Subject: Arabic Media Internet Network (Palestine) Jeff Halper, on Apartheid
Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2007 21:19:51 +0000

Keeping on a Steady Course to Apartheid

Arabic Media Internet Network (Palestine)


By: Jeff Halper





For all the attention and hysteria the latest events in Gaza have generated since the Hamas “takeover,” for Israel they represent nothing but a minor blip in its inexorable drive towards its own unilateral “solution:” apartheid. Israel’s end-game, explicit and unruffled by the recent turmoil on the ground, is clear. It is laid out in detail in the Convergence Plan” Olmert presented to a joint session of the American Congress in May, 2006, based on Sharon’s plan of “cantonization.” With minor adjustments, it constitutes the plan Israel’s Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni is quietly advancing with the help of Condoleezza Rice, and it is accepted in its entirety by Ehud Barak, the newly-elected leader of the Labor Party, who played a key role in its formulation. The Israeli plan for apartheid is as follows:

(1) Creating a truncated Palestinian “state” comprised of four disconnected cantons, three in the West Bank and Gaza. By annexing its major settlement blocs defined by the Wall, Israel thereby expands onto 85% of the country, leaving the Palestinians confined to impoverished enclaves on the remaining 15% of the land. In such a “two-state solution” Israel would control the borders, external and internal Palestinian movement, the “Greater” Jerusalem area, all the water resources, the air space, the communications sphere and even the Palestinian state’s foreign policy. Such a Bantustan would have no genuine sovereignty or viable economy – but would have to accept all the traumatized and impoverished Palestinian refugees.

(2) If this fails, primarily because Israel cannot find the quisling Palestinian leader who would sign off on a Bantustan, Plan B – the Livni-Rice plan – calls for the unilateral declaration by the US of a “provisional” Palestinian state with no fixed borders, no meaningful sovereignty and no viable economy, squeezed between the Wall, Israel’s eastern “demographic” border incorporating the settlement blocs, and the Jordan Valley, Israel’s eastern “security” border. The Palestinians would thus be left in the limbo of a “provisional” state indefinitely – or until they agree to a Bantustan – all in conformity to the parameters of the "Road Map".

Period. Regardless of the “peace initiative” of the moment – the Road Map, the Saudi initiative, the summit at Sharm el-sheikh, the appointment of a Middle East envoy – all these plans will have to conform to one of these alternatives or be doomed to irrelevance.

What happens in Gaza, then (tellingly nicknamed “Hamastan,” the Palestinian cantons of the West Bank now dubbed “Fatahland”), is therefore irrelevant to Israel, since Gaza represents nothing more than a tiny part of the tiny Palestinian Bantustan (about 8%). Whether Gaza would have been “quieted” after the Israeli disengagement as Sharon had planned, exporting cheap labor into Israel and perhaps enjoying limited economic growth, whether it was merely isolated and impoverished due to US and Israeli sanctions after the Hamas election victory or whether, as happened, it explodes, nothing will hamper Israel’s ceaseless process of consolidating its hold on the West Bank. Sooner or later, in the Israeli-American plan, Gaza will fall into place.

Not only are the Palestinians irrelevant, in Israel’s view, but the Hamas “takeover” is actually a positive development, since it furthers the apartheid process. A key reason why Palestinians voted for Hamas was the perception that it would resist pressures to accept a Bantustan better than the weak, vacillating Fatah movement, which was seen as little more than Israel’s policeman in the Territories. Israel, the US and a complicit Europe is thus seen as trying to isolate precisely those who truly resist the Occupation while “strengthening” Abbas and the “moderates” – “moderate” defined as those willing to pacify the Palestinians without securing their fundamental right to a sovereign and viable state of their own. The American-sponsored program of arming Fatah against its own people, complete with “lending” them an American general (Dayton), only confirms these suspicions, especially if they make Abbas dependent upon outside forces for his survival.

Israel and the US are doing in microcosm in Palestine what the US is doing throughout the Muslim world, forcing the Palestinians to choose between two unacceptable options: either the prospects of an apartheid regime which is all the “moderates” can deliver or continued resistance to occupation and apartheid under Hamas at the price of international isolation and an unwanted process of Islamization. Where are the true liberators who can deliver a viable Palestinian state while recognizing – though standing up to – Israel? Where are the progressive leaders who represent the wishes of the overwhelming majority of the Palestinian people? Where are the “strong” leaders that Bush claims are lacking on the Palestinian side? Either dead, the victims of a 30-year campaign on the part of Israel to eliminate any effective Palestinian leader, or languishing in refugee camps or in exile, or in prison. If Marwan Bargouti and the prisoners of all the factions who produced the Prisoners’ Document, the only viable peace plan that has any chance of success, were free and allowed to lead their people, the Israel/Palestine conflict could be resolved tomorrow.

What is lacking, of course, is good faith. The will among governments to stand up for Palestinian rights and against Israeli apartheid is totally lacking. The Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz (21.6.07) noted the cynicism underlying the recent Olmert-Bush meeting. “Olmert reached an understanding with…Bush during his visit to Washington that it is necessary to support Abbas,” a senior political source in Jerusalem said. “The decision to aid Abbas was made despite skepticism about his chances for success, in view of past experience. Olmert and Bush agreed they must not allow the impression that Abbas failed because Israel or the U.S. failed him.”

Israel is not going to bolster Abbas – unless he becomes the collaborator Israel is looking for, which he won’t. Olmert has already announced that there will be no final status negotiations in the foreseeable future. So neither the Saudi Initiative nor the Sharm meeting will lead to genuine negotiations. The US, with its moribund Road Map, will not facilitate the establishment of a viable Palestinian state and Europe will not act independently to do so, even in its own interest. The Palestinians, for their part, are powerless to achieve a viable state on their own and will continue to be beaten and blamed for their own incarceration and resistance.

Our governments have failed us. Unless we, the people worldwide, can mobilize grassroots opposition to the Israeli-US-European Occupation, a new apartheid regime, in the Holy Land no less, will soon emerge before our very eyes. Its only when the people lead that our “leaders” will even contemplate doing the right thing.

* Jeff Halper is the Coordinator of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions (ICAHD) and a candidate, with the Palestinian peace activist Ghassan Andoni, for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. He can be reached at .

Subject: Haaretz: U.S. to increase military aid to Israel in decade-long deal
Date: Thu, 21 Jun 2007 13:14:39 +0000

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http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/objects/pages/PrintArticleEn.jhtml?itemNo=873594

U.S. to increase military aid to Israel in decade-long deal
By Aluf Benn and Shmuel Rosner, Haaretz Correspondents

The United States will increase its military assistance to Israel and sign a new agreement securing American aid to the country for the next decade, President George W. Bush announced Tuesday following his meeting with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.

Olmert had persuaded Bush to announce the aid increase, senior political sources said Wednesday.

Prior to Olmert's visit to Washington it was agreed that the issue would be raised during their meeting, but the President gave his response to the Israeli request for increased military assistance only during the meeting with the prime minister.

"The increase of the military assistance is the most important result of Olmert's visit to the United States," the political sources said.

This year, Israel will receive $2.4 billion in military aid from the U.S.

The agreement concluded by former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, according to which the United States' economic aid package to Israel would be gradually diminished and the military aid would increase, is coming to an end this year.

According to the existing arrangement, most of the grant is meant for procurement from the U.S. industry, and Israel is allowed to spend 26.7 percent of the military assistance in shekel purchases for acquisitions from local defense industries.

Israel asked for a gradual increase in the aid over a 10-year period at the tune of $50 million per year. At the end of the 10 years, Israel will receive $2.9 billion annually in military assistance from the U.S.

Olmert told the president that an announcement on the increase in aid would be an expression of American support for Israel against the growing threats to its existence in the region.

In its announcement, the U.S. reiterated that the increased funds will allow Israel to deal with the new challenges it faces and to ensure a "qualitative military edge."

The prime minister asked U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates for his assistance in expediting the handling of a number of IDF procurement requests meant to complete the replenishment of equipment and stores used during the Second Lebanon War.

Gates pointed out that though there is no problem with the requests in principle, there is an orderly procedure. However, Bush intervened and directed the defense secretary to expedite approval of the IDF's requests.

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Subject: The Guardian: Hamas acted on a very real fear of a US-sponsored coup Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 13:29:50 +0000
Hamas acted on a very real fear of a US-sponsored coup


Washington's fingerprints are all over the chaos that has hit Palestinians. The last thing they now need is an envoy called Blair

Jonathan Steele
Friday June 22, 2007
The Guardian


Did they jump or were they pushed? Was Hamas's seizure of Fatah security offices in Gaza unprovoked, or a pre-emptive strike to forestall a coup by Fatah? After last week's turmoil, it becomes increasingly important to uncover its origins.
The fundamental cause is, of course, well known. Israel, aided by the US, was not prepared to accept Hamas's victory in last year's Palestinian elections. Backed by a supine EU, the two governments decided to boycott their new Palestinian counterparts politically and punish Palestinian voters by blocking economic aid. Their policies had a dramatic effect, turning Gaza even more starkly into an open prison and creating human misery on a massive scale. The aim was to turn voters against Hamas - a strategy of stupidity as well as cynicism, since outside pressure usually produces resistance rather than surrender.

The policy shocked even moderate western officials like James Wolfensohn, the former World Bank chief, whom the Americans had appointed to help Gaza's economy before the Hamas election victory. "The result was not to build more economic activity but to build more barriers," he said this week while explaining why he resigned in disagreement with US and Israeli strategy.

It is also well known that Hamas was as surprised by its election victory as everyone else and that it offered its rival, Fatah, a coalition government of national unity. The offer was refused. If this was done initially out of wounded pride, Fatah's rejection of Hamas's regularly repeated overtures increasingly appeared to be coordinated with Washington as part of the boycott strategy.

Reports have been circulating for months of a more sinister side to the boycott. According to them, the US decided last year on a plan to arm and train Mahmoud Abbas's presidential guard in a deliberate effort to confront and defeat Hamas militarily. Israel has already locked up several dozen Hamas legislators and mayors from the West Bank. The next stage was to do the same in Gaza but have Palestinians, rather than Israelis, run the crackdown.

Arming insurgents against elected governments has a long US pedigree and it is no accident that Elliott Abrams, the deputy national security adviser and apparent architect of the anti-Hamas subversion, was a key player in Ronald Reagan's supply of weapons to the Contras who fought Nicaragua's elected government in the 1980s.

Documents doing the rounds in the Middle East purport to have evidence for Abrams's "hard coup" strategy. One text recounts Washington's objectives as expressed in US officials' conversations with an Arab government. These are, among others, "to maintain President Abbas and Fatah as the centre of gravity on the Palestinian scene", "avoid wasting time in accommodating Hamas's ideological conditions", "undermine Hamas's political status through providing for Palestinian economic needs", and "strengthen the Palestinian president's authority to be able to call and conduct early elections by autumn 2007".

The document is dated March 2, less than a month after Saudi Arabia brokered the Mecca agreement under which Abbas finally agreed with Hamas on a unity government. The deal upset the Israelis and Washington because it left Hamas's prime minister Ismail Haniyeh in charge. The document suggests the US wanted to sabotage it. Certainly, according to Hamas officials whom a depressed Abbas later briefed, Abbas was told to scrap Mecca at every subsequent meeting he has had with Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert or with US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice and Abrams.

Most ominously, the document of US objectives outlined a $1.27bn programme that would add seven special battalions, totalling 4,700 men, to the 15,000 Abbas already has in his presidential guard and other security forces, which were also to be given extra training and arms. "The desired outcome will be the transformation of Palestinian security forces and provide for the president of the Palestinian Authority to able to safeguard decisions such as dismissing the cabinet and forming an emergency cabinet," the document says.

Alastair Crooke, a former Middle East adviser to the EU foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, and current head of a research institute in Beirut, points out that Israel blocked some arms deliveries. It was wary of sending too many into Gaza for fear Fatah might lose them, as indeed has happened. In this sense, only part of the plan went ahead. (Britain has played a small part in helping Abbas's security forces. It has provided about £350,000 of "non-lethal" equipment this year for protecting the Karni freight crossing between Gaza and Israel.)

But Crooke says Hamas was irritated that the Mecca deal was being sabotaged, notably by the refusal of Mohammed Dahlan, Fatah's long-time Gaza strongman and head of the Preventive Security Forces, to accept the authority of the independent interior minister appointed to the unity government. "Dahlan refused to deal with him, and put his troops on the streets in defiance of the interior minister. Hamas felt they had little option but to take control of security away from forces which were in fact creating insecurity," Crooke says.

Ahmed Yousef, a Hamas spokesman, confirms the movement thought it had to move fast. In his words, last week's events were "precipitated by the American and Israeli policy of arming elements of the Fatah opposition who want to attack Hamas and force us from office".

While Hamas has successfully blocked the US-Fatah plans for Gaza, Abbas is trying to implement them in the West Bank by forming an emergency government. The policy is doomed since the constitution says such a government can only last 30 days. Parliament has to renew it by a two-thirds majority, and parliament is controlled by Hamas. The only sensible policy for Abbas must be to end the effort to marginalise Hamas. He should go back to the Mecca agreement and support a unity government. Even now, Hamas says it is willing to do so.

Where does all this leave the White House idea to involve Tony Blair as a Middle Eastern envoy? It creates a "coalition of the discredited" - Bush, Olmert and Blair - and sounds like something from a satire since Blair has no credibility with Hamas or most other Palestinians. Better to leave it to the Saudis to revive the Mecca deal, or wait until Abbas realises he has fallen into a trap. Neither common sense nor democratic principles, let alone time, are on Fatah's side.

j.steele@guardian.co.uk



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Subject: Washingtonpost: 'Reel Bad Arabs' Takes on Hollywood Stereotyping
Date: Mon, 25 Jun 2007 15:19:00 +0000


Cast of Villains
'Reel Bad Arabs' Takes on Hollywood Stereotyping

By William Booth
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, June 23, 2007; C01



LOS ANGELES -- A full house has turned out at the Directors Guild of America for the L.A. premiere of the new documentary "Reel Bad Arabs," which makes the case that Hollywood is obsessed with "the three Bs" -- belly dancers, billionaire sheiks and bombers -- in a largely unchallenged vilification of Middle Easterners here and abroad.

"In every movie they make, every time an Arab utters the word Allah? Something blows up," says Eyad Zahra, a young filmmaker who organized the screening this week with the support of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.

The documentary highlights the admittedly obsessive lifework of Jack Shaheen, a retired professor from Southern Illinois University, the son of Lebanese Christian immigrants and the author of "TV Arabs," "Reel Bad Arabs" and the upcoming "Guilty? Hollywood's Verdict on Arabs after 9/11."

In his tireless quest for evidence -- any evidence-- of Arab stereotyping, Shaheen has viewed (and reviewed in his books) thousands of movies and TV shows. What he has found, the 71-year-old academic says, are the most maligned people on the silver screen. It is a diss that dates back to the earliest days of cinema and continues today with popular television shows such as "Sleeper Cell" and "24," which Shaheen calls the worst of smears, "because it portrays American Arabs as the enemy within, like, 'Look at the terrorist -- hey, he's my next-door neighbor!' "

In the documentary, Shaheen shows dozens of film clips to illustrate his point. Arab women? Hip-swiveling eye candy of the oasis or "bundles in black." If Arab men are not presented as buffoons, or smarmy carpet-dealers, or decadent sheiks (and oh, how the oily sultans are smitten with the blond Western womens!), then they are basically your bug-eyed hijacker-bomber.

"And not only are the Arabs dangerous, they're inept," says Shaheen, pointing to the head villain, called Salim Abu Aziz, in James Cameron's "True Lies," whom Arnold Schwarzenegger's character kills -- by launching him to his maker on the back of a missile.

We all love Omar Sharif in "Lawrence of Arabia," but Shaheen mostly ignores the positive. Here in Los Angeles, the audience groans and tsk-tsks when a clip from the James Bond film "Never Say Never Again" shows the blond and partially disrobed Kim Basinger being auctioned off to dirty, grasping Arabs with bad dental work. And the audience laughs when a couple of Libyan yahoos with machine guns suddenly show up (why?) in a VW van (why?) in "Back to the Future" to blast away at Christopher Lloyd's Dr. Brown, because it is just so absurd.

"When I saw these movies as a kid, sometimes I laughed, but now you kind of cringe," Omar Naim, a director ("The Final Cut" with Robin Williams), says after seeing the documentary. For example, Shaheen includes the scene from "Raiders of the Lost Ark" in which Indiana Jones is confronted by the sword-wielding Arab, and then just shrugs and shoots him. "That's a funny scene," Naim says, "and if there were more normal Arabs in the movies, we could all laugh at him and not think, wait, is Indiana Jones racist?"

Seriously, check out the hook-nosed Jamie Farr as the hand-licking sheik in "Cannonball Run II." There is also a scene from "Father of the Bride Part II" that features Eugene Levy as the thickly accented Mr. Habib, who rips off poor Steve Martin (though if you live in L.A. you'd get that Levy was doing a Persian, not an Arab). But Shaheen suggests imagining Mr. Habib as a Jew and see if it's still funny.

And why did Disney's Oscar-winning "Aladdin" begin with the song lyrics: "Oh I come from a land, from a faraway place / Where the caravan camels roam / Where they cut off your ear / If they don't like your face / It's barbaric, but, hey, it's home!" (The lyrics were changed but only after protests from Arab Americans.)

These are the buffoons. The more serious baddies appear in bad films such as "Black Sunday" (Middle East terrorists attack Super Bowl using the Goodyear blimp) and "Death Before Dishonor" (Middle East terrorists attack U.S. embassy). And then there is the work of Israeli film producers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus, who brought you Chuck Norris in "The Delta Force," in which Arab terrorists swarm (and are squashed) like insects, bringing to mind treatment of the Japanese in World War II films.

The Defense Department, Shaheen says, has assisted in the making of some particularly insulting anti-Arab fare, such as "Iron Eagle" (kid flies jet to save dad from radical Middle Eastern state), "Navy Seals" (Charlie Sheen tags and bags Middle Eastern terrorists) and Shaheen's choice for most inflammatory work, "Rules of Engagement," released in 2000, in which armed women and children lay siege to the U.S. Embassy in Yemen, based on the story by the former Navy secretary and now junior senator from Virginia, Jim Webb, and starring Samuel L. Jackson and Tommy Lee Jones.

And thus we have the Timeline of International Villainy. To create drama, especially in action and war movies, Hollywood needs bad guys, and in their time, the Japanese and Germans, and later the Koreans and Vietnamese, served that role. For a long while, commies were useful foils (with their taste for world domination, nukes and vodka), but with the end of the Cold War, the Soviets became the Russians, and the Russians only worked if they were gangsters, and Hollywood already had the Italians to do that job. Colombian drug traffickers were employed as handy replacements, but then coke just felt . . . dated. Transnational corporate evildoers are okay, if not that sexy. But there just has been something about those Arabs. They've got legs.

In an interview before the premiere, Shaheen says that the OPEC oil embargo, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the Iranian revolution and hostage crisis all conspired to cast the Arab as film villain beginning in the 1970s. "We pray and we kill," Shaheen says of the depiction. Like other stereotypes on film -- of blacks, Jews, gays, Latinos, Native Americans -- Arabs are now in the crosshairs.

"The Arab serves as the ultimate outsider, the other, who doesn't pray to the same God, and who can be made to be less human," says Shaheen, who argues that movies and TV shows do matter -- that they shape public opinion at home and abroad. "Do you have any idea what it must be like to be a young person watching this stuff over in the Middle East?" he says. And if you ask Shaheen who even cares about an old Chuck Norris film, he answers, "Have you ever looked through a TV Guide? These movies are on television constantly. The images last forever. They never go away."

The 50-minute documentary, for which Shaheen is looking for a distributor, is making the rounds at film festivals, and Shaheen says he would like to see it aired on public television. A DVD can be purchased through the Media Education Foundation.

In the Q&A session after his documentary, Shaheen explains that he is not advocating a politically correct scrubbing of all portrayals of Arab Americans and Arabs -- even as terrorists. The problem is balance, he says.

Meaning? Hollywood still shows black pimps and Latino gangbangers, but pop culture has also made some room for Will Smith and "Ugly Betty." "I've seen the Arab hijacker, but where is the Arab father?" Shaheen says. What we need, he says, seriously, is a sitcom called "Everybody Loves Abdullah."



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My computer crashed last week, so it will be awhile before I find a new one and can make further entries In the meantime below is an excellent article.

Bronwin


Subject: Forward: Avraham Burg’s New Zionism
Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2007 20:29:58 +0000
Avraham Burg’s New Zionism
Editor’s Notebook

J.J. Goldberg | Wed. Jun 13, 2007
Zionism has meant many things to many people over the past century. To Theodor Herzl and the founders of the Zionist movement, it meant creating a national home to gather in the Jewish people — to some minds, as a refuge from antisemitism; for others, as a fulfillment of an ancient promise. To Herzl’s great critic, the essayist Asher Ginsberg, better known as Ahad Ha’am, Zionism meant building a cultural and spiritual center in Israel to enrich the lives of Jews wherever they live.

To David Ben-Gurion and generations of Israelis after him, it meant the act of settling in Israel and building it, brick by brick. To millions of Jews around the world, it meant providing material and moral backing for that effort. To Palestinians and other Arabs, it meant assault and dispossession. To much of the outside world, it has come to mean the seed of seemingly endless conflict.
To Avraham Burg, former Knesset speaker, former chairman of the World Zionist Organization and son of one of Israel’s founding fathers, it is all of those things and more. In a new book, “Defeating Hitler,” and in a much-discussed interview in Ha’aretz last week, Burg argues that the time for Herzl’s Zionism is past. Now it is time for Ahad Ha’am’s Zionism, for Israel as a spiritual beacon.

Israel has lived long enough in the shadow of trauma and fear, he argues. Now is the time for trust — trust in Israel’s place in the world, in the possibility of coexistence, in the moral legacy of Judaism.

That, at least, is how Burg describes his message. You’d hardly know it, though, from the Ha’aretz interview and the response it’s gotten in Israel and the broader Jewish world. The interviewer, Ari Shavit, read the book and admits he detested it.

As Shavit reads it, Burg’s book rejects the very notion of a Jewish state, claims that Israel has no moral core and has become a brutal Sparta fast sliding toward Nazism. In the interview, Burg tries gamely to answer Shavit’s objections, to explain what he meant, but Shavit won’t have it. Burg is talking spiritual philosophy, and Shavit is tasting red meat.

They go at each other for 4,500 words (2,800 in the abridged English translation), but the casual reader needn’t wade through it all. Shavit and his editors sum up the main points — abandoning Zionism, rejecting Israel — in the headlines and bold print.

“He did something I’ve never experienced before in journalism,” Burg told the Forward in a telephone interview this week. “He read my book and got angry, and then sat with me for what was supposed to be an interview and argued with me.”

Reading the interview, after hearing it discussed endlessly online and in synagogues over the weekend, is an almost psychedelic experience. Shavit starts out by telling Burg that he saw the book as a “farewell to Zionism” and asks, “Are you still a Zionist?” Burg explains his belief that it’s time to move from Herzl to Ahad Ha’am.

Shavit promptly informs Burg that Zionism “means belief in a Jewish national state,” and that he, Burg, no longer believes in that.

Burg: “Not in its current definition. A state in my eyes is a tool,” not a spiritual or religious value. “To define Israel as a Jewish state and then to add the words ‘the first dawning of our redemption’” — a quote from the chief rabbis’ Prayer for the State of Israel, and the core principle of settler messianism — “is explosive. And to add to that the attempt to embrace democracy, it’s just impossible.”

Shavit: “Then you no longer accept the notion of a Jewish state?” Burg: “It can’t work.” (The English version, by the way, skips over Burg’s warning about messianism and the state as a tool, and cuts straight to “explosive” and “can’t work.”)

I phoned Burg because the interview looked fishy to me. I hadn’t read his new book, but I know Burg.

Is it true, I asked, that he believes Israel can no longer be a Jewish state?

“I think Israel should be defined not as a Jewish state, but as a state of the Jewish people,” Burg said. “What I mean is that the significance of the state’s content, its culture and ethos and so on, should be placed on the shoulders of every one of us. We shouldn’t be on automatic pilot.” “I see Israel as a state that was created by the Jewish people, as the expression of thousands of years of yearning,” he said. “Its governing structures should be democratic. Its content should be created by its people. When you create something called a Jewish state and then leave it on automatic pilot, the individual bears no responsibility for its content and character.”

Burg has harsh words for Israel’s current character. He believes that years of confrontation and fear have spawned a militaristic spirit and a widespread contempt for universal norms like human rights. In one of his most controversial assertions, he compares Israel today to Germany in the years before the Nazi takeover. Shavit hammers him on that one.

Is Shavit exaggerating the point? “Yes and no,” Burg said. “Not every comparison to Germany means gas chambers. There is a long history to the rise of German nationalism, beginning with Bismarck.”

It’s also true, Burg said, that important elements of Israeli society and culture are drawn from German culture. “From the beginning, Max Nordau and Theodor Herzl were deeply influenced by the awakening of German nationalism.”

Still, he said, “It’s important to recognize that there are some difficult processes underway in Israel. What I’m saying is that we’re living in a society that is becoming more militaristic, and it’s important to pay attention to the process. That means looking at similarities elsewhere.”

Burg, 52, is used to raising eyebrows and stirring outrage, and he seems to get a kick out of it. The son of Yosef Burg, the longtime leader of Israel’s National Religious Party, he gained almost instant notoriety in 1982, when he helped lead a soldiers’ protest against the first Lebanon War. He quickly entered politics, serving as an aide to Labor Party leader Shimon Peres, while also hosting an improbably popular weekly biblical-portion show on television.

Elected to the Knesset in 1988, he resigned in 1995 to run for chairman of the World Zionist Organization and Jewish Agency for Israel, a post traditionally reserved for washed-up ex-politicians. In 1999, he returned to politics. Riding that year’s Labor Party election victory, he became speaker of the Knesset.

In the fall of 2003, a few months after leaving the speaker’s post, Burg gained international notoriety for an article that was published in Yediot Aharonot, translated by the Forward and then reprinted worldwide, in which he claimed that Israel’s ongoing occupation of the West Bank and Gaza was undermining the moral foundations of Zionism. That was taken, by Israel’s friends and enemies alike, to mean that Zionism had lost all moral justification — something he never said. Soon afterward, he left politics entirely and entered business.

His latest outing in Ha’aretz seems like a rerun of his 2003 misadventure — especially the part where his provocative thesis is circulated in a slightly garbled version and makes him a bete noire. He claims to be annoyed, but he seems at least a bit amused at the same time.

During the interview with Shavit, he recalled with a chuckle, “I got him angry when I said, ‘You have abandoned Judaism. You have an Israeli identity without Jewish content. You identify Judaism with narrow particularism and settlements. I suggest you go to see places where Judaism is a universalistic ideal. Go and learn the meaning of Reform and Conservative and Reconstructionist Judaism.’”

“What I want to do is to expand the borders of Israel beyond land and location to include universalism and spiritual search,” Burg told me. “We were raised on the Zionism of Ben-Gurion, that there is only one place for Jews and that’s Israel. I say no, there have always been multiple centers of Jewish life.”

And what about Shavit’s claim — repeated in a headline — that Burg favors abolishing Israel’s Law of Return?

“I never said ‘abolish’,” Burg replied. “I said ‘rethink.’ Look, in the parliamentary mythology of Israel, the Law of Return is an answer to the Nuremberg Laws. That’s not its actual origin, but that’s how it has come to be seen. Whomever Hitler would have killed, we will accept as a Jew. And I say Hitler will not define me and who I am.” Hence the book’s title, “Defeating Hitler.”

“If a state is Jewish,” Burg said, “it is founded on a certain measure of holiness. Moses himself defined holiness as an ongoing process of actions, of behavior toward others and toward God. I am very afraid of automatic holiness. It can lead to chauvinism, to exclusivism, to all kinds of negative ramifications in relations between individuals and between nations. The Jewish people after 60 years of statehood cannot allow itself to take its holiness for granted. It has to question itself every day.”

For the next week I will post articles pertaining to the "Six Day War" that has left Palestine under Israeli occupation for forty years. Then on June 11th I have an appointment with a delegation with my representatives in both the House and Senate to declare our objection to this continuing illegal occupation and what has become an apartheid worse than the infamous South African one.

For further articles pertaining to the misrepresentation of the Six Day War by the governments of both Israel and the US go to www.palestinianchronicle.com and www.whatreallyhappened.com
CRIMES AND CORRUPTION OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER NEWS
This blog was formerely at: http://mparent7777.livejournal.com mparent7777 Marc Parent CCNWON MY OTHER BLOG IS AT: http://mparent7777.blogspot.com/(Note there is no "-2" in the URL).

Thursday, June 7, 2007
The Congress' Israel butt-kissing resolution is out (with doc)
Senator Dianne Feinstein cooked this one up with the Lobby. Senators Dodd, Hagel, and Lugar are down on their knees with her as well(I wonder how FeinSTEIN's war profiteering is going?).

[Danke to Sharon's former flunky for putting me on to this].


The advance copy of celebrating Israel's premeditated theft of the West Bank and Jerusalem, otherwise known as the Six Day War follows,


Resolution

Expressing the sense of the Senate regarding the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

Whereas ending the violence and terror that have devastated Israel, the West Bank, and Gaza since September 2000 is in the vital interests of the United States, Israel, and the Palestinian people;

Whereas the ongoing Israeli-Palestinian conflict strengthens extremists and opponents of peace throughout the region;

Whereas more than 7 years of violence, terror, and military engagement have demonstrated that armed force alone will not solve the Israeli-Palestinian dispute;

Whereas the vast majority of Israelis and Palestinians want to put an end to decades of confrontation and conflict and live in peaceful coexistence, mutual dignity, and security, based on a just, lasting, and comprehensive peace;

Whereas on May 24, 2006, addressing a Joint Session of the United States Congress, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reiterated the Israeli government’s position that “In a few years, [the Palestinians] could be living in a Palestinian state, side by side in peace and security with Israel, a Palestinian state which Israel and the international community would help thrive”;

Whereas, in his speech before the Palestinian Legislative Council on February 18, 2006, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said: “We are confident that there is no military solution to the conflict. Negotiations between us as equal partners should put a long-due end to the cycle of violence… Let us live in two neighboring states”;

Whereas in June 2002 the President presented his vision of “two states, living side by side in peace and security,” and has since repeatedly reaffirmed this position;

Whereas a robust and high-level American diplomatic presence on the ground is critical to bringing Israelis and Palestinians together to make the tough decisions necessary to achieving a permanent resolution to the conflict;

Whereas June 2007 marks the 40th anniversary of the Six-Day War between Israel and a coalition of Arab states;

Whereas all parties should use the occasion of this anniversary to redouble their efforts to achieve peace;

Whereas achieving Israeli-Palestinian peace could have significant positive impacts on security and stability in the region;


Resolved, That the Senate—

(1) reaffirms its commitment to a true and lasting solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, based on the establishment of two states, Israel and Palestine, living side by side in peace and security, and with recognized borders;

(2) denounces the use of violence and terror and reaffirms its unwavering commitment to Israel’s security;

(3) calls on President Bush to pursue a robust diplomatic effort to engage the Israelis and Palestinians, begin negotiations, and make a two-state settlement a top priority;

(4) urges President Bush of the United States to consider appointing a Special Envoy for Middle East Peace;

(5) calls on the Hamas-led Palestinian Authority to recognize Israel’s right to exist, renounce and end all terror and incitement, and accept past agreements between Israel and the Palestinian Authority;

(6) calls on moderate Arab states in the region to intensify their diplomatic efforts toward a two-state solution and welcomes the Arab League Peace Initiative;

(7) calls on Israeli and Palestinian leaders to embrace efforts to achieve peace and refrain from taking any actions that would prejudice the outcome of final status negotiations;

.doc

Posted by CRIMES AND CORRUPTION OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER NEWS mparent7777 Marc Parent CCNWON at 9:31 AM

Labels: Congress, Israel, Israel lobby


2 comments:
Anonymous said...
Our elected officials SUCK!!

- Noah Count

Thursday, June 07, 2007
Anonymous said...
And they have the chutzpah to say that claims of Jewish world control are baseless examples of racism, when in fact it is a simple observation and an established fact.

Thursday, June 07, 2007
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About Me
Marc Parent mparent7777 mparent CCNWON
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For the next week I will post articles pertaining to the "Six Day War" that has left Palestine under Israeli occupation for forty years. Then on June 11th I have an appointment with a delegation with my representatives in both the House and Senate to declare our objection to this continuing illegal occupation and what has become an apartheid worse than the infamous South African one.

For further articles pertaining to the misrepresentation of the Six Day War by the governments of both Israel and the US go to www.palestinianchronicle.com and www.whatreallyhappened.com


THE USS LIBERTY

Archived from: http://www.wrmea.com/archives/August_2005/0508017.html

USS Liberty Veterans Present Pentagon With Report on Israeli War Crimes
By Delinda C. Hanley



Survivors of Israel’s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty have been silenced and ignored by the country they put their lives on the line to protect. They are asking the Bush administration for a thorough investigation (Staff photo D. Hanley).




SURVIVORS, friends and family gathered at Arlington Cemetery on June 8, 2005 to honor 34 USS Liberty sailors killed in Israel’s shocking naval and air attack on the ship 38 years ago. As a sailor struck a triangle, breaking the silence in a sea of tombstones, shipmates read the names of each victim. One survivor, whose ill health made him miss this reunion, listened from afar via cell phone.

As survivors watched the 90-year-old mother of one fallen hero and the sister of another lay a wreath at the grave marker where 11 crew members are buried, these men, and the women who love them, silently vowed to keep fighting until the murders and the subsequent cover-up are explained.

There was a palpable, almost electric feeling at this particular gathering in Washington, DC. At past reunions survivors swapped talk of recent surgeries and the continuing struggle to cope with their injuries. Of the original crew of 294 officers and civilians, 34 men were killed and another 173 wounded in action that day in June 1967. Because the few who survived without physical wounds had to gather up their buddies’ body parts, no one left that ship unscathed. Even harder to bear than the physical and mental anguish these Americans have endured, however, has been their government’s betrayal and silence for nearly four decades.

At their reunion this year, crewmembers began the legal process which they hope will open the doors to the first thorough investigation of the Israeli attack.

At a June 10 press conference at the Hotel Washington, Liberty survivors presented details of a “Report of War Crimes” brief filed by James R. Gotcher, general legal counsel for the USS Liberty Veterans Association (USS-LVA). On June 8, the anniversary of the attack, Gotcher submitted the 35-page, carefully footnoted report to Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey, who acts as executive agent for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld. After receiving this report, brimming with evidence of war crimes committed by Israel against U.S. military personnel, the secretary of defense is obligated to initiate an official inquiry.

The report lists the laws of war that Israel ignored and provides vital testimony from survivors, as well as pertinent quotes from leaders of that time. To examine the entire report, visit the USS Liberty Web site: . It’s vital that all Americans and their elected officials read this compelling and conclusive document.

USS-LVA board member Moe Shafer told reporters that the victims of the Israeli attack filed this report after 38 years because their government has never asked them to testify or carried out a complete investigation. “There is no statute of limitations on war crimes,” Shafer pointed out.

“It’s now incumbent on the U.S. government to take action for the vindication of the survivors of this attack,” said Shafer, “but most importantly for those who lost their lives. To continue doing nothing sends a message to the rest of the world that they may attack U.S. personnel without fear of reprisal.

“Every other maritime attack has been investigated, including the Pueblo, Stark and Cole incidents. This event remains unexamined. It’s long past time to uncover the cover-up,” Shafer concluded.

Next to address reporters was former U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia James Akins, who for years has spoken up for Liberty survivors. Akins noted that his friend Ambassador Dwight Porter, U.S. ambassador to Lebanon in 1967, had told syndicated columnists Rowland Evans and Robert Novak, Akins, and other friends (including the Washington Report’s publisher, executive editor and this reporter), that he had seen transcripts of Israeli radio discussions during the attack. The U.S. monitors heard an Israeli pilot identify the Liberty’s American flag. His superiors ordered him to attack the ship anyway.

In his book The Liberty Incident, A. Jay Cristol, a self-proclaimed historian whose day job is that of a bankruptcy judge, claimed Porter recanted that testimony. “If he had recanted, he would only have done so under threats or blackmail,” his old friend Akins noted.

It’s time to get everyone’s testimony recorded once and for all, Akins said. “Justice must be served while the victims are still alive,” he told the press.

Rear Admiral Merlin Staring, USN, Ret., former judge advocate general of the Navy, who was involved with the initial Court of Inquiry in 1967, next described hurriedly reading 607 pages of typed testimony. When he questioned some of its conclusions, the report was taken from him and whisked off to Washington officials.

Joe Lentini, a communications expert who was wounded on the Liberty, presented a detailed history of the attack. He showed the audience that the Liberty was unmistakably a spy ship with the latest technology and flew the American flag during the attack. He dedicated his Power Point presentation to Liberty Captain William McGonagle, without whom, he said, “we wouldn’t be here today.” Lentini said he would give his Power Point talk, complete with photos and other evidence of a planned and sustained Israeli attack, to anyone, anywhere, who will listen.

“I don’t know why Israel attacked a neutral vessel in neutral waters without warning or justification,” Lentini said. He’d like to know, he explained, because 14 of the 34 people killed were his own men.

Lentini went on to describe a litany of Israeli war crimes: Israeli forces fired on the wounded and their rescuers. Israeli torpedo boats shot at firefighters, shredding their fire hoses. “The same torpedo boats shot at USS Liberty’s life rafts,” he said, “after the rafts had been put over the side of the ship into the sea for use by shipwrecked survivors.”

Israel’s attack was a violation of the Geneva Conventions regulating conduct of war, Lentini noted. But the subsequent actions of his own government are just as galling as Israel’s original offense. ”Why did the U.S. put a foreign nation’s interest ahead of our own?” Lentini asked the audience.

When Ken Halliwell, a semi-retired telecommunications and information systems engineer, saw the photos Cristol used in his book, especially the cover photo, he was troubled, he said—so he did some sleuthing. Using survivor Warren Haney’s cane as an impromptu pointer, Halliwell showed the audience evidence of fraud in Cristol’s photos.

When he presented his findings to an Israel Defense Forces archivist, Halliwell continued, the IDF official agreed that Cristol’s photos, which the bankruptcy judge claimed were taken by the gun camera of Israel’s lead attack aircraft, were faked. The photos actually are doctored U.S. photos of a ship at dock, Halliwell said. Producing and using fraudulent evidence to support Israel’s case casts doubt on Cristol’s claim that the ship was attacked by accident, Halliwell concluded.




After describing the injuries he and others have suffered over the years, Larry Weavers is comforted by his wife, Pam, at the Army-Navy Club banquet (Photo by Michael Keating).




Richard Larry Weaver, who was a seaman on the deck of the Liberty during the attack, described his ordeal in moving testimony. “It seemed like the pilot went straight at me,” Weaver said. He wasn’t supposed to live through that first night, he added, and thanked Dr. Richard Kiefer, the ship’s brave physician—who was too ill to attend this reunion—for saving his life.

Weaver said he’d never forget recuperating in the hospital and being wheeled down to meet with a three-star admiral, who took off his stars and asked him about the Israeli attack. The admiral then put his stars back on and said, “If you tell anyone what happened you will be put in prison and we’ll lose the key.”

Deserters get shot or put in prison, Weaver told the hushed crowd. “The USS Liberty was deserted by our own government for 38 years...

“I’ve been living in pain day and night since that day,” he continued. “I’ve had 29 major surgeries over the years...I’ve had sons and daughters of my friends on the Liberty ask me what their dad looked like—what kind of a guy he was,” Weaver said, his voice breaking. “Every president, every government has turned its back on this tragedy. I challenge President Bush to step forward and right this wrong.”

USS-LVA vice president Ernie Gallo, who, after surviving the attack on the Liberty, spent the next 30 years working for the CIA, introduced himself by saying, “First, I’m a loyal American.”

He thought he’d start out that way, he explained, because survivors often are silenced by accusations that they are somehow anti-Semitic for speaking the truth. Gallo’s presentation focused on the shocking cover-up by U.S. public officials of Israel’s attack on his ship. “Why were U.S. planes called back and not permitted to come to our rescue? Why has Congress never investigated the attack?” Gallo asked reporters.

“We think the U.S. government is for the people and of the people,” he noted. “But when it comes to the Middle East and our relationship with Israel, our country wantonly breaks its own laws and falsifies its records.”

After all these years, Gallo said, the truth is still suppressed. Most documents are declassified after 25 years, he noted, but even today many documents requested by survivors are blacked out, or not even released, because they are still top secret.

The State Department’s January 2004 panel discussion on the attack, Gallo marveled, failed to include even one survivor.

“You can’t call what we witnessed an accident,” he stated, but “not one crewmember has been able to tell their story to the authorities.”

Gallo also called for an inquiry into the question of who was responsible for the attack on the USS Liberty, and why. Addressing the media present, he said, “We need your help to get our story out.”

Delinda C. Hanley is news editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

For the next week I will post articles pertaining to the "Six Day War" that has left Palestine under Israeli occupation for forty years. Then on June 11th I have an appointment with a delegation with my representatives in both the House and Senate to declare our objection to this continuing illegal occupation and what has become an apartheid worse than the infamous South African one.

Following is an excerpt from the Palestine Chronicle, www.palestinechronicle.com:



With Friends Like These - Glenn
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



"The recent news concerning President Lyndon JohnsonÂ’s order to cover up the murder of 35 American sailors aboard the USS Liberty by the Israeli government should come as no surprise .."


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They get together once or twice a year to smile and shake hands in front of the cameras in their desire to keep the outside world in its 50 year long state of delusion. The actors in question are the leaders of Israel and the United States, celebrating a friendship which has existed since the days of Harry Truman, a friendship which they extol as vitally important to the otherÂ’s interests as well as to the safety of the free world. The truth is, though, that these exhibitions are nothing more than cheap perfume which are used to mask the stench of their combined hatred for America and for her people. These leaders, (Mafiosi whose hands drip with the blood of American patriots, patriots whose lives have been snuffed out in the service of Zionism) are nothing more than vampires who have profited off of the blood of innocent American citizens for 50 years. The obvious examples proving this hatred are so numerous as to be mind boggling, but empirical and undeniable facts of history they are. And now, as America and her people face the calm before the storm, a storm which threatens her possible annihilation, it should be recounted who has, time and again, put her head on the chopping block, and who has been engaged in a plan of systematic mass murder of the American people since her inception in 1948.

The recent news concerning President Lyndon Johnson’s order to cover up the murder of 35 American sailors aboard the USS Liberty by the Israeli government should come as no surprise to anyone who has followed the history of the American/Israeli relationship. The sailors whose lives were stolen by Israeli pilots that day, pilots who, (after noting to their command headquarters that the ship was American) bombed, machine-gunned and napalmed the ship for 90 minutes are, tragically, only a few of the thousands of Americans who have died and will continue to do so because of America’s friendship with Israel. The history of Israel’s relationship with America is replete with examples of similar incidents, up to an including the murder of over 3,000 Americans on September 11, 2001. And with this in mind, any level-headed and patriotic American must ask him or herself at some point the rhetorical yet prophetic question, “With friends like these, who needs enemies?”

The Liberty incident, kept barely alive in public discourse by those who survived the 90 minute attack, is, (albeit one of the most glaring examples of Israeli duplicity and treachery against the people of the United States) nevertheless by no means an isolated event. The war waged by Israel against the American people, in military action, espionage, and erosion of freedoms and security is as ingrained in the decades-long relationship as the color red is ingrained in the American blood she has shed. The concerted effort by the long arm of Zionist power in media, government and finance to keep a lid on this easily verifiable history of treachery has succeeded to the point that to this day a thorough investigation of these events by Congress has yet to take place. The lies surrounding the murder of AmericaÂ’s young men aboard the USS Liberty, as well as those Americans murdered on 9/11, are so thick and so brazen in their audacity that it has long since surpassed being surreal. And as much a revelation as it may be concerning that murderous, duplicitous nation founded in 1948 by atheistic communists from what was then the Soviet Union, it also speaks volumes about who are the traitors occupying the seats of power in the US government, who for 35 years have not sought an ounce of justice for the American people out of their fear of Zionist power.

For those who now, wide-eyed and incredulous, ponder the ridiculous “how did this happen?” question, consider this: It is only one instance in a mountain sized heap of similar instances. The Liberty, as awful as it is, is only one of many times in which the Israelis have deliberately harmed or put in harm’s way the American people for their own benefit. And let the American people not fall victim to the propaganda surrounding what has been an acquittal of the Israelis in these situations. The evidence proving willful intent of malice is so prevalent that an individual whose only legal training was watching Judge Joe Brown on daily TV could put the pieces together with the competence of a trained lawyer.

Besides the acts of overt warfare against the people of the United States, (examples of which follow later herein) the Israelis have for generations now employed agencies such as the ADL, AIPAC, and the JDL as outlets in facilitating for their purposes the prosecutable acts of espionage, bribery and sometimes outright murder and terrorism. The ADL, which champions itself as a defender of those who suffer from racial persecution (except when it comes to Arab-Americans) has been on the front lines in deceiving Americans about what has been the parasitic relationship Israel has enjoyed with the US since its creation. The ADL has boldly lied about every instance of verifiable treachery in that history, maintaining in the process a network of spies and disinformation agents (who share files with the government of Israel) concerning Americans who dare to exercise their 1st Amendment right in criticizing this dangerous relationship. This has been validated recently in the fact that the ADL has been busted several times for illegally wiretapping the phones of American citizens, and for which has recently lost a $10,000,000.00 lawsuit brought by an American citizen in pursuance thereof. In addition, the ADL is and has been actively involved in de-Christianizing American society to the point that now the most successful actor in American society, Mel Gibson, cannot make a movie about the death of Christ without having the heat brought down upon him and upon his family by the Jewish lobby.

Besides the spying they have perpetrated, the ADL has labored without pause in its interest of destroying the protections that the American people have enjoyed under the US Constitution for 200 years. Just as Israel in 1967 attacked the USS Liberty in furtherance of her desires, in like manner today she (through her interlocking networks in the US) time and again attack US Liberty in her outright contempt for the freedom by which America has been made great. The Israeli spy network known as the Anti-Defamation League works night and day to erode the rights of gun owners, property owners, the rights of parents and homeschoolers, and has in effect used its very powerful influence in having police-state legislation introduced into the fabric of American life. It was the ADL who pushed for “Anti-Terrorist” legislation six months before the bombing in Oklahoma City, and who steered the US Justice Department into initiating the events which led to the murder of US citizens at Ruby Ridge and Waco. And besides using their power to see to it that Americans are not afforded the right to express their religious sentiments, (as in the case of Mel Gibson and Judge Roy Moore) at the same time Israel’s Spymaster Abe Foxman sees to it that public funding is used to denigrate and degrade every religious sentiment held dear by the same American people whose money has been the lifeblood of the Israeli state. It is no surprise therefore to see the ADL coming out and supporting the use of taxpayer dollars in promoting “art works” such as those depicting a crucifix emersed in a jar of urine and pictures of Christ’s Holy Mother covered with elephant dung.

The JDL, the more “action-oriented” of Israel’s defenders operating in the US, (and the more willing of her organizations to get its hands dirty) to this day continues to occupy its well-deserved place on the FBI’s list of most dangerous terrorist organizations. In 2003, 2 of its members were convicted for attempting to blow up a Mosque in the state of Florida. Prior to this, the group’s former leader, Irv Rubin, was “suicided” in prison the day before he was to go on trial for his role in the planned blowing up of the office of California Congressman Daryl Issa, an American of Middle Eastern descent. There are several other instances of violence in their history, including attempted arsons, bombings, bricks through windows, not to mention the obligatory death threats for which they claim credit, revealing a characteristic cleverly kept hidden from an American public who still believes that Israel is their best friend.

If the ADL and JDL attempt to hide their agenda of supporting Israel through their use of spying and threats, AIPAC, the American Israel Political Action Committee, makes no such attempt. It is the largest political action committee in the US, and literally decides who wins government offices at the State and Federal level. If an individual, (incumbent or not) is not looked upon favorably by this Israeli lobbying group, all the stops will be pulled out in making sure that he or she doesnÂ’t get into office, and along with a Zionist controlled media, this organization will make sure to run at break-neck speed and efficiency in sabotaging such a campaign. In this way, the nation of Israel, not the American people, decides who runs the nation.

In further consideration of this friendship under which Americans have suffered and continue to do so, perhaps a further review of that friendshipÂ’s history is also in order.

Lest we forget, it was Israel who, in 1983, knew of the planned assault on the Marine barracks in Lebanon, an assault which resulted in the deaths of 241 Americans, and about which Israel refused to warn the US. Consider the words uttered by the same intelligence officers in the Israeli government who watched as the explosives-laden truck met its final destination with American lives:

“As far as the Yanks go, we are not here to protect them. They can do their own watching. They wanted to stick their nose into this thing, so let them pay the price.”

Lest we forget, it was Israeli intelligence operatives, dressed as Arabs who blew up American buildings in Egypt, done for the purpose of blaming the Arabs in an event known as the Lavon Affair.

Lest we forget, it was Israel who sent a team of covert operatives into Libya, rented an apartment near KhaddafiÂ’s headquarters, and broadcast radio messages in Arabic to make it sound like terrorist cell planning in what was known as Operation Trojan Horse. As a result of this, air strikes were launched against the Libyans under completely false pretenses for IsraelÂ’s benefit.

Lest we forget, it was Israeli intelligence who was handling the Monica Lewinsky affair for the purposes of blackmailing then president Bill Clinton. Having, as Clinton admitted, tapped his phone, “America’s only ally” in the Middle East held a gun to the head of her leader and blackmailed him into dropping his support for a peace plan between Israel and the Palestinians.

Lest we forget, in a theme similar to that which involved Monica Lewinsky, the whole business involving Chandra Levy and Congressman Gary Condit was managed by Israeli Intelligence. It is now postulated by investigators that their affair and her subsequent disappearance were an attempt to blackmail him into revealing what information his Intelligence Committee had on the 9/11 attacks.

Lest we forget, Israel, now the headquarters of the Russian Mafia, is the biggest trafficker in the drug Ecstasy, which plagues American society and preys on American youth.

Lest we forget, Israel is now and for some time has been involved in the sex-slave business, as well as snuff-pornography involving children. Several Americans have been indicted for acting as “mules” for the Israelis in bringing these vices into American society and acting as marketing agents.

Let we forget, in the days and weeks after 9/11 the largest spy ring in American history was busted up by the FBI. The events which led to this were the arrest of 5 Israeli intelligence agents who were seen videotaping the planes crashing into the Twin Towers while cheering in the process. Another team of intelligence operatives were arrested in New York while driving a van containing Palestinian-looking clothing, and who upon arrest were quoted as saying “We’re not the enemies. Your enemies are the same as ours, the Palestinians!” Since that time, there have been several teams of Israeli operatives arrested carrying false passports, and within several of the vehicles they drove were found traces of explosives. All in all, over 100 intelligence agents have been deported back to Israel since 9/11. It is to be assumed then that upon this basis was the assertion by Senator Bob Graham of Florida made that a foreign government was involved with the attacks, as well as Fox News’ statement that “all material linking Israel to the events of 9/11 was classified.”

Lest we forget, it was Israel who employed the American Naval Officer Jonathan Pollard to steal over 500,00 pages of ultra secret documentation concerning AmericaÂ’s most high tech weapons, documentation which was then turned around and sold to AmericaÂ’s enemies, including the Russians and the Chinese.

Lest we forget, it was Israel who in the year 2001 scoured the downed US Spy plane in China of all its technological secrets. It has been revealed that the reason the Chinese held the plane (as well as the American servicemen) for the duration of time that they did was to facilitate this scouring at the beheast of “America’s only ally in the Middle East.”

Lest we forget, it was Israel who stole American nuclear material and technological wherewithal from the Nuclear Materials and Equipment Corporation located in Apollo, Pennsylvania. FBI agents literally stood and watched, helpless to do their jobs under orders from their superiors, as nuclear material was packed in boxes marked “diplomatic” and loaded on a ship sailing for Haifa. The Israeli Embassy threatened to make trouble if the US Government interfered.

Lest we forget, it was Israel who sold the computer software known as Promis to the Chinese government, who then used that software to hack into the computers at Los Alamos Nuclear Laboratory, enabling the Chinese to advance their nuclear capability (and thus advance the danger posed to the American people) by a quarter century.

Lest we forget, Israel is the biggest violator of US Patent laws, particularly those which involve military technology and encryption. There are several recorded instances of Israel directly breaking into or penetrating sensitive American military installations in the interest of stealing such technology, and afterwards selling it off to AmericaÂ’s enemies.

Lest we forget, the main suspect in the Anthrax attacks which occurred in the weeks following 9/11 is an ardent Zionist and political friend to Israel. It is alleged that his reason for doing this was to frame an Arab-American who worked in the Army Weapons Lab with him.

Lest we forget, Islamic Fundamentalism, which as been blamed for the 9/11 attacks and against which the war on terror is being fought, is the product of Israel’s murderous policies against the peoples of the Middle East, and in particular Palestine. Her stated desire to rebuild Israel to its “biblical borders,” encompassing all the lands within Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and the northern part of Saudi Arabia is the greatest source of the violence against her main supplier of weaponry and funding, the United States. Prior to her creation in 1948, Islamic Fundamentalism did not exist, and the countries of the Middle East were friends who wanted to emulate the United States.

Let we forget, it was Israel who created Hamas, the organization blamed for terror attacks against her people. Hamas was created by Israeli intelligence for the purpose of drawing support away from the PLO and Yasser Arafat.

There are other disturbing pieces of information as well. For those who are still unconvinced of the danger which is posed to America and her people by her relationship with Israel, the following items should be considered also:

*At least one Congressman who has sat on several intelligence committees, Paul Findley, has voiced his suspicion of Israeli involvement in the death of President John F. Kennedy. It is a well known fact that David Ben Gurion, then Prime Minister of Israel, was infuriated with JFK for his refusal to allow Israel to develop nuclear weapons. A detailed account of the evidence supporting Congressman FindleyÂ’s suspicion is outlined in a book by Michael Collins Piper entitled Final Judgment.

*Much evidence exists implicating Israel in the death of Clinton Administration Official Vince Foster. It is suspected that he may have been involved with passing on the launch codes of AmericaÂ’s nuclear arsenal to Israel in return for monetary contributions to ClintonÂ’s presidential campaign. In the hours following his death, Mossad agents scoured his apartment in search of something which, in this light, was deemed of obvious importance.

*Within moments of TWA Flight 800 exploding over the Atlantic Ocean after leaving New York, the Israeli Government (through her agents in the US media) put the blame for the atrocity on Islamic Fundamentalists. This fact, coupled with the 100 or more persons who have sworn in public testimony that they witnessed a missile hitting the aircraft leaves troubling questions about who actually engineered this act of war against America. Given Israel’s history of perpetrating similar atrocities, (known in Israeli Intelligence parlance as “false flag operations,”) concerned Americans are left with troubling conclusions.

Based on this short list, it should be obvious to anyone with an ounce of sense that America’s only ally in the Middle East is the kind of friend she would be better off not having. She has murdered American citizens, lied in every instance and occurrence, and deliberately placed America and her people in the gravest danger as it served her own purposes. And now, in the calm before the storm, she is preparing (facilitated by the Neocons in the Bush Administration and disinformation agents on the talk show circuit) the next event which will send American men and women off to the sands of the Middle East to fight and die for her. It is possible that it is too late for America to disentangle herself from such a bad friendship, as the inference has already been made that in the event that America puts the Jewish state in danger, she (Israel) would resort to the “Samson Option” which entails the use of nuclear weapons against anyone termed an “unfriendly.”

It should be clear to all Americans who love their country that the “friendship” they enjoy with the terrorist state of Israel is the most perverse notion of an alliance that has yet occurred in the history of the United States. It has been a one-way friendship from the beginning, as is that enjoyed by some parasitic tick on the back of a dog. This tick, as it draws the life-blood out of its healthy host, at the same time introduces various diseases and maladies that will one day sicken that host. In like manner, the American body is beginning to show serious signs of such sickness and weakness, to the point that her very survival is threatened. And were she, America, fortunate enough to survive for a short time in this unenviable state, it would still be the slow, agonizing death of watching her freedoms torn asunder as a result of Israeli influence over the American legislation process, influence which has already brought forth such abominations as the Patriot Act and other like minded assaults on US Liberty.

The time has come (much too late) for America, and for her freedom loving/justice hungry/ patriotic citizenry to take a good look at the Beast which masqerades itself as her friend, and at the same time eye with commensurate suspicion and anger those elected officials who have sold out America in what have been the greatest acts of treason and treachery in her history. Americans who truly love their country should feel the bile rising in their throats and view with nausea those leaders who make a mockery of their duty to protect America from her enemies, those self-serving traitors who heap derision upon the very nation and whose flag they dare to sport as lapel pins for all the world to see. A responsible America, desiring beyond hope to save the last vestiges of her Liberty must not lazily allow the interests of a terrorist nation such as Israel to do her thinking for her when it comes to meting out justice against her enemies, nor to allow her the power to decide who her enemies will be.

A new American Revolution is drastically needed, the origins of which must be born in that question which (with GodÂ’s help) will burn in the hearts of an outraged American people who have considered such treachery in light of the danger which they now face. That question, simply put, is this:

“With friends like these, who needs enemies?”


“With Friends Like These”...is a condensed essay of the theme covered in the soon to be released book entitled “With Friends Like These...The Danger Posed to America by the State of Israel.” Mark Glenn is also the author of Not My Words, But Theirs: An American Christian’s Defense of Middle Eastern Culture and its People.” The Website for the book may be accessed at www.notmywords.com. The author may be contacted at mglenn@mediamonitors.org

Source: The Palestine Chronicle – www.palestinechronicle.com

Subject: IPS: Arab, Jewish Communities in the US Share Peace Goals
Date: Wed, 06 Jun 2007 13:52:45 +0000
POLITICS-US:
Arab, Jewish Communities Share Peace Goals
Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON, Jun 4 (IPS) - Almost exactly 40 years after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, the Arab and Jewish communities of the United States appear largely agreed on the general outlines of a final settlement and the importance of Washington playing a stronger role in bringing it about.

Those are the main findings of a national survey of the two communities carried out late last month and released here Monday by Americans for Peace Now, a Jewish Zionist group, and the Arab American Institute.

"Despite heightened tensions and the devastation of continued conflicts in the region, solid majorities of Arab Americans and Jewish Americans are united in their desire for an end to the occupation and settlements, and for peace through a two-state solution (to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict)," said the institute's president, James Zogby.

The survey, based on interviews with 501 members of each community, found nearly unanimous support for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a similar level of agreement that such an accord will help the U.S. achieve its broader strategic interests in the region.

The poll also found strong majorities -- 63 percent of Jewish Americans and 77 percent of Arab Americans -- in favour of a freeze on Jewish settlement activity in the occupied territories and similar levels of support for the revived 2002 Arab League peace plan that would normalise ties with Israel in return for land it conquered in the 1967 war.

More than four out of five respondents in each community said they support negotiations between Israel and Syria, while 73 percent of Jewish Americans and 79 percent of Arab Americans said they favoured "serious diplomacy" with Iran over other options that could lead to war.

Four out of five respondents in each community also assessed President George W. Bush's performance in the Middle East as ineffective, particularly compared to his predecessor, Bill Clinton, whose handling of the region was given high marks by large majorities of both groups.

"This survey, yet again, reaffirms our assertion that most American Jews support a diplomatic approach to resolving conflicts in the Middle East -- whether conflicts between Israel and its neighbours or the conflict between the U.S. and Iran," said Americans for Peace Now president Debra DeLee.

"Not only do members of both communities support negotiated peace between Israel and its neighbours, they also want to see the Bush administration play a role to make it happen," she added.

The survey, a sequel to a first-ever side-by-side poll of the two communities in 2002, comes amid growing speculation about prospects for peace -- or more war -- in the region.

Recent fighting in Gaza between Fatah and Hamas, which are supposed to be working together as part of a government of national unity midwifed by Saudi King Abdullah, has dampened prospects for a resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that has been promoted, in particular, by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Washington's European allies.

At the same time, the government of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has so far spurned -- reportedly at the behest of the Bush administration -- appeals by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for direct talks aimed at returning the Golan Heights to Damascus in return for normalising bilateral ties and presumably ending Syrian support for Hezbollah and Hamas.

Meanwhile, Iran's regional ascendancy in the wake of Washington's 2003 Iraq invasion has stirred growing concern not only on the part of both Israel and the U.S., but also Sunni-led Arab governments which, under Abdullah's leadership, have appeared more disposed to make peace with Israel than ever before. But they have so far been frustrated by Bush's reluctance to press Olmert to make key concessions that could give the Arab League initiative greater momentum.

Bush's failure to become seriously engaged in peace efforts has also clearly frustrated the Jewish and Arab American communities here, too. Only one in five respondents in each community described Bush's performance in the region as either somewhat or very effective.

Both the Jewish-American and the Arab-American communities, which are highly educated when compared with other demographic groups, have been very attentive to events in the region, according to the survey. More than nine out of 10 respondents in both communities said they follow the situation in the Middle East either "very" (55 percent of each group) or "somewhat" closely.

Majorities in both communities described Bush's approach to the region either as favouring Israel or as "disengaged". Asked what approach they preferred, two-thirds of Arab Americans said he should "steer a middle course", a position with which 40 percent of Jewish Americans agreed. Forty-four percent of Jewish respondents, however, said Bush should continue "leaning toward Israel".

Two-thirds of both groups said they would be more likely to vote for a presidential candidate next year if that candidate pledged to take an active role in the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians.

Nine in 10 Jewish Americans said they agreed that Palestinians "have a right to live in a secure and independent state of their own", while 88 percent of Arab Americans said the same about Israel.

At the same time, however, each of the two groups underestimated the degree to which the other supports their position. Thus, 60 percent of Arab Americans believe that Jewish Americans support the right of Palestinians to live in a secure and independent state, while only 34 percent of Jewish-American respondents believe that Arab Americans support the same right for Israelis.

"There's clearly a need in each community to create a broader sense about how the other community feels on this issue," said DeLee. "There's very high support for these (positions) but not necessarily trust that the other side feels the same way."

At the same time, four in five Arab American respondents and two in three Jewish respondents said it was "very important" for the two communities to work together to achieve a two-state solution.

Ninety-six percent of Jewish Americans and ninety-one percent of Arab Americans said they agreed that a peace accord between Israel and the Palestinians was important to U.S. strategic interests in the region. Eighty-seven and 81 percent, respectively, agreed "strongly" with that assessment.

Two-thirds of Jewish Americans said ending the occupation was either very (41 percent) or somewhat (24 percent) important, compared to 89 percent of Arab Americans.

Seven in 10 Jewish Americans and eight in 10 Arab Americans said they support the Arab League Initiative.

"While presidential candidates are urged to believe that there's no way to bring the two sides together, in fact the opposite is true," said Zogby. "This is not a situation where the two communities are divided; rather, they are extraordinarily united around the vision of what the Middle East ought to look like." (END/2007)


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