Bush plays the Nazi card at the Knesset

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President Bush’s Knesset speech is getting a lot of attention today for what appeared to be a veiled swipe at Barack Obama, implying that those who suggest negotiations with Iran are repeating the mistakes made during the lead-up to World War II:

“Some seem to believe we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: ‘Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.’ We have an obligation to call this what it is – the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history.”

Leaving aside whether the remark was aimed at Obama, (and Obama certainly thinks it was) is it really necessary for politicians to constantly invoke the Holocaust when speaking about international affairs with Jewish audiences, as if that’s the only analogy through which they can understand security threats? For the record, some Israeli politicians are just as guilty of this. 

Anyway, Bush may claim to be horrified at the idea of negotiating with terrorist-supporting regimes, but his administration actually appears to have dropped its opposition to once-taboo negotiations between Israel and Syria in recent weeks. This would seem to support the view that Bush’s remarks had more to do with U.S. politics than the reality of Israel’s security.

Laura Rozen has much more on Bush’s last chance to advance the peace process in her FP web-exclusive this week and today’s photo essay explores Israel and Syria’s continuing conflict over the Golan Heights.