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Sheera Frenkel in Jerusalem
President Obama’s push for peace in the Middle East has provoked the ire of right-wing Israelis, who have launched a campaign against his initiative with the slogan “No you can’t”.
The words are a play on the “Yes we can” campaign that propelled Mr Obama into the White House.
As George Mitchell, the US President’s special envoy to the Middle East, arrived in Jerusalem yesterday he was confronted by a growing campaign against Mr Obama’s push for a halt to the construction of Jewish settlements in the West Bank.
One poster depicted Mr Obama in a Palestinian keffiyeh headscarf; <span style="font-weight: bold">others made sure his full name — Barack Hussein Obama — was highlighted</span>.
One activist condemned Mr Obama as America’s most anti-Semitic president. The protest follows Mr Obama’s landmark speech in Cairo, in which he reiterated his support for a Palestinian state. Israeli officials say that the new US Administration is on a collision course with Israel and that relations between the longtime allies have soured to their worst point in more than a decade.
<span style="font-weight: bold">Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli Prime Minister, has said that he will respond to the US stance in a speech on Sunday</span>.