A bipartisan group of fourteen United States Senators has forwarded an open letter to President Obama regarding his speech at the United Nations later this week. The letter was signed by Senators Menendez, Lieberman, Kyl, Casey, Collins, Gillibrand, Kirk, Blumenthal, Hatch, Cardin, Rubio, Schumer, Isakson, and Coons, and can be found here on Senator Gillibrand’s Web site. Here is the letter:
Dear Mr. President:
As you prepare to address the United Nations General Assembly this week, we write to express our concern about a number of troubling developments in the Middle East that pose difficult challenges for our ally Israel as well as our own regional security interests.
We are deeply disappointed that President Mahmoud Abbas appears determined to scorn your persistent efforts to persuade him to return to the negotiating table with Israel and instead seek unilateral diplomatic action in New York that will only set back the prospects for peace. We are also troubled by the anti-Israeli rhetoric that Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan has displayed in recent weeks in the wake of the Palmer Report, which is harmful to Turkey’s reputation in the United States, especially when coupled with its reluctance to take any meaningful actions in response to the brutal crackdown in Syria. Lastly, the attack on the Israeli Embassy in Cairo earlier this month by a mob was profoundly unsettling. We commend your immediate and direct engagement with Egyptian authorities to save the lives of the six trapped Embassy personnel.
We believe it is imperative for you to speak strongly, forthrightly and publicly about U.S. concerns over these developments. We need to make it clear that we will not tolerate continued threats to Israel by governments or individuals in the region or attempts to delegitimize Israel at the UN or other international forums. Violence and unilateralism against Israel will be met with the strongest U.S. opposition.
Political and physical attacks on Israel pose real dangers to the prospects for building Mideast peace and present the possibility of a region-wide deterioration into violence. Israel’s real sense of growing isolation will make it much more difficult to move the Mideast in a positive direction. We therefore urge you to utilize the opportunity offered by your address at the United Nations later this month to reaffirm and explain America’s determination to stand by Israel at this difficult hour.
The whole world will be watching and listening when you speak next week at the UN. The world needs to hear unequivocally from you that Israel – our friend, ally, and strategic partner — is not alone in facing these threats.
We look forward to your response.
In a sense it is amazing that these things need to be said to Obama, but we all know that they do in fact need to be said, and why.
Via Daily Alert.
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