Obama’s harsh words for Israel lacked steel

The US president gave a forceful speech at the UN, but he was lacking on the details of action

US president Barack Obama at the United Nations General Assembly  in New York this week. Peter Foley / EPA
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For many of those who heard the US president speak at the United Nations on Wednesday, this was the speech they had been waiting for. Expansive, passionate and forceful, this was Barack Obama as they hoped he would be in the years after George W Bush. Yet those listeners have had to wait five years until matters became so grave that the US president was willing to act.

Although the UN was gathered at a moment when a US-assembled coalition was striking an Arab country, Mr Obama spoke about the world beyond Syria. He mentioned Ebola, Ukraine and Russia, and even the troubles in the Pacific (although not China by name). He was right to point out the sharp end of the challenges immediately facing the world.

At the same time, he was light on solutions. For as eloquent as his words were, the devil remains in the detail. Mr Obama called on the United Nations to pull together and show it was serious about tackling Russia. But when it came to the troubles of the Middle East, he has few options that do not involve the military.

In particular, Mr Obama had hard words for Israel, striking a far firmer tone than is usually heard from the head of the country that bankrolls the state. He made the usual caveat that Israel was not to blame for the problems of the region, even though that claim is never seriously made.

The criticism of Israel is that it has never sought to make the Middle East better for all, only better for itself since it was founded in 1948. Israel, alone among the countries of the Middle East, occupies land of three of its neighbours and has waged wars against more of them. The festering sore of the occupation of Palestine – now the longest running occupation of the modern world – has not caused the problems of the Middle East, but has contributed to them enormously. The militarisation of so much of the Middle East has been a direct result of Israel’s repeated wars and threats of wars: Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, Sudan have all been attacked by the Israeli state.

Mr Obama could not say any of this, of course, for the same reason that he offered only words: he is hamstrung by the US Congress and its pro-Israel stance. But on Israel, words aren’t enough, not when the US has given billions to the state and provided weapons and political cover. If Mr Obama wants his words be taken seriously, he has to back them with actions.