Secretary Kerry at the Water’s Edge

Editor’s Note: This column was coauthored by Bob Morrison.

“I will not allow my commitment to Israel to be questioned by anyone, particularly for partisan, political purposes, so I want to be crystal clear about what I believe and what I don’t believe,” Kerry said after U.S. lawmakers and pro-Israel groups criticized him, with some demanding his resignation or at least an apology…”I have been around long enough to also know the power of words to create a misimpression, even when unintentional, and if I could rewind the tape, I would have chosen a different word [than Apartheid] to describe my firm belief that the only way in the long term to have a Jewish state and two nations and two peoples living side by side in peace and security is through a two-state solution,” Kerry said. – [From Breitbart news.]

The Secretary of State admits he was “inarticulate.” And he proceeds to prove it daily.

We might have thought that was an unusual quality for America’s top diplomat. But in his statement trying to extricate himself from his most recent gaffe, the Secretary digs in deeper.

“I will not allow,” he says, anyone to question his commitment to Israel. Well, we certainly do question it. He is completely bound to the idea that Israel should make dangerous concessions to the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The PLO was listed by Kerry’s own State Department for decades as a terrorist organization.

Twenty years ago, this PLO outfit– which invented airline hijacking for terror purposes, which murdered Israel’s Olympic athletes in 1972 and assassinated our U.S. Ambassador Cleo Noel in 1973—was “legitimized” by our State Department on the basis of its supposed agreement to give up terrorism and recognize Israel.

The PLO has never kept its word. It has continued to incite hatred of Jews and Israelis almost without ceasing since the U.S. State Department began openly dealing with it.

The PLO was allowed to administer broad areas of Judea and Samaria, on the West Bank of the River Jordan. In these areas, no Jews may live and Christian Arabs are under daily threats of violence.

Still, Kerry and the State Department persist in the myth that the PLO is a proper “peace partner.” They refer to the PLO as the Palestinian Authority (PA). This fiction is based on Western notions of authority. But, strangely, the PA-PLO boss, Mahmoud Abbas, cancelled the scheduled 2009 elections. He has no plans to submit his rule to a vote of the people he claims to represent.

In our Civil War, elections were held regularly. In WWII, Franklin Roosevelt submitted his administration to regularly scheduled elections. During the Battle of Britain, the House of Commons sat daily. When their ancient chamber was bombed, they crossed over and met in the House of Lords. That’s what democracy looks like.

It’s nothing that we see in the PLO. The majority faction of the PLO is called Fatah, Arabic for “Islamic conquest.” No Jews may live under PLO rule. And Christians are finding it increasingly dangerous in their midst.

Secretary Kerry says Israel must live “side-by-side” with a PLO state. That’s theonly path to peace, he has decreed. Israel already lives side-by-side with a Hamas-ruled state. Gaza has been ruled by Hamas since 2007, since Western pressure forced Israel to evacuate all areas of the Gaza Strip.

How is that working out? So far, 10,000 rockets have been launched by Hamas against homes, villages, schools, hospitals, churches, and synagogues in Israel. Still, Sec. Kerry assures the world that creating another Terroristan is the only path to peace.

Mr. Kerry seems unaware that Mahmoud Abbas has brokered a cease-fire and a rapprochement—not with Israel—but with Hamas. Thus he shows the world the wolf fangs beneath the sheep’s wool. Everyone can see it except John Kerry and this administration

“I will not allow my commitment to Israel to be questioned by anyone…” says the Secretary. That’s a strange statement coming from the senior Cabinet officer of this Great Republic. American Secretaries of State have been the subject of controversy since Thomas Jefferson first held that post. Surely, Lincoln’s Secretary of State, William Seward, attracted no small amount of criticism. Harry Truman’s Dean Acheson and Dwight Eisenhower’s John Foster Dulles were mercilessly skewered in the press.

So, how does Kerry declare he will not allow his positions to be questioned?

Well, Mahmoud Abbas doesn’t allow criticism of his policies, either. Those Arab majority areas of Judea and Samaria on the West Bank of the River Jordan were once home to locally elected Arab mayors who sought to live in peace with Israel. These mayors were “kneecapped” (shot in the knees) by supporters of Mahmoud Abbas.

Is this the kind of “will not allow” democracy Mr. Kerry has in mind?

John Kerry may yearn for the days when Americans rallied behind our foreign policy, as articulated by our State Department. He may long for the time when “politics stopped at the water’s edge.” But that time is long gone in the Middle East. Pharaoh learned early that when dealing with the Children of Israel, politics does not stop at the water’s edge.

Ken Blackwell is a senior fellow at the Family Research Council and the American Civil Rights Union, and on the board of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.