Wednesday, December 06, 2006

"The Iraq Support Group, "part of the New Diplomatic Offensive", apparently excludes Jews. The report demands that we stop blindly supporting Israel and that we press them for concession after concession, all without any demand for reciprocity, but they will not have a seat at the regional conference on Iraq. That's extraordinary, especially considering that Baker, Hamilton, and Company insist that "all key issues in the Middle East—the Arab-Israeli conflict, Iraq, Iran, the need for political and economic reforms, and extremism and terrorism—are inextricably linked." If they're inextricably linked, then why isn't Israel invited?

Once again, we have to recall that James Baker has never been Israel's friend. Here he and the ISG make that very clear. The US will ask Israel to marginalize itself in order to enable Syria and Iran to dominate a regional conference comprised mainly of Israel's enemies that will supposedly deal with their territorial integrity. If that sounds a lot like Mussolini's efforts to call a regional conference together at Munich in 1938, it's not a coincidence."