U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel assured Israel on Monday that the Obama administration is committed to preserving and improving the Jewish state's military edge in the Middle East.
Hagel, on his first visit to Israel as Pentagon chief, also declared that it is Israel's right to decide for itself whether to attack Iran to stop it from building a nuclear bomb.
Those two messages appeared to form the foundation of Hagel's effort to improve U.S. relations with Israel, which have been strained in recent years by obstacles to reviving Israeli-Palestinian peace talks and by the threat of an Iranian bomb.
Later, Hagel was flown in an Israeli Army UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter over northern Israel to view the Golan Heights, an area along the Syrian border that Israel captured during the 1967 Six-Day War.
TVNL Comment: There goes any hope of an 'even handed' approach in the region. Same old, same old.....
The fragile truce in Gaza faced its first major test on Sunday after Israel alleged Hamas...
A brazen robbery at the Louvre Museum in Paris Sunday morning has left investigators searching for...
Ukraine sees its EU membership bid advancing before the end of this year thanks to “creative...
Colombia’s president accused U.S. officials of murder in a military campaign that has targeted alleged drug...
