Israel,LBJ and the JFK assassination

[Lee Forman]

Final Judgment’s case in this regard is principally built on the key significance of Meyer Lansky as the real power player in American organized crime in the 1950s and 1960s, the superior of Giancana, Roselli, Marcello, Mickey Cohen, Mickey Weiner, Moe Dalitz, Frank Costello, and others previously mentioned as participants in the Kennedy conspiracy. quote]

Which is completely untrue. Lansky was subservient to the Genovese family. He was not the boss of Trafficante, and had a close confidant, Jimy Alo, look over Lansky's interests FOR the Genovese family.

THis comes from wiseguys' mouths not mine.

Also he did not die rich, nor did he die powerful. HIs 'power' in the underworld was being eclipsed by the 1960's.

BTW- another good book on Jewish gangsters is Rich Cohen's TOUGH JEWS- a great account of the Lower East side guys like Kid Twist Reles.

Scott,

Are you saying Lansky died poor? Didn't he offer the Israeli Government ten million bucks to allow him to emigrate in the 70's?

Lansky subservient to Genovese? Laughable. Genovese spent the last decade of his life in jail. Some believe Lansky helped put him there.

Politics of Heroin - I guess we could ask McCloy - he has Lansky being first to Havana. Trafficante 'assumed responsibility' for Lansky's interests in Havana and Miami.

I have never seen anything about Lansky being subservient to the Genovese family - would you mind sharing a reference?

http://www.carpenoctem.tv/mafia/luciano.html

Can't copy and paste from this site. Worth reading.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Anastasia

However, Genovese dared not move against Anastasia and his real target, Costello, because of Meyer Lansky, one of the highest ranking and most powerful members of the National Crime Syndicate. Lansky and Genovese were long-standing enemies, with disputes dating from the 1920s, and Genovese could not make a move for power without Lansky's support.

Anyone know the names of the Israeli journalists Ruby allegedly met with? Was Ruby a Zionist? If Ruby is really a hardcore Zionist, and I see no reason to believe otherwise, it would make a great deal of logical sense to me.

- lee

[Owen Parsons]

i tend to agree with Piper's general theory on the landscape of how Israel has progressed militarily and in the United States policies since 1963.Bottom line,they call the shots...look no further than the United States waging and threatening war today on Israel's worst blood enemies....the whole 9 yards from the USS Liberty to Jack Abramoff and everything in between.

More anti-Israeli nonsense. Israel as a state can certainly be subjected to criticism, but much of it is ridiculous and borderline, yes, "anti-Semitic." I really fail to see how the attack on the USS Liberty can be seen as anything other than a case of mistaken identity. First of all, I have never seen any plausible motive whatsoever put forward for why Israel would deliberately attack the ship. Second, Israel did not sink the Liberty. These two factors pretty much "sink" the theory. Its just another smear to paint the Jewish nation as totally malevolent and evil.

This little piece by Dr. Dore Gold (former Israeli ambassador to the U.N.) shows that the U.S.'s recent Iraqi adventure has not been at Israel's behest, nor is it even necessarily in Israel's best interest.

Also, this lengthy analysis by Dr. Francisco Gil-White shows that U.S. foreign policy has been pro-PLO, not pro-Israeli. How interesting that the United States should get the PLO out of Lebanon on the brink of their destruction by Israel, or that the PLO provided security for U.S. diplomats in the same conflict. This is just one example among many. In addition, another long series of articles by the same author details the attacks on Israel in the media by "former" CIA officials Raymond McGovern and Vincent Cannistraro, including linking Israel to 9-11 (for which there is still no evidence that hasn't been "cooked," so to speak).

Edited April 15, 2006 by Owen Parsons

[Mark Wilson]

i tend to agree with Piper's general theory on the landscape of how Israel has progressed militarily and in the United States policies since 1963.Bottom line,they call the shots...look no further than the United States waging and threatening war today on Israel's worst blood enemies....the whole 9 yards from the USS Liberty to Jack Abramoff and everything in between.

More anti-Israeli nonsense. Israel as a state can certainly be subjected to criticism, but much of it is ridiculous and borderline, yes, "anti-Semitic." I really fail to see how the attack on the USS Liberty can be seen as anything other than a case of mistaken identity. First of all, I have never seen any plausible motive whatsoever put forward for why Israel would deliberately attack the ship. Second, Israel did not sink the Liberty. These two factors pretty much "sink" the theory. Its just another smear to paint the Jewish nation as totally malevolent and evil.

This little piece by Dr. Dore Gold (former Israeli ambassador to the U.N.) shows that the U.S.'s recent Iraqi adventure has not been at Israel's behest, nor is it even necessarily in Israel's best interest.

Also, this lengthy analysis by Dr. Francisco Gil-White shows that U.S. foreign policy has been pro-PLO, not pro-Israeli. How interesting that the United States should get the PLO out of Lebanon on the brink of their destruction by Israel, or that the PLO provided security for U.S. diplomats in the same conflict. This is just one example among many. In addition, another long series of articles by the same author details the attacks on Israel in the media by "former" CIA officials Raymond McGovern and Vincent Cannistraro, including linking Israel to 9-11 (for which there is still no evidence that hasn't been "cooked," so to speak).

Hi,Owen..i agree with you,there are plenty of "woe is Israel" articles out there.We're so far apart on how we see things in regards to the role Israel plays in American foreign policy and the media there's no need to even comment further....i will add that you've embellished Ray McGovern's influence in the media.His best moments have been on CSpan,which is not the mainstream media. Ray McGovern's work since 9/11 has been very admirable in my opinion..

Edited April 15, 2006 by Mark Wilson

[Ron Ecker]

I have never seen any plausible motive whatsoever put forward for why Israel would deliberately attack the ship.

I've seen one. It has been theorized that it was a false flag operation to blame the attack on the Egyptians. If true, it was a rerun of the Lavon Affair, which was also a failure: Israeli agents attacked U.S. and British targets in Egypt in 1954 with the intent of blaming it on the Egyptians. The affair is named after the Israeli minister who had to resign as a result.

[Owen Parsons]

i tend to agree with Piper's general theory on the landscape of how Israel has progressed militarily and in the United States policies since 1963.Bottom line,they call the shots...look no further than the United States waging and threatening war today on Israel's worst blood enemies....the whole 9 yards from the USS Liberty to Jack Abramoff and everything in between.

More anti-Israeli nonsense. Israel as a state can certainly be subjected to criticism, but much of it is ridiculous and borderline, yes, "anti-Semitic." I really fail to see how the attack on the USS Liberty can be seen as anything other than a case of mistaken identity. First of all, I have never seen any plausible motive whatsoever put forward for why Israel would deliberately attack the ship. Second, Israel did not sink the Liberty. These two factors pretty much "sink" the theory. Its just another smear to paint the Jewish nation as totally malevolent and evil.

This little piece by Dr. Dore Gold (former Israeli ambassador to the U.N.) shows that the U.S.'s recent Iraqi adventure has not been at Israel's behest, nor is it even necessarily in Israel's best interest.

Also, this lengthy analysis by Dr. Francisco Gil-White shows that U.S. foreign policy has been pro-PLO, not pro-Israeli. How interesting that the United States should get the PLO out of Lebanon on the brink of their destruction by Israel, or that the PLO provided security for U.S. diplomats in the same conflict. This is just one example among many. In addition, another long series of articles by the same author details the attacks on Israel in the media by "former" CIA officials Raymond McGovern and Vincent Cannistraro, including linking Israel to 9-11 (for which there is still no evidence that hasn't been "cooked," so to speak).

Hi,Owen..i agree with you,there are plenty of "woe is Israel" articles out there.We're so far apart on how we see things in regards to the role Israel plays in American foreign policy and the media there's no need to even comment further....i will add that you've embellished Ray McGovern's influence in the media.His best moments have been on CSpan,which is not the mainstream media. Ray McGovern's work since 9/11 has been very admirable in my opinion..

Gil-White documents how Raymond McGovern's work is disingenuous, dishonest, and malicious, particularly about things he should be aware of as a "former" CIA man. McGovern's main point linking Israel to 9/11, which appears to be the ZIM shipping company allegations, have been debunked (note: there is much on this particular site I do not support, but this is solidly documented). As for McGovern in the mainstream media, I'll quote Gil-White here: "If you do a search in the Lexis-Nexis archive, limiting yourself just to the major papers, McGovern has appeared a total of 80 times since 1999. This gives a yearly average of about 13 appearances, which is already impressive and yet deceptive because McGovern's exposure has been growing over time: in the last year alone (August 2004-August 2005) he has appeared 30 times, which is more than twice a month. Remember, this is just in the major papers that are archived by Lexis-Nexis; his total exposure is more impressive still, for he appears also in papers not archived by Lexis-Nexis, and in radio and television. (And none of this counts appearances of McGovern's VIPS that do not mention McGovern specifically.)"

It is indeed obvious that our views on American foreign policy towards Israel diverge significantly, but I would like to know how you can reconcile America's rescue of the P.L.O. from extinction in Lebanon with your views (for starters).

Edited April 15, 2006 by Owen Parsons

[Owen Parsons]

I have never seen any plausible motive whatsoever put forward for why Israel would deliberately attack the ship.

I've seen one. It has been theorized that it was a false flag operation to blame the attack on the Egyptians. If true, it was a rerun of the Lavon Affair, which was also a failure: Israeli agents attacked U.S. and British targets in Egypt in 1954 with the intent of blaming it on the Egyptians. The affair is named after the Israeli minister who had to resign as a result.

The targets in the Lavon Affair were such places as public libraries and post offices. You fail to mention that there were no deaths or even injuries in these bombings (deliberately so), and property damage was slight. This is usually left out, leaving the impression that these were something like terrorist attacks.

In any case, if the intention was to blame the attack on the Egyptians, you would think the Israelis would at least sink the ship, and failing that, not inform the U.S. Embassy immediately after calling the attack off.

Edited April 15, 2006 by Owen Parsons

[Ron Ecker]

I'm not familiar with all the details of the attack. I do recall reading that U.S. jet fighters were on their way to defend the ship, and LBJ ordered them to turn around and come back. If that's true, I guess LBJ figured that Israel, like Castro, is nobody to mess with.

[Owen Parsons]

I'm not familiar with all the details of the attack. I do recall reading that U.S. jet fighters were on their way to defend the ship, and LBJ ordered them to turn around and come back. If that's true, I guess LBJ figured that Israel, like Castro, is nobody to mess with.

I've never seen this particular allegation anywhere before. It sounds like another in the long line of myths which permeate anti-Israel propaganda. If someone can provide me with a citation or link, I'll look into it.

Edited April 15, 2006 by Owen Parsons

[Owen Parsons]

....who makes movies,who financed Stone's JFK? how about the movie Nixon?, what a bumbling, drunken, anti semite fool it made him out to be with again the insinuation being that Nixon had some knowledge or involvement via Hunt,Sturgis in the JFK assassination.

on a semi related note....today on Chris Matthew's Hardball,they discussed the Nixon tapes where Nixon and the reverand Billy Graham had a conservation where Nixon said the Jews dominated the media and Graham said the stranglehold must be broken or the country would go down the drain,a comment he later apologized for....These tapes were more than 30 years ago and less than 10 years from when JFK was killed.

Well I see it didn't take long for a plausible theory to denigrate into the usual "Jews control everything" diatribe.

In case you're unaware, Scott, there's many people who believe the US media is run by those whose loyalty to Israel prevents them from objectivity in the analysis of Middle Eastern affairs. Myself included. How many stories on Fox or NBC are sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians? Do you think the Palestinians have been oppressed and dispossessed or is it just "poor leadership", as the Israeli lobby contemptuously suggests? Will the History channel be presenting an (objective) doco on the USS Liberty, an unresolved historical issue if ever there was one?

Funny you should mention the History Channel not airing an "objective" documentary, because they have indeed aired a documentary on the Liberty that you would probably find "objective." See here. As for the plight of the Palestinians, they have been running almost all of the "occupied territories" for some time now, thus making the very phrase "occupied territories" a misnomer and placing the blame for their plight squarely on the Palestinian leadership. See this article by Professor Efraim Karsh, whose writings documenting the fabrications of the Israeli "New Historians" (Benny Morris, Illan Pappe, Avi Shlaim, etc.) were initially responsible for turning my views around on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

I also find it hilarious that Mr. Wilson goes off on Stone for portraying Nixon as an anti-Semite (something I don't actually recall from my viewing of the movie, but whatever) and then, in the next paragraph, cites with approval the comments of Nixon and Billy Graham to the effect that the "Jews" run the media. I don't know how I missed this before.

Edit: Oh yes, and to return to U.S. foreign policy in Israel, I'd like to note that the U.S. threatened to withdraw financial aid from Israel if Israel did not participate in its project to resettle the P.L.O. in the West Bank, the Madrid Peace talks. What an "ally."

Edited April 15, 2006 by Owen Parsons

[Ron Ecker]

Ex-officer alleges cover-up in probe of spy ship attack

By James W. Crawley

UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

February 17, 2004

Ward Boston is an unassuming octogenarian who resides in a gated community on Coronado's Silver Strand.

A retired Navy captain, he hardly attracts attention in a town full of active-duty and retired sailors.

Yet Boston is in the maelstrom of a nearly 37-year-old controversy surrounding Israel's deadly attack on the Navy's spy ship Liberty during the Six-Day War with Egypt, Syria and Jordan. The June 1967 attack killed 34 Americans and wounded 171.

Last October, Boston broke decades of silence and declared that the Navy admiral who investigated the incident had been ordered by President Lyndon Johnson and Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to conclude it was a case of mistaken identity, despite evidence to the contrary.

As the chief counsel for the Navy's court of inquiry, Boston had an insider's view.

"I didn't speak up earlier because I was told not to," Boston said in an interview.

His revelation, repeated last month before a State Department conference about the Six-Day War, has rekindled a smoldering debate over how it happened and whether the United States and Israel covered up the truth.

Anti-Israel factions portray Boston's words – true to his legal background, memorialized in two affidavits but rarely spoken to an audience larger than one person – as proof of Israel's guilt.

Israel's supporters, including a federal bankruptcy judge who researched the attack and wrote a book on it, say Boston is lying. Some pin an anti-Semitic badge on his lapel.

On Web pages and through e-mail, an electronic brawl is raging over Boston's disclosures among his admirers and detractors.

But, for the men who survived the attack, Boston's comments endorse views smelted in cordite, blood and smoke.

"We feel we've been vindicated," said James Ennes, the Liberty's officer of the deck the day of the attack, which left him severely wounded.

"We've been saying for 37 years that the court of inquiry was a fraud, that it was corrupted, that it ignored evidence and made findings not supported by the evidence," said Ennes, whose book about the incident claims it was a deliberate Israeli attack.

Boston's cover-up allegation is "enormously significant," said author James Bamford, who has written several books about the super-secret National Security Agency, which analyzed radio intercepts from Liberty and other U.S. surveillance ships.

"It's equivalent to former Supreme Court (Chief) Justice Earl Warren coming out and saying 'the Warren Commission report on (the) Kennedy (assassination) – everything we said was not what we believed, but we were pressured to say it,' " Bamford said.

"It puts an enormous shadow over everything that was in the (Navy) report," he said.

Even with Boston's affidavits and some newly released documents presented at the State Department conference, no consensus was reached on whether the attack was deliberate, accidental or the result of negligence.

The Liberty was a Navy spy ship, plain and simple.

Like its ill-fated sister vessel Pueblo, which was captured by North Korea six months later, the Liberty was festooned with antennas and its cargo holds were converted into top-secret locked compartments lined with receivers where petty officers eavesdropped on other nations' militaries.

During the Six-Day War, the Liberty loitered off the Sinai Peninsula, listening to Israel's lightning victory over Egypt.

On the afternoon of June 8, 1967, Israeli jets strafed the ship. Hours later, Israeli torpedo boats attacked. By the evening, 34 U.S. sailors were dead and 171 injured.

Israel said the attack was a terrible mistake caused by the misidentification of the Liberty as an Egyptian vessel. Investigations followed, including the Navy's court of inquiry.

That's when Ward Boston's involvement began.

If Hollywood had discovered Boston, he could have been the real-life prototype for Cmdr. Harmon Rabb, one of the leads on the television show "JAG."

In the Pacific during World War II, Boston flew harrowing photo-reconnaissance missions over Tokyo and Iwo Jima in Navy Hellcat fighters, sometimes making three passes over a single target – once to take pre-bombing pictures, then joining other planes in attacking the target and, finally, a post-attack pass to photograph the damage.

After the war, Boston went to law school, passed the bar and entered private practice. Meanwhile, he continued to fly Navy fighters as a reservist, including its first jet, the FH-1 Phantom.

In the late 1940s, he joined the FBI and was assigned to field offices in San Francisco and Los Angeles. During the Korean War, he rejoined the Navy, this time as a JAG officer.

By June 1967, Boston was legal officer for then-Rear Adm. Isaac Kidd Jr. when the flag officer was assigned to head the hastily convened inquiry into the Liberty attack.

Unable to interview hospitalized sailors and Israeli military and civilian officials, the investigative panel was given just a week to examine the battered ship, interview survivors and collect radio intercepts and other information.

Boston said it was obvious then who was responsible.

"There's no way in the world that it was an accident," Boston said.

In his affidavits and a recent interview, Boston recounted how he and Kidd discussed their conclusions about the survivors' testimony.

"(Kidd) referred to the Israelis as 'murderous bastards,' " Boston said.

After Kidd delivered the panel's report to Washington officials, Boston said the admiral told him, "they aren't interested in the facts or what happened. It's a political issue. They want to cover it up." Then Kidd admonished Boston to keep silent.

Boston said Kidd told him privately that orders came from Johnson and McNamara to find the incident was a mistake and not a deliberate act.

There is no documentation to support Boston's account.

Kidd died in 1999 at 79 after a career topped by command of the Atlantic Fleet. He never spoke of a cover-up.

The late '60s was the height of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Soviets were backing the Arab nations; the United States was allied with Israel. U.S. troops were fully engaged in Vietnam and the United States was fearful of growing Soviet influence, especially in the oil-rich Mideast.

Those who claim the attack was no accident argue that Israel wanted to stop the Liberty from snooping on its military during the war.

Boston kept quiet too, until the 2002 publication of "The Liberty Incident," by Judge Jay Cristol, provoked him.

Cristol's book, based on more than 10 years of research and hundreds of interviews and the collection of thousands of documents, argued that Israeli pilots, sailors and top military officials, in the heat of combat and the fog of war, were unaware the Liberty was a U.S. ship, mistaking it for an Egyptian vessel.

The two men spoke twice during the 1990s while Cristol researched his book, but Boston said recently that he only discussed his career and did not reveal details of the inquiry.

"It is Cristol's insidious attempt to whitewash the facts that has pushed me to speak out," Boston said in a Jan. 8 affidavit, read by Bamford at the State Department conference last month. Boston did not attend the conference.

Boston's affidavit was passed to Bamford by a friend who believes that Israel is responsible for the attack on the Liberty.

The judge, during a recent telephone interview, discounted Boston's contention that Johnson and McNamara covered up Israel complicity.

"I think those (accusations) are kind of nonsense," Cristol said.

Cristol – also a former Navy pilot and JAG officer – said Boston's comments show that he either lied in 1967 by knowingly filing a false report or that his memory has changed with age.

Referring to Cristol, Boston said, "I'm not going to get into a spitting contest with a skunk."

He also rejected suggestions that he is anti-Semitic, while acknowledging some sympathy for the plight of Palestinian refugees.

As he splits his day between local organizations and daily visits to the gym to loosen up arthritic joints, Boston remains largely oblivious to the electronic cacophony of e-mail and Internet chat that makes him out to be either a patriot or a patsy for anti-Israel factions.

That's because Boston doesn't have a computer. Friends print out and pass along Internet postings mentioning him or his statements.

"I'm a dinosaur," he said. "I use a pencil with an eraser and a typewriter."

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/militar...n17liberty.html

Edited April 15, 2006 by Ron Ecker

[Mark Stapleton]

I'm not familiar with all the details of the attack. I do recall reading that U.S. jet fighters were on their way to defend the ship, and LBJ ordered them to turn around and come back. If that's true, I guess LBJ figured that Israel, like Castro, is nobody to mess with.

I've never seen this particular allegation anywhere before. It sounds like another in the long line of myths which permeate anti-Israel propaganda. If someone can provide me with a citation or link, I'll look into it.

Try this one:

http://home.cfl.rr.com/gidusko/liberty/

There's no way it was mistaken identity. Survivors of the Liberty claim there's no way the ship could have been mistaken for an Egyptian fishing boat. Many sites show a comparison between the two--to mistake one for the other is not something the IDF would do. Also, the US flag was flying full mast, for heaven's sake. Why don't you tell the survivors and their families that it was a simple case of mistaken identity. You can reach them online at the above site. The LBJ story has been told before on the Forum and I believe it to be true.

No myths, just facts.

[Scott Deitche]

Thanks guys for supplying some of the dots.

i'd like to qualify my original post... in late 1963 it was clear that a plot against JFK was in the works,the exposed Chicago and Miami assassination plans having been thwarted in the weeks before Dallas...looking back it's easy for us to say now,how in the hell could they let JFK ride in an open car under those conditions in the proximity of the Miami and Chicago plots? i think people in the know in 1963 would have asked the same key questions then as we can so easily answer now...threats all over the place,JFK needed extra security,not less......and this is where the unknown administrators come into play to coordinate the various players needed....at the very least,i would put the Mossad in a front row seat watching this all unfold and then using the first hand knowledge of the crime to bride and blackmail the relevant power figures in the investigation/cover up as well as future agendas when need be.......at the very most i would put the Mossad as chief co conspirator with the MIC in which they coordinated the various aspects and players as to leave the trail pointed in various directions excluding Israel and the MIC,such as the Mafia,CIA,big Oil,Castro,the Birch society, or Oswald...The Mossad has a ruthless reputation for getting the job done,it's my hunch that 11/22/63 has something to do with it....if it's true, they lay claim to killing the most powerful leader in the world,having wash investigations that point everywhere but to them,dominating the america media(see below) so any relevant evidence is totally ignored,and money / resources in hollywood to put false theories out regularly....who makes movies,who financed Stone's JFK? how about the movie Nixon?, what a bumbling, drunken, anti semite fool it made him out to be with again the insinuation being that Nixon had some knowledge or involvement via Hunt,Sturgis in the JFK assassination.

on a semi related note....today on Chris Matthew's Hardball,they discussed the Nixon tapes where Nixon and the reverand Billy Graham had a conservation where Nixon said the Jews dominated the media and Graham said the stranglehold must be broken or the country would go down the drain,a comment he later apologized for....These tapes were more than 30 years ago and less than 10 years from when JFK was killed.

Well I see it didn't take long for a plausible theory to denigrate into the usual "Jews control everything" diatribe.

And it didn't take long for the predictable "don't blame Israel for anything" apologists to spring out of the woodwork.

In case you're unaware, Scott, there's many people who believe the US media is run by those whose loyalty to Israel prevents them from objectivity in the analysis of Middle Eastern affairs. Myself included. How many stories on Fox or NBC are sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians? Do you think the Palestinians have been oppressed and dispossessed or is it just "poor leadership", as the Israeli lobby contemptuously suggests? Will the History channel be presenting an (objective) doco on the USS Liberty, an unresolved historical issue if ever there was one?

Incredibly, the US is seriously considering a strike on Iran, citing the possibility of an Iranian nuclear strike on Israel as one of the main reasons. Does this mean the US will pre-emptively strike any country who attempts to obtain a nuclear capability in proximity to one of its allies? If Indonesia, at times hostile to Australia, announces it intends to produce a nuclear capability for security reasons, as Israel did in the 50's and 60's, will America pre-emptively strike Indonesia? After all, Australia is a close ally of the US.

If you seroiusly believe that US Middle Eastern policy isn't run by the Israeli lobby, and zealously supported through the US media, then you don't know what you're talking about. And the overriding influence of that lobby on US foreign policy dates back to (surprise, surprise), 1963.

I don't see Mark Wilson's post as a "diatribe" at all. It's a very informative post, actually.

My point was that it was an informative post then he ends it with the whole "Jews control the media" thing which immediately detracts from the information. It's like if I were posting about the mob's role in the assasination and said "all Italians are mobsters." I could care less whether he likes Jews or not, but don't assume that all Jews share the same views on any topic, including Israel.

I forget which prominent rabbi said this, maybe Daniel Lapin. "Jews agree on only one thing- that Jesus was not the Messiah."

Happy Passover

[Scott Deitche]

Final Judgment’s case in this regard is principally built on the key significance of Meyer Lansky as the real power player in American organized crime in the 1950s and 1960s, the superior of Giancana, Roselli, Marcello, Mickey Cohen, Mickey Weiner, Moe Dalitz, Frank Costello, and others previously mentioned as participants in the Kennedy conspiracy. quote]

Which is completely untrue. Lansky was subservient to the Genovese family. He was not the boss of Trafficante, and had a close confidant, Jimy Alo, look over Lansky's interests FOR the Genovese family.

THis comes from wiseguys' mouths not mine.

Also he did not die rich, nor did he die powerful. HIs 'power' in the underworld was being eclipsed by the 1960's.

BTW- another good book on Jewish gangsters is Rich Cohen's TOUGH JEWS- a great account of the Lower East side guys like Kid Twist Reles.

Scott,

Are you saying Lansky died poor? Didn't he offer the Israeli Government ten million bucks to allow him to emigrate in the 70's?

Lansky subservient to Genovese? Laughable. Genovese spent the last decade of his life in jail. Some believe Lansky helped put him there.

Politics of Heroin - I guess we could ask McCloy - he has Lansky being first to Havana. Trafficante 'assumed responsibility' for Lansky's interests in Havana and Miami.

I have never seen anything about Lansky being subservient to the Genovese family - would you mind sharing a reference?

http://www.carpenoctem.tv/mafia/luciano.html

Can't copy and paste from this site. Worth reading.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Anastasia

However, Genovese dared not move against Anastasia and his real target, Costello, because of Meyer Lansky, one of the highest ranking and most powerful members of the National Crime Syndicate. Lansky and Genovese were long-standing enemies, with disputes dating from the 1920s, and Genovese could not make a move for power without Lansky's support.

Anyone know the names of the Israeli journalists Ruby allegedly met with? Was Ruby a Zionist? If Ruby is really a hardcore Zionist, and I see no reason to believe otherwise, it would make a great deal of logical sense to me.

- lee

Costello was part of the original Lansky/Luciano/Siegel/Costello quartet.

I talked with a number of old wiseguys in research for my books and articles. A few of them have stated that Lansky's role was way overplayed once the 60's came around. I'm not denying he wielded immense influence, especially when Luciano was in power, but it diminshed over the years.

After Luciano died (Costello had 'retired') Lansky simply did not have the muscle, he had no real crew to speak of- only a small circle of guys. His 'power' was more political- a consigliere role, especially towards the latter decades of his life. The Italians had the muscle . lansky was respected but he was not Costello's or Giancana's superior.

It was the same with John Gotti. The media made him to be this all-powerful godfather when in reality, Chin Gigante and the Genovese family were larger, stronger, and wielded considerably more influence.

Robert Lacey's "Little Man" does a pretty good job of talking about Lansky's financial situation. It's hard to ever really determine how much a wiseguy is worth but Lansky did not leave much at all to his family and no other monies were found. His legit investments went bust as well. If he had all those millions and didn't leave it to his family then no one knows where it went. Maybe Alvin Malnick and the rest of Lansky's inner circle took some- but then again his brother Jake was fairly impoverished by the time he died as well.

He may very well have had the $10 million he offered Israel to stay, but who knows what happened to it by 1983.

Gangsters are , above all, greedy bastards. As one former mob associate so eloquently put it to me, "The wiseguy ALWAYS ends up with teh cash."

[

Politics of Heroin - I guess we could ask McCloy - he has Lansky being first to Havana. Trafficante 'assumed responsibility' for Lansky's interests in Havana and Miami.

I'm not sure if Lansky was there before Trafficante Sr. or not. Certainly before Jr.

However early Tampa mob figures, Ignazio Antinori chief among them, had political and criminal connections to Cuba since the 1920's, due to the large Cuban immigrant population in Tampa. When Marchado left Cuba, he came to Tampa and stayed with Ignazio Antinori before moving on- I think Marchado settled in Miami. His family told me that when Marchado arrived he had a huge trunk with him. Ignazio assumed it was clothing, but later came to find out it was filled with cash. Ignazio could have kicked himself for not getting his hands on it before Marchado left.

The Tampa mob was smuggling narcotics and molasses out of Cuba since at least 1925, which would precede Lansky's arrival.

Edited April 15, 2006 by Scott Deitche

[Mark Wilson]

....who makes movies,who financed Stone's JFK? how about the movie Nixon?, what a bumbling, drunken, anti semite fool it made him out to be with again the insinuation being that Nixon had some knowledge or involvement via Hunt,Sturgis in the JFK assassination.

on a semi related note....today on Chris Matthew's Hardball,they discussed the Nixon tapes where Nixon and the reverand Billy Graham had a conservation where Nixon said the Jews dominated the media and Graham said the stranglehold must be broken or the country would go down the drain,a comment he later apologized for....These tapes were more than 30 years ago and less than 10 years from when JFK was killed.

Well I see it didn't take long for a plausible theory to denigrate into the usual "Jews control everything" diatribe.

In case you're unaware, Scott, there's many people who believe the US media is run by those whose loyalty to Israel prevents them from objectivity in the analysis of Middle Eastern affairs. Myself included. How many stories on Fox or NBC are sympathetic to the plight of the Palestinians? Do you think the Palestinians have been oppressed and dispossessed or is it just "poor leadership", as the Israeli lobby contemptuously suggests? Will the History channel be presenting an (objective) doco on the USS Liberty, an unresolved historical issue if ever there was one?

Funny you should mention the History Channel not airing an "objective" documentary, because they have indeed aired a documentary on the Liberty that you would probably find "objective." See here. As for the plight of the Palestinians, they have been running almost all of the "occupied territories" for some time now, thus making the very phrase "occupied territories" a misnomer and placing the blame for their plight squarely on the Palestinian leadership. See this article by Professor Efraim Karsh, whose writings documenting the fabrications of the Israeli "New Historians" (Benny Morris, Illan Pappe, Avi Shlaim, etc.) were initially responsible for turning my views around on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

I also find it hilarious that Mr. Wilson goes off on Stone for portraying Nixon as an anti-Semite (something I don't actually recall from my viewing of the movie, but whatever) and then, in the next paragraph, cites with approval the comments of Nixon and Billy Graham to the effect that the "Jews" run the media. I don't know how I missed this before.

Edit: Oh yes, and to return to U.S. foreign policy in Israel, I'd like to note that the U.S. threatened to withdraw financial aid from Israel if Israel did not participate in its project to resettle the P.L.O. in the West Bank, the Madrid Peace talks. What an "ally."

Owen,i wasnt going off on Stone for portraying Nixon as an anti semite,but he did.Rather,i was pointing out that yet again, the anti semite card had been played.As i recall Nixon was made out to be a racist,this was done when they were declassifying the transcripts of the Nixon tapes...Nixon had apparently used the slurs of Jews,Niggers, and possibly other racially offensive terms that were recorded on the tapes that needed to be cleaned up......my point about the media and film makers is that Israel is more than fairly represented in the media and in hollywood,some would say there's a Jewish media dominance in america......What's really hillarious is your denial of the Jewish influence in the media and hollywood and how any criticism or suspisions of Israel or Jewish propaganda is adressed as anti semitism...

[Mark Stapleton]

Final Judgment’s case in this regard is principally built on the key significance of Meyer Lansky as the real power player in American organized crime in the 1950s and 1960s, the superior of Giancana, Roselli, Marcello, Mickey Cohen, Mickey Weiner, Moe Dalitz, Frank Costello, and others previously mentioned as participants in the Kennedy conspiracy. quote]

Which is completely untrue. Lansky was subservient to the Genovese family. He was not the boss of Trafficante, and had a close confidant, Jimy Alo, look over Lansky's interests FOR the Genovese family.

THis comes from wiseguys' mouths not mine.

Also he did not die rich, nor did he die powerful. HIs 'power' in the underworld was being eclipsed by the 1960's.

BTW- another good book on Jewish gangsters is Rich Cohen's TOUGH JEWS- a great account of the Lower East side guys like Kid Twist Reles.

Scott,

Are you saying Lansky died poor? Didn't he offer the Israeli Government ten million bucks to allow him to emigrate in the 70's?

Lansky subservient to Genovese? Laughable. Genovese spent the last decade of his life in jail. Some believe Lansky helped put him there.

Politics of Heroin - I guess we could ask McCloy - he has Lansky being first to Havana. Trafficante 'assumed responsibility' for Lansky's interests in Havana and Miami.

I have never seen anything about Lansky being subservient to the Genovese family - would you mind sharing a reference?

http://www.carpenoctem.tv/mafia/luciano.html

Can't copy and paste from this site. Worth reading.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Anastasia

However, Genovese dared not move against Anastasia and his real target, Costello, because of Meyer Lansky, one of the highest ranking and most powerful members of the National Crime Syndicate. Lansky and Genovese were long-standing enemies, with disputes dating from the 1920s, and Genovese could not make a move for power without Lansky's support.

Anyone know the names of the Israeli journalists Ruby allegedly met with? Was Ruby a Zionist? If Ruby is really a hardcore Zionist, and I see no reason to believe otherwise, it would make a great deal of logical sense to me.

- lee

I think it's a safe bet he was fiercely Zionist. Cohen was and Jack looked up to him. To me it's obvious.

Good question re the journalists, Lee. It's a very hard topic to nail. Were they (if the story is true) "journalists". I wonder.

On the Genovese thing, I've always been under the impression that the 'big four'--Luciano, Lansky, Costello and Seigel--started out together. Two Italians and two Jews. I'm willing to be corrected but I've not read anything contradicting this. Luciano became leader of the New York mafia but didn't interefere in non competing jurisdictions, enhancing his underworld popularity. Genovese was Luciano's 2ic and from the beginning was disliked by the other three and Luciano himself, according to his bio. I can't see how the other three would accept Genovese as the boss once Luciano went to prison. It's daft.