{"id":531,"date":"2009-07-01T22:19:21","date_gmt":"2009-07-01T22:19:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/progressiverevival\/2009\/07\/president-obama-vs-illegal-wes.html"},"modified":"2009-07-01T22:19:21","modified_gmt":"2009-07-01T22:19:21","slug":"president-obama-vs-illegal-wes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/07\/president-obama-vs-illegal-wes.html","title":{"rendered":"President Obama vs. Illegal West Bank Settlements (I support the President)"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

It is time to get serious about stopping ALL Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank.\u00a0 <\/span>All moderate Americans and Israelis should rally behind President Obama\u00a0<\/span>in applying\u00a0pressure\u00a0on Netanyahu to stop these illegal settlements that are devastating both for Israeli security and Palestinian lives. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

President Obama made it clear in his address in Cairo to the Muslim world<\/a> that the settlements must stop (just as chaos and violence from the Palestinian side must stop) in order to build a sustainable peace. \u00a0In response the settlers made disrespectful Obama Huts<\/a>. \u00a0Given how much the United States gives in support of our ally Israel, and how the Israeli government is supporting the settlements it grieves me to think that these “Obama Huts” are being paid for by American taxpayers like me.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to Brit Tzedek vShalom The Jewish Alliance for Justice and Peace<\/a>\u00a0the settlements continue to be built:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak authorized the building of 300 new homes in the West Bank settlement of Talmon.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n


<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

No clearer statement could be made of Prime Minister Netanyahu’s intent to fight President Obama’s settlement policy.<\/b>\u00a0Netanyahu, in an effort to detract from the conversation, even went so far as to say: “I think that the more we spend time arguing about this, the more we waste time instead of moving towards peace.” In his talks with Secretary of State Clinton, Israeli Foreign Minister Lieberman said bluntly: “We cannot accept this vision absolutely, completely freezing these settlements. I think we must keep natural growth.”<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n


<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

Brit Tzedek vShalom has started a petition called “We’ve Got Your Back on the Settlement Freeze Mr. President”<\/a> and I encourage you to go sign it. \u00a0There will\u00a0 <\/span>be some who try to paint this pressure as “anti-Israel” – this is false.\u00a0 <\/span>Just as opposing the Iraq war was not anti-American, but instead\u00a0<\/span>a sound and correct assessment of foreign policy, so is opposing settlements a pro-Israel stance which looks towards the longtime welfare of a cherished friend of America.<\/span><\/p>\n

The stakes are very high. Whether they are built based on cynical realpolitik or isolationist scriptural literalism there is no time for settlement recklessness any more.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>Moderate\u00a0and progressive Israelis and Americans must rally behind President Obama and pressure Netanyahu to\u00a0permanently dismantle the\u00a0settlements in the West Bank.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It is time to get serious about stopping ALL Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank.\u00a0 All moderate Americans and Israelis should rally behind President Obama\u00a0in applying\u00a0pressure\u00a0on Netanyahu to stop these illegal settlements that are devastating both for Israeli security and Palestinian lives. \u00a0 President Obama made it clear in his address in Cairo to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-international-relations"],"yoast_head":"\nPresident Obama vs. Illegal West Bank Settlements (I support the President) - Progressive Revival<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/2009\/07\/president-obama-vs-illegal-wes.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"President Obama vs. Illegal West Bank Settlements (I support the President) - 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Paul B. Raushenbush is the moderator of the Progressive Revival blog and the Associate Dean of Religious Life at Princeton University. .An ordained American Baptist minister, Rev. Raushenbush speaks and preaches at colleges, churches and institutes around the country including the College of Preachers at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C., The Chautauqua Institute in upstate New York, and the New America Foundation. Rev. Raushenbush has served at Seattle First Baptist Church, the Presbyterian Chaplaincy at Columbia University and as College and Young Adult Minister at The Riverside Church in New York City. He has appeared on ABC World News Tonight and is a repeated guest on CNN. He has been quoted in The New York Times and The Washington Post and is a contributing editor for Beliefnet.com. His first book, Teen Spirit: One World, Many Faiths (HCI) was released in the Fall of 2004. He is the editor of the 100th Anniversary edition of Walter Rauschenbusch\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s book Christianity and the Social Crisis \u00e2\u20ac\u201c In the 21st Century (HarperOne). His work at Princeton includes strengthening the interfaith community on campus. He is the Co-Director of the Program on Religion, Diplomacy and International Relations at The Liechtenstein Institute on Self Determination at Princeton University. Rev. Raushenbush studied religion at Macalester College before attending Union Theological Seminary in New York City where he graduated with distinction.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/author\/praushenbush"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/531\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/progressiverevival\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}