President Barak Obama's choice for Secretary of Defense is veteran Senator Chuck Hagel of the Nebraska. It seems, however, that the confirmation process of Mr. Hagel is going to be tough and tricky. The Nebraska senator, who happens to be a Republican, is facing the strongest opposition from his fellow GOP lawmakers who see him as “soft” on Iran and not a strong “enough” supporter of Israel. They have accused him of being “very soft” on terror and called him an “appeaser” whose careful geopolitical style seems a threat to national security in the post Sept. 11 world. The Republican Party, particularly its hawkish wing, still cannot forget or forgive Mr. Hagel's criticism of the George W. Bush's campaign and invasion of Iraq. Mr. Hagel clearly expressed his doubt about the decision to invade Iraq and he turned out to be right at the end. Mr. Hagel managed, furthermore, to aggravate the same group by voicing his concerns against any military strike aimed at Iran and pushed for a dialogue between the US and Tehran instead. Mr. Hagel did not stop there. He did the grand daddy of all ‘faux pas' when he critized Israel, although in reality he only questioned the priorities of the American foreign policy vis-a-vis Israel and the influential Jewish lobby in Washington. All hell broke lose. A smear campaign was orchestrated and launched. An ugly severe attack on the man. Now the old wounds were opened up again. The Repulican-Jewish coalition, an important lobbying group headed by the influential American Jewish financier Sheldon Adelson, severely criticized Mr. Hagel's nomination. Elliot Abrams, an important figure in the Jewish community in the US and who once served as a national security adviser in the Bush administration during the Iraq war, has raised the criticism of Mr. Hagel to an even uglier level, he accused him of being “anti-Semite'' which is very typical of anyone attempting to question some of the politics of the state of Israel. Elliot Abrams further said that Mr. Hagel has “some of kind of problems with Jews” in a radio interview. Another Jewish lobby group, with strong ties to Israel joined the ugly campaign. The Emergency Committee For Israel, has run a TV attack that concluded by stating that Mr. Hagel is a wrong choice for the Pentagon. This is not to mention the conservative Neocon mouthpiece, the Weekly Standard and its editor-in-chief William Kristol who kept on repeating the same theme. Frankly if Mr. Hagel's decent record as a war veteran, his patriotic America-first stand and his skepticism toward the Bush-war policies managed to aggravate these “voices” that in themselves are a sufficient reason to approve his nomination immediately.
