By CHARLES HURT in Jerusalem and ANDY SOLTIS in New York
Last updated: 8:38 am
July 24, 2008
Posted: 3:46 am
July 24, 2008
Barack Obama paid a solemn predawn visit to Judaism's holiest site today, bowing his head in prayer at the Western Wall.
He 5 a.m. visit was unannounced by the campaign, although dozens of people were waiting for his arrival.
Wearing a white yarmulke, Obama was escorted by the Rabbi of the Wall, Shmuel Rabinovich.
As the rabbi quietly read Psalm 122, both he and Obama flipped through a holy book on a wooden stand. Some 10 yards away, a heckler repeatedly hollered, "Obama, Jerusalem is not for sale!"
Afterward, Obama placed a personal note between the stone cracks, with his prayers or wishes left behind along with hundreds of others. Then he placed his hand on the Wall, bowed his head and stood quietly for a few moments.
The heckler continued his chant, but others tried to drown him out, yelling out, "Obama!" and rushing to shake his hand.
The visit lasted about 10 minutes. Obama then left for the airport to fly to Europe for stops in Germany, France and England before returning home over the weekend.
The visit to the Wall was the last stop on a whirlwind tour of Israel that included a Holocaust memorial, meetings with top leaders and a solidarity trip to an embattled border town.
The presumed Democratic nominee talked tough on Iran, praised Israel as a "miracle," and promised the Palestinians during a stop in the West Bank that he wouldn't wait until "my second term" to get the Mideast peace process moving.
As he raced from event to event, Obama spent his time trying to make friends rather than news.
Wearing a white and blue tie, the colors of the Israeli flag, he first met with a wide variety of Israeli officials. They included Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, opposition leader Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.
He complimented Israeli President Simon Peres, 84, on his youthful appearance and told him that the Jewish state is a "miracle that has blossomed" over 60 years.
Next was a visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum, a must-stop for visiting dignitaries, where Obama laid a wreath and lit a memorial flame.
"Despite this record of monumental tragedy, this ultimately is a place of hope," he said.
Yesterday afternoon, Obama was driven by motorcade past Israeli checkpoints and rows of armed Palestinian police to the West Bank for an hourlong meeting with US-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said Obama told Abbas he would not "waste a minute" before getting involved in the Mideast peace process.
Later, in a jab at President Bush's efforts to wrap up a peace pact before he leaves office, Obama said he wouldn't "wait a few years into my term or my second term if I'm elected" to press for a deal.
Obama then flew to Sderot, the southern Israeli town that is regularly pounded by homemade rockets fired from the nearby Gaza Strip. "I am here to say, as an American and as a friend of Israel, that we stand with the people of Sderot and all of the people of Israel," he said in the town's police station, with mounds of empty rocket casings stacked behind him.
In Sderot, as he had done in his talk with hard-liner Netanyahu, Obama ratcheted up his rhetoric about Iran. "A nuclear Iran would be a game-changing situation, not just in the Middle East but around the world," he said. With AP
churt@nypost.com
