Most of our readers will agree that more than any other president before him, US President Barack Obama is leaning toward the Arabs in their conflict with the Jewish state. According to weekly public opinion polls, most Israelis feel the same.
But Israel has always been able to count on the strong support of the US Congress to balance any dangerous initiatives by the White House. According to leading Republican Rep. Eric Cantor, however, that could be changing.
In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, Cantor, the only Jewish Republican in the legislature, warned that he has seen a lot of indications lately that congressional support for Israel is deteriorating.
"I have a lot of concerns about what I have seen lately, about the continued desire to try to engage with Iran and about pressure being applied to Israel in terms of concessions in the name of peace," said Cantor in regards to both Obama and the currently Democrat-controlled Congress.
In yet another sign of faltering relations between Jerusalem and Washington, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu traveled to the US on Sunday, but had yet to be invited to the White House.
Netanyahu was officially visiting the US to attend and address the General Assembly of the Jewish Federations of North America. But very seldom do Israeli leaders visit the US without being invited to meet with the president. It was expected that the two leaders would meet in the end, but the absence of an official invitation beforehand spoke volumes to Israelis.
It is widely believed that Obama is deeply frustrated with Netanyahu for not caving to his demands that Israel meet a broad range of Arab demands in order to get peace talks moving again. In particular, Obama wants Israel to stop building homes for Jews in any areas claimed by the Palestinians.