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Obama Pledges Israel His 'Unshakable Commitment'

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The Washington Post

Published: July 24, 2008

JERUSALEM - Sen. Barack Obama stepped gingerly through the intractable politics of the Middle East on Wednesday, offering resolute support for Israel's security, warning that Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons would be a "game-changing" event for the world, and pledging to make peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians one of his highest priorities if he becomes president.

By motorcade and helicopter, in private meetings and public appearances, the Democratic presidential candidate moved from the Yad Vashem holocaust museum in Jerusalem to the Palestinian Authority headquarters in the West Bank city of Ramallah to the southern Israeli town of Sderot just outside the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip.
Palestinian gunmen in Gaza have long fired makeshift rockets at Sderot, typically following Israeli military operations in the Strip or the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Obama used Sderot's police station and a backdrop of racks of spent Qassam rockets to declare his "unshakeable commitment to Israel's security."

He added: "The state of Israel faces determined enemies who seek its destruction. But it also has a friend and ally in the United States that will always stand by the people of Israel."

Obama's busy day in Israel concluded the Middle East and Asia portion of his trip overseas. After four days in Afghanistan and Iraq, a day in Jordan and another in Israel, the presumptive Democratic nominee will turn his attention to Europe. He will fly to Berlin this morning and hold the biggest public event of his tour at Tiergarten Park in the evening.

With an eye to Jewish voters back in the United States and to public opinion here, Obama defended himself Wednesday as a staunch and longtime friend of Israel and said he has a voting record that proves it. "The way you know where somebody's going is where have they been," he said. "And I've been with Israel for many, many years now."

Obama's day was a succession of meetings with top Israeli and Palestinian officials, interspersed with his few public events. He met over dinner with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, but before that he had already seen President Shimon Peres, Defense Minister and Labor Party leader Ehud Barak, Likud Party leader Binyamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.

He also made the short drive north to Ramallah for face-to-face meetings with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said the hourlong meeting with Abbas had gone well, with Obama mostly listening as Abbas briefed him on the state of negotiations with Israel.

The trip to Ramallah took Obama past the elaborate system of checkpoints and barrier walls that Israel has built in what it says is an effort to thwart suicide bombers and other would-be attackers from the West Bank. Security was tight. Dozens of Palestinian security officers, wearing helmets and vests and carrying automatic weapons, lined the access road to the walled presidential compound.

In Sderot, Obama said he would assign a high priority to the peace talks.

Implicitly critical of the Bush administration, Obama said he would not wait until years into his presidency to tackle the Middle East issue. "I think we have a window right now that needs to be taken advantage of," he said.

Netanyahu said after his meeting with Obama, "We agreed that the greatest priority in our foreign policy is that both countries must prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons."

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