Jon Stewart wasn’t fooled
Jon Stewart acknowledged exactly what Isrtaeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the Joint Session of Congress was, an attempt to poke President Obama in the eye, a festival of slights. Benjamin Netanyahu appeared at the ‘invitation’ of Speaker of the House John Boehner, read ‘pandering in the attempt to embarrass the President’. Boehner did so while disrespectfully not consulting or informing the White House that a foreign Head of State would be addressing Congress.
“Benjamin Netanyahu was on hand to explain to our Congress why our President should not be negotiating a nuclear deal with Iran,” Jon Stewart pointed out. “And even though Netanyahu was speaking only two weeks before the Israeli elections, he wasn’t there just to use our Congress as the most elaborate campaign commercial backdrop ever.”
Of course he was. Jon Stewart showed him bragging on Israeli TV about his mission as the savior of the Jews. Stewart then showed a clip that should be embarrassing to America, the super power that Israel needs to remain a viable country. President Obama was pandering to Israel even as the leader of Israel was maligning his foreign policy nationally and abroad.
America should be even more embarrassed by the adoration and loud applause given to Benjamin Netanyahu by their congressional representatives as if he was a dignified statesman. This is the man that indiscriminately bombed and killed thousands of Palestinians for the sins of a very few. He turned much of Gaza into rubble.
Jon Stewart in classic form pointed out how silly it was to listen to any pronouncements from Benjamin Netanyahu. He pointed out that Netanyahu has been crying wolf on Iran for over 19 years. Netanyahu claimed that Iran would develop a nuclear bomb 19 years ago. He was one of the warmongering neocons advising Congress that regime change in Iraq would have stabilized the region. He has been wrong on all counts. Yet America panders and glorifies this incompetent empty suit. America should be embarrassed.