Democrats spurn Bush's remarks; was Obama the target?

JERUSALEM — President Bush took the occasion of Israel's 60th anniversary Thursday to denounce those who would negotiate with "terrorists and radicals," a remark widely interpreted as a rebuke to Sen. Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential contender, who has argued that the United States should talk directly with countries such as Iran and Syria.

Although Bush did not mention Obama in the speech to the Israeli Parliament, and White House officials said his remarks were not aimed at the senator, the president's pointed criticism appeared to be a veiled jab at Obama as well as at former President Carter, who last month met with senior officials of the radical Palestinian group Hamas in Syria.

Bush invoked World War II to make the case that talking to extremists was no different from appeasing Adolf Hitler and the Nazis.

"Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with the terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along," Bush said. "We have heard this foolish delusion before. As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if I could only have talked to Hitler, all this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is: the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history."

The senator's campaign fired back almost immediately, denouncing Bush for launching "a false political attack," adding, "George Bush knows that I have never supported engagement with terrorists, and the president's extraordinary politicization of foreign policy and the politics of fear do nothing to secure the American people or our stalwart ally Israel."

Other Democrats leapt to Obama's defense, among them Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, who accused Bush of taking politics overseas.

"The tradition has always been that when a U.S. president is overseas, partisan politics stops at the water's edge," Emanuel said. "President Bush has now taken that principle and turned it on its head."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said GOP presidential candidate John McCain should distance himself from Bush's remarks. McCain did the opposite: He questioned why Obama would "want to sit down with a state sponsor of terrorism." That prompted Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor to accuse McCain, who advocates civility in politics, of reaching "the height of hypocrisy."

White House press secretary Dana Perino said the comment was not a reference to Obama, and that Bush was simply reiterating his own long-standing views.

"I understand when you're running for office, you sometimes think the world revolves around you — that is not always true and it is not true in this case," Perino said.

Bush made the remarks in a speech in which he painted a picture of the future Middle East as a place of "tolerance and integration." He told the Israeli Parliament that the United States would stand by Israel in its fight against extremism, and predicted that in decades to come, Palestinians would "have the homeland they have long dreamed of and deserved."

As Israelis celebrate the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Israeli state — an event Palestinians were marking Thursday as the "nakba," or catastrophe, with rallies and the launch of thousands of black balloons — Bush did not use his time before the Knesset to discuss the differing Israeli and Palestinian versions of the events of 1948.

Nor did he address Israeli-Palestinian peace talks directly. He dismissed as "a tired argument" long-standing suggestions that America's ties to Israel were the root of its problems in the Middle East.

Thursday was the second day of Bush's five-day Middle East tour, which will take him to Saudi Arabia today and Egypt after that.

He spent Thursday morning with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert touring Masada, the ancient fortress overlooking the Dead Sea where Jewish rebels took their lives instead of surrendering to Roman forces.

At the site, Bush echoed the pledge made by thousands of Israeli soldiers. "At this historic site, Israeli soldiers swear an oath: 'Masada shall never fall again,' " he said. "Citizens of Israel: Masada shall never fall again, and America will always stand with you."

Material from USA Today and McClatchy Newspapers is included in this report.