There is no other American president that has been so unfriendly toward Israel than President Barack Obama, says Middle East expert Joshua Muravchik.
"President Obama is the least friendly American president toward Israel perhaps ever, or at least since Eisenhower," Muravchik told J.D. Hayworth on "America's Forum" on
Newsmax TV Wednesday.
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"Eisenhower was actually pretty cool toward Israel but maybe at a less tense and crucial moment," he explained.
Obama seems to be following the lead of the rest of the world, he contends.
"Globally, much of the world, most of the world has turned its back on Israel," Muravchik said.
"The United States has been Israel's staunch defender," he added. And "polls show that the American people are still very strongly supportive of Israel."
However, "this administration has not been," which sends a dangerous message to Israel's enemies.
"When the rest of the world hears the White House and the State Department making harsh criticisms of Israel . . . then Israel's most shrill detractors around the globe take that as a green light to get that ever more vociferous in their attacks on Israel," the Middle East expert explained.
Muravchik's latest book released in July is
"Making David into Goliath: How the World Turned Against Israel." He is also a fellow at Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.
He says that he agrees with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that
"Iran is a terrible threat."
"It is really the original source of Islamic extremism," he explained. "Islamic extremism was a peripheral phenomenon until Ayatollah Khamenei took over Iran and harnessed the resources and power of that nation to the cause of a new caliphate Islamic revolution around the world."
"That's what's driven all of this that we're dealing with — al-Qaida, ISIS, etc.," Muravchik contends.
"The prospect that Iran will become a nuclear weapons state, which is very real and which it's not clear if Obama really wants to stop, would bring us into a whole new terrifying era," he added.