Unlike some observers, I disagree totally that by speaking first Obama gained the upper hand and stole Netanyahu’s thunder. In the game of golf, the player farthest from the cup gets to putt first, but then the player who putts next gets to “go to school” on the first putt. In show biz, the opening act precedes the star of the show. In geopolitics, Obama has lost the element of surprise.
Obama’s decision to show his cards before Netanyahu touched down in Washington may be poor etiquette, but it has given the Israelis valuable time to adjust their game plan and, most important, rewrite the speeches the prime minister is set to deliver to AIPAC on Sunday and to an historic joint session of Congress on Tuesday. Netanyahu is now in position to make that his grand finale and bring the House down, while Obama watches helplessly on a White House HDTV.
Obama has made another costly foreign policy blunder, one that he could have easily avoided were it not for the man’s inability to control his visceral animosity toward the Jewish State and his bred-in-the-bone Islamophilia. In the final analysis, his mistake will hurt America and his presidency more than it will hurt Israel or Netanyahu.
But we already know leftist anti-Zionism is what makes Obama tick. We will soon learn once and for all what Netanyahu is made of too.