"National home of the Jewish people?" Rubbish. Jewish people have national homes all round the world, which they share with other people. Australia is one of them. How are the mythical "Jewish people", as a people and not just as a collective noun for individuals of Jewish origin, more special than everyone else? Where's the "national home" of the "Celtic people? Or the so-called "Aryan people"? Heaven forbid that there should ever be one.

David. I am inclined to agree with President Obamas' rejection of "one of President Bush's most cherished objectives". After all, this is an objective of Bush, not that of the Palistinian representatives, and it is they that determine their form of govenance surely?

Events in both 'Palestine', syria, Iran and other 'Arab Spring' states demonstrates that the more traditional 'dictator/bully/tribal might form of governance is preferred to that of democracy. That is fine by me.

The right of Isreal to exist without the threat of extinction from its neighbours, on the other hand, is not negotiable and the ultimate objective of a peace plan. Once negotiated, agreed borders are established, Palistinians and all others are free to carry on with their internecine tribal squabbles as long as they like, provided it does not spill over into neighbouring states.

Greg Sheridan had a piece in The Australian titled:

Obama leaves Labor adrift on Mid East

LET'S be quite blunt. President Barack Obama is an ardent Zionist.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/columnists/obama-leaves-labor-adrift-on-mid-east/story-e6frg76f-1226605779928

In contrast to most of my co-religionists I've long felt that Obama is the best friend Israel has had in the White House since Harry Truman. He is certainly a better friend that the fake friends on the Republican side.

Excerpt:

>>His unequivocal statement of support for Zionism, the idea that there should be a Jewish state in the land of Israel, went too little remarked.

Here's part of what he said in Jerusalem: "For the Jewish people, the journey to the promise of the state of Israel wound through countless generations. It involved centuries of suffering and exile, prejudice and pogroms and even genocide . . . And while Jews achieved extraordinary success in many parts of the world, the dream of true freedom finally found its full expression in the Zionist idea - to be a free people in your homeland.">>

stevenmeyer,

"... to be a free people in your homeland."

Tragically, it's somebody else's homeland. The notion that Jews are uniquely privileged to return to some ancestral "homeland" is chauvinistic nonsense.

Emperor Julian,

yes, indeed,

Humans have a thousand "homelands", I've absolutely no inclination or moral right to "return" to Western Turkey, the area north of the Black Sea, a small island off NW Europe, or East Africa.

To #Emperor Julian and #mac

Your denial of the right of the Jews to have their own state in their biblical,ancient and legally sanctioned and recognized homeland - as President Obama so eloquently stated - indicates you have no conception of what is required to end the Jewish-Arab conflict.

President Obama expressed this requirement in a simple one liner:
"Palestinians must recognize that Israel will be a Jewish state."

Their failure to do so will see the current two-state solution end up in the dust bin of history - like previous two state solutions proposed in 1922, 1937, 1947 and 2000.

#To Prompete

The requirement that any Palestinian state be democratic was a condition of the Roadmap the terms of which were endorsed by the European Union, the United Nations and Russia.

The requirement seems to have been quietly shelved in the face of the total inability of the Palestinian Arabs being given the opportunity to have a say in their own future for the last six years.

My own view is that this is a big mistake.

The Palestinian Arabs should not be muzzled by their despotic masters.

Realpolitik seems to dictate otherwise at the moment - but frustration could see the situation change very quickly. One can only live in hope that this will occur.

#To stevenlmeyer

Both Presidents Bush and President Obama are Zionists as were virtually all members of the US House of Representatives and Senate who endorsed the letter from President Bush to Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon dated 14 April 2004.

The Jew-haters who frequent OLO should take note that their jaundiced viewpoint will be the straw that breaks the camel's back in achieving a peaceful resolution to a conflict that has now raged for over 130 years.

Denigrating Jews and delegitimizing the Jewish state will prolong the conflict - not bring about its resolution.

David. I take your point in the fact that democratisation was a condition of the 'roadmap', as agreed by the parties to the negotiations, and not necessarily a personal requirement of Bush.

However, as further 'compromise' is continually demanded and as particularly espoused by many on this site, my inclination is that the dumping of 'democratisation' in the area, in a pragmatic compromise gesture, be the area that I would offer that compromise.

On the other hand, I bleed for all Palistinian and other Arabs being subject to their traditional forms of governance. Perhaps I am displaying my cultural cheauvenism here?