The White House stated in a letter to Congressional leaders that it has reasonable evidence that Syrian President Bashar Assad used chemical weapons, but Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel told reporters it was only on a “small scale.”

The letter confirms a statement two days ago by Israel’s military intelligence officer Gen. Itan Brun that the nerve gas sarin was used. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry refused to accept the informant as fact, particularly since Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu did not “confim” the information in an ensuing telephone conversation.

President Barack Obama is in no hurry to carry out his promise that if Assad were to cross the red line and use the mass destruction weapons, a horrid war crime, he would order the American military to intervene militarily in the two-year-old civil war.

He presumably does not want to take military action unless he has solid and 100 percent certain evidence to show the world. The United States has been burned enough by getting stuck into wars and paying the price with the lives of American soldiers, but this time around, it may be burned by not having intervened to stop one of the worst imaginable war crimes.

Rebels have posted on the Internet, on at least three occasions the past three months, pictures of children and adults with burns from chemical weapons.

Hagel told reporters in the United Arab Emirates that “our intelligence community does assess, with varying degrees of confidence, that the Syrian regime has used chemical weapons on a small scale in Syria, specifically, the chemical agent sarin.”

Kerry said that the administration believes Assad used chemical weapons twice. Only twice.

All indications are that the “red line” is actually only orange.

The problem is that by the time the American government comes up with its proof, Assad may have deformed or killed dozens, or hundreds or thousands of more of his people.

The White House letter warns, “Precisely because the President takes this issue so seriously, we have an obligation to fully investigate any and all evidence of chemical weapons use within Syria.” It was signed by Miguel Rodriguez, director of the Office of Legislative Affairs.

The letter was sent to Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Carl Levin, D-Mich., after they and other senators asked the White House for answers on the chemical weapons question.

An indication of the U.S. government’s desire to see things other than they are can be found in an editorial in Wednesday’s New York Times, which often acts as a non-official member of the Obama Cabinet.

Under the headline “Were Chemical Weapons Used in Syria?” the editorial stated that although it is easily imagine bale that Assad would gas his own people, “There is no proof that he has done so…. The case against Mr. Assad, so far, is thin.

“Experts say the best way to prove that chemical weapons have been used is to collect soil samples promptly at the site and examine suspected victims. That’s hard to do in a war zone, and, so far, Israel, Britain and France have not offered physical proof “

The editorial calls for “a coordinated investigation…to see whether the charges by Israel, Britain and France hold water.”

The newspaper is correctly worried about a repeat of history, recalling American intervention in Iraq on the wrong assumption that Saddam Hussein had a nuclear weapons program.

But there also are other lessons from history than can be noted.

The United States knew that Hitler was exterminating Jews. But did it have proof?

Are countries bound to treat moral issues as legal cases at the cost of genocide?

It was a no brainer: Gen. Itai Baron, head of the research division at IDF Military Intelligence, told the annual conference of the Institute for National Security Studies on Tuesday about the the Syrian government’s repeated use of chemical weapons.

He said photographs of the victims in Syria show foam coming out of their mouths, which he and his staff at Military Intelligence identified as the result of a chemical attack.

“To the best of our professional understanding, the regime has used lethal chemical weapons on a number of occasions, including the incident on March 19,” he said.

On 19 March 2013, the Syrian government and the Syrian rebels accused each other of using chemical weapons in an attack in the province of Aleppo. Reports of the event indicated that between 15 and 40 died. A Reuters photographer reported the gas had a “chlorine like smell” and said that he saw victims suffocating. The Syrian rebels say the chemical agent was delivered via a SCUD missile. Reuters photographs show images of government soldiers injured in the attack. But senior American officials said that the rebels don’t possess the means to launch chemical weapons.

All of the above is not good enough for the U.S. Administration. According to the NY Times, it is still waiting for the results of “an exhaustive analysis of soil, hair and other material to determine whether chemical warfare agents have been used.”

And then, even if that investigation proves the use of chemicals, a U.S. official told the Times, “the White House must determine who used them and whether they were used deliberately or accidentally.”

He did not offer a timetable for that process.

The whole world knows the Syrians have five chemical weapons production facilities, two of which are next door to missile launching sites (al-Safira and Hama). And by now the whole world is convinced Syria has been using those weapons on its own civilians. So what’s the catch? Why are Sec. John Kerry and Sec. Chuck Hagel hell bent on denying the obvious truth?

Because President Obama has told the world he would send American troops in, should Syria use chemical weapons.

He obviously directed his warning at President Assad, to make sure the latter understands America means business this time. He was wagging his finger, he wasn’t actually planning to make good on his warning. President Obama really doesn’t need another war on his hands.

He did not expect the rather savvy Assad to dare him on his statement. Now he’s stuck with the whole world watching. So, if he can’t change his warning, the only thing left to change is reality.

Which is why both his lieutenants, Kerry and Hagel, are working overtime to spread doubt about the validity of the evidence and the analysis. Hagel even put down the source of the analysis, Israel, wondering how come the Israelis hadn’t told him about it when he was there.

Because they didn’t think he had to be told, they were pretty sure he already knew. They also didn’t tell him about the thing with the sun going down come 7 o’clock, and he still managed to prepare for all the darkness that followed.

“It is precisely because this is a red line that we have to establish with airtight certainty that this happened,” the official told the Times.

But the UN is not allowed to send a team into Syria to take soil samples from the site, and certainly not to inspect the chemical facilities – so where is the U.S. going to get its “airtight certainty?”

It won’t. Because President Obama is not prepared to send troops into Syria—and I don’t blame him for it, I think only a fool would jeopardize American lives when we’re perfectly happy to see the Syrians killing each other with impunity. So the Administration will not be confused by the fact, please stop trying.

Except that from Israel’s point of view this is the ultimate test case. It’s got a red line, it’s got a criminal Arab regime, it’s got professional analysis, it’s got pictures. let’s face it, by the time—possibly this coming June—Iran will be ready with an operational nuclear bomb to be mounted on an operational long rage missile, Israel will be able to offer a whole lot less as evidence.

You think we’re making this up? Well, somebody made this up, but not us. Somebody got a hold of the video of President Obama’s March 4 speech to the “Zionist cabal,” also known as AIPAC, and noticed – how could they not – that one of President Obama’s shape-shifting body guards, a lizard-humanoid, let go of his human shape for a brief moment, exposing to the world his truly hideous alien form.

We repeat: the alleged shape-shifter is not Israeli President Shimon Peres, sitting up front, but some unnamed White House body guard from a neighboring planet. We’re not saying President Peres is or is not a shape-shifter, only that he isn’t shifting in this well documented scene.

The text-to-speech program narrator tells you all about it with the certainty of a GPS program plowing away minutes after your car has gone into the lake.

The bald-headed secret service agent acts strangely, looking to his right and to his left incessantly and almost mechanically, then totally shape-shifts into a reptile. Or not. How many shape-shifters have you seen to compare with this one?

The video was shot by JN1, a Jewish news service, which probably hadn’t been told by the Jewish cabal to keep their lenses off the alien shape-shifters.

Anyway, the video has gone seriously viral, with close to 3 million views. I believe this week humanity has gone just a little more stupid, possibly because we’re all oxygen deprived.

President Barack Obama once again will hold a Passover Seder in the White House, perhaps a bit more serious than year’s National Jewish Democratic Council’s ego-centric desecration of the Four Questions, which his aides re-invented to glorify the Commander in Chief.

After “Preacher Obama’s” revival appearance in Israel, he is likely to take more seriously the Passover Seder tradition this year and is even more likely to come up with his own interpretations and meaning of the Seder.

For a man who had the chutzpah to tell synagogue worshippers in Florida during his 2008 presidential campaign that he is “blessed,” as indicated by his name “Baruch” that he said means “Blessed” in Hebrew, he will have no trouble in skipping over 2,000 years of Talmudic study of the Exodus of the Jewish People that led us to Mount Sinai and eventually to the Land of Israel.

Somehow, he will dig into the deeper meaning of Passover and declare that God brought the Jews to Israel to divide the homeland and give most of it to the Palestinian Authority, whose Muslim clerics also have done a nifty job of rewriting ancient Bible. According to them, the Binding of Yitzchak (Isaac) is the wrong version, and it was Ishmael who was bound. If you believe that, then of course the Holy Temples never existed and the Western Wall was Mohammed’s hitching post.

The problem with President Obama’s annual Seder ceremony, as evidenced by his “I believe” Hallelujah speech in Jerusalem, is that he truly does believe he knows better than anyone else, certainly better than Israelis, better than Arabs and better than Talmudic sages.

We would be better off if he were to run a repeat performance of last year’s travesty, when the “Four Questions, designed to educate Jewish children about the Seder, turned into a mockery of the president’s intelligence.

In case anyone forgets, the questions posed by the National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC) were: Why has President Obama provided record amounts of military aid to Israel?”; “Why has President Obama worked so hard and succeeded at uniting the world against Iran’s illicit nuclear weapons program?”; “Why has President Obama achieved the historic passage of ‘Obamacare’”?; and, “Why has President Obama fought to strengthen Medicare and Medicaid?”

Commentary Magazine’s Jonathan Tobin wrote last year, “Passover is the occasion for Jews to remember their liberation from Egypt and to embrace not only the gift of freedom but also the ability to worship God and His laws as a people.

”While Seders are appropriate moments to remember those in need as well as other Jewish communities — such as that in Israel — which are assailed by foes, it is not the time to be delivering obsequious paeans to American politicians, no matter which party they belong to. That sort of absurd distortion of the festival of freedom bears a closer resemblance to idol worship than it does to Judaism.”

President Obama is not paying any attention to Tobin. In his pre-Passover sermon at the Jerusalem Convention Center last Thursday, he said, “The Seder… is a story about finding freedom in your own land. For the Jewish people, this story is central to who you have become. But it is also a story that holds within it the universal human experience, with all of its suffering and salvation. It is a part of the three great religions – Judaism, Christianity, and Islam – that trace their origins to Abraham, and see Jerusalem as sacred….

“To African-Americans, the story of the Exodus told a powerful tale about emerging from the grip of bondage to reach for liberty and human dignity – a tale that was carried from slavery through the civil rights movement.”

After invoking a quote by Martin Luther King relating to Moses and Joshua, President Obama continued to the next obvious step – the Palestinian Authority.

President Obama’s inevitable reference to the Palestinian cause when he sits down for his version of the Seder with 20 chosen guests this week will be accompanied by everything that is totally the opposite of the message of the Seder, and that is materialism.

The matzah is the simplest of foods, unleavened bread. Jew lived on Manna during their sojourn in the desert. No cheeseburgers, no ice cream and not even meat, except for the plague that swept the Jews when they demanded meat and the quickly became sorry for what they wished.

Do you remember “Kremlinology,” the study of what was actually going on behind the walls of the Soviet citadel? Experts would scrutinize photos of Soviet officials to see who was standing closest to the leaders, who had moved farther away, or, ominously, who was not present at all. Since the Soviets were not exactly transparent about their policies, a known ‘hawk’ moving closer to party chiefs might signal a threat.

A free society is expected to be more transparent. Officials should announce policies, which are more or less the policies that the government then tries to carry out.

But in the America of today — and particularly with regard to Middle East policy — this is not the case. At least the pro-Israel community finds it necessary to microscopically examine the behavior of important officials, to try to determine what the administration intends. At times like this — immediately preceding the presidential visit to Israel — speculation reaches a high pitch. We find ourselves engaged in Obaminology.

There are some simple methods that can be employed. First, what doesn’t work: it is usually a waste of time to listen to the President’s actual words. As we can see by his recent comments to “Jewish leaders” and to representatives of American Arab organizations, he will tell his audiences what they want to hear. Such statements are carefully calibrated so that they will be technically true but either vacuous or open to multiple interpretations.

One useful technique is to look at the “friendly” media. For example, the New York Times often presents the official line or floats trial balloons for the administration. And the Times has run no less than four anti-Israel op-eds or stories in the past seven days: the Joseph Levine piece arguing that Israel did not have the right to exist as a Jewish state (which I commented on here); an op-ed by Columbia professor and Palestinian apologist Rashid Khalidi which claims the U.S. has enabled Israel’s “apartheid” policies; a long story in the magazine by Ben Ehrenreich, blaming the IDF and ‘settlers’ for provoking “resistance” by saintly Arab residents of Nabi Saleh; and a front-page news story by bureau chief Jodi Rudoren critical of Israel for allowing Jews to live in what she calls “Arab East Jerusalem.”

All of these articles had this in common: they are intended to reduce sympathy for Israel, to establish the ‘Palestinian’ narrative of both historical and current events, and to weaken the Jewish one.

This is nothing new for the Times, but the concentration of coverage makes one wonder. And it is not only the Times: this weekend NPR presented an interview with Khalidi making the same points as his op-ed.

If the President’s words are not useful in sniffing out his intentions, his actions are. Wednesday, President Obama will be visiting Israel, where he will snub the democratically elected Knesset by speaking at a nearby convention center, unlike Presidents Carter, Clinton and Bush, who chose to speak at Israel’s parliament. This is apparently because of the unprecedented lengths to which the Obama Administration has gone to deny Israel’s sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem. To add insult to injury, students from one of Israel’s accredited universities — the one that happens to be located in Ariel, east of the armistice line — were left out of the invitations offered to students at other universities.

I believe that the administration believes that it has set all of its ducks in a row for the upcoming visit. I do not believe that it will be “merely a photo-op,” as some have suggested, because Obama has no need for a photo-op today. The visit is costly and complicated, and will have objectives that the President and his advisers think are important.

It has also been suggested that the President will concentrate on issues involving Iran and the Syrian civil war rather than the question of the Palestinian Arabs. But this is not what is implied by the media offensive and the deliberate snub of Israel’s parliament and government.

Obaminology tells us that these objectives will be related to the ongoing effort to force Israel to withdraw from Judea, Samaria and eastern Jerusalem. Probably there will be renewed pressure to freeze construction east of the armistice lines, including Jerusalem. It would not surprise me if support for Israel in possible future actions against Iran were conditioned on concessions in the Palestinian arena.

Visit Fresno Zionism.

The White House wasted ho time in expressing dissatisfaction with Israel’s new Ministry of Housing Uri Ariel, one day after he took office. Ariel said there will be no change in policies and that construction for Jews will continue in Judea and Samaria as in the past.

White House spokesman Jay Carney told reporters at a press briefing Monday that building for Jews anywhere in “settlements’ is a “unilateral action.”

“Well, I don’t have anything specific on that particular announcement, except what our general position is, is that unilateral actions that make it more difficult to engage – to resume face-to-face negotiations, direct negotiations, are not things that we view favorably.,” Carney said. “And that was true of unilateral efforts at the United Nations by the Palestinians, and it’s been true of actions by the Israelis.

“It is in our view and it’s the position of the Israeli leadership that a two-state solution is the preferred goal here for both Israelis and Palestinians, and that all of us who are party to that process, but in particular the Israelis and Palestinians, ought to take steps that enhance the prospect of progress. But beyond that, I haven’t gotten any specific reaction.”

Along with that response, Carney said that President Barack Obama is coming to Israel with a message of “the unshakeable commitment the United States has to Israel’s security.”

U.S. President Barack Obama has decided not to address the Knesset during his visit to Israel next week. Senior U.S. officials said that, after long deliberations and discussions, the White House decided that the president will address students from universities in Israel at the ICC (Binyaney Ha’uma) in Jerusalem.

That initial snub did not go unnoticed. The Prime Minister’s Office and a number of Knesset members passed messages to the White House saying they would be much happier if the speech took place in the Knesset. But senior U.S. officials have insisted that Obama decided to deliver his messages directly to the Israeli public, especially the younger generation, not just to politicians in the Knesset.

Has the president been following the recent changes in the Knesset? Many of the new elected MKs wouldn’t know a politician if they ran one over on their mountain bikes. But, obviously, Obama does not think much of national institutions in third world countries, or he wouldn’t be spending so much treasure overturning them.

On Tuesday it turned out that the White House has little respect for Israeli academic institutions as well. According to Reshet Bet, almost all of Israel’s universities received invitations to hear the president’s speech in the big hall in Jerusalem – with the noted exception of Ariel University.

Habayit Hayehudi MK Yoni Chetboun revealed this latest snub to Reshet Bet Wednesday morning, saying this was unacceptable, as Ariel is an officially accredited university, and its students—Jews and Arabs—are part of the Israeli public.

Ariel has over 600 Arab students, as well as the largest number Ethiopian university students in all of Israel.

The White House has refused to comment on Obama’s refusal to endow with his message of hope and peace Israelis who go to school on the wrong side of the “green line.”

MK Chetboun called on Ariel students to come greet President Obama outside the national auditorium in Jerusalem, if only to prove to him that they, too, exist.

According to recent news stories, the U.S. embassy (in Tel Aviv) is in charge of sending out the invitations to some 2000 Israelis, as well as 300 members of the press. It is possible, then, that the boycott against Ariel was not necessarily conceived in Washington, but right here, on Hayarkon Street on the shore of the Mediterranean.

Perhaps the White House will clarify this later today.

For the second time in office, US President Barack Obama has used a Hanukkah menorah from a hurricane-ravaged area to conduct the official White House Hanukkah celebration.

The 90-year old, seven-foot brass menorah was brought from the Conservadox Temple Israel in Long Beach, NY, one of the religious items which was not destroyed in Hurricane Sandy, according to a report by JTA.  It was untouched by the elements due to its location on an upper floor of the synagogue.

The menorah used by the Obama administration in 2010 came from a New Orleans synagogue ravaged by Hurricane Katrina.

“This 90-year-old menorah survived, and I am willing to bet it will survive another 90 years, and another 90 years after that,” Obama was quoted by JTA as saying before the lighting of the candles Thursday night at the White House Chanukah party. “So tonight, it shines as a symbol of perseverance, and as a reminder of those who are still recovering from Sandy’s destruction — a reminder of resilience and hope and the fact that we will be there for them as they recover.”

Jarrod Bernstein, Director of Jewish Outreach at the White House, chose the menorah for the lighting ceremony during a family visit in New York, where he formerly served under Mayor Michael Bloomberg as a community outreach official.  His wife, Democratic National Committee Finance Director Hildy Kuryk, recommended finding a menorah from a NY synagogue hit by Hurricane Sandy.

“The story of what’s going on there — the rededication and re-sanctification of these communities, there’s definitely a correlation” with Chanukah, Bernstein was quoted as saying.

Temple Israel has reportedly sustained $5 million in damage, only a portion of which will be covered by insurance.