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By J. Zel Lurie
 DELRAY BEACH, Florida—“What has Obama accomplished in five months?” my Republican neighbor asked disdainfully,
It will be six months when this column sees the light of day. But five months or six months it’s the wrong question.
The correct question is where would we be of John McCain had defeated Barack Obama. I shudder to contemplate the answer.
Our economy was heading down in a fast spin. Anticipating a devastating crash the stock market had decreased an overwhelming 40 percent. The insurance industry was collapsing. The automobile industry was in shambles. We were heading for a long and deep depression.
The fall was stopped by Obama in midair. A slow recovery is beginning. That is what President Obama and his young staff have accomplished by hard work in eighty hour weeks in six months.
On foreign affairs Obama has passed his first “summit meeting” with Russia, the second great power. Hampered by inheriting George Bush’s support for Georgia and the Ukraine in their disputes with Russia and a cold war remnant, the missile defense system we are building in Europe, Obama still established excellent relations with President
Medvedev.
Obama and Medvedev are the same generation and they found a lot to talk about at dinner the first night and lunch the next day. On the second night of the two-day visit to Moscow, Prime minister Putin more or less snubbed him. Known as a night owl, who is not accustomed to morning business meeting, Putin invited the Americans to breakfast instead of a state dinner.
The breakfast lasted for two hours, an hour of which was devoted to a lecture by Putin on Russia and the world.
A section of Putin’s history must have been devoted to the Soviet incursion into Afghanistan. It was defeated by the CIA’s arming of the future Taliban with sting surface-to-air missiles which brought down the Russian aircraft. Remember “Charlie Wilson’s War.”
Obama’s reward for listening to the CIA’s errors was the most important result of the summit. Russia is now on our side in Afghanistan. Obama secured Russia’s agreement for American planes to fly over Russia to supply our troops in Afghanistan.
The press trumpeted the agreement to renew the treaty limiting the number of nuclear warhead on each side which expires in December. The new treaty will reduce the number of a warheads by 25 percent from about 2,000 to about 1,500.
On Sunday July 5, the day Obama flew to Russia, The New York Times featured on its front page an essay which Obama had published 26 years ago in a Columbia literary journal. Obama, who was then a Columbia student, called for the elimination of all nuclear warheads, each of which can destroy a city.
This is till Obama’s goal. He has announced that after the new treaty is signed and ratified on December he will work on a further reduction. While there are nine countries known to have nuclear capabilities, 95 percent of the warheads are owned by United States and Russia.
Now let’s talk about Obama and Israel.
Israeli public opinion has changed several times in the last twenty-six years. Maintaining the same goal for twenty-six years is not Israel’s way. Twenty-six years ago I was told by a Maariv editor that a Palestine state would be a causus belli.
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Israel would go to war to destroy it. Today the majority of Israelis favor a Palestine state as the best security for Israel.
George Mitchell, who has been charged by President Obama and Secretary of State Clinton to seek out peace, has been working with Minister of Defense Ehud Barak to find a way for the Israel Government to obey Mitchell’s demand to freeze settlement building.
Meanwhile, Mitchell’s competent staff has been lobbying key ministers in Israel’s sprawling government. The results can be seen in recent Israel government actions.
Mark Rogev, government spokesman, met with members of the foreign press. He said once again that Israel was ready to negotiate with the Palestine authority “without preconditions.” He then laid down three conditions.
1. The Palestinians must recognize Israel as a Jewish state. The Palestinian reply is we will negotiate with the government of Israel. What Israel calls itself is their business.
And they might also be thinking: Israel calls itself a democracy. Twenty percent of its citizens are Palestinians. How is it that Avigdor Liebeman, who received 12 percent of the vote on a campaign of hate for the Palestinians, is the foreign minister while the 20 percent of Palestinians are not represented at all in the oversized cabinet of thirty ministers and deputies?
2. To protect Israel’s security, the Palestine state must be demilitarized. This is the wrong way to protect Israel’s security. It substitutes demeaning words for useful actions.
The fact is that under the supervision of U.S. General Drayton, with a green light from the Israel Army, the Palestinians are building a large and efficient security force. More and more Palestinian youth are going to Jordan for training in this force, which has already taken over security from the Israel army in three Palestinian cities.
As it grows it will take over from the Israel Army more and more of the West Bank. This is the security force that the Israel negotiators must deal with to secure a demilitarized state -- no warplanes or heavy tanks -- without raising the dander of the proud Palestinians.
3. Prosperity. Regev said quite rightly that a secure peace depends on a prosperous nation and Israel is taking steps to revive Palestine life.
These steps were announced on Wednesday July 8 in a government press release which said that that morning Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had “convened the Ministerial Committee on Improving the Economic Situation of the Palestinian Residents of Judea and Samaria.”
Minister Silvan Shalom briefed the committee on three long term projects. funded by foreign governments, which are being revived after being frozen for years.
1. An industrial zone near Bethlehem for tourism and services funded by France.
2. A major industrial zone in Islameh near Jenin funded by Germany,
3. A zone in Jericho for the processing and export of agricultural products, funded by Japan.
Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon reported on the large-sale removal of checkpoints “due to the position of the international community and world opinion.”
The Jewish Journal (of South Florida) is part of world opinion. Imagine the Israeli foreign office and the Israeli Army paying attention to the opinions of this ancient columnist.
And Israel listening to world opinion is a direct result of Barack Obama defeating John McCain.
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