editorial: Obama and Sarkozy in yichud

It appears that as hard as President Barack Obama struggles to preserve his image as a supporter of Israel, the truth continues to leak out. Following his defense of Israel at the United Nations, the boost Obama received in the polls among Jews, was jeopardized by Vice President Joe Biden’s harsh dismissal of clemency appeals for convicted spy Jonathan Pollard. Nonetheless, the president values the support of the Jewish community, and recently appointed likeable Long Island native Jarrod Bernstein as his liaison to the Jewish community.
How ironic that on the same day that Bernstein was defending his boss before an Agudath Israel of America legislative breakfast in Manhattan on Monday, Obama was nodding in apparent agreement with French President Nicolas Sarkozy in a private room at the G20 Summit. “Netanyahu, I can’t stand him. He’s a liar,” Sarkozy said. To which Obama replied, “You are sick of him, but I have to work with him every day.”
Sarkozy’s record on Israel is the best for a French leader since pre-1967, and Obama’s record $2.775 billion military aid package for Israel demonstrate that personal opinions aside, he is willing to put his money where his mouth isn’t.
Obama is not alone among American presidents in badmouthing Israel or its leaders in private while continuing to public praise and public money on the embattled democracy that remains America’s staunchest ally in the middle east.
The diaries of Harry S. Truman, the president who recognized newborn Israel over the objections of his State Department and Defense Department advisors, privately described the Jews as “very selfish,” with a capability for cruelty exceeding that of Hitler and Stalin. Likewise, Richard M. Nixon, who delivered planeloads of military supplies to Israel in the Yom Kippur War, was recorded on his infamous tapes disparaging Jews. “The Jews are just a very aggressive and abrasive and obnoxious personality.”