Obama on rack over Palestine ‘state’

President Barack Obama is losing friends at home over the Palestinian question, leading to an unseemly scramble as Republican rivals attempt to garner Jewish votes.

The White House is currently engaged in frantic diplomatic efforts to avert a push for statehood by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas at the United Nations in New York tomorrow.

But despite vowing to veto any such resolution, Mr Obama is taking flak from Republicans for “encouraging” the move in the first place through his Middle East policy.

Front-runners in the race to challenge him in next year’s American presidential election have accused the Democrat president of throwing “Israel under the bus” and “appeasing” terrorists.

Such accusation could be highly damaging to Mr Obama. Although relatively small, America’s Jewish community is both politically active and very influential.

Last week Mr Obama saw for himself what a Jewish backlash could do. At a special election in New York, the Democrats lost a seemingly safe congressional seat, which many believe was a direct result of Mr Obama’s Middle East stance.

The former democratic mayor of New York, Ed Koch, even endorsed Republican candidate Bob Turner, telling voters in Queens – which is mainly Jewish – to “send a message” to Mr Obama over the Palestinian issue.

The front-runner to become the Republican presidential hopeful, Texas governor Rick Perry, has jumped on the bandwagon. He wrote an article in the Jerusalem Post accusing Mr Obama of bowing to the Palestinians and distancing himself from Israel in a bid to engage Iran and Syria.

Yesterday, he upped the rhetoric further.

At a press conference in New York, Mr Perry hit out at Palestinian leaders and their “apologists” at the UN over the push for state recognition.

And he accused the White House of a “Middle Eastern policy of appeasement that has encouraged such an ominous act of bad faith” by the Palestinians.

He added: “Simply put, we would not be here at the precipice of such a dangerous move if the Obama policy in the Middle East wasn’t naive, and arrogant, misguided and dangerous.”

He continued: “The Obama policy of moral equivalency, which gives equal standing to the grievances of Israelis and Palestinians, including the orchestrators of terrorism, is a very dangerous insult.”

Not to be outdone, Mr Perry’s main rival for the Republican candidacy, Mitt Romney, also came out swinging. In a statement, the former Massachusetts governor said: “What we are watching unfold at the UN is an unmitigated diplomatic disaster.

“It is the culmination of president Obama’s repeated efforts over three years to throw Israel under the bus and undermine its negotiating position. That policy must stop now.”