minister Ehud Barak to drive him out of the prime minister’s office when he was accused of suspected corruption. He was hounded out even before he was indicted.

Just four days ago, Livni made a well-publicized appearance at a big demonstration in Tel Aviv on behalf of a new law for ending exemptions from military duty for ultra-religious yeshiva students and Arab citizens (Equal Sharing of the Burden). Tuesday, her image and hopes of a comeback were quickly overlaid by the triumphant former prime minister.

Some scrambling was also detected in the ruling camp under Netanyahu’s unchallenged leadership. His popularity has recently taken a knock from the way he wavered over legislation for making compulsory conscription universal. His actions were criticized for being prompted by the narrow political motive of preserving his government coalition against the loss of Kadima’s Mofaz who championed the Equal Burden movement, rather than meeting a just popular demand.

Prime Minister Netanyahu feels the need to shore up his government against the loss of a senior coalition partner: The hard-line Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman of Israeli Beitenu goes on trial next month for alleged financial wrongdoing including money laundering. For the duration of the trial and in case of his conviction, Lieberman has chosen an able successor, Yair Shamir, son of the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir who passed away on June 30.

Shamir is close to Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon of Likud. They are emerging as possible leaders of a solidified right-of-center alliance against a future left-of-center bloc. It would bring together Likud, Israeli Beitenu, Independence (led by Ehud Barak) and the National Union.

Israel’s political anatomy is historically dominated by two big rival alliances which operate on opposite sides of the aisle most of the time, but tend to join forces for national unity in some national emergencies.

The two camps have this in common:  Each traditionally enlists ultra-religious groups, Shas and Degel Hatorah, as tie-breakers to gain the lead in forming a government, and then builds them safe niches in their coalition governments.

Jerusalem to become Egypt’s capital under Mursi’s rule, says Muslim cleric

If Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Mursi became president, Egypt’s new capital will no more be Cairo, but the new capital will be Jerusalem, a prominent Egyptian cleric said at a presidential campaign rally, which was aired by an Egyptian private TV channel.

“Our capital shall not be Cairo, Mecca or Medina. It shall be Jerusalem with God’s will. Our chants shall be: ‘millions of martyrs will march towards Jerusalem’,” prominent cleric Safwat Hagazy said, according to the video aired by Egypt’s religious Annas TV on Tuesday.

The video went viral after being posted on YouTube – accompanied by English subtitles by Memri TV –, with 61,691 views until Thursday night.

“The United States of the Arabs will be restored on the hands of that man [Mursi] and his supporters. The capital of the [Muslim] Caliphate will be Jerusalem with God’s will,” Hegazy said, as the crowds cheered, waving the Egyptian flags along with the flags of the Islamist Hamas group, which rules the Gaza Strip.

“Tomorrow Mursi will liberate Gaza,” the crowds chanted.

“Yes, we will either pray in Jerusalem or we will be martyred there,” Hegazy said.

Hegazy’s speech came during a presidential campaign rally at the Egyptian Delta city of Mahalla, where Mursi attended along with the Muslim Brotherhood Supreme Guide Mohammed Badei and members of the group and its political wing the Freedom and Justice Party (FJP).

Mursi will challenge Egypt’s former prime minister Ahmed Shafiq in the election run-off, scheduled on June 16 and 17. Shafiq, an air force general, was the country’s last prime minister before former president Hosni Mubarak was forced to step down by a popular uprising in February 2011.

A court on Saturday sentenced the former ruler and his interior minister to life imprisonment for their role in the killings of up to 850 protesters in the January 25 uprising that ended Mubarak’s 30-year rule. Six senior police officers were acquitted for lack of evidence.

 The verdicts were met by angry street protests by Egyptians who considered them too lenient and demanded a purge of the judiciary.

 Members of the Islamist-dominated parliament attacked the verdicts, accusing the court of ignoring the rights of peaceful protesters killed in the uprising.

Hegazy led thousands of protesters at Cairo’s iconic Tarir Square against the verdicts. Protesters also called for the endorsing of the ‘Political Isolation Law’ that could bar political figures from Mubarak era, including Shafiq, from joining political life in the country for some years.

Endorsing the law, which will be decided by Cairo Supreme Constitutional Court on June 14, two days before the election run-off, could push Shafiq out of the presidential race.

For activists, choosing Shafiq would symbolize a return to the old regime and an end to the revolution. Voting for Mursi, on the other hand, would mean handing Egypt to an Islamic movement they say has monopolized power since the uprising.