John Bolton: Obama’s U.N. Speech Touched on Reality ‘Only Occasionally’

‘He said nothing new ... but the president did take the opportunity to slam Israel’

BOLTON: “Well, I thought was a stunningly abstract and ethereal speech, really touching on reality only occasionally, and nowhere was that better demonstrated than in the president’s lengthy discussion of Islamic extremism. And I think that was the main news coming out of this. This is the longest treatment the president has ever given to the sources of terrorism, and I think there was a lot of very good analysis about the causes of it, he did lay it out very clearly. But what was stunning was that having laid out the problem, his recommendation was that the solution to Islamic extremism was negotiation and understanding and generational changes … The president did take the opportunity to slam Israel by saying that the situation in Gaza, in the West Bank is not sustainable, implying more pressure on Israel to resolve those issues with the Palestinians.”

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