Naturally, the UN Security Council, which always stands at the ready to condemn Israel, responded to Turkey’s call with a first draft of a resolution attacking Israel for defending itself.  As it happens, the draft resolution isn’t so bad, for a relentlessly anti-Israel organization (and I’m talking here about the UN, not the Obama administration).  But the UN would be worthless if it weren’t the primary tool for Israel’s isolation from the rest of the world.  (Giving Gaza free access to Iranian arms, or the West Bank a state, isn’t going to change that, no matter what this administration thinks.)

…

The Turks, who had held down NATO’s southern flank and, through Ataturk’s modernism, were the model for what a Muslim state could be, is back to being what Muslim states usually are.  It’s moved from a tactical alliance with Israel and knocking on the Gates of Brussels, to a strategic alliance with Iran and Russia, and calling up the battering rams to the gates of Jerusalem.

So much for moderate Islamism.

…

Far from representing the failure of Zionism, as Peter Beinart’s column would have us believe, this weekend’s events should point out the failure of liberalism.  The moral difference between Israel and its enemies has rarely been more clear.  It’s been the left that has defined public education, college education, and most of the public debate in the west for 40 years.  If liberals are turning against Israel, if the west is doing so, it’s because liberals have defined morality not as virtuous action, but as weakness.

The following is being cited by administration apologists as proof that Israeli nuclear scientists are not being denied visas:

QUESTION: Can I go back to Israel for a second – non nuclear? Well, actually it’s – actually it’s somewhat nuclear. There’s a report in an Israel newspaper that says that the U.S. is denying visas to Israeli nuclear scientists who want to come to the States. Can you say anything about that?

MR. CROWLEY: Without commenting on individual visa determinations which are governed by the Privacy Act, we continue to issue visas to Israeli scientists, including nuclear scientists, on a regular basis. We’ve actually improved processing times for visas for scientific exchanges with Israel. So there’s been – it has been suggested there’s been a policy change. There has not been a policy change. And we continue to support exchanges with the Israeli scientific and academic communities.

QUESTION: So this report is wrong?

MR. CROWLEY: To the extent the report is that we’ve stopped providing visas to Israeli scientists as a whole, that report is wrong.

This mis-states the problem. It’s not ‘Israeli scientists as a whole,” or even “Israeli nuclear scientists,” it’s Israeli nuclear scientists working at Dimona.  The former would be unmistakably a generalized academic and professional boycott.  The latter would be a specific, unmistakable message about Israel’s nuclear program.

According to Ma’ariv, the administration is now denying visas to Israeli nuclear scientists associated with the Dimona research facility:

Israel’s Dimona nuclear reactor’s employees have told Israel’s Maariv daily that they have been having problems recently getting visas to the United States where they have for years attended seminars in  Chemistry, Physics and Nuclear Engineering. They also complain of being treated in an ‘insulting manner’ by President Obama’s people. Until recently, employees of the Nuclear Research Center routinely traveled to the United States for seminars and courses.

But reactor employees also complain of an American refusal to sell them reactor components that have routinely been sold to them by the United States.

At the same time, the administration is prepared to allow Turkey and Egypt hijack a conference aimed at nuclear non-proliferation to terrorists with demands that Israel sign the non-proliferation treaty.  Prime Minister Netanyahu has canceled a planned trip to Washington over the decision, apparently in violation of previous administration assurances (expiration date, April 8, 2010), with Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor leading the delegation instead.

Some of us have feared that the price of administration action against Iran’s nuclear program would be administration action against Israel’s.  The pretext for such a position would, of course, be garnering Islamic support for moves against Iran, as though the Arabs and Turkey weren’t equally worried about Iran getting a bomb.  Naturally, they see an opportunity to use administration disdain for Israel to score a major diplomatic victory.  Since an Iranian bomb would pose an existential threat to many of these regimes, they would seem to be gambling that 1) the administration will crack, and act against Iran even with Israel signing the NPT, or 2) that Israel will crack, and make its program open to international inspection.

UPDATE: The White House is denying that there has been a change in visa policy.  Value White House denials accordingly.