Scary US views [View All]

[shira]

In recent days, there has been a truly frightening articulation of the US administration’s perception of Israel vis-à-vis the Muslim world. On Friday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta essentially blamed Israel for its own “increasing isolation,” urging the Jewish state to reach out to its neighbors.

He suggested that Israel make diplomatic inroads with the Muslim Brotherhood’s Egypt, Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s increasingly Islamist and anti-Israel Turkey, and vulnerable Jordan, a country whose leadership – for the sake of self-preservation – has been making concessions to its own Muslim Brotherhood.

And when asked at the end of his speech at the Brookings Institution in Washington what operative steps Israel could make to advance negotiations with the Palestinians, Panetta said: “Just get to the damn table.”

In other words, the clearly exasperated Panetta believes that if only stubborn Israel would make more concessions to the Palestinians, regional animosity toward Israel would miraculously evaporate after decades of incitement.

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http://www.jpost.com/Opinion/Editorials/Article.aspx?id=248255