Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Back to Opinion

Obama Is Israel’s Captain America

Apparently, all it took was a speech.

After Barack Obama’s address to the United Nations last week, in which he spent approximately two minutes telling the Israeli narrative in a way that satisfied certain Jewish ears (and, of course, opposing Palestinian statehood), he is suddenly in the good graces of the Israeli population for really the first time since his election. The man who once had an abysmal 4% approval rating, is now, according to a new Jerusalem Post poll thought by 54 percent of Jewish Israelis to have policies that are favorable to Israel, while 19 percent said they are pro-Palestinian. In the sad, zero-sum logic of the conflict, this means they like him.

But you didn’t need the polls. The whole tone of the way the mainstream Israeli media has covered Obama seems to have changed. Nahum Barnea, the country’s most respected columnist, mockingly called the president “Israel’s ambassador to the UN.”

And then there was the cover of Maariv’s weekend magazine. Enough said.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.