Obama defends his Mideast peace vision to pro-Israel lobby

Obama can't sell his demented plan.

Hamas said it wouldn’t recognize the Israeli “occupation” and that it, too, rejected Obama’s reference to the 1967 borders. “It is a mistake to consider the U.S. as an honest sponsor for the so-called peace process,” spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri said.

Good for Hamas. The people living in the Middle East knows more about the situation than Obama.

Some people just feel sorry for the Palestinians because they are poor and downtrodden; despite the fact that most aid for the Palestinians comes from the US and Europe and Arab nations give them nothing preferring to use them as proxies to fight against Israel. Jordan is particularly at fault for screwing over the Palestinians and keeping them in "slums". They could have taken them in as refugees but prefer the West support them in semi-squalor.

President Obama has always been pro-Palestinian. He just uses Jews for their money and influence at election time. If he gets re-elected, this 1967 borders flap will be nothing. The Israeli's understand where Obama's loyalties are - and it isn't with them. Things will continue to be frosty with Israel until a new American president is sworn in. Israel just has to hope that they are still around when that happens.

Obama acknowledged that he had touched nerves by outlining his principles for peace and that “the easy thing to do, particularly for a president preparing for re-election, is to avoid any controversy.” But he said peace efforts needed to gain ground quickly.

He must be worried he won't get re-elected, doing some PR.

Isn't this the 'tick-tock' approach to the Middle East? Invade a country, or take out a terrorist leader (for lack of a better word) and then say you are pressing Israel to make concessions? Surely this is designed to show he is fair and even-handed and not an 'enemy of Islam', whatever that is. I'm not sure that this is really for internal consumption, except perhaps for the left-leaning democrats.

Well, the AIPAC lobby group gave Obama some standing applauses.

Guess that didn't turn out as intriguing as I initially thought........

Or maybe it did, heh.

Objectively though, the US shouldn't really be the arbiter in the process. Because you can't be an arbiter if you have loyalty to one party or another, regardless of whoever it is, because that's conflict of interest.

Unfortunately, there's really no other party who could do it (no, not the UN). So, the US will just have to do and do its best at it.

"Palestinian reaction to Obama's speech was mixed"

What would Obama have to say for Palestinian reaction to be decidedly favorable? Israel must surrender?

What would Obama have to say for Palestinian reaction to be decidedly favorable?

Probably something about zionists or burn an American flag or fire rocket at a housing development. That might do the trick.

The president's critics seem to think stealing land as Israel did is OK.

Ok.....

Israel did not steal land. They earned it as spoils of war. They turned it green. What have the Paestinians done except complain, shoot rockets and make babies. The Palestinian people as well as the Iranians are technically Arabs. It is all in their DNA. They should help each other instead of bitchin about Israel. They could learn a lot from Israel on how to turn a dessert green.

ihavegreatlegs - "Israel did not steal land. They earned it as spoils of war."

So we agree - Israel stole it. :-)

War is always about land not faith.. recent wars mostly about valuable commodities..

Israel did not steal the land.

In 1967, when the three noes declaration came forth from Khartum, Israel would have had every right to annexe the West Bank. The opportunity was lost, and Moshe Dayan's magnanimity towards the Arab nations that did their best to destroy Israel, was repaid in the manner to which we have become accustomed. What a tragic error of judgement, for which Israel pays the price every day. Which other country would, or has, relinquished territory won in a defensive war against genocidal enemies for nothimg in return? Answer---none.

Ha! America doesn't care about Canada, Lieberman2012. They've always just been the punchlines of America's jokes. Remember when Canada wanted to legalize marijuana?

Ihavegreatlegs, you are soo out of it. You could easily do a quick search on the creation of israel in 194? and how the thousands of arabs were expelled from their homes in order for israel to be created. Thats what the british did with support from us and ussr. I cant wait for someday someone coming to your housr grabbing you by the hair and throwing you out of your house because u will be judged as you judge. The 1967 came waaay after half the land was STOLEN. They fought for their land and lost and the punishment for trying to claim their land back is for more land to be stolen, and every year after 1967 until now 2011 are still kicking out arab farmers and building new settelements for the Russian jews and other poor jew immigrants paid by your money collected as taxes if you happen to b an american. And i really do hope one day someone robs you of everything so you can maybe understand the plight of the palestinians. I wonder if you would have the stones to fight back, pun intended.

Going back to '67 could backfire.At the time there were no "Palestinians" in the sense the word is used today.You need only examine contemporary coverage on the issue.They were simply described as Arabs.

On another interesting note if we really really were to back track to land "rights" Palestine was actually created under the Roman empire, Isreal still before that and all peoples of that "land" were nothing but a group of arabic tribes. Isreal was attacked during 1967 after its creation and aquired land from defending itself from the surrounding hostile nations aquiring land from that. If the palestinians did not want to lose land they should not have attacked in the first place.

The president's critics seem to think stealing land as Israel did is OK.

Heh, those in the Golan Heights seem to be glad that Israel stole their land. Particularly at the moment. Of course they've been living in a much freer society then their brothers on the other side of the border. At this point, I suspect a lot of Syrians wish Israel had kept more of their land, rather then just settling for the Golan Heights.

The strategic value of the Golan Heights to Israel cannot be overstated. As with the mountain ridges of Judea and Samaria, the visual and radar stations located there give advance warning of any approach from Syria. Any attacking ground force would be effectively blocked by having to cross the Golan Heights. Furthermore, about one third of Israel’s fresh water supply originates there, in the watershed of Lake Kinneret.