I have written here and elsewhere that Barack Obama's views on Israel and the possibilties of peace between it and the Palestinians are both tough-minded and deeply comprehending. I don't at all think that I'd be disappointed with an Obama presidency, and certainly not with his attitude towards the Jewish State. He is also not massaging Jewish audiences when he observes -- correctly -- that Israelis are, in general, far more various in their views on the security situation than American Jews or American Jewish organizations. But one of the reasons for that is many of those who are prone to criticize Israel in the U.S. are also deluded in their conviction that Jewish sovereignty itself is the essence of what prevents peace with the Palestinians. So, instead of asserting the justice of Jewish peoplehood, they really want to abandon it, and, with that, the state itself. Well, in Israel, no Jew would countenace giving up sovereignty. In America, there are a lot of self-righteous and cavalier Jews who would give up the sovereignty of other Jews, half the Jews in the world, so that they themselves might feel morally untouched by nationalism. Just like many deluded Jews in pre-war France, England and Germany.
In any case, here are Obama's opinions and sharp insights, as expressed in Cleveland yesterday, on Israel and the Palestinians. They are not mine exactly. But they are enough like mine to let me sleep calmly.