It Sure Looks Like Israel Should Be Worried About Obama
Written by: Aaron Katsman | January 28, 2009
Throughout the US presidential campaign, many were worried that a Barack Obama presidency would spell trouble for Israel. Obama surrogates continuously denied the claim. Well if the first 7 days of his presidency are any indication, Israel had better be prepared to deal with tremendous pressure from Washington.
As we documented here last week, the first leader that Obama called was Palestinian Authority head Abbas. Today, the first TV interview he gave as president was to Arabic cable TV network, Al-Arabiya. An now Bloomberg is reporting about a huge potential conflict of interest between, Obama, Vice President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and new special mid-east envoy George Mitchell.
According to the Bloomberg report:” George Mitchell, President Barack Obama’s special Middle East troubleshooter, was chairman of a law firm that was paid about $8 million representing Dubai’s ruler in connection with a child-trafficking lawsuit. The DLA Piper law firm did legal and lobbying work on the case, which alleged that Dubai’s Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al- Maktoum and another official used children kidnapped from other countries to ride as jockeys in camel races.”
The report continues: “Mitchell’s firm had extensive lobbying clients and offices in the Middle East ranging from the leader of Dubai to a Kuwait construction firm contracting in Iraq. The firm also has offices in Egypt, Oman, Qatar and Abu Dhabi and has an affiliation with a law firm in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Mitchell traveled to Dubai and spoke to the press there about the issue.”
How can he be ‘objective’ when he has such clear conflicts of interest? What happened to Obama’s new edict about lobbying?
It looks like Obama is bending over backwards to placate enemies of both the US and Israel. This foreign policy strategy, has the potential to cause much more harm then good.
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