The parts of President Obama’s remarks after disembarking in Israel that the media seem to have focused on were his declarations about how similar the United States and Israel are, and his insistence, once again, of the “unbreakable bond” between the U.S. and Israel.

To this set of ears, though, the most striking, and important, words he uttered were the following ones:

“More than 3,000 years ago, the Jewish people lived here, tended the land here, prayed to God here. And after centuries of exile and persecution, unparalleled in the history of man, the founding of the Jewish State of Israel was a rebirth, a redemption unlike any in history.”

Many Arab teeth were surely set on edge by that clear and deliberate statement.  And Mr. Obama had to know that they would be.

All of us who care about Israel’s well-being and about Klal YIsrael need to stop a moment and acknowledge not only the import of the president’s words but his courage in uttering them.