Liz Cheney: Obama’s Language On Israel Goes ‘Much Further’ Than The Bush-Era Road Map For Peace.

When exactly did Liz Cheney become the public face of the Republican party? She really seems to be everywhere. It used to be that she was simply on her own, "Please don't put my daddy in jail" tour. But now it appears as if there is no subject on which she will not jump up and spout Republican nonsense.

The latest being that Obama's insistence that Israeli settlement building must stop in some way goes "much further" than the Road Map.

MITCHELL: Can you clarify at all a dispute some or among former Bush administration middle east experts and officials as to whether there was a secret promise or an agreement with Israel that Israel could proceed with settlement expansion to accommodate population growth?

CHENEY: It is a very complicated issue and the Road Map does talk about settlements. … But there’s the issue of, in existing settlements, if a family has a baby, are you allowed to build another room in the house? … I think there’s no question that this White House has gone much further in saying to the Israelis, “you must absolutely stop all of it.” And without, in my view, being as demanding of the Palestinians in terms of the security side of this equation.

The only problem I have with this is that Cheney is talking blatant nonsense. She is right that the Road Map does talk of settlements, but the notion that Obama has gone "much further" than the Road Map by forbidding "natural growth" is simply a big fat lie.

From the Road Map:

Consistent with the Mitchell Report, GOI freezes all settlement activity (including natural growth of settlements).

So, rather than go "much further" than the Road Map, Obama is actually insisting that Israel comply with the terms that they publicly agreed to.

And she is also utterly wrong when she claims that Obama is not being as tough on the Palestinians as he is on the Israelis.

From Obama's speech in Cairo:

Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and it does not succeed. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights. It was a peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals at the center of America’s founding. This same story can be told by people from South Africa to South Asia; from Eastern Europe to Indonesia. It’s a story with a simple truth: that violence is a dead end. It is a sign neither of courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That’s not how moral authority is claimed; that’s how it is surrendered.

The difference here is that Obama is being tough with both sides. And, unlike Bush, there will be no secret deals where one thing is said in private and another in public.

Hat tip to Think Progress.

Tags: Liz Cheney, Obama, Israel, Palestine