Obama Avoiding Israeli Eye Contact As Impotence On Ukraine Showcased

Washington, DC, March 2 – As Russian troops flood into the Crimea region of Ukraine with a less-than-impressive American response, US President Barack Obama is trying not to look any Israelis in the eye lest they ask him what guarantees he can offer to assuage their concerns over security after their withdrawal from strategic areas.

Similar confrontation between the US and Russia over Georgia several years ago resulted in Putin shrugging off whatever negative international consequences the US could muster. It remains unlikely that similar diplomatic and economic measures will work to force a Russian withdrawal from Ukraine, and Obama faces domestic reluctance to commit US military forces anywhere, let alone against Russia. This display of impotence makes the president uncomfortable around Israelis, whom he is trying to press to relinquish security assets in a peace deal with Palestinians and simultaneously assure them that the US stands ready to defend them.

Obama has expressed his intention to personally involve himself in pressing Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to compromise on core issues and reach a final status agreement. Netanyahu is scheduled to visit the US this month, followed by Abbas. White House sources confirm that Obama has inquired about conducting the meeting with Netanyahu by chat over the internet rather than have to make actual eye contact.

“The President is understandably reluctant to actually have to talk to anyone from Israel right now,” explained White House Press Secretary Jay Carney. “He faces the difficult prospect of encouraging Mr. Netanyahu to make sacrifices for peace, promising him that the US will continue to guarantee a more vulnerable Israel’s security, in full view of the President’s own inability to project American power.”

Avoidance of this critical question has occurred before. During his last trip to the region, US Secretary of State John Kerry sought to allay Israeli concerns over withdrawal from the Jordan Valley by committing to the provision of US assistance on security and sensory technology, conveniently avoiding the question of the force necessary to make such technology meaningful.

“Kerry tried to dazzle the Israelis with whiz-bang technology to detect infiltrators, weapons smugglers, everything,” recalled Dan Shapiro, the US ambassador to Israel. “His tactic was to keep talking so the Israelis wouldn’t be able interrupt and ask him how that technology is working for the US on the Mexican border.”

Shapiro also noted the US administration’s consistent avoidance of another important question: what happens when the Palestinian state to be created through these negotiations fails to stop attacks on Israel from its territory? Any Israeli military action would be condemned as a violation of another nation’s sovereignty, and attract as much or more international opprobrium than it does now.

A State Department spokesman whistled when a reporter posed that question, pretending he could not hear it.