Ground Kerry, Send Amb. Hussain!
Secretary of State John Kerry was heard off-mic sarcastically putting down Israel’s push into Gaza. “Helluva pinpoint operation,” he said, deploring the number of Arab casualties in the latest war between Israel and Hamas. Mr. Kerry represents an administration that didn’t break off ties with the so-called Palestinian Authority (formerly the terrorist PLO). This outfit is run by Mahmoud Abbas, who was for years Yasser Arafat’s henchman. Abbas’ Fatah faction of the PLO maintains a tenuous hold on West Bank Arabs by the simple maneuver of never holding the scheduled elections. When the openly terrorist group, Hamas, won elections in Gaza, they kicked out Fatah. Hamas killed their Fatah brothers and broke into the home of the late Arafat and stole his Nobel Peace Prize. (We’re not making this up.) Since then, however, Hamas and Fatah have kissed and made up.
Messers Obama and Kerry continue to sluice billions of American taxpayer dollars to the PLO, which is now in bed with Hamas. One reason that the War on Terror has lasted, so far, 4,700 days (compared with just 1,365 for World War II) is that we were only paying for one side in WWII. That may be why we achieved Unconditional Surrender of our enemies.
President Obama’s spokesman, Josh Earnest, has told us that this administration has brought greater Tranquility to the globe. He actually said that with a straight face.
So, Mr. Obama sends John Kerry winging off to the Mideast for another round of shuttle diplomacy. Meanwhile, the Obama administration wants to ban jet travel to Israel. Why?
Because, of course, the possibility that unarmed civilian jets might be hit with surface-to-air missiles fired by Hamas from Gaza (or perhaps even from the West Bank where they would be aided in concealing them by their coalition partners in Fatah.)
The ban is quickly lifted. But the ban on jet travel to Israel -- which relies so heavily on American tourism -- is in place long enough for the Obama administration to make its point: We have your back, but we also have your windpipe.
When he gets to Israel, Kerry will press for a cease-fire. He wants the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) not to complete the work of smashing Hamas’ rocket launching sites. He wants a cease-fire to look good on CNN. But that would let Hamas continue tunneling into Israel. Once complete, those tunnels will send suicide bombers to Israeli schools and shopping malls.
We suggest, instead, grounding Kerry and sending over there President Obama’s Special Envoy to the Organization for Islamic Cooperation (OIC). This 56-member body is the largest single bloc in the UN. It represents the countries with Muslim majorities. Mr. Obama introduced Amb. Rashad Hussain with great fanfare back in 2010. Amb. Hussain, the President glowingly told us, is a Hafiz. That is, someone who has committed to memory the entire Koran. That effort apparently was enough for this administration to promote this man to ambassadorial rank.
The State Department website boasts of Amb. Rashad’s successes.
As U.S. Special Envoy, he has traveled extensively around the world, meeting with government and civil society leaders as part of his work on a number of issues involving Muslim-majority countries in bilateral and multilateral settings. He has also been active in efforts to combat violent extremism and protect religious freedom, including initiatives to protect the rights of religious minorities in Muslim-majority countries.
Let’s give Secretary Kerry a much-needed rest. Sending Amb. Hussain would allow him to visit all the Tranquil areas of the Globe that we are witnessing. Just a few areas remain less than Tranquil. And these are mostly in those OIC countries’ backyards. Surely, anyone as skilled as Amb. Hussain could speak peace those who share his faith and get them to lay off blowing up Buddhist statues, torching and shooting up hotels in Hindu India, rocketing Jews in Jerusalem, and terrorizing Christians in Mosul, Iraq, Sudan, and Nigeria. Maybe he could induce co-religionists to “Coexist.”
If Amb. Hussain cannot arrange a cease-fire among his fellow adherents of the religion of peace, perhaps we ought to close down his office -- or John Kerry’s. It seems a shame to waste more money on peacemakers who cannot seem to make any peace.