Obama Wants Turkey/Israel to Help Bomb Shit Outta Syria (3-27-13)

Some people still don’t get that Obama is a pragmatist with a heart of stone. Both domestically and internationally speaking.

Internationally speaking, according to Melkulangara Bhadrakumar, Obama got what he wanted from the trip to Israel when at the very end of it he played catalyst to Turkey's and Israel's “making up” after the killing of nine Turkish nationals by Israeli commandos in the 2010 Turkish flotilla on a humanitarian mission to help the Palestinians of Gaza.

Erdogan and Netanyahu cooperated with Obama for a win/win/win scenario that means more horror for the hapless Syrians and eventually, if these three hegemonic monsters have their way, the Iranians.

As far as Turkey and Israel are concerned, the enemy of my enemy can be my friend, pragmatically, holding-the-nose speaking, which is what Obama was bargaining for.

What Obama wants is to “take out” the Assad regime ASAP to get on with the steamrolling U.S. hegemony and Obama's next target, Iran, and the ever-shadow target, China.

NATO’s top military commander Adm. James Stavridis told the US Armed Services Committee last Monday that the US has to take a stronger “posture” against Syria to help with regime change. Of course, Sen. John McCain was the most enthusiastic.

Stavridis went on to explain that the NATO Patriot missiles now deployed in Turkey ostensibly for the sake of defending Turkish airspace has the capability also to attack Syrian air force in that country’s air space and that any such a NATO operation would be a "powerful disincentive" for the Syrian regime.

Obama knows that U.S. troops put on the ground in Syria may finally elicit some serious blowback from a seemingly morally comatose but war-weary U.S. citizenry. (Would that Obama seriously respected the sanctity of human life.) Bhadrakumar claims that as Obama sees it, the U.S., NATO and Israel can give air cover and launch “devastating missile attacks” on the Syrian government's command posts. Obama calculates that if ground forces are needed, Turkey can handle that end of it, since it is a Muslim country that belongs to NATO.

Bhadrakumar adds:

However, the crucial operational aspect will be that in order for the US-NATO-Turkish operation to be optimal, Israel also needs to be brought in. A close cooperation between Turkey and Israel at the operational level can be expected to swiftly pulverize the Syrian regime from the north and south simultaneously. Hence the diligence with which Obama moved to heal the Turkish-Israeli rift.

PULVERIZE THE SYRIAN REGIME.

WTG, Barack. Enjoying that peace prize?

Both Turkey and Israel have political scores to settle with Syria, so once again ends justifies the means and again, the enemy of my enemy is my pragmatic and nose-holding friend!

Bhadrakumar:

In sum, Obama’s mediatory mission to Israel and his stunning success in healing the Turkish-Israeli rift resets the compass of Middle Eastern politics. In a way, American regional policies are returning to their pristine moorings of perpetuating the western hegemony in the Middle East in the 21st century, no matter how.

In the process, the Palestinian problem has been relegated to the backburner; Obama didn’t even bother to hide that he feels no particular sense of urgency about the Middle East peace process. The resuscitation of the Turkish-Israeli strategic axis gives the unmistakable signal that the Obama administration is shifting gear for an outright intervention in Syria to force «regime change». Thereupon, the strong likelihood is that Iran will come in the US-Israeli-Turkish crosshairs...

A few more words about Obama’s realpolitik detachment from the plight of the Palestinians:

Lawrence Davidson writes:

Israeli forces have sprayed Palestinian homes in the village of Nabi Saleh with Skunk as punishment for organizing weekly protests against the Apartheid Wall built on occupied land. Human rights watchdog B’Tselem  published a video showing Israel’s armored tanker trucks fitted with “water canons” [spraying] the foul fluid.

Skunk is a fluid so offensive smelling that people automatically retreat from anywhere or anyone doused with it.

This is not the first time the Israelis have used such noxious tactics. Zionist settlers are fond of diverting the sewage from their illegal settlements, which are usually placed on high ground,  into the fields and towns of Palestinians living in the valleys below. This is apparently done with the knowledge and approval of the Israeli state.

snip

President Obama had an interview with Israel’s Channel 2 TV station on 15 March 2013, just before he left to visit that country. In the interview he stated that he admires Israel’s “core values.” The Israeli journalist Gideon Levy, who has an honest nose for these things, editorially asked Obama, ... which values he was talking about? The dehumanization of the Palestinians? The attitude toward African migrants? The arrogance, racism and nationalism? Is this what he admires? Don’t separate buses for Palestinians remind him of something? Doesn’t two communities living on the same land, one with full rights and the other with no rights, ring a bell . . . ?

To admire “core values” while knowing we’re talking about one of the most racist countries there is, with a separation wall and apartheid-like policies, means betraying the core values of the American civil rights movement that made the Obama miracle possible.

Nonetheless, upon arriving in Israel, President Obama said that U.S. support for the very same Israel Levy describes will “be forever.” It might be added that, at the same time, the president insisted that the Palestinians cease demanding a halt to the building of settlements, with their targeted open- sewer policies, before any further “peace” negotiations with the Israelis.

When it comes to Israel, President Obama, and most of the Congress as well, can’t tell the difference between fair and foul. That is because they live in a peculiar professional world whose parameters, in reference to Israel and Palestine, are defined by a Zionist lobby with Orwellian powers. In this special world, double-think abounds. Racism, apartheid, ethnic cleansing, and the tactical use of Skunk and raw sewage disappear and are replaced by imaginary “core values” that smell like roses.

Norman Pollack on Obama and the irrelevance of the Palestinian plight to him

Israel is merely one instance, a support of broadly conceived counterrevolution, with respect to its surroundings, and as the facilitator of US penetration, from securing oil to natural resources, throughout the hemisphere and encroaching still further East.

snip

... Obama’s performance in Israel mirrors his domestic performance: promises meant to be broken, talk of peace while engaging in war, and when the accumulated deceit is about to burst open, provide the purgative with more words of unctious platitudes.

Obama-Brennan and Obama-Netanyahu (what I refer to below as compatible bedfellows) represent the face of liberal fascism, Obama the smiling face of betrayal, his partners here, the real thing of political thuggery and merciless killing.

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Obama’s putatively ennobling rhetoric (i.e., Ben Rhodes’s rather glib speechwriting) is not persuasive because Israel under no circumstances wants peace–and, by not taking a stand on the settlements, Obama merely reinforces that position. He loves the adulation (and support which will now come from home), but this trip is a clear example of public relations trumping substance. Perhaps we can see two further interventions (Iran, Syria), if indeed US presence in Iraq and Afghanistan is finally winding down. Hints of that were dropped in his various conversations.

I am sick of being lied to, whether domestic or foreign policy. In this case, Obama overlooks the harshness of Israel’s occupation. The wall going up on the border between Israel and Egypt, as with the other walls (Gaza, Golan, etc.) speaks volumes about a hunkering down–Fortress Israel–rather than moving toward peace. And Obama legitimizes the charade.

But why expect otherwise? US armed drones for targeted assassination, Obama’s signature weapon, testifies to violation of international law with impunity, much as Israel too does–making for compatible bedfellows. In world opinion, the US and Israel are engaged in a race to the moral bottom via the militarization of the two societies. ...

Obama’s and Israel’s race to the moral bottom. Aptly worded. My money is on stone-hearted “liberal fascist” Obama.

[cross-posted on open salon]