Mark Stapleton

They seem like a civilized people. That's all people want, a place to live and work and create a community.

A very hazy couple of sentences.

So are you implying that Palestinians don't want to live and work and create a community?

What do you mean?

I think Israel can administer the area of Gaza better than any terrorist organization, and they should just take over the whole area and open it up to free market enterprise and let everyone live in peace and security.

That's what the Jews are all about, making money, so let them do it and make everybody happy.

Where were the voices to complain about the weeks long rocket attacks Hamas launched from schools and churches?

Why didn't anybody compain about that?

BK

And the children (those who haven't already been killed or maimed by the IDF) would laugh and play with gumdrop smiles---just like they do in Iraq now, right?

Please don't delete that post Bill. I want to show it to a few people.

I believe that a Palestinian state was set to be established several years ago, and the Palestinian "leader" Arafat turned it down, possibly because peace might prevent him from stuffing more millions of the Palestinians' money into his foreign bank accounts.

If you're referring to the Camp David talks sponsored by Bill Clinton in 2000, then you've been misled Ron.

Arafat turned it down because he had no choice. Besides not abiding with UNSC Resolution 242, it stank in many other ways. The Israelis demanded early warning stations inside the Palestinian state, control of Palestinian airspace and the right to deploy troops inside the Palestinian state in the event of 'emergency'. The Israelis also rejected the proposal that those Arabs expelled from their homes in 1948, about 700,000 in number, be entitled to return. It might alter the nature of Israel, the supremacist state maintained.

It was peace only under Israel's strict terms, just like all the other peace negotiations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camp_David_2000_Summit

Israel doesn't want peace. They're making that abundantly clear right now. They want war---or subjugation. Everything else they say is Zionist bullxxxx and spin.

Israel has become a mass murderer, an entity which uses its power to slaughter the weak,

just like the Nazis. In that sense, Israel has now turned onto the very horror they themselves

have been complaining about since the WWII.

Why can't the Israeli-Palestinian conflict be compared to the Holocaust?

The two are so dissimilar that they cannot be compared in any meaningful way.

The Holocaust was the attempt by the Nazis and their partners to kill all the Jews. In the Holocaust a sovereign nation harnessed all the apparatus of their state to the goal of the mass systematic murder of a specific people.

More than anything else, the murder of the Jews stemmed from Nazi racial ideology. According to that ideology, the Jews were an evil race, whose very existence endangered Germany and all of human civilization. The Nazi crusade against the Jews was not focused on winning tangible gains, such as land and other wealth from the Jews. Its goal was to rid the world of the supposed pernicious influence of the Jews.

The Nazis systematically murdered Jews in shooting actions and by gas in specially designed gas chambers in extermination camps. In the ghettos, camps and slave-labor installations under the Nazis, hundreds of thousands of Jews were also brutally worked to death. The end result was the murder of close to 6 million Jews.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is not racial, but national; it is political and territorial. It is a struggle between two peoples for a small land. Throughout the decades this struggle has oscillated between violence and attempts to negotiate a settlement. As tragic as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict may be, there are no mass graves, no public executions of thousands of people, no gas chambers. It cannot be compared to the Holocaust. Using terms taken from the history of the Holocaust to describe the situation in the Middle East does more to obscure than to clarify the events and their consequences

http://www1.yadvashem.org

That's one of the most threadbare apologies for Zionist genocide I've heard.

Gaza is a giant concentration camp, all sealed and blockaded from the outside world. Even international journalists are generally barred, except for the ones handpicked by Israel.

How could you possibly claim it is a struggle between two peoples for a small land? One of those 'peoples' has cutting edge military technology and is using it with blatant disregard for civilians, the other has sticks, stones and homemade rockets. The rockets have reportedly killed 17 Israelis in the last 7 years--about 2.5 Israeli deaths per year. What a massive military threat that is.

Hamas doesn't recognise Israel and nor should they. Why would you recognise a brutal occupier?

The only redeeming feature of this disgusting genocide is that all the Zionist spin doctors on earth can't save Israel's image now. The attack on the UN schools yesterday was the last straw. They can prove Israel knew it was firing on UN schools.

The current invasion is also cowardly. Palestine has barely any weapons at all. Let's see the brave IDF try the same thing on Iran. Of course, they've been wanting America to do it for them.

The answer to this thead is easy. The state of Israel is above the law, for now anyway.

Three minutes and twenty five seconds into this clip a reporter asks Chief Curry, "Could you detail for us what led you to Oswald?"

Curry begins to reply with the words "Not exact(ly)".

The tape then cuts to the next question.

Hmmm..

I say yea.

Here's his 64th and last press conference--14 November '63--in three parts:

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=SmGiXshzOww

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=HfuljkGBykY&...feature=related

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=HfuljkGBykY&...feature=related

In this press conference JFK is asked 27 questions, ranging from US/Soviet relations, Madame Nhu, the Honolulu Conference and the situation in Vietnam, foreign aid, Congressional gridlock of his reforms, the Civil Rights Bill (you know--the forerunner to the legislation which LBJ took the credit for), private citizens bills, the candidacy of Margaret Chase Smith, Nuclear Test bans and the theatre in Lafeyette Square, to name a few.

JFK exhibits an extraordinary depth of knowledge and understanding on all issues, coupled with his trademark humility and humour. Compare and contrast with today's timid corporate sockpuppets masquerading as leaders.

Towards the end of part one and the start of part two, JFK expresses his disappointment and frustration at being denied the major part of his foreign aid bill. This program, JFK said, was essential to the conduct of US foreign policy. It provided for aid to less wealthy countries in places like South America and the Middle East and was a tiny fraction of GDP.

Of course, after JFK's death foreign aid took a surprising turn with aid to Israel rocketing from 40 million to over 300 million in three years, most of it military aid. Prior to his death, Congress wouldn't let JFK spend a penny on poor countries. Kinda gets you thinking................

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?con...a&aid=11392

The Failed Logic of Supporting the Troops

by Remi Kanazi

Global Research, December 14, 2008

In the United States, a growing number of leftists are voicing their opposition to the Israeli occupation. They condemn the demolition of homes, the jailing of Palestinians without charge, and the confiscation of Palestinian land for settlements. They don't support the Israeli troops or their mission, nor do they give a free pass to those who are just "doing what they are told."

Nonetheless, many of these same individuals support the US troops in Iraq. Dangerously, most Americans put forth the notion that the troops' intrinsic heroism provides them with the impunity to destroy any bogeymen who stand in their way, cultivating a code of silence that strongly discourages dissent. It is under this premise that we support our "brave" and "noble" soldiers: we know their stories well, they miss their families, they are "just like us," and we should respect their service.

While one may comprehend the mindset of the troops, this understanding does not validate support for them. If the invasion of Iraq, the mission, and the occupation as stated policy are all wrong, then support for the armed forces carrying out the mission must also be wrong.

US soldiers are not a monolith and nearly everyone would argue that the majority of the troops are "good people." Yet, our emotional inclinations and the societal norm that tells us troops are good like bumper sticker slogans shouldn't serve as justification for supporting them and, by extension, the mission they are carrying out. We are led to believe that a soldier can either serve out the rest of his tour or be branded a disgrace and imprisoned for becoming a conscientious objector. In reality the choice is much starker: a soldier can refuse to serve or contribute to the death of a million Iraqis.

When people invoke the hardships our troops face, I think of the dead Iraqi mother, the splattered torsos painting the pavement, and the .50 caliber bullets that have hollowed out the bodies of Iraqi children. Each American has a distinct face and a tale that chokes us up, but our government and media have systematically dehumanized another people, whittling their presence in the world down to a nuisance that drains our budget, as though Iraq is a welfare state that strips our society of health care, education, and gas for cross country vacations.

Iraq is not Lehman Brothers pillaging our economy. Yet, even many self-described progressives deride the Iraqi people for their $79 billion surplus but make no mention of the fact that they lack proper access to electricity; Baghdad is still one of the most dangerous city in the world, and stability is nowhere in sight. Furthermore, a growing number among the mainstream left discuss Iraq in terms of "our" interests, criticizing the so-called ineptness of Iraqis and their unwillingness to embrace democracy (democracy that was never truly offered), all while five million have been made refugees, Baghdad has been cleansed of Sunnis, and each child, father, and mother live with horror stories we wouldn't wish upon our worst enemies. This is the result and reality of US occupation.

The assertion that troops are "just following orders" and that it is impossible to refuse once enlisted rings hollow. The US has not implemented a draft; on the contrary, each soldier chooses to fight in Iraq on behalf of the American government. This should not be applauded, nor should it be respected. Real courage would be abandoning this war—against orders, against the US administration—as a number of US soldiers have done (a phenomenon ignored by the mainstream media).

Staff Sergeant Camilo Mejia is a well known conscientious objector who served nine months in prison for refusing to return to Iraq. In a 2005 article on AlterNet, Mejia wrote:

"I say without any pride that I did my job as a soldier. I commanded an infantry squad in combat and we never failed to accomplish our mission. But those who called me a coward, without knowing it, are also right. I was a coward not for leaving the war, but for having been a part of it in the first place. Refusing and resisting this war was my moral duty, a moral duty that called me to take a principled action. I failed to fulfill my moral duty as a human being and instead I chose to fulfill my duty as a soldier."

Perhaps most importantly, many people fail to make the connection that supporting the troops enables the war and presents people who are against the occupation with a false reality: the ability to support the troops while rejecting the mission. Standing in solidarity with the troops facilitates funding for the occupation; it redresses the "intrinsic nobility" of the soldier, which further weakens congressmen who rhetorically reject the war, but support it through their votes. Occupation is dirty, and so too are the people who employ it. Following orders should not replace humanitarian law, and the excuse shouldn't serve to satisfy our consciences.

We are asked to support US troops when logic is absent. We look at the troops as victims who are forced to do things they would not otherwise do; we give them immunity and their crimes become unseen collateral damage. Yet, Iraqis are not monsters; they are the victims that face the gun's barrel. We should only support the troops as much as we support this war. Anything less supports the victimizer and not the victim.

Remi Kanazi is a Palestinian-American writer, poet, and editor living in New York City. He is editor of the recently released collection of poetry, spoken word, hip hop and art, Poets For Palestine. For more information, please visit www.PoetsForPalestine.com.

Remi Kanazi is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Remi Kanazi

Dorothy Kilgallen's last appearance on What's My Line--November 7, 1965--Arlene Francis and Tony Randall are also on the show.

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfjkQE-l2Ho&...feature=related

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=PSTgYIABk6w&...feature=related

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=6gn6jS1UK78&...feature=related

The show's host begins the following week's show with the announcement of her death:

http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=ASeMN0XRef8&...feature=related

The spike of MND in the soccer players was caused by something else, imo, but I don't know what it was.

big wet heavy leather balls to you Mr Stapleton

In the 1970s leather footballs were coated with a special polyurethane preparation, which eliminated water absorption during games. That is why the cases of MND in football who played with the new balls is causing so much concern.

Being leather they were a dammed sight heavier than the balls used today - is there a correlation between disease incidence and position played?

I would imagine that players who regularly headed one of those things experienced a trauma not dissimilar to be being punched on the head.

What about cases where there's been no head trauma? Not everyone who contracts MND is a soccer player. How does it explain the spike in Guam?

John / Mark:

What about rugby players? What about boxers? I feel sure that these people must also suffer the effects of repeated cranial concussion.

Evan, I don't claim to be an expert but my guess is that it isn't related to getting knocked on the head. I haven't heard of many boxers contracting MND, although Ali's severe Parkinson's disease is almost certainly related to the welter of blows he took late in his career, and I think Parkinson's is related to MND. As far as I know, the only Rugby League player who has contracted MND was Scott Gale, the ex-Balmain pivot.

The spike of MND in the soccer players was caused by something else, imo, but I don't know what it was.

It's the worst of any disease imaginable. I would never consider enduring it. Luckily it's rare. The last figure I read was that it strikes 6-7 people per 100,000. About 15,000 to one. I would hate those odds to shorten.

In the 1970s it was finally accepted that playing football could result in brain damage. The Encyclopedia of British Football (2002) pointed out: "On wet days the ball grew increasingly heavy as the leather soaked up large amounts of liquid. This, together with the lacing that protected the valve of the bladder, made heading the ball not only unpleasant but also painful and dangerous." A large number of football players in the past have suffered long-term brain damage because of repeated heading of a heavy, wet ball. Several top footballers in the 1950s and 1960s have suffered developing dementia in later life.

Research carried out by D. R. Williams in 2002 concluded that repetitive mild head trauma over the course of an amateur and professional footballer's career may increase an individual's risk of developing dementia in later life. Former players who have suffered from this disease include Joe Mercer, Bob Paisley, Stan Cullis, Bill Shorthouse, Peter Broadbent and Malcolm Allison. In 2002 a coroner said it was likely that the death of former West Bromwich Albion centre-forward, Jeff Astle, had been caused by "repeated small traumas to the brain".

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Fhealth.htm

In the 1970s leather footballs were coated with a special polyurethane preparation, which eliminated water absorption during games. Footballs used today combine a latex bladder with an outer casing made from synthetic leather. It was believed that this would eliminate brain damage in football players. However, recent research shows this is not the case.

Recently there has been concerns about the possible connections between motor neurone disease (MND) and professional football. In 2007 Ammar Al-Chalabi, a neurologist at King's College Hospital called on the Football Association to investigate whether the sport contributed to MND. It was pointed out that Don Revie, Jimmy Johnstone and Rob Hindmarch had all died of the disease.

Several top Italian footballers have also suffered from MND. This includes Gianluca Signorini, Adriano Lombardi and Stefano Borgonovo. Adriano Chio, a neurologist and Italy's foremost expert on the condition, has shown that professional footballers in the country are seven times more likely to develop MND than others. He discovered that 41 players had suffered from MND since 1973.

According to one theory, the incurable disease might be linked to pesticides used on football pitches. Others suggest it could be a result of performance enhancing drugs, the treatment used to combat physical injuries or repeatedly heading the ball.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/Fballs.htm

That is indeed frightening. I was unaware of the spike in cases in Italian and English footballers.

This dreaded affliction has for many years been noticeable in Guam, the Kii Peninsula in Japan and tribes in New Guinea. I have read that the incidence of all forms of MND on Guam is 15 times higher than that of the rest of the world. The use of cycad seed to make flour in Guam was identified as a possible cause. Bats also eat the seed and the cycad is stored in high concentrations in bat flesh, which was a traditional food of Guam. The bat cannery is now closed, I believe.

If you google MND and Guam, many pages appear detailing this strange phenomenon.

*********************************************************

"America has a long and disgraceful record of intervention in sovereign nations."

You got that right! It's called breaking the law, by having total disregard for The Geneva Accords.

"The US, while sometimes paying lip service to peace plans, continues to support Israel financially, militarily and diplomatically."

EXACTLY! Last I heard, back in 1994, it was to the tune of 11 BILLION DOLLARS A YEAR.

Who knows what it's been jacked up to over the last 14 years? And, what have they done for us, lately? Nothing but aid and abet our sorry asses into another money pit of delusion and paranoia aimed at separating the U.S. taxpayers from more billions of our hard-earned and dwindling cash reserves. And, for what? In order to eminent domain more of the Islamic Middle East's oil fields?

I'm fed up with being a "Hebrew slave" just so Israel can allow itself to be coddled and coerced by the C.I.A. into one skirmish after another with every country in their vicinity. Their nuclear warheads should be pulled, along with capping the missile silos. What good is it for them to have WMD at their fingertips, anyway? Whose interests are they suppose to be protecting? Not mine. They should be able to confront each other on an equal and conventional style battle field. All I see is a weak little outpost, set up by the C.I.A. from which to conduct more of their dirty tricks and black-ops campaigns on the rest of the Middle East's countries, for the specific purpose of exploiting their oil and "poppy" reserves.

Bottom line is, there should be NO NUCLEAR or WMD's allowed in the Middle East. But, if one country is allowed to be armed with them, then the rest of them should be allowed to, as well. How can you blame Iran, or Syria, when the U.S. has already and intentionally stacked the deck against them?

We need to get the hell out of there and let the chips fall where they may. And, cut that damned umbilical cord of a hemorrhaging cash flow.

wrmea.com

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Home > U.S. Aid to Israel

U.S. Financial Aid To Israel: Figures, Facts, and Impact

Summary

Benefits to Israel of U.S. Aid

Since 1949 (As of November 1, 1997)

Foreign Aid Grants and Loans

$74,157,600,000

Other U.S. Aid (12.2% of Foreign Aid)

$9,047,227,200

Interest to Israel from Advanced Payments

$1,650,000,000

Grand Total

$84,854,827,200

Total Benefits per Israeli

$14,630

Cost to U.S. Taxpayers of U.S.

Aid to Israel

Grand Total

$84,854,827,200

Interest Costs Borne by U.S.

$49,936,680,000

Total Cost to U.S. Taxpayers

$134,791,507,200

Total Taxpayer Cost per Israeli

$23,240

Special Reports:

* Congress Watch: A Conservative Total for U.S. Aid to Israel: $91 Billion—and Counting

* Congressional Research Report on Israel: US Foreign Assistance by Clyde Mark (213K pdf file)

* U.S. Aid To Israel: The Strategic Functions

* U.S. Aid to Israel: What U.S. Taxpayer Should Know

* U.S. Aid to Israel: Interpreting the 'Strategic Relationship'

* The Cost of Israel to U.S. Taxpayers: True Lies About U.S. Aid to Israel

THE STRATEGIC FUNCTIONS OF U.S. AID TO ISRAEL

By Stephen Zunes

Dr. Zunes is an assistant professor in the Department of Politics at the University of San Francisco

Since 1992, the U.S. has offered Israel an additional $2 billion annually in loan guarantees. Congressional researchers have disclosed that between 1974 and 1989, $16.4 billion in U.S. military loans were converted to grants and that this was the understanding from the beginning. Indeed, all past U.S. loans to Israel have eventually been forgiven by Congress, which has undoubtedly helped Israel's often-touted claim that they have never defaulted on a U.S. government loan. U.S. policy since 1984 has been that economic assistance to Israel must equal or exceed Israel's annual debt repayment to the United States. Unlike other countries, which receive aid in quarterly installments, aid to Israel since 1982 has been given in a lump sum at the beginning of the fiscal year, leaving the U.S. government to borrow from future revenues. Israel even lends some of this money back through U.S. treasury bills and collects the additional interest.

In addition, there is the more than $1.5 billion in private U.S. funds that go to Israel annually in the form of $1 billion in private tax-deductible donations and $500 million in Israeli bonds. The ability of Americans to make what amounts to tax-deductible contributions to a foreign government, made possible through a number of Jewish charities, does not exist with any other country. Nor do these figures include short- and long-term commercial loans from U.S. banks, which have been as high as $1 billion annually in recent years.

Total U.S. aid to Israel is approximately one-third of the American foreign-aid budget, even though Israel comprises just .001 percent of the world's population and already has one of the world's higher per capita incomes. Indeed, Israel's GNP is higher than the combined GNP of Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza. With a per capita income of about $14,000, Israel ranks as the sixteenth wealthiest country in the world; Israelis enjoy a higher per capita income than oil-rich Saudi Arabia and are only slightly less well-off than most Western European countries.

AID does not term economic aid to Israel as development assistance, but instead uses the term "economic support funding." Given Israel's relative prosperity, U.S. aid to Israel is becoming increasingly controversial. In 1994, Yossi Beilen, deputy foreign minister of Israel and a Knesset member, told the Women's International Zionist organization, "If our economic situation is better than in many of your countries, how can we go on asking for your charity?"

U.S. Aid to Israel: What U.S. Taxpayer Should Know

by Tom Malthaner

This morning as I was walking down Shuhada Street in Hebron, I saw graffiti marking the newly painted storefronts and awnings. Although three months past schedule and 100 percent over budget, the renovation of Shuhada Street was finally completed this week. The project manager said the reason for the delay and cost overruns was the sabotage of the project by the Israeli settlers of the Beit Hadassah settlement complex in Hebron. They broke the street lights, stoned project workers, shot out the windows of bulldozers and other heavy equipment with pellet guns, broke paving stones before they were laid and now have defaced again the homes and shops of Palestinians with graffiti. The settlers did not want Shuhada St. opened to Palestinian traffic as was agreed to under Oslo 2. This renovation project is paid for by USAID funds and it makes me angry that my tax dollars have paid for improvements that have been destroyed by the settlers.

Most Americans are not aware how much of their tax revenue our government sends to Israel. For the fiscal year ending in September 30, 1997, the U.S. has given Israel $6.72 billion: $6.194 billion falls under Israel's foreign aid allotment and $526 million comes from agencies such as the Department of Commerce, the U.S. Information Agency and the Pentagon. The $6.72 billion figure does not include loan guarantees and annual compound interest totalling $3.122 billion the U.S. pays on money borrowed to give to Israel. It does not include the cost to U.S. taxpayers of IRS tax exemptions that donors can claim when they donate money to Israeli charities. (Donors claim approximately $1 billion in Federal tax deductions annually. This ultimately costs other U.S. tax payers $280 million to $390 million.)

When grant, loans, interest and tax deductions are added together for the fiscal year ending in September 30, 1997, our special relationship with Israel cost U.S. taxpayers over $10 billion.

Since 1949 the U.S. has given Israel a total of $83.205 billion. The interest costs borne by U.S. tax payers on behalf of Israel are $49.937 billion, thus making the total amount of aid given to Israel since 1949 $133.132 billion. This may mean that U.S. government has given more federal aid to the average Israeli citizen in a given year than it has given to the average American citizen.

I am angry when I see Israeli settlers from Hebron destroy improvements made to Shuhada Street with my tax money. Also, it angers me that my government is giving over $10 billion to a country that is more prosperous than most of the other countries in the world and uses much of its money for strengthening its military and the oppression of the Palestinian people.

U.S. Aid to Israel: Interpreting the 'Strategic Relationship

by Stephen Zunes

"The U.S. aid relationship with Israel is unlike any other in the world," said Stephen Zunes during a January 26 CPAP presentation. "In sheer volume, the amount is the most generous foreign aid program ever between any two countries," added Zunes, associate professor of Politics and chair of the Peace and Justice Studies Program at the University of San Francisco.

He explored the strategic reasoning behind the aid, asserting that it parallels the "needs of American arms exporters" and the role "Israel could play in advancing U.S. strategic interests in the region."

Although Israel is an "advanced, industrialized, technologically sophisticated country," it "receives more U.S. aid per capita annually than the total annual [Gross Domestic Product] per capita of several Arab states." Approximately a third of the entire U.S. foreign aid budget goes to Israel, "even though Israel comprises just…one-thousandth of the world's total population, and already has one of the world's higher per capita incomes."

U.S. government officials argue that this money is necessary for "moral" reasons-some even say that Israel is a "democracy battling for its very survival." If that were the real reason, however, aid should have been highest during Israel's early years, and would have declined as Israel grew stronger. Yet "the pattern…has been just the opposite." According to Zunes, "99 percent of all U.S. aid to Israel took place after the June 1967 war, when Israel found itself more powerful than any combination of Arab armies…."

The U.S. supports Israel's dominance so it can serve as "a surrogate for American interests in this vital strategic region." "Israel has helped defeat radical nationalist movements" and has been a "testing ground for U.S. made weaponry." Moreover, the intelligence agencies of both countries have "collaborated," and "Israel has funneled U.S. arms to third countries that the U.S. [could] not send arms to directly,…Iike South Africa, like the Contras, Guatemala under the military junta, [and] Iran." Zunes cited an Israeli analyst who said: "'It's like Israel has just become another federal agency when it's convenient to use and you want something done quietly."' Although the strategic relationship between the United States and the Gulf Arab states in the region has been strengthening in recent years, these states "do not have the political stability, the technological sophistication, [or] the number of higher-trained armed forces personnel" as does Israel.

Matti Peled, former Israeli major general and Knesset member, told Zunes that he and most Israeli generals believe this aid is "little more than an American subsidy to U.S. arms manufacturers," considering that the majority of military aid to Israel is used to buy weapons from the U.S. Moreover, arms to Israel create more demand for weaponry in Arab states. According to Zunes, "the Israelis announced back in 1991 that they supported the idea of a freeze in Middle East arms transfers, yet it was the United States that rejected it."

In the fall of 1993-when many had high hopes for peace-78 senators wrote to former President Bill Clinton insisting that aid to Israel remain "at current levels." Their "only reason" was the "massive procurement of sophisticated arms by Arab states." The letter neglected to mention that 80 percent of those arms to Arab countries came from the U.S. "I'm not denying for a moment the power of AIPAC [the American Israel Public Affairs Committee], the pro-Israel lobby," and other similar groups, Zunes said. Yet the "Aerospace Industry Association which promotes these massive arms shipments…is even more influential." This association has given two times more money to campaigns than all of the pro-Israel groups combined. Its "force on Capitol Hill, in terms of lobbying, surpasses that of even AIPAC." Zunes asserted that the "general thrust of U.S. policy would be pretty much the same even if AIPAC didn't exist. We didn't need a pro-Indonesia lobby to support Indonesia in its savage repression of East Timor all these years." This is a complex issue, and Zunes said that he did not want to be "conspiratorial," but he asked the audience to imagine what "Palestinian industriousness, Israeli technology, and Arabian oil money…would do to transform the Middle East…. [W]hat would that mean to American arms manufacturers? Oil companies? Pentagon planners?"

"An increasing number of Israelis are pointing out" that these funds are not in Israel's best interest. Quoting Peled, Zunes said, "this aid pushes Israel 'toward a posture of callous intransigence' in terms of the peace process." Moreover, for every dollar the U.S. sends in arms aid, Israel must spend two to three dollars to train people to use the weaponry, to buy parts, and in other ways make use of the aid. Even "main-stream Israeli economists are saying [it] is very harmful to the country's future."

The Israeli paper Yediot Aharonot described Israel as "'the godfather's messenger' since [israel] undertake the 'dirty work' of a godfather who 'always tries to appear to be the owner of some large, respectable business."' Israeli satirist B. Michael refers to U.S. aid this way: "'My master gives me food to eat and I bite those whom he tells me to bite. It's called strategic cooperation." 'To challenge this strategic relationship, one cannot focus solely on the Israeli lobby but must also examine these "broader forces as well." "Until we tackle this issue head-on," it will be "very difficult to win" in other areas relating to Palestine.

"The results" of the short-term thinking behind U.S. policy "are tragic," not just for the "immediate victims" but "eventually [for] Israel itself" and "American interests in the region." The U.S. is sending enormous amounts of aid to the Middle East, and yet "we are less secure than ever"-both in terms of U.S. interests abroad and for individual Americans. Zunes referred to a "growing and increasing hostility [of] the average Arab toward the United States." In the long term, said Zunes, "peace and stability and cooperation with the vast Arab world is far more important for U.S. interests than this alliance with Israel."

This is not only an issue for those who are working for Palestinian rights, but it also "jeopardizes the entire agenda of those of us concerned about human rights, concerned about arms control, concerned about international law." Zunes sees significant potential in "building a broad-based movement around it."

The above text is based on remarks, delivered on. 26 January, 2001 by Stephen Zunes - Associate Professor of Politics and Chair of the Peace and Justice Studies Program at San Francisco University.

The Cost of Israel to U.S. Taxpayers: True Lies About U.S. Aid to Israel

By Richard H. Curtiss

For many years the American media said that "Israel receives $1.8 billion in military aid" or that "Israel receives $1.2 billion in economic aid." Both statements were true, but since they were never combined to give us the complete total of annual U.S. aid to Israel, they also were lies—true lies.

Recently Americans have begun to read and hear that "Israel receives $3 billion in annual U.S. foreign aid." That's true. But it's still a lie. The problem is that in fiscal 1997 alone, Israel received from a variety of other U.S. federal budgets at least $525.8 million above and beyond its $3 billion from the foreign aid budget, and yet another $2 billion in federal loan guarantees. So the complete total of U.S. grants and loan guarantees to Israel for fiscal 1997 was $5,525,800,000.

One can truthfully blame the mainstream media for never digging out these figures for themselves, because none ever have. They were compiled by the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. But the mainstream media certainly are not alone. Although Congress authorizes America's foreign aid total, the fact that more than a third of it goes to a country smaller in both area and population than Hong Kong probably never has been mentioned on the floor of the Senate or House. Yet it's been going on for more than a generation.

Probably the only members of Congress who even suspect the full total of U.S. funds received by Israel each year are the privileged few committee members who actually mark it up. And almost all members of the concerned committees are Jewish, have taken huge campaign donations orchestrated by Israel's Washington, DC lobby, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), or both. These congressional committee members are paid to act, not talk. So they do and they don't.

The same applies to the president, the secretary of state, and the foreign aid administrator. They all submit a budget that includes aid for Israel, which Congress approves, or increases, but never cuts. But no one in the executive branch mentions that of the few remaining U.S. aid recipients worldwide, all of the others are developing nations which either make their military bases available to the U.S., are key members of international alliances in which the U.S. participates, or have suffered some crippling blow of nature to their abilities to feed their people such as earthquakes, floods or droughts.

Israel, whose troubles arise solely from its unwillingness to give back land it seized in the 1967 war in return for peace with its neighbors, does not fit those criteria. In fact, Israel's 1995 per capita gross domestic product was $15,800. That put it below Britain at $19,500 and Italy at $18,700 and just above Ireland at $15,400 and Spain at $14,300.

All four of those European countries have contributed a very large share of immigrants to the U.S., yet none has organized an ethnic group to lobby for U.S. foreign aid. Instead, all four send funds and volunteers to do economic development and emergency relief work in other less fortunate parts of the world.

The lobby that Israel and its supporters have built in the United States to make all this aid happen, and to ban discussion of it from the national dialogue, goes far beyond AIPAC, with its $15 million budget, its 150 employees, and its five or six registered lobbyists who manage to visit every member of Congress individually once or twice a year.

AIPAC, in turn, can draw upon the resources of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, a roof group set up solely to coordinate the efforts of some 52 national Jewish organizations on behalf of Israel.

Among them are Hadassah, the Zionist women's organization, which organizes a steady stream of American Jewish visitors to Israel; the American Jewish Congress, which mobilizes support for Israel among members of the traditionally left-of-center Jewish mainstream; and the American Jewish Committee, which plays the same role within the growing middle-of-the-road and right-of-center Jewish community. The American Jewish Committee also publishes Commentary,one of the Israel lobby's principal national publications.

Perhaps the most controversial of these groups is B'nai B'rith's Anti-Defamation League. Its original highly commendable purpose was to protect the civil rights of American Jews. Over the past generation, however, the ADL has regressed into a conspiratorial and, with a $45 million budget, extremely well-funded hate group.

In the 1980s, during the tenure of chairman Seymour Reich, who went on to become chairman of the Conference of Presidents, ADL was found to have circulated two annual fund-raising letters warning Jewish parents against allegedly negative influences on their children arising from the increasing Arab presence on American university campuses.

More recently, FBI raids on ADL's Los Angeles and San Francisco offices revealed that an ADL operative had purchased files stolen from the San Francisco police department that a court had ordered destroyed because they violated the civil rights of the individuals on whom they had been compiled. ADL, it was shown, had added the illegally prepared and illegally obtained material to its own secret files, compiled by planting informants among Arab-American, African-American, anti-Apartheid and peace and justice groups.

The ADL infiltrators took notes of the names and remarks of speakers and members of audiences at programs organized by such groups. ADL agents even recorded the license plates of persons attending such programs and then suborned corrupt motor vehicles department employees or renegade police officers to identify the owners.

Although one of the principal offenders fled the United States to escape prosecution, no significant penalties were assessed. ADL's Northern California office was ordered to comply with requests by persons upon whom dossiers had been prepared to see their own files, but no one went to jail and as yet no one has paid fines.

Not surprisingly, a defecting employee revealed in an article he published in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs that AIPAC, too, has such "enemies" files. They are compiled for use by pro-Israel journalists like Steven Emerson and other so-called "terrorism experts," and also by professional, academic or journalistic rivals of the persons described for use in black-listing, defaming, or denouncing them. What is never revealed is that AIPAC's "opposition research" department, under the supervision of Michael Lewis, son of famed Princeton University Orientalist Bernard Lewis, is the source of this defamatory material.

But this is not AIPAC's most controversial activity. In the 1970s, when Congress put a cap on the amount its members could earn from speakers' fees and book royalties over and above their salaries, it halted AIPAC's most effective ways of paying off members for voting according to AIPAC recommendations. Members of AIPAC's national board of directors solved the problem by returning to their home states and creating political action committees (PACs).

Most special interests have PACs, as do many major corporations, labor unions, trade associations and public-interest groups. But the pro-Israel groups went wild. To date some 126 pro-Israel PACs have been registered, and no fewer than 50 have been active in every national election over the past generation.

An individual voter can give up to $2,000 to a candidate in an election cycle, and a PAC can give a candidate up to $10,000. However, a single special interest with 50 PACs can give a candidate who is facing a tough opponent, and who has voted according to its recommendations, up to half a million dollars. That's enough to buy all the television time needed to get elected in most parts of the country.

Even candidates who don't need this kind of money certainly don't want it to become available to a rival from their own party in a primary election, or to an opponent from the opposing party in a general election. As a result, all but a handful of the 535 members of the Senate and House vote as AIPAC instructs when it comes to aid to Israel, or other aspects of U.S. Middle East policy.

There is something else very special about AIPAC's network of political action committees. Nearly all have deceptive names. Who could possibly know that the Delaware Valley Good Government Association in Philadelphia, San Franciscans for Good Government in California, Cactus PAC in Arizona, Beaver PAC in Wisconsin, and even Icepac in New York are really pro-Israel PACs under deep cover?

Hiding AIPAC's Tracks

In fact, the congress members know it when they list the contributions they receive on the campaign statements they have to prepare for the Federal Election Commission. But their constituents don't know this when they read these statements. So just as no other special interest can put so much "hard money" into any candidate's election campaign as can the Israel lobby, no other special interest has gone to such elaborate lengths to hide its tracks.

Although AIPAC, Washington's most feared special-interest lobby, can hide how it uses both carrots and sticks to bribe or intimidate members of Congress, it can't hide all of the results.

Anyone can ask one of their representatives in Congress for a chart prepared by the Congressional Research Service, a branch of the Library of Congress, that shows Israel received $62.5 billion in foreign aid from fiscal year 1949 through fiscal year 1996. People in the national capital area also can visit the library of the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) in Rosslyn, Virginia, and obtain the same information, plus charts showing how much foreign aid the U.S. has given other countries as well.

Visitors will learn that in precisely the same 1949-1996 time frame, the total of U.S. foreign aid to all of the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean combined was $62,497,800,000--almost exactly the amount given to tiny Israel.

According to the Population Reference Bureau of Washington, DC, in mid-1995 the sub-Saharan countries had a combined population of 568 million. The $24,415,700,000 in foreign aid they had received by then amounted to $42.99 per sub-Saharan African.

Similarly, with a combined population of 486 million, all of the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean together had received $38,254,400,000. This amounted to $79 per person.

The per capita U.S. foreign aid to Israel's 5.8 million people during the same period was $10,775.48. This meant that for every dollar the U.S. spent on an African, it spent $250.65 on an Israeli, and for every dollar it spent on someone from the Western Hemisphere outside the United States, it spent $214 on an Israeli.

Shocking Comparisons

These comparisons already seem shocking, but they are far from the whole truth. Using reports compiled by Clyde Mark of the Congressional Research Service and other sources, freelance writer Frank Collins tallied for theWashington Report all of the extra items for Israel buried in the budgets of the Pentagon and other federal agencies in fiscal year 1993.Washington Report news editor Shawn Twing did the same thing for fiscal years 1996 and 1997.

They uncovered $1.271 billion in extras in FY 1993, $355.3 million in FY 1996 and $525.8 million in FY 1997. These represent an average increase of 12.2 percent over the officially recorded foreign aid totals for the same fiscal years, and they probably are not complete. It's reasonable to assume, therefore, that a similar 12.2 percent hidden increase has prevailed over all of the years Israel has received aid.

As of Oct. 31, 1997 Israel will have received $3.05 billion in U.S. foreign aid for fiscal year 1997 and $3.08 billion in foreign aid for fiscal year 1998. Adding the 1997 and 1998 totals to those of previous years since 1949 yields a total of $74,157,600,000 in foreign aid grants and loans. Assuming that the actual totals from other budgets average 12.2 percent of that amount, that brings the grand total to $83,204,827,200.

But that's not quite all. Receiving its annual foreign aid appropriation during the first month of the fiscal year, instead of in quarterly installments as do other recipients, is just another special privilege Congress has voted for Israel. It enables Israel to invest the money in U.S. Treasury notes. That means that the U.S., which has to borrow the money it gives to Israel, pays interest on the money it has granted to Israel in advance, while at the same time Israel is collecting interest on the money. That interest to Israel from advance payments adds another $1.650 billion to the total, making it $84,854,827,200.That's the number you should write down for total aid to Israel. And that's $14,346 each for each man, woman and child in Israel.

It's worth noting that that figure does not include U.S. government loan guarantees to Israel, of which Israel has drawn $9.8 billion to date. They greatly reduce the interest rate the Israeli government pays on commercial loans, and they place additional burdens on U.S. taxpayers, especially if the Israeli government should default on any of them. But since neither the savings to Israel nor the costs to U.S. taxpayers can be accurately quantified, they are excluded from consideration here.

Further, friends of Israel never tire of saying that Israel has never defaulted on repayment of a U.S. government loan. It would be equally accurate to say Israel has never been required to repay a U.S. government loan. The truth of the matter is complex, and designed to be so by those who seek to conceal it from the U.S. taxpayer.

Most U.S. loans to Israel are forgiven, and many were made with the explicit understanding that they would be forgiven before Israel was required to repay them. By disguising as loans what in fact were grants, cooperating members of Congress exempted Israel from the U.S. oversight that would have accompanied grants. On other loans, Israel was expected to pay the interest and eventually to begin repaying the principal. But the so-called Cranston Amendment, which has been attached by Congress to every foreign aid appropriation since 1983, provides that economic aid to Israel will never dip below the amount Israel is required to pay on its outstanding loans. In short, whether U.S. aid is extended as grants or loans to Israel, it never returns to the Treasury.

Israel enjoys other privileges. While most countries receiving U.S. military aid funds are expected to use them for U.S. arms, ammunition and training, Israel can spend part of these funds on weapons made by Israeli manufacturers. Also, when it spends its U.S. military aid money on U.S. products, Israel frequently requires the U.S. vendor to buy components or materials from Israeli manufacturers. Thus, though Israeli politicians say that their own manufacturers and exporters are making them progressively less dependent upon U.S. aid, in fact those Israeli manufacturers and exporters are heavily subsidized by U.S. aid.

Although it's beyond the parameters of this study, it's worth mentioning that Israel also receives foreign aid from some other countries. After the United States, the principal donor of both economic and military aid to Israel is Germany.

By far the largest component of German aid has been in the form of restitution payments to victims of Nazi attrocities. But there also has been extensive German military assistance to Israel during and since the Gulf war, and a variety of German educational and research grants go to Israeli institutions. The total of German assistance in all of these categories to the Israeli government, Israeli individuals and Israeli private institutions has been some $31 billion or $5,345 per capita, bringing the per capita total of U.S. and German assistance combined to almost $20,000 per Israeli. Since very little public money is spent on the more than 20 percent of Israeli citizens who are Muslim or Christian, the actual per capita benefits received by Israel's Jewish citizens would be considerably higher.

True Cost to U.S. Taxpayers

Generous as it is, what Israelis actually got in U.S. aid is considerably less than what it has cost U.S. taxpayers to provide it. The principal difference is that so long as the U.S. runs an annual budget deficit, every dollar of aid the U.S. gives Israel has to be raised through U.S. government borrowing.

In an article in the Washington Report for December 1991/January 1992, Frank Collins estimated the costs of this interest, based upon prevailing interest rates for every year since 1949. I have updated this by applying a very conservative 5 percent interest rate for subsequent years, and confined the amount upon which the interest is calculated to grants, not loans or loan guarantees.

On this basis the $84.8 billion in grants, loans and commodities Israel has received from the U.S. since 1949 cost the U.S. an additional $49,936,880,000 in interest.

There are many other costs of Israel to U.S. taxpayers, such as most or all of the $45.6 billion in U.S. foreign aid to Egypt since Egypt made peace with Israel in 1979 (compared to $4.2 billion in U.S. aid to Egypt for the preceding 26 years). U.S. foreign aid to Egypt, which is pegged at two-thirds of U.S. foreign aid to Israel, averages $2.2 billion per year.

There also have been immense political and military costs to the U.S. for its consistent support of Israel during Israel's half-century of disputes with the Palestinians and all of its Arab neighbors. In addition, there have been the approximately $10 billion in U.S. loan guarantees and perhaps $20 billion in tax-exempt contributions made to Israel by American Jews in the nearly half-century since Israel was created.

Even excluding all of these extra costs, America's $84.8 billion in aid to Israel from fiscal years 1949 through 1998, and the interest the U.S. paid to borrow this money, has cost U.S. taxpayers $134.8 billion, not adjusted for inflation. Or, put another way, the nearly $14,630 every one of 5.8 million Israelis received from the U.S. government by Oct. 31, 1997 has cost American taxpayers $23,240 per Israeli.

It would be interesting to know how many of those American taxpayers believe they and their families have received as much from the U.S. Treasury as has everyone who has chosen to become a citizen of Israel. But it's a question that will never occur to the American public because, so long as America's mainstream media, Congress and president maintain their pact of silence, few Americans will ever know the true cost of Israel to U.S. taxpayers.

Richard Curtiss, a retired U.S. foreign service officer, is the executive editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.

Home > U.S. Aid to Israel

The issue of the massive aid recieved by Israel is yet further proof that the lobby has Congress tied around its finger. These figures cited by Terry are disturbing enough for US taxpayers when it is considered that Israel has a high standard of living, soon perhaps higher than the USA.

In addition, there are also the billions given to Israel by the wealthy Jewish diaspora. Australia's richest man, Frank Lowy, under investigation by tax officials, told a recent US Senate Committee hearing that $68 million held in a Leichtenstein bank account was distributed for charitable purposes in Israel:

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/07/18/2307289.htm

There's no justification for such taxpayer largesse any more, especially since it just serves to lubricate the US and Israeli weapons industries.

Yea, you can predict he will respond to your posts bashing Americans to set you straight.

If you can change your mind so quickly after reading about the appointment of Rahm a long a ding dong, then you should better inform yourself.

Here's the women behind Rahm, Sarah Feinberg, "enrolled in a master's program, studying Middle East foreign policy at the National Defense University at Fort McNair in Washington."

http://wvgazette.com/News/200811080481

I'm not the only one critical of America and its policies.

America's foreign policy is owned by Israel. Destabilisation its regional neighbours is Israel's aim, via US foreign policy.

Iran has every right to a nuclear capability. Israel's nuclear capability was obtained by deception, which you would acknowledge if you were better informed. No IAEA rules and guidelines burden Israel, because they have effectively placed themselves outside the regulatory structure. The inflammatory rhetoric in the western media aimed at Iran is merely cowardly warmongering and intimidation. America has a long and disgraceful record of intervention in sovereign nations.

Israel is engaged in ethnically cleansing Palestine. The US, while sometimes paying lip service to peace plans, continues to support Israel financially, militarily and diplomatically.

You're a very long way from setting me straight, precious.

Yes Bill, I did say I thought Obama might try galvanizing global opinion in order to make changes regarding Palestine but because of the Emanuel appointment I don't think this will happen now. Instead, it's now more probable that the US will increase commitments in Aghanistan (I notice Obama is using his shiny new mandate to politely ask for a little more help from other countries) and Pakistan. We'll get inflamed rhetoric about Iran possibly followed by a bitter war with countless dead.

It could all be avoided if Obama would address the central foreign policy problem in the Middle East. This would make America's other problems in the region all but dissolve, imo.

Of course, Israel doesn't like that idea.

I think it will be easier to predict Mark Stapleton's opinions than it will be US foreign policy.

BK

And Bill Kelly's are very predictable.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?con...a&aid=10857

Worth reading.

Yes Bill, I did say I thought Obama might try galvanizing global opinion in order to make changes regarding Palestine but because of the Emanuel appointment I don't think this will happen now. Instead, it's now more probable that the US will increase commitments in Aghanistan (I notice Obama is using his shiny new mandate to politely ask for a little more help from other countries) and Pakistan. We'll get inflamed rhetoric about Iran possibly followed by a bitter war with countless dead.

It could all be avoided if Obama would address the central foreign policy problem in the Middle East. This would make America's other problems in the region all but dissolve, imo.

Of course, Israel doesn't like that idea.

Tzipi Livni is not Israeli PM yet, but here she is telling America what the new US administration's foreign policy will be:

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?con...a&aid=10831

Israel said today US president-elect Barack Obama's stated readiness to talk to Iran could be seen in the Middle East as a sign of weakness in efforts to persuade Tehran to curb its nuclear programme.

"We live in a neighbourhood in which sometimes dialogue -- in a situation where you have brought sanctions, and you then shift to dialogue -- is liable to be interpreted as weakness," foreign minister Tzipi Livni said, asked on Israel Radio about policy change toward Tehran in an Obama administration.

Her remarks sounded the first note of dissonance with Mr Obama by a senior member of the Israeli government since the Democrat's sweeping victory over Republican candidate John McCain in the US presidential election on Tuesday.

Asked if she supported any US dialogue with Iran, Ms Livni replied: "The answer is no."

Ms Livni, leading the centrist Kadima party into Israel's February 10th parliamentary election, also said "the bottom line" was that the United States, under Obama, "is also not willing to accept a nuclear Iran".[/b]

A senior Iranian official today called on Mr Obama to show goodwill and remove sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

Mr Obama has said he would harden sanctions but has also held out the possibility of direct talks with the United States to solve problems, including the dispute over Tehran's nuclear ambitions.

"Through the lifting of the past government's cruel sanctions against Iran, Barack Obama can demonstrate his goodwill to the Iranian people," Prosecutor-General Ayatollah Qorban-Ali Dori-Najafabadi said.

"Calling for forgiveness and remorse for the past U.S. government's deeds by the new government can bring about the great Iranian nation's forgiveness," he was quoted as saying in the northwestern city of Tabriz.

The United States cut diplomatic ties with Iran after its Islamic Revolution in 1979 and is spearheading a drive to isolate the country over its nuclear activities.

Mr Obama, like current US President George W. Bush, has not ruled out military action although he has criticised the outgoing administration for not pushing diplomacy and engagement with Iran.

Iranian officials have said his election victory on Tuesday showed the American people's desire for fundamental change in domestic and foreign policy from the policies of Mr Bush, who labelled Iran part of an "axis of evil".

The head of the Iranian parliament's national security and foreign policy commission said any change in Iran's strategy towards Washington would depend on a change in the US approach, the official IRNA news agency reported.

"As long as the US policy toward Iran stays the way it currently is, negotiations with that country will have no meaning," Alaeddin Boroujerdi said in the city of Mashad.

The West believes Iran's nuclear enrichment programme is aimed at building atomic weapons, an allegation the Islamic Republic denies.

Israel, believed to have the Middle East's only atomic arsenal, has said Iran's nuclear programme is a threat to its existence and that it was keeping all options on the table to stop it.

Reuters. © 2008 irishtimes.com

Rahm Emanuel is an interesting character. He actually was a volunteer in the Israeli Army during the 1990s Gulf War. The Israeli press boasted today that "Israel will have its own man in the White House". Although Jews only make up 2% of the US population, they have always been a highly successful lobby group that can deliver the vote. For example, 78% of Jewish voters supported Obama in the election. To be fair to the Jews, they have always been active in the Civil Rights campaign and are natural allies of Obama.

It is claimed that Emanuel is not unlike LBJ in the way he controls Congress. On the surface, the signs are not good. However, it is possible, the appointment of Emanuel, might give Israel the confidence to agree a peace deal in the Middle East.

Emanuel is a hardline Zionist, John. His appointment merely affirms that Israel is the proud owner of US foreign policy and this is not going to change:

http://www.counterpunch.org/

Weekend Edition

November 7 / 9, 2008

CounterPunch Diary

Hail to the Chief of Staff

By ALEXANDER COCKBURN

The first trumpet blast of change ushers in Rahm Emanuel as Obama’s chief of staff and gate keeper. This is the man who arranges his schedule, staffs out the agenda, includes, excludes. It’s certainly as sinister an appointment as, say, Carter’s installation of arch cold-warrior Zbigniev Brzezinski as his National Security Advisor at the dawn of his “change is here” administration in 1977.

Emanuel, as Ralph Nader points out in my interview with him below, represents the worst of the Clinton years. His profile as regards Israel is explored well on this site by lawyer John Whitbeck. He’s a former Israeli citizen, who volunteered to serve in Israel in 1991 and who made brisk millions in Wall Street. He is a super-Likudnik hawk, whose father was in the fascist Irgun in the late Forties, responsible for cold-blooded massacres of Palestinians. Dad’s unreconstructed ethnic outlook has been memorably embodied in his recent remark to the Ma’ariv newspaper that "Obviously he [Rahm] will influence the president to be pro-Israel… Why wouldn't he be [influential]? What is he, an Arab? He's not going to clean the floors of the White House."

Working in the Clinton White House, Emanuel helped push through NAFTA, the crime bill, the balanced budget and welfare reform. He favored the war in Iraq, and when he was chairing the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee in 2006 he made great efforts to knock out antiwar Democratic candidates. On this site in October and November, 2006, John Walsh documented both the efforts and Emanuel’s role in losing the Democrats seats they would otherwise have won.

In 2006 Emanuel had just published a book with Bruce Reed called The Plan: Big Ideas for America, with one section focused on “the war on terror”. Emanuel and Reed wrote, “We need to fortify the military's ‘thin green line ‘around the world by adding to the U.S. Special Forces and the Marines, and by expanding the U.S. army by 100,000 more troops. …Finally we must protect our homeland and civil liberties by creating a new domestic counterterrorism force like Britain's MI5.” Recall that Obama has been calling throughout his recent campaign for an addition of 92,000 to the US Army and US Marine Corps.

Emanuel and Reed had fond words for the mad-dog Peter Beinart, neocon warrior theoretician for the Democrats, roosting Marty Peretz's The New Republic, and author of The Good Fight where Beinart explained why a tough new national security policy is as essential to the future of of progressive politics as a united front against totalitarianism and communism was to the New Deal and the Great Society. Emanuel and Reed also commended Anne-Marie Slaughter's proposal for "a new division of labor in which the United Nations takes on economic and social assistance and an expanded NATO takes over the burden of collective security." In other words, let NATO shoot the natives and the UN clean the floors.

Walsh took a hard look at the 2006 Democratic primary race between Christine Cegelis and Tammy Duckworth in Illinois's 6th CD, a Republican District, which had elected the disgusting Henry Hyde from time immemorial. In 2004 Cegelis, who iwas only mildly antiwar, ran as the Democrat with a grass roots campaign and polled a remarkable 44 per cent in her first run. It was not too long before Hyde decided to retire, and the field seemed to be open for Cegelis in the November poll, in 2006.

Enter Rahm Emanuel, who promptly dug up a pro-war candidate, Tammy Duckworth. Although she had both her legs blown off in Iraq, she remained committed to "staying the course" in Iraq. Duckworth had no political experience and did not live in the 6th District. Emanuel raised a million dollars for her and brought in Joe Lieberman, Barak Obama, John Kerry, John Edwards and Hillary Clinton to support her. Despite all this help and with the Cegelis campaign virtually penniless, Duckworth barely managed to eke out a primary victory by a measly four percentage points.

To win the House, the Dems had to win 15 seats from the Republicans. Walsh identified 22 candidates hand picked by Emanuel to run in open districts or districts with Republican incumbents. Of these, nine adopted a US “must win” in Iraq position and only one of Rahm's candidates was for prompt withdrawal from Iraq.

Then, after the election, Walsh assessed Rahm’s supposed brilliance in winning back the House. “Looking at all 22 candidates hand-picked by Rahm, “ Walsh wrote, “we find that 13 were defeated [including Duckworth], and only 8 won! And remember that this was the year of the Democratic tsunami and that Rahm's favorites were handsomely financed by the DCCC. The Dems have picked up 28 seats so far, maybe more. So out of that 28, Rahm's choices accounted for 8! Since the Dems only needed 15 seats to win the House, Rahm's efforts were completely unnecessary. Had the campaign rested on Rahm's choices, there would have been only 8 or 9 new seats, and the Dems would have lost. In fact, Rahm's efforts were probably counterproductive for the Dems since the great majority of voters were antiwar and they were voting primarily on the issue of the war (60 per cent according to CNN). But Rahm's candidates were not antiwar.

Latest figures show that 55% of all white voters went for McCain. He also got the support of 74% of white evangelicals.

This white bias can be seen when looking at other results. In Virginia, for instance, Obama beat McCain by 51% to 47%, while the white Democrat, Mark Warner, beat Republican Jim Gilmore among the exact same electors by 64% to 34%. That means that around 400,000 voted for McCain and Warner.

They should at least rename themselves the white racist party. Truth in advertising is important.

...JUAN GONZALEZ: Congratulations are pouring in from around the world for President-elect Barack Obama after his historic victory Tuesday night....

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AMY GOODMAN: We’ll leave that question there. Mahmood Mamdani and all of our roundtable, thanks so much for joining us. http://www.democracynow.org [11/6/08]

Interesting post, Peter.

Further disturbing news today is that Obama will ask Australia for more troops in Afghanistan. From Jeffrey Bader, China expert for the Brookings Institution and advisor to the Obama campaign:

"Given that Afghanistan-Pakistan is at the top of the foreign policy agenda.........we would be looking to have different allies to make a contribution".

A report in today's SMH also claims that the US Ambassador to Japan called on Tokyo to make "a greater contribution" to military operations in Afghanistan as the President-elect takes office.

It looks like the new Administration will step up activities in the Afghan--Pakistani theatre, while scaling down in Iraq.

How stupid do they think people are? The war on terror is a fraud--most informed people know this. Now it looks like America will be looking to other countries for a greater contribution towards America's folly. Incredible.

We also have a Republican party that is obsessed with irrelevant social issues like banning gay marriage- which I don't support nor see a need for government to get involved in. The final nails are the anti-science, religious nutcases that have hijacked a significant portion of the party.

As someone who voted against McCain and Obama, I can symnpathize with a need for a viable third party. Maybe I'll start my own.

I have read that the bulk of Republican candidates who were swept away in Obama's win were moderates. This is a bad sign for the future of the GOP because all that remains is a dried out husk of religious and economic conservative hardliners.

The GOP was irrelevant to the bulk of Americans before the elections, so how irrelevant will they be now?

The Democrats are already guaranteed to win the next election, providing America still exists in its present form in four years. The stench from the Bush era will last much longer than four years, imo.

I said this has already been a two hundred year old war - Remember the Intrepid?

Americans have been fighting tyrianical Islamic pirates for centuries, and will continue to do so, I will venture, for as long as such tyrany esists.

You want to start a thread on Azizabad? Go ahead.

This is your thread on the USA attack against Abu Ghadiya in Syria.

While I am not familiar with that incident, if it's anything like this incident, the bad guys lost.

Like I said, you are not interested in the truth of the raid, the evil of Abu Ghadiya, or the end of al Quada and radical islamic fundamentalism and their intent on the imposition of islamic law on everyone, you are merely trying to inflame anti-American passions.

BK

That's your opinion. I would be interested to know what other Americans think, but I realise this can be a sensitive issue for Americans.

As for me trying to inflame anti-American passions, America does that quite effectively itself---look at its tattered reputation around the globe.

What really irritates me is the continued harange against Americans killing innocent civilians and children, and the alledged violation of a national soverignty in an attempt to rally hatred for Americans as kid killing imperialists.

That's okay, though. You can still hate Americans (and Isralies) and imagine that that's what Americans do, - intentionally and randomly kill innocent civilians because that's their job, they like it, and they want to incite further terrorists action for the next generation to fight.

It's easy to stirr up anti-American emotions, evoking bombing, child killing, war mongering and war crime trials, but its more difficult to find out what really happened and analysize it so you have an accurate idea of what will happen next.

BK

On August 22, 2008, US forces led by the 7th special forces group (airborne) were conducting a midnight raid to apprehend Mullah Siddiq, a Taliban Commander. When they encountered initial resistance, they called in reinforcements and the resultant massacre left 91 dead----61 of them children.

The attack took place near Azizabad, Herat province, Afghanistan.

Here's a list of the dead, with photos and comments from survivors:

http://www.uruknet.de/?s1=1&p=46866&s2=02

How many survivors of this war crime will now hate America? All of them, imo. How many will in turn become martyrs for the cause? Unknowable, but I would suggest plenty.

Bill Kelly says this is a hundred year war. How many Americans really want to be part of this insanity?

Yes, Mark,

Carry on, ranting and raving about Americans killing babies with bombs from helicopters.

I'm sure the Americans learned everything they know about Imperialism from the British.

And thanks for starting this thread, Mark, I never heard of TF88 before this.

And your surmising that I support McCain is also wrong. My best scenario is that Bush arranges for a false flag terrorist action that gives him the excuse to declare marshall law and call off, ah, postpone the election, so real American patriots can actively take up their God given rights to bear arms against the unConstitutional government and overthrow it.

BK

This is pretty poor form from a respected researcher like you, Bill. I'm a little surprised. You well know I made no such comment about killing babies from helicopters. US forces have killed civilians is what I said, and it's quite true.

You seem to think this is justified. I think that's sad.

You also can't see the folly of this never ending cycle of violence, whereas John and Ron (and I assume other readers) can. That's sad, too.

So you want to exercise your ""God given right"" (evidence, please) to bear arms and overthrow the Government, eh. Well I agree the current political system in the US has failed but I'm having trouble reconciling your contempt for the system with your support for its disastrous foreign policy agenda.

I think I'm just about through trying to figure out Americans.