On January 9, Ron Paul addressed Congress to voice his opposition to a House resolution expressing strong support for Israel in its invasion of Gaza, and branding Hamas as a terrorist organization. Ron Paul called for American neutrality in conflicts that have nothing to do with the United States.
Statement of Congressman Ron Paul
United States House of Representatives
Statement on H Res 34, “Recognizing Israel’s right to defend itself against attacks from Gaza, Reaffirming the United States strong support for Israel, and supporting the Israeli-Palestinian peace process”
January 9, 2008
Madame Speaker, I strongly oppose H. Res. 34, which was rushed to the floor with almost no prior notice and without consideration by the House Foreign Affairs Committee. The resolution clearly takes one side in a conflict that has nothing to do with the United States or US interests. I am concerned that the weapons currently being used by Israel against the Palestinians in Gaza are made in America and paid for by American taxpayers. What will adopting this resolution do to the perception of the United States in the Muslim and Arab world? What kind of blowback might we see from this? What moral responsibility do we have for the violence in Israel and Gaza after having provided so much military support to one side?
As an opponent of all violence, I am appalled by the practice of lobbing homemade rockets into Israel from Gaza. I am only grateful that, because of the primitive nature of these weapons, there have been so few casualties among innocent Israelis. But I am also appalled by the longstanding Israeli blockade of Gaza — a cruel act of war — and the tremendous loss of life that has resulted from the latest Israeli attack that started last month.
There are now an estimated 700 dead Palestinians, most of whom are civilians. Many innocent children are among the dead. While the shooting of rockets into Israel is inexcusable, the violent actions of some people in Gaza does not justify killing Palestinians on this scale. Such collective punishment is immoral. At the very least, the US Congress should not be loudly proclaiming its support for the Israeli government’s actions in Gaza.
Madame Speaker, this resolution will do nothing to reduce the fighting and bloodshed in the Middle East. The resolution in fact will lead the US to become further involved in this conflict, promising “vigorous support and unwavering commitment to the welfare, security, and survival of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.” Is it really in the interest of the United States to guarantee the survival of any foreign country? I believe it would be better to focus on the security and survival of the United States, the Constitution of which my colleagues and I swore to defend just this week at the beginning of the 111th Congress. I urge my colleagues to reject this resolution.
Later, Ron Paul was interviewed by Press TV about the ongoing tragedy in Gaza:
Congressman Ron Paul condemns the violence in the Gaza Strip, saying the “collective punishment” against Palestinians is immoral.“Many innocent children are among the dead. While the shooting of rockets into Israel is inexcusable, the violent actions of some people in Gaza does not justify killing Palestinians on this scale,” said the outspoken Republican. More…
Ron Paul was also interviewed by Russia Today on the same subject. He expressed his belief that Israel’s critics and enemies will see the United States as the side to be blamed for the ongoing violence in the Gaza Strip, and called for the US to review its unconditional support of the Jewish state.
Excerpt:
Interviewer: [...]“Why do you think that so many US officials, Congress, Senate, show overwhelming support to involving the US over there?”
Ron Paul: [...] “It’s been going on for more than 50 years, because there has been a pretty strong case made for the Jewish people being treated quite badly, and emotionally there was an argument for having a place they can call their homeland, and people bought into this. But even then there was no justification for us to be using our money for doing that.
There’s one thing being friends, getting along with people and trading with people versus subsidizing them. So it’s been going on a long time, and even from the origination of the state of Israel, the American people generally have supported all of this, and it’s what they’ve read about and heard about and the way they’ve been taught, yet today there’s a growing number of Americans who are questioning it.
They don’t have anything against Jewish people, they don’t have anything against Israel per se, but there’s a lot of questioning whether or not it should be our money and our weapons, and a blank check, so to speak.
So if Israel would get into trouble, there’s not very many people in this country that don’t assume that we would come to their rescue.”
- Ron Paul on Healthcare, Yemen, Ben Stein and Israel Date: 12/31/2009 Host: Jack Hunter Station: 1250 AM WTMA, Charleston, South Carolina Transcript Jack Hunter:...
- Ron Paul: Leave Iran Alone! This Friday, June 19, Ron Paul was the only member of the House to back...
I like Ron Paul’s on anything else, but his foreign views. Israel has been a very reliable, if not only, friend to US in the middle east for all these years. When I say friends I mean we share lot’s of common democratic views with them just like with the rest of the western civilized world. What Ron Paul suggest is take my friend just don’t touch me! I wouldn’t want to be Ron’s friend in a bad situation!
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Yeah, realiable…We need to zip our pants up and leave Isreal like a cheap whore. To continue our relationship with Isreal is to condone to the continued slaughter of innocent Palestinians.
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Isreal is not the true friend everybody thinks it is. They pay off our politicians for Isreali interests. And politicians in general are easy enough to buy. Isreal has much of the world fooled into thinking that Isreal is a “victim” country, when in reality it is a covert aggressor. Our media establishment does an outstanding job (and a very successful job, I might add) at convincing Americans that Isrealis are “good guys”, our friends, whereas the rest of thr Middle East is bad guys. If only people knew that it’s really Isreal that orchestrates most of the terrorism in this world.
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Ron Paul is a first class spook. Thus, he would be a sensible replacement for the Kenyan.
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Believe it or not- there are a lot of israelis that support Ron Paul!!!
http://israelfinancialexpert.blogspot.com/search/label/Ron%20Paul
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I watched the video. Ben Stein and those like him are the reason we’ll never stop sending money to Isreal, never stop sending troops to the Middle East, and get or own country in order. Ben Stein and those like him are un-American.
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I agree Terry. Stein is un-American. He wrote a book about four years ago called “Can America Survive?” I saw him on Glenn Beck’s show a few times, they are pretty good friends. Then, I saw Glenn Beck’s documentary about communist and socialist dictators. Next, I just happened to take Ben Stein’s book out of the library thinking it was about conservative ideas, and low and behold, the book says the exact same things Beck said and showed in his documentary. Then, I see Stein is for the U.S. helping Israel, he knows Obama won’t do it, so basically Stein hijacked the Tea Party people by using Beck, got them thinking Obama is an evil socialist, so they will stop him from getting re-elected. I bet if someone asked Glenn Beck if Stein gave him all of that information, he would say yes.
There’s another bad one on Fox who is doing the same thing. Charles Krauthammer is hijacking the Tea Party people because he wants the U.S. to help Israel. I went into a website called The American Thinker. It was pretty much all Glenn Beck followers, and I started to debate them about the social programs many of them want, and I got put out in five posts. I had no clue Krauthammer had any tie to it at all. I was saying that 85 percent of people in this country don’t have a college education, asking about Medicare and Social Security. Well, the next night, Krauthammer goes on Fox and parots me, he says, well, 80 percent of people in the country don’t have a college degree and he says, well, so what the Tea Party people want Medicare and Social Security, total smear over. So, I knew at that point he had to be connected to that American Thinker website. I went in there and here was a big front page article praising him. Then, I emailed Bill O’Reilly, I told him Charles Krauthammer snowed you last night, he is using the Tea Party people to get rid of Obama over Israel. I told O’Reilly how come Krauthammer goes on about socialism when capitalism tanked the banks and AIG and so on. Well, Bill O’Reilly comes on the next evening and he admits in his talking points that it was capitalism, not socialism that ruined the economy and so on. He got it what Krauthammer was doing. Then, I did a little research, and I found out some middle eastern people also got booted out of his website really fast too. So, he allows no freedom of speech, and he has his hands on the brains of some of the tea party people too. I would never have thought any of this. Boy, politics is a dirty business, and some of these talking heads are manipulating people to get the U.S. to help Israel. I had no idea.
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I didn’t mention, Ben Stein is a Jew himself. Krauthammer may also be. So many people in media and Hollywood are Jews, and doing whatever it takes to keep U.S. funding of Isreal. From the sources that I consider reliable enough, the Tea Party has been hijacked for a while now. Sarah Palin is now plugging John McCain’s campaign. Most of those in the Tea Party are unaware that it’s the same old neo-cons running the show. That’s why we need to get away from al the party stuff and focus on actual candidates – candidates who will do what’s good for America. And the vast, vast majority of politicans out there – in both parties – are pro-Isreal. We need someone who’s not going to suck up to Isreal – ever!
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I agree Terry. The best thing that could happen to the country is if Ron Paul got elected. Yes, I didn’t know one thing about Krauthammer, when I went into the American Thinker website, the article about him said that he is Jewish. It’s funny, American Thinker, but if you think at all, they boot you out. I emailed them and told them I got put out of the American Thinker website for thinking. Krauthammer is on Fox five days a week, on Bret Bair’s show, and he goes on and on about how horrible it is that Obama is not helping Israel.
I agree also that Palin hijacked the Tea Party to make money. It’s too bad. They will end up voting Republicans back in, we just voted the Republicans out, now everyone is mad at the Dems, and it’s all more of the same old politics as usual. I hope the Tea Party people evaluate what it is they really want our country to be in ten years and get behind Ron Paul.
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I wasn’t able to reply to your last (no reply option, only permalink) so I’m replying to your previous. Anyway, you’re right about the politics as usual. That’s just what the Republicrats want – politics as usual. That’s how they maintain their power. And as far as Obama not helping Isreal, that’s all a media lie to continue the very popular idea that Obama is anti-Isreal and that he is a Muslim. The fact is that neither is the case. He’s really not a Muslim, even though he does have Muslims in his family, and he’s not anti-Isreal. This is where politicians are able to equate themselves with Hollywood actors. Obama is actually working FOR ISREAL! He’s only PRETENDING to be anti-Isreal. That way nobody will ever suspect otherwise. Also, it keeps Isreal from being suspect of controling the USA in some way. Isreal uses the media (which it owns anyway, so why not) to make itself look like victims and everyone around Isreal is an evil aggressor. Americans have no idea how close to being the opposite of this is actually the case. Isreal is evil to the bone. And Americans have no problem with us sending them our money – because they have no clue about the truth. We can’t do anything about countries like Isreal, but we can at the very least vote in a president who will stop funding this terrorist nation known as Isreal.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MprAMPnI6w&feature=related
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Very important statement by Ron Paul.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mALpnSTGAQs&feature=related
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“Der Aayed Durust Aayed,” Obama showing Israel its place
There is a saying in Farsi, “Der Aayed Durust Aayed,” which means, “Late coming is good coming.” Obama is showing Israel a rouge nation governed by racist criminals doing human genocide for the last 61 years; its right place. Israel is responsible to a major extent for world unrest because of their continued occupation of Palestine with brutal force; arms and ammunition financed by Americans. Obama is directly challenging the thesis of Israel and its lobby AIPAC that U.S. and Israeli interests are one and the same, that we are partners. Obama is saying honestly the truth that further Israeli settlements on Palestinian land are an impediment and an independent Palestinian state indispensable to world peace.
I admire Obama’s courage for confronting the Zionist Lobby controlling US Foreign & Domestic policies besides control on US Banking, Congress, Media, Hollywood, Real Estate & local politics. I refuse to call any one American who can vote in the election of a foreign country, holding citizenship of a foreign country and can serve in the Defense forces of a foreign country. American Jews with a philosophy of Israel first as prisoners of their Zionist Leadership fall in this category. It’s about time that the welfare of the USA be put first – and the greed of the Zionist spies and defense technology thieves in America stealing for Israel be put to an end.
My advise to such racist fanatics with American citizenship and putting America second after their country of origin; move out of America. No offense, but if your loyalties are for some other country than America; feel free to move there especially Zionist and their loyalist in America go to Israel and enlist in the IDF. I wish them all the best, but they are not our responsibility.
Hindu fanatics behaving like Zionist living in America and doing demonstrations against US Government that India’s security is America’s responsibility is another joke. While living in 82% Christian country dreaming of their Bharat “India” without Muslims and Christians by writing filthy blogs is contrary to American values. Then some are holding racist events on the pattern of AIPAC in the name of a Indian state Gujarat in America by excluding Gujarati Muslims, Gujarati Christians as well as non-Gujarati speaking Hindus is an insult to American Democratic values. These Hindus are also free to move back to India. My request to such brain paralyzed idiots is please show me in the US Constitution where it says Israel or any other country is our responsibility? Where in our Constitution it is written that as US citizen you can do politics of a foreign country?
Probably Obama is the first US President since JFK to publicly confront bloody Zionist & their BS organizations like AIPAC etc controlling America. However we all know what happened to JFK. After him Israel HAS enjoyed this special partnership with the successive US government with Israel-centric Middle East and foreign policy. Bill Clinton even out sourced the domestic policy also to Zionist and Israel and Bush helped them to literally call every shot. This will not die an easy death. I expect some turbulent waters ahead for our President, as he performs this sea change” with a formidable power group. Expect “bad press” for President Obama from the elements of the Zionist controlled US media with the support of Zionist controlled Congress and big corporations here. I pray to God long live our President, God Bless America and every human on this planet earth.
Dave Makkar
American Hindu
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This will be difficult for me to change, because I and others have said this for years, Israel is a Jewish state. It is not a Jewish state. Israel IS a Zionist state.
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Even Jimmy Carter is now speaking out against Israel. Check out this link.
http://www.ifamericansknew.org/download/ObamaFlyer.pdf
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The only comment I will make is that the whole of the Americas were invaded and taken. We Americans live on land that was conquered and colonized a few hundred years ago. Do the native or ancient people’s of the America’s any longer have any right to these lands?
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The USS Liberty
Some of the USS Liberty Dead
On June 8, 1967, 34 American servicemen were killed and 174 were wounded during an Israeli attack on the USS Liberty. According to former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Thomas Moorer, “Those men were then betrayed and left to die by our own government.” The survivors are still awaiting justice.
Articles About the USS Liberty
The USS Liberty Timeline
Americans for Middle East Understanding – June 8, 1967, Israeli forces attack the USS Liberty. They kill 34 American servicemen, wounding 171 others. It will be the highest casualty rate ever inflicted on a U.S. naval vessel, with 7 out of every 10 crew members killed or injured. It will also be the only peacetime attack on a U.S. naval vessel that, to this day, the Congress of the United States of America formally refuses to investigate. The facts, as known, are as follow: more
Key Figure in USS Liberty Inquiry Dies
Bryant Jordan, Military.com read article
Obituary: Ward Boston Jr.; helped investigate ’67 Liberty attack
Blanca Gonzalez, San Diego Union-Tribune read article
Obituary: Ward Boston; Investigated Attack on USS Liberty
Chelsea J. Carter, Washington Post read article
Congressional inquiries got nowhere
John Crewdson in the Chicago Tribune – In the 40 years since the U.S. Court of Inquiry closed its books on the Liberty investigation, members of Congress have asked for information about the attack and have received stock replies, like the one provided to the late Sen. Alan Cranston. more
New revelations in attack on American spy ship
John Crewdson in the Chicago Tribune – Veterans, documents suggest U.S., Israel didn’t tell full story of deadly ’67 incident. more
Letter to Secretary of the Army Regarding Report of War Crimes
Rear Admiral Merlin Staring and Rear Admiral Clarence Hill, Jr. – On 8 June 2005 the U.S.S. Liberty Veterans Association, Inc., submitted to you a documented Report of War Crimes Committed Against U.S. Military Personnel on June 8, 1967. That report was submitted to you in your capacity as Executive Agent for the Secretary of Defense under Department of Defense Directive No. 5810.01B of 29 March 2004. It was based upon, and contained a detailed description of, the sudden, savage, unjustified, and prolonged attack made on 8 June 1967, by air and naval forces of the state of Israel, upon the USS LIBERTY (AGTR-5), a U.S. Navy technical research ship then operating peacefully in international waters in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea. The LIBERTY was at that time the most sophisticated and best-equipped intelligence ship in the world. Of a crew of 294 officers and men, including three American civilian government employees, she suffered 34 Americans killed in action and 173 wounded in action. The ship itself was so badly damaged that it never again sailed on an operational mission. more
Four Decades of Twisting Facts About Israel’s Attack on the USS Liberty
James Ennes in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – Since June 8, 1967, when Israeli air and naval forces deliberately attacked the American intelligence ship USS Liberty, Israel and its American supporters have lied about what happened. more
American Media Miss the Boat: For USA Today, Freedom of the Press Means the Right to Report It Wrong
Alison Weir in CounterPunch – Capitol Hill, October 2003. It is a historic occasion. An independent, blue-ribbon commission is to release its findings from an investigation into an internationally significant 36-year-old attack on a US Navy ship that left more than 200 American sailors killed or wounded. more
Cristol Claim of 13 Investigations Into Israel’s Attack on USS Liberty a Travesty
Terence O’Keefe in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – When A. Jay Cristol’s The Liberty Incident was released a year ago, it was uncritically hailed as the last word in the 36-year controversy surrounding Israel’s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty that took 34 American lives and wounded 172. The book was packed with tedious minutiae arguing the case. Indeed, if its author is to be believed, Liberty survivors have engaged in a 36-year slander against the state of Israel—which was guilty, at worst, of a grievous mistake in the heat of war. more
‘In Awesome Peril’
Richard K. Kolb in VFW Magazine – On June 8, 1967, the spy ship USS Liberty withstood an unparalleled assault by Israeli torpedo boats and planes off the coast of Egypt. Despite official and public abandonment, the courageous crew deserves recognition on this 40th anniversary of the costliest hostile U.S. ship action since World War II. more
Statement of Rear Admiral Merlin H. Staring, JAGC, USN (Ret.)
Rear Admiral Merlin H. Staring – I am honored to be allowed to participate in this tribute to the crew and survivors of the USS Liberty – ruthlessly attacked by Israeli forces on 8 June 1967. As a Navy JAG-Corps Captain, I had only a brief official contact with that event at the time – and not until many years later did I learn the full facts. When I did, I became aware – and I am now of the firmest conviction – the the Liberty honorees have suffered – for 40 years – an unprecedented injustice – and at the hands of our very own Navy and government. more
2007 USS Liberty Memorial Statement of Ambassador Edward Peck
Ambassador Edward Peck – The Congressional Medal of Honor, the highest decoration for bravery that our nation can bestow, was awarded to the Commanding Officer of the USS Liberty, Captain William McGonagle. more
2007 USS Liberty Memorial Speech
Stan White at Arlington National Cemetery – The first thing I would like to talk about, in speaking for the USS Liberty survivors, is the organization “No Greater Love”. These special people have been conducting ceremonies on June 8th annually at this location, for many, many years now, honoring our thirty-four shipmates killed during the attack on our ship June 8, 1967. more
War Crimes Committed Against U.S. Military Personnel, June 8, 1967
USS Liberty Veterans Association – On June 8, 1967 while patrolling in international waters in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, USS Liberty was savagely attacked without warning or justification by air and naval forces of the state of Israel. Of a crew of 294 officers and men (including three civilians), the ship suffered thirty four (34) killed in action and one hundred seventy three (173) wounded in action. The ship itself, a Forty Million ($40,000,000) Dollar state of the art signals intelligence (SIGINT) platform, was so badly damaged that it never sailed on an operational mission again and was sold in 1970 for $101,666.66 as scrap. more
The Attack on the USS Liberty and its Cover-up
Ambassador James Akins – In 1963, three World War II Victory hull freighters were refitted as technical research ships. Their function, formally, was “to conduct technical research operations in support of U.S. Navy electronic research projects, which include electromagnetic propagation studies and advanced communications systems.” Jane’s Fighting Ships called these vessels “mobile bases for research in communications and electromagnetic radiation…. [They are] considered electronic intelligence ships.” They were designed to intercept foreign electronic messages, and they were popularly called “spy ships.” One of these ships was re-christened the “USS Liberty.” more
A fair probe would attack Liberty misinformation
Admiral Thomas Moorer in the Stars and Stripes – While state department officials and historians converge on Washington this week to discuss the 1967 war in the Middle East, I am compelled to speak out about one of U.S. history’s most shocking cover-ups. On June 8, 1967, Israel attacked our proud naval ship—the USS Liberty—killing 34 American servicemen and wounding 172. Those men were then betrayed and left to die by our own government. more
The Assault on the USS Liberty Still Covered Up After 26 Years
Lieutenant Commander James Ennes in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – Twenty-six years have passed since that clear day on June 8, 1967 when Israel attacked the USS Liberty with aircraft and torpedo boats, killing 34 young men and wounding 171. The attack in international waters followed over nine hours of close surveillance. Israeli pilots circled the ship at low level 13 times on eight different occasions before attacking. Radio operators in Spain, Lebanon, Germany and aboard the ship itself all heard the pilots reporting to their headquarters that this was an American ship. They attacked anyway. And when the ship failed to sink, the Israeli government concocted an elaborate story to cover the crime. more
New Findings Reveal U.S.-Israeli Cover Up of Deliberate Israeli Attack on U.S. Naval Vessel
A new report released today by former officials from the highest level of the military and government reveals that Israel “committed acts of murder against American servicemen and an act of war against the United States” when it deliberately attacked the USS Liberty and killed 34 American crewmembers in 1967. more
Read the Findings of the Independent Commission
Media Coverage of the New Findings
Read the Affidavit of the 1967 Chief Attorney Captain Boston
For more than 30 years, I have remained silent on the topic of the USS Liberty. I am a military man and when orders come in from the Secretary of Defense and President of the United States, I follow them. However, recent attempts to rewrite history compel me to share the truth. more
Listen to an interview with Captain Boston
James Lupton (Oct. 29, 1942 – Jun. 8, 1967) was killed aboard the USS Liberty
Letter from a Liberty Widow
I am the wife of James Mahlon Lupton, CT1, who was killed aboard the USS Liberty when it was attacked by Israel on June 8, 1967. He was right where the torpedo hit. more
Documentary Film: The Loss of Liberty
Howard Films – ‘Loss of Liberty’ dramatically proves, beyond any doubt, that the attack by Israel on June 8, 1967 against the US naval intelligence gathering ship USS Liberty was deliberate. This filmed testimony by dozens of USS Liberty survivors demolishes Israel’s ‘tragic accident’ claim. Former Secretary of State Dean Rusk and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Thomas Moorer are representative of the honored high-ranking Americans supporting the condemnation of deliberate aggression against the United States by ‘ally’ Israel. Watch the Film
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USS Liberty dead & survivors no Justice after 42 years against Israeli aggression
On June 8, 1967, Israeli forces attacked the USS Liberty. They killed 34 American servicemen, wounded 171 others. Till to-date it is the highest casualty rate ever inflicted on a U.S. naval vessel, with 7 out of every 10 crew members killed or injured after World War 11. It is the only peacetime attack on a U.S. naval vessel to this day, the Zionist controlled Congress of the United States of America formally refuses to investigate.
Admiral Thomas Moorer in the Stars and Stripes – While state department officials and historians converge on Washington this week to discuss the 1967 war in the Middle East, I am compelled to speak out about one of U.S. history’s most shocking cover-ups. On June 8, 1967, Israel attacked our proud naval ship—the USS Liberty—killing 34 American servicemen and wounding 172. Those men were then betrayed and left to die by our own government.
Rear Admiral Merlin H. Staring – I am honored to be allowed to participate in this tribute to the crew and survivors of the USS Liberty – ruthlessly attacked by Israeli forces on 8 June 1967. As a Navy JAG-Corps Captain, I had only a brief official contact with that event at the time – and not until many years later did I learn the full facts. When I did, I became aware – and I am now of the firmest conviction – the Liberty honorees have suffered – for 40 years – an unprecedented injustice – and at the hands of our very own Navy and government.
War Crimes Committed Against U.S. Military Personnel, June 8, 1967 by Israel
USS Liberty Veterans Association – On June 8, 1967 while patrolling in international waters in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, USS Liberty was savagely attacked without warning or justification by air and naval forces of the state of Israel. Of a crew of 294 officers and men (including three civilians), the ship suffered thirty four (34) killed in action and one hundred seventy three (173) wounded in action. The ship itself, a Forty Million ($40,000,000) Dollar state of the art signals intelligence (SIGINT) platform, was so badly damaged that it never sailed on an operational mission again and was sold in 1970 for $101,666.66 as scrap.
John Crewdson in the Chicago Tribune – In the 40 years since the U.S. Court of Inquiry closed its books on the Liberty investigation, members of Congress have asked for information about the attack and have received stock replies, like the one provided to the late Sen. Alan Cranston.
Richard K. Kolb in VFW Magazine – On June 8, 1967, the spy ship USS Liberty withstood an unparalleled assault by Israeli torpedo boats and planes off the coast of Egypt. Despite official and public abandonment, the courageous crew deserves recognition on this 40th anniversary of the costliest hostile U.S. ship action since World War II.
Four Decades of Twisting Facts About Israel’s Attack on the USS Liberty
James Ennes in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – Since June 8, 1967, when Israeli air and naval forces deliberately attacked the American intelligence ship USS Liberty, Israel and its American supporters have lied about what happened.
Zionist controlled American Media Miss the Boat: For USA Today, Freedom of the Press Means the Right to Report It Wrong: Alison Weir in CounterPunch – Capitol Hill, October 2003. It is a historic occasion. An independent, blue-ribbon commission is to release its findings from an investigation into an internationally significant 36-year-old attack on a US Navy ship that left more than 200 American sailors killed or wounded.
Cristol Claim of 13 Investigations into Israel’s Attack on USS Liberty a Travesty
Terence O’Keefe in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – When Jay Cristol’s The Liberty Incident was released, it was uncritically hailed as the last word in the 36-year controversy surrounding Israel’s 1967 attack on the USS Liberty that took 34 American lives and wounded 172. The book was packed with tedious minutiae arguing the case. Indeed, if its author is to be believed, Liberty survivors have engaged in a 36-year slander against the state of Israel—which was guilty, at worst, of a grievous mistake in the heat of war.
The Assault on the USS Liberty Still Covered Up After 42 Years
Lieutenant Commander James Ennes in the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs – on June 8, 1967 when Israel attacked the USS Liberty with aircraft and torpedo boats, killing 34 young men and wounding 171. The attack in international waters followed over nine hours of close surveillance. Israeli pilots circled the ship at low level 13 times on eight different occasions before attacking. Radio operators in Spain, Lebanon, Germany and aboard the ship itself all heard the pilots reporting to their headquarters that this was an American ship. They attacked anyway. And when the ship failed to sink, the Israeli government concocted an elaborate story to cover the crime.
New Findings Reveal U.S.-Israeli Cover Up of Deliberate Israeli Attack on U.S. Naval Vessel
A new report released by former officials from the highest level of the military and government reveals that Israel “committed acts of murder against American servicemen and an act of war against the United States” when it deliberately attacked the USS Liberty and killed 34 American crewmembers in 1967.
Affidavit of the 1967 Chief Attorney Captain Boston: For more than 30 years, I have remained silent on the topic of the USS Liberty. I am a military man and when orders come in from the Secretary of Defense and President of the United States, I follow them. However, recent attempts to rewrite history compel me to share the truth.
Even the Documentary Film “The Loss of Liberty” dramatically proves, beyond any doubt, that the attack by Israel on June 8, 1967 against the US naval intelligence gathering ship USS Liberty was deliberate. This filmed testimony by dozens of USS Liberty survivors that demolishes Israel’s ‘tragic accident’ claim. Former Secretary of State Dean Rusk and former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Thomas Moorer are representative of the honored high-ranking Americans supporting the condemnation of deliberate aggression against the United States by ‘ally’ Israel.
Can the survivors and dead of USS liberty expect Justice from their new Commander in Chief of US Armed Forces President Barack Hussein Obama?
Contents provided by Chrsitine at Ron Paul on Israel
Dave Makkar
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Israel deliberately forgets its history
Zionist nationalist myth of enforced exile
An Israeli historian suggests the diaspora was the consequence, not of the expulsion of the Hebrews from Palestine, but of proselytising across north Africa, southern Europe and the Middle East.
Schlomo Sand is professor of history at Tel Aviv university and the author of Comment le people juif fut inventé (Fayard, Paris, 2008)
Schlomo Sand
Le Monde Diplomatique
September 2008
Translated by Donald Hounam
Every Israeli knows that he or she is the direct and exclusive descendant of a Jewish people which has existed since it received the Torah1 in Sinai. According to this myth, the Jews escaped from Egypt and settled in the Promised Land, where they built the glorious kingdom of David and Solomon, which subsequently split into the kingdoms of Judah and Israel. They experienced two exiles: after the destruction of the first temple, in the 6th century BC, and of the second temple, in 70 AD.
Two thousand years of wandering brought the Jews to Yemen, Morocco, Spain, Germany, Poland and deep into Russia. But, the story goes, they always managed to preserve blood links between their scattered communities. Their uniqueness was never compromised.
At the end of the 19th century conditions began to favour their return to their ancient homeland. If it had not been for the Nazi genocide, millions of Jews would have fulfilled the dream of 20 centuries and repopulated Eretz Israel, the biblical land of Israel. Palestine, a virgin land, had been waiting for its original inhabitants to return and awaken it. It belonged to the Jews, rather than to an Arab minority that had no history and had arrived there by chance. The wars in which the wandering people reconquered their land were just; the violent opposition of the local population was criminal.
This interpretation of Jewish history was developed as talented, imaginative historians built on surviving fragments of Jewish and Christian religious memory to construct a continuous genealogy for the Jewish people. Judaism’s abundant historiography encompasses many different approaches.
But none have ever questioned the basic concepts developed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Discoveries that might threaten this picture of a linear past were marginalised. The national imperative rejected any contradiction of or deviation from the dominant story. University departments exclusively devoted to “the history of the Jewish people”, as distinct from those teaching what is known in Israel as general history, made a significant contribution to this selective vision. The debate on what constitutes Jewishness has obvious legal implications, but historians ignored it: as far as they are concerned, any descendant of the people forced into exile 2,000 years ago is a Jew.
Nor did these official investigators of the past join the controversy provoked by the “new historians” from the late 1980s. Most of the limited number of participants in this public debate were from other disciplines or non-academic circles: sociologists, orientalists, linguists, geographers, political scientists, literary academics and archaeologists developed new perspectives on the Jewish and Zionist past. Departments of Jewish history remained defensive and conservative, basing themselves on received ideas. While there have been few significant developments in national history over the past 60 years (a situation unlikely to change in the short term), the facts that have emerged face any honest historian with fundamental questions.
Founding myths shaken
Is the Bible a historical text? Writing during the early half of the 19th century, the first modern Jewish historians, such as Isaak Markus Jost (1793-1860) and Leopold Zunz (1794-1886), did not think so. They regarded the Old Testament as a theological work reflecting the beliefs of Jewish religious communities after the destruction of the first temple. It was not until the second half of the century that Heinrich Graetz (1817-91) and others developed a “national” vision of the Bible and transformed Abraham’s journey to Canaan, the flight from Egypt and the united kingdom of David and Solomon into an authentic national past. By constant repetition, Zionist historians have subsequently turned these Biblical “truths” into the basis of national education.
But during the 1980s an earthquake shook these founding myths. The discoveries made by the “new archaeology” discredited a great exodus in the 13th century BC. Moses could not have led the Hebrews out of Egypt into the Promised Land, for the good reason that the latter was Egyptian territory at the time. And there is no trace of either a slave revolt against the pharaonic empire or of a sudden conquest of Canaan by outsiders.
Nor is there any trace or memory of the magnificent kingdom of David and Solomon. Recent discoveries point to the existence, at the time, of two small kingdoms: Israel, the more powerful, and Judah, the future Judea. The general population of Judah did not go into 6th century BC exile: only its political and intellectual elite were forced to settle in Babylon. This decisive encounter with Persian religion gave birth to Jewish monotheism.
Then there is the question of the exile of 70 AD. There has been no real research into this turning point in Jewish history, the cause of the diaspora. And for a simple reason: the Romans never exiled any nation from anywhere on the eastern seaboard of the Mediterranean. Apart from enslaved prisoners, the population of Judea continued to live on their lands, even after the destruction of the second temple. Some converted to Christianity in the 4th century, while the majority embraced Islam during the 7th century Arab conquest.
Most Zionist thinkers were aware of this: Yitzhak Ben Zvi, later president of Israel, and David Ben Gurion, its first prime minister, accepted it as late as 1929, the year of the great Palestinian revolt. Both stated on several occasions that the peasants of Palestine were the descendants of the inhabitants of ancient Judea2.
Proselytising zeal
But if there was no exile after 70 AD, where did all the Jews who have populated the Mediterranean since antiquity come from? The smokescreen of national historiography hides an astonishing reality. From the Maccabean revolt of the mid-2nd century BC to the Bar Kokhba revolt of the 2nd century AD, Judaism was the most actively proselytising religion. The Judeo-Hellenic Hasmoneans forcibly converted the Idumeans of southern Judea and the Itureans of Galilee and incorporated them into the people of Israel. Judaism spread across the Middle East and round the Mediterranean. The 1st century AD saw the emergence in modern Kurdistan of the Jewish kingdom of Adiabene, just one of many that converted.
The writings of Flavius Josephus are not the only evidence of the proselytising zeal of the Jews. Horace, Seneca, Juvenal and Tacitus were among the Roman writers who feared it. The Mishnah and the Talmud3 authorised conversion, even if the wise men of the Talmudic tradition expressed reservations in the face of the mounting pressure from Christianity.
Although the early 4th century triumph of Christianity did not mark the end of Jewish expansion, it relegated Jewish proselytism to the margins of the Christian cultural world. During the 5th century, in modern Yemen, a vigorous Jewish kingdom emerged in Himyar, whose descendants preserved their faith through the Islamic conquest and down to the present day. Arab chronicles tell of the existence, during the 7th century, of Judaised Berber tribes; and at the end of the century the legendary Jewish queen Dihya contested the Arab advance into northwest Africa. Jewish Berbers participated in the conquest of the Iberian peninsula and helped establish the unique symbiosis between Jews and Muslims that characterised Hispano-Arabic culture.
The most significant mass conversion occurred in the 8th century, in the massive Khazar kingdom between the Black and Caspian seas. The expansion of Judaism from the Caucasus into modern Ukraine created a multiplicity of communities, many of which retreated from the 13th century Mongol invasions into eastern Europe. There, with Jews from the Slavic lands to the south and from what is now modern Germany, they formed the basis of Yiddish culture4.
Prism of Zionism
Until about 1960 the complex origins of the Jewish people were more or less reluctantly acknowledged by Zionist historiography. But thereafter they were marginalised and finally erased from Israeli public memory. The Israeli forces who seized Jerusalem in 1967 believed themselves to be the direct descendents of the mythic kingdom of David rather than – God forbid – of Berber warriors or Khazar horsemen. The Jews claimed to constitute a specific ethnic group that had returned to Jerusalem, its capital, from 2,000 years of exile and wandering.
This monolithic, linear edifice is supposed to be supported by biology as well as history. Since the 1970s supposedly scientific research, carried out in Israel, has desperately striven to demonstrate that Jews throughout the world are closely genetically related.
Research into the origins of populations now constitutes a legitimate and popular field in molecular biology and the male Y chromosome has been accorded honoured status in the frenzied search for the unique origin of the “chosen people”. The problem is that this historical fantasy has come to underpin the politics of identity of the state of Israel. By validating an essentialist, ethnocentric definition of Judaism it encourages a segregation that separates Jews from non-Jews – whether Arabs, Russian immigrants or foreign workers.
Sixty years after its foundation, Israel refuses to accept that it should exist for the sake of its citizens. For almost a quarter of the population, who are not regarded as Jews, this is not their state legally. At the same time, Israel presents itself as the homeland of Jews throughout the world, even if these are no longer persecuted refugees, but the full and equal citizens of other countries.
A global ethnocracy invokes the myth of the eternal nation, reconstituted on the land of its ancestors, to justify internal discrimination against its own citizens. It will remain difficult to imagine a new Jewish history while the prism of Zionism continues to fragment everything into an ethnocentric spectrum. But Jews worldwide have always tended to form religious communities, usually by conversion; they cannot be said to share an ethnicity derived from a unique origin and displaced over 20 centuries of wandering.
The development of historiography and the evolution of modernity were consequences of the invention of the nation state, which preoccupied millions during the 19th and 20th centuries. The new millennium has seen these dreams begin to shatter.
And more and more academics are analysing, dissecting and deconstructing the great national stories, especially the myths of common origin so dear to chroniclers of the past.
Notes
1. The Torah, from the Hebrew root yara (to teach) is the founding text of Judaism. It consists of the first five books of the Old Testament (the Pentateuch): Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. | BACK
2. See David Ben Gurion and Yitzhak Ben Zvi, Eretz Israel in the past and present, 1918 (in Yiddish), and Jerusalem, 1980 (in Hebrew); Yitzhak Ben Zvi, Our population in the country, Executive Committee of the Union for Youth and the Jewish National Fund, Warsaw, 1929 (in Hebrew). | BACK
3. The Mishnah, regarded as the first work of rabbinic literature, was drawn up around 200 AD. The Talmud is a synthesis of rabbinic discussions on the law, customs and history of the Jews. The Palestinian Talmud was written between the 3rd and 5th centuries; the Babylonian Talmud was compiled at the end of the 5th century. | BACK
4. Yiddish, spoken by the Jews of eastern Europe, was a Germano-Slavic language incorporating Hebrew words. |
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Refugees and Ethnic Cleansing
“Everyone has the right to leave any country,
including his own, and to return to his country.”
— Universal Declaration of Human Rights
“On October 31, 1948, the commander of the Northern Front, Moshe Carmel, issued an order in writing to his units to expedite the removal of the Arab population…There is no doubt in my mind that this order originated with Ben-Gurion [the first Prime Minister of Israel]”
— Israeli Historian Benny Morris, in Ha’aretz
Sderot Built on Ashes of Ethnically Cleansed and Defaced Najd
Um Khalil Blog – We often hear about Palestinian rockets hitting the Israeli town of Sderot. What is often left out of these reports is that these rockets almost never kill or injure anyone, and only rarely cause damage. In addition, as this article describes, Sderot was built on the remains of a Palestinian town that had been ethnically cleansed by Israel’s founders in 1948. more
Forgotten Christians
Anders Strindberg, The American Conservative – At the time of the creation of the Israeli state in 1948, it is estimated that the Christians of Palestine numbered some 350,000. Almost 20 percent of the total population at the time, they constituted a vibrant and ancient community; their forbears had listened to St. Peter in Jerusalem as he preached at the first Pentecost. Yet Zionist doctrine held that Palestine was “a land without a people for a people without a land.” Of the 750,000 Palestinians that were forced from their homes in 1948, some 50,000 were Christians—7 percent of the total number of refugees and 35 percent of the total number of Christians living in Palestine at the time. more
Ethnic Cleansing: How Palestine Became Israel
If Americans Knew – In the late 1800s a small, fanatic movement called “political Zionism” began in Europe. Its goal was to create a Jewish state somewhere in the world. Its leaders settled on the ancient and long-inhabited land of Palestine for the location of this state. more
Commentary: Embarrassing history
Arnaud de Borchgrave in UPI – The Palestinians call Israel’s 1948 war of independence their nakba, or catastrophic ethnic cleansing, or forced exile. The Israelis, for their part, have steadfastly rejected any suggestion of ethnic cleansing as calumny in all its anti-Semitic horror. Historic revisionism is now under way. Without fanfare, just below the media radar screen, the Israeli Education Ministry has approved a textbook for Arab third-graders in Israel that concedes the war that gave birth to Israel was a “nakba” for the Palestinians. The textbook refers to the “expulsion” of some of the Palestinians and the “confiscation of many Arab-owned lands.” more
An Iraqi Jewish family arrives in Israel in 1949.
Hitching a ride on the magic carpet
Yehouda Shenhav in Haaretz – Any analogy between Palestinian refugees and Jewish immigrants from Arab lands is folly in historical and political terms.
An intensive campaign to secure official political and legal recognition of Jews from Arab lands as refugees has been going on for the past three years. This campaign has tried to create an analogy between Palestinian refugees and Mizrahi Jews, whose origins are in Middle Eastern countries – depicting both groups as victims of the 1948 War of Independence. The campaign’s proponents hope their efforts will prevent conferral of what is called a “right of return” on Palestinians, and reduce the size of the compensation Israel is liable to be asked to pay in exchange for Palestinian property appropriated by the state guardian of “lost” assets. more
The Legacy of Ariel Sharon
Robert Fisk in the UK Independent – This is a place of filth and blood which will forever be associated with Ariel Sharon. In Israel today, he may well be elected prime minister. Then he will be master of the most powerful nation in the Middle East; he will travel to America, he will visit the White House and shake hands with President George W Bush. But for everyone who stood in the Sabra and Chatila refugee camps in Beirut on 18 September 1982, his name is synonymous with butchery; with bloated corpses and disembowelled women and dead babies, with rape and pillage and murder… more
Fortress Israel
Ilan Pappe in the London Review of Books – The right of the Palestinian refugees expelled in the 1948 war to return home was acknowledged by the UN General Assembly in December 1948. It is a right anchored in international law and in accordance with notions of universal justice. More surprisingly perhaps, it also makes sense in terms of realpolitik: unless Israel agrees to repatriate the refugees, all attempts to solve the Israel-Palestine conflict are bound to fail. more
Why a ‘right of return’ is necessary
Sari Hanafi in The Daily Star – The right of return of Palestinian refugees to their place of origin is enshrined in four separate bodies of international law: humanitarian law, human rights law, the law of nationality as applied to state succession, and refugee law. more
Response to Benny Morris’ “Politics by other means” in the New Republic
Israeli Historian Ilan Pappé in the Electronic Intifada – In a 17 March 2004 article, “Politics by Other Means”, Benny Morris offered a “review” of Ilan Pappé’s new book, “A History of Modern Palestine; one land, two peoples” (Cambridge University Press, 2003), which tells the history of Palestine from the point of view of its workers, peasants, children, women and all the subaltern groups that make the society and not its political elite. Morris’ “review” consisted of a series of ad hominem attacks and outright factual distortions. Ilan Pappé sent the following reply to the New Republic, who refused to publish it. more
Israel Bars Rabin From Relating ’48 Eviction of Arabs
David K. Shipler in the New York Times – A censorship board composed of five Cabinet members prohibited former Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin from including in his memoirs a first-person account of the expulsion of 50,000 Palestinian civilians from their homes near Tel Aviv during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. In it, Mr. Rabin attributes the final decision on expulsion to David Ben-Gurion, one of Israel’s founders and its first Prime Minister, who died in 1973. Mr. Rabin says that some Israeli soldiers refused to participate in driving out the Arabs and that afterward, propaganda sessions were required to soothe the consciences of embittered troops. more
“Diagnosing Benny Morris: the mind of a European settler”
Gabriel Ash in the Yellow Times – Israeli historian Benny Morris crossed a new line of shame when he put his academic credentials and respectability in the service of outlining the “moral” justification for a future genocide against Palestinians. Benny Morris is the Israeli historian most responsible for the vindication of the Palestinian narrative of 1948. The lives of about 700,000 people were shattered as they were driven from their homes by the Jewish militia (and, later, the Israeli army) between December 1947 and early 1950. Morris went through Israeli archives and wrote the day by day account of this expulsion, documenting every “ethnically cleansed” village and every recorded act of violence, and placing each in the context of the military goals and perceptions of the cleansers. more
Right of Return: Two-State Solution Again Sells Palestinians Short
Professor George Bisharat in the Los Angeles Times – It is a tragic irony that, more than 55 years ago, one desperate people seeking sanctuary from murderous racism decimated another — and continue to oppress its scattered survivors to this day. In 1948, about 700,000 Palestinians were expelled from their homeland, their land and possessions taken by the new Jewish state of Israel. This included the Jerusalem home of my grandparents, Hanna and Mathilde Bisharat, which was expropriated through a process tantamount to state-sanctioned theft. more
Photo of Palestinian refugees fleeing in 1948.
Palestinian Refugees Return and Repatriation
Mazin Qumsiyeh, PhD in Sharing the Land of Canaan – Israel’s military occupation of Gaza and the West Bank (including East Jerusalem) is the most persistent military occupation on earth. But this 35-year-old occupation is only the second stage in the colonization of the land of Canaan. The first stage, between 1947-1949, generated the largest population of refugees still unsettled since World War Two, with the longest displacement in modern history. Until recently, two competing accounts of this catastrophic event existed. Recently, Israeli historians, such as Ilan Pappé, Benny Morris, Zeev Sternhall, Avi Shlaim, Simha Flapan, and Tom Segev, have validated the accounts of hundreds of thousands of Palestinian refugees and debunked the established Israeli myths of Israel’s creation. Using Israeli archives and declassified material, they were able to discover much of the hidden history of Zionism and they reveal a factual account of the establishment of Israel. more
Photo of Naeim Giladi.
The Jews of Iraq
Naeim Giladi in The Link – I write this article for the same reason I wrote my book: to tell the American people, and especially American Jews, that Jews from Islamic lands did not emigrate willingly to Israel; that, to force them to leave, Jews killed Jews; and that, to buy time to confiscate ever more Arab lands, Jews on numerous occasions rejected genuine peace initiatives from their Arab neighbors. I write about what the first prime minister of Israel called “cruel Zionism.” I write about it because I was part of it. more
Photo of a Gaza Refugee Camp. Shacks surrounded by rubble are constructed from sheets of metal.
Life in a Palestinian Refugee Camp
Grace Halsell in Journey to Jerusalem – Entering the refugee camp, I feel I am entering some medieval ghetto. I walk along a narrow alleyway, skirting an open sewage ditch. I pass tens of dozens of one- and two-room houses, each leaning on the other for support. I am in a ghetto without streets, sidewalks, gardens, patios, trees, flowers, plazas, or shops—among an uprooted, stateless, scattered people who, like the Jews before them, are in a tragic diaspora. I pass scores of small children, the third generation of Palestinians born in the ghetto that has almost as long a history as the state of Israel itself. Someone has said that for every Jew who was brought in to create a new state, a Palestinian Arab was uprooted and left homeless.
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A Synopsis of the
Israel/Palestine Conflict
The following is a very short synopsis of the history of this conflict. We recommend that you also read the much more detailed account, “The Origin of the Palestine-Israel Conflict.”
For centuries there was no such conflict. In the 19th century the land of Palestine was inhabited by a multicultural population – approximately 86 percent Muslim, 10 percent Christian, and 4 percent Jewish – living in peace.
Zionism
In the late 1800s a group in Europe decided to colonize this land. Known as Zionists, they represented an extremist minority of the Jewish population. Their goal was to create a Jewish homeland, and they considered locations in Africa and the Americas, before settling on Palestine.
Map of historic Palestine. Click here for larger map.
Historic Palestine
more maps
At first, this immigration created no problems. However, as more and more Zionists immigrated to Palestine – many with the express wish of taking over the land for a Jewish state – the indigenous population became increasingly alarmed. Eventually, fighting broke out, with escalating waves of violence. Hitler’s rise to power, combined with Zionist activities to sabotage efforts to place Jewish refugees in western countries, led to increased Jewish immigration to Palestine, and conflict grew.
UN Partition Plan
Finally, in 1947 the United Nations decided to intervene. However, rather than adhering to the principle of “self-determination of peoples,” in which the people themselves create their own state and system of government, the UN chose to revert to the medieval strategy whereby an outside power divides up other people’s land.
Map of UN-proposed partition of Palestine. Click here for larger map.
UN Plan of Partition
more maps
Under considerable Zionist pressure, the UN recommended giving away 55% of Palestine to a Jewish state – despite the fact that this group represented only about 30% of the total population, and owned under 7% of the land.
1947-1949 War
While it is widely reported that the resulting war eventually included five Arab armies, less well known is the fact that throughout this war Zionist forces outnumbered all Arab and Palestinian combatants combined – often by a factor of two to three. Moreover, Arab armies did not invade Israel – virtually all battles were fought on land that was to have been the Palestinian state.
Finally, it is significant to note that Arab armies entered the conflict only after Zionist forces had committed 16 massacres, including the grisly massacre of over 100 men, women, and children at Deir Yassin. Future Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, head of one of the Jewish terrorist groups, described this as “splendid,” and stated: “As in Deir Yassin, so everywhere, we will attack and smite the enemy. God, God, Thou has chosen us for conquest.” Zionist forces committed 33 massacres altogether.
By the end of the war, Israel had conquered 78 percent of Palestine; three-quarters of a million Palestinians had been made refugees; over 500 towns and villages had been obliterated; and a new map was drawn up, in which every city, river and hillock received a new, Hebrew name, as all vestiges of the Palestinian culture were to be erased. For decades Israel denied the existence of this population, former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir once saying: “There is no such thing as a Palestinian.”
Map of Palestinian, Egyptian, and Syrian lands occupied by Israel in 1967. The Palestinian West Bank and Gaza Strip, and the Syrian Golan Heights are all still under occupation. Click here for larger map.
1967 Occupation
more maps
1967 War & USS Liberty
In 1967, Israel conquered still more land. Following the Six Day War, in which Israeli forces launched a highly successful surprise attack on Egypt, Israel occupied the final 22% of Palestine that had eluded it in 1948 – the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Since, according to international law it is inadmissible to acquire territory by war, these are occupied territories and do not belong to Israel. It also occupied parts of Egypt (since returned) and Syria (which remain under occupation).
Also during the Six Day War, Israel attacked a US Navy ship, the USS Liberty, killing and injuring over 200 American servicemen. President Lyndon Johnson recalled rescue flights, saying that he did not want to “embarrass an ally.” (In 2004 a high-level commission chaired by Admiral Thomas Moorer, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, found this attack to be “an act of war against the United States,” a fact few news media have reported.)
Current Conflict
There are two primary issues at the core of this continuing conflict. First, there is the inevitably destabilizing effect of trying to maintain an ethnically preferential state, particularly when it is largely of foreign origin. The original population of what is now Israel was 96 percent Muslim and Christian, yet, these refugees are prohibited from returning to their homes in the self-described Jewish state (and those within Israel are subjected to systematic discrimination).
Second, Israel’s continued military occupation and confiscation of privately owned land in the West Bank, and control over Gaza, are extremely oppressive, with Palestinians having minimal control over their lives. Over 10,000 Palestinian men, women, and children are held in Israeli prisons. Few of them have had a legitimate trial; Physical abuse and torture are frequent. Palestinian borders (even internal ones) are controlled by Israeli forces. Periodically men, women, and children are strip searched; people are beaten; women in labor are prevented from reaching hospitals (at times resulting in death); food and medicine are blocked from entering Gaza, producing an escalating humanitarian crisis. Israeli forces invade almost daily, injuring, kidnapping, and sometimes killing inhabitants.
According to the Oslo peace accords of 1993, these territories were supposed to finally become a Palestinian state. However, after years of Israel continuing to confiscate land and conditions steadily worsening, the Palestinian population rebelled. (The Barak offer, widely reputed to be generous, was anything but.) This uprising, called the “Intifada” (Arabic for “shaking off”) began at the end of September 2000.
U.S. Involvement
Largely due to special-interest lobbying, U.S. taxpayers give Israel an average of $7 million per day, and since its creation have given more U.S. funds to Israel than to any other nation. As Americans learn about how Israel is using our tax dollars, many are calling for an end to this expenditure.
Notes
Recommended Reading: “The Origin of the Palestine-Israel Conflict.”
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Al-Hewar Center Panel Explores How to Address
the Issues of Jerusalem and Palestine
to the American Public
During the month of May, 1998, the Al-Hewar Center in Vienna, Virginia, hosted several discussions and events related to the 50th anniversary of the nakba or catastrophe which befell the Palestinians in 1948 upon the creation of Israel and the ensuing loss and occupation of their land. One of the featured events was a panel discussion on May 20, 1998, about how talk to Americans about the issues of Jerusalem and Palestine so that they can better understand the reasons for the struggle over this land. The panelists featured at this event were: Mr. Richard Curtiss, the Executive Editor of the respected magazine, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, and a retired Foreign Service Officer; Mr. Ra’afat Dajani, the Executive Director of the American Committee on Jerusalem, a coalition of Arab-American organizations dedicated to educating the American public and policy makers about the issue of Jerusalem; and Dr. Murhaf Jouejati, an expert on Middle East affairs. The event was moderated by Dr. Ayman Al-Ouri.
The Cost of Israel to the American People
Richard Curtiss
By now many Americans are aware that Israel, with a population of only 5.8 million people, is the largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid, and that Israel’s aid plus U.S. aid to Egypt’s 65 million people for keeping the peace with Israel has, for many years, consumed more than half of the U.S. bi-lateral foreign aid budget world-wide.
What few Americans understand however, is the steep price they pay in many other fields for the U.S.-Israeli relationship, which in turn is a product of the influence of Israel’s powerful U.S. lobby on American domestic politics and has nothing to do with U.S. strategic interests, U.S. national interests, or even with traditional American support for self-determination, human rights, and fair play overseas.
Besides its financial cost, unwavering U.S. support for Israel, whether it’s right or wrong, exacts a huge price in American prestige and credibility overseas. Further, Israel’s powerful U.S. lobby has been a major factor in delaying campaign finance reform, and also in the removal from American political life of some of our most distinguished public servants, members of Congress and even presidents.
Finally, the Israel-U.S. relationship has cost a significant number of American lives. The incidents in which hundreds of U.S. service personnel, diplomats, and civilians have been killed in the Middle East have been reported in the media. But the media seldom revisits these events, and scrupulously avoids analyzing why they occurred or compiling the cumulative toll of American deaths resulting from our Israel-centered Middle East policies.
Each of these four categories of the costs of Israel to the American people merits a talk of its own. What follows, therefore, is just an overview of such losses.
First is the financial cost of Israel to U.S. taxpayers. Between 1949 and 1998, the U.S. gave to Israel, with a self-declared population of 5.8 million people, more foreign aid than it gave to all of the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, all of the countries of Latin America, and all of the countries of the Caribbean combined – with a total population of 1,054,000,000 people.
In the 1997 fiscal year, for example, Israel received $3 billion from the foreign aid budget, at least $525 million from other U.S. budgets, and $2 billion in federal loan guarantees. So the 1997 total of U.S. grants and loan guarantees to Israel was $5.5 billion. That’s $15,068,493 per day, 365 days a year.
If you add its foreign aid grants and loans, plus the approximate totals of grants to Israel from other parts of the U.S. federal budget, Israel has received since 1949 a grand total of $84.8 billion, excluding the $10 billion in U.S. government loan guarantees it has drawn to date.
And if you calculate what the U.S. has had to pay in interest to borrow this money to give to Israel, the cost of Israel to U.S. taxpayers rises to $134.8 billion, not adjusted for inflation.
Put another way, the nearly $14,630 every one of 5.8 million Israelis had received from the U.S. government by October 31, 1997, cost American taxpayers $23,241 per Israeli. That’s $116,205 for every Israeli family of five.
None of these figures include the private donations by Americans to Israeli charities, which initially constituted about one quarter of Israel’s budget, and today approach $1 billion annually. In addition to the negative effect of these donations on the U.S. balance of payments, the donors also deduct them from their U.S. income taxes, creating another large drain on the U.S. treasury.
Nor do the figures above include any of the indirect financial costs of Israel to the United States, which cannot be tallied. One example is the cost to U.S. manufacturers of the Arab boycott, surely in the billions of dollars by now. Another example is the cost to U.S. consumers of the price of petroleum, which surged to such heights that it set off a world-wide recession during the Arab oil boycott imposed in reaction to U.S. support of Israel in the 1973 war.
Other examples are a portion of the costs of maintaining large U.S. Sixth Fleet naval forces in the Mediterranean, primarily to protect Israel, and military air units at the Aviano base in Italy, not to mention the staggering costs of frequent deployments to the Arabian Peninsula and Gulf area of land and air forces from the United States and naval units from the Seventh Fleet, which normally operates in the Pacific Ocean.
Many years ago the late Undersecretary of State George Ball estimated the true financial cost of Israel to the United States at $11 billion a year. Since then direct U.S. foreign aid to Israel has nearly doubled, and simply adjusting that original figure into 1998 dollars would send it considerably higher today. Next comes the cost of Israel to the international prestige and credibility of the United States. Americans seem constantly astounded at our foreign policy failures in the Middle East. This stems from a profound ignorance of the background of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, which in turn results from a reluctance by the mainstream U.S. media to present these facts objectively.
Toward the end of the 19th century when political Zionism was created in Europe, Jews were a tiny fraction of the population of the Holy Land, much of which was heavily cultivated and thickly populated, and certainly not a desert waiting to be reclaimed by outsiders.
Even in 1947, after half a century of Zionist immigration and an influx of Jewish refugees from Hitler, Jews still constituted only one third of the population of the British Mandate of Palestine. Only seven percent of the land was Jewish-owned. Yet when the United Nations partitioned Palestine in that year, the Jewish state-to-be received 53 percent and the Arab state-to-be received only 47 percent of the land. Jerusalem was to remain separate under international supervision, a “corpus seperatum” in the words of the United Nations.
One of the myths that many Americans still believe is that the initial war between the Arabs and Israelis broke out on May 15, 1948 when the British withdrew and military units from Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and Syria entered Palestine, allegedly because the Arabs had rejected a partition plan that the Israelis accepted.
In fact, the fighting began almost six months earlier, immediately after the partition plan was announced. By the time the Arab armies intervened in May, some 400,000 Palestinians already had fled or been driven from their homes. To the Arab nations the military forces they sent to Palestine were on a rescue mission to halt the dispossession of Palestinians from the areas the U.N. had awarded to both the Jewish and the Palestinian Arab state. In fact history has revealed that the Jordanian forces had orders not to venture into areas the U.N. had awarded to Israel.
Although the newly created Israeli government didn’t formally reject the partition plan, in practice it never accepted the plan. To this day, half a century later, Israel still refuses to define its borders.
In fact, when the fighting of 1947 and 1948 ended, the State of Israel occupied half of Jerusalem and 78 percent of the former mandate of Palestine. About 750,000 Muslim and Christian Palestinians had been driven from towns, villages and homes to which the Israeli forces never allowed them to return.
The four wars that followed, three of them started by Israel in 1956, 1967, and 1982, and one of them started by Egypt and Syria to recover their occupied lands in 1973, have been over the portions of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt which the Israelis occupied militarily in those wars, the other half of Jerusalem, and the 22 percent of Palestine – comprising the West Bank and Gaza – which is all that remains for the Palestinians.
It is the unwillingness of successive U.S. governments to acknowledge these historical facts, and adjust U.S. Middle East policies to right these wrongs, that has resulted in such a devastating loss of international credibility. Americans, who once were identified with the modern schools, universities and hospitals they had established throughout the Middle East starting more than 150 years ago, now are identified with U.S. misuse of its veto in the United Nations to condone Israeli violations of the human rights of the Palestinians living in the lands Israel has seized by force. The Israeli occupation violates the preface to the United Nations Charter banning the acquisition of territory by war. What the Israeli government has been doing in the occupied territories also violates the Fourth Geneva convention, which forbids the transfer of populations to or from such areas.
Governments of Middle Eastern countries which once looked to the United States as their protectors from European colonialism, now find it very difficult to justify maintaining cordial relations with the United States at all. Friendly Arab governments are jeopardized by their U.S. alliances, and the fall of one, the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, was directly attributable to its premature withdrawal of its armed forces from Palestine during the 1948 fighting, and its subsequent membership in a military alliance with the U.S. and Britain.
Even our European and Asian allies have joined in deploring the perpetual American tilt toward Israel. In a recent vote on a U.N. General Assembly resolution calling upon Israel to curb further encroachments on Palestinian lands by Jewish settlers, only the United States and Micronesia voted with Israel. Of the 185 U.N. member nations, all of the others, without exception, voted against Israel or abstained.
Yet Americans seem oblivious to such examples of how their Israel-centered Middle East policies are isolating the United States in the world.
Next is the cost of Israel to the American domestic political system. In December 1997, Fortune magazine asked professional lobbyists to select the most powerful special interest group in the United States. They chose the American Association of Retired Persons, which lobbies on behalf of all Americans over 60.
In second place, however, was the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Israel’s official Washington, D.C. lobby, with a $15 million budget – the sources of which AIPAC refuses to disclose – and 150 employees. AIPAC, in turn, can draw upon the resources of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, a roof group set up to coordinate the efforts on behalf of Israel of some 52 national Jewish organizations.
Among those organizations are groups such as B’nai B’rith’s Anti-Defamation League (ADL), with a $45 million budget, and Hadassah, the Zionist women’s group, which spends more than AIPAC and sends thousands of Americans every year to Israel on Israeli government-supervised visits.
Both AIPAC and the ADL maintain secret “opposition research” departments which compile files on politicians, journalists, academics and organizations, and circulate this information through local Jewish community councils to pro-Israel groups and activists in order to damage the reputations of those who dare to speak out and thus have been blackballed as “enemies of Israel.” In the case of ADL, police raids on the organization’s Los Angeles and San Francisco offices established that much of the information they had compiled was erroneous, and thus slanderous, and some also was illegally obtained.
In the case of AIPAC, this is not the organization’s most controversial activity. In the 1970s members of AIPAC’s national board of directors set out to form deceptively named local political action committees (PACs) which could coordinate their efforts in supporting candidates in federal elections. To date, at least 126 pro-Israel PACs have been registered, and no fewer than 50 PACs, like AIPAC, can give a candidate who is facing a tough opponent and who has voted according to AIPAC recommendations up to half a million dollars. That’s enough money to buy all the television time needed to get elected in most parts of the country.
What is totally unique about AIPAC’s network of political action committees is that they all have deceptive names. Who could possibly know that the Delaware Valley PAC in Philadelphia, San Franciscans for Good Government in California, Cactus PAC in Arizona, Chili PAC in New Mexico, Beaver PAC in Wisconsin and even Ice PAC in New York are really pro-Israel PACs. 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.
Some of America’s wisest and most distinguished public servants have been kept from higher office by the blackballing of the Israel lobby. One such leader was George Ball, who served the Kennedy administration as Under Secretary of State and the Johnson administration as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Given his unmatched brilliance in forecasting international developments, there is no doubt that he would have become secretary of state had he not publicly expressed the skepticism about the U.S. relationship with Israel which most Americans involved in foreign affairs privately feel.
In membership meetings which journalists are not allowed to attend, AIPAC presidents have boasted that the organization was responsible for the defeats of two of history’s most distinguished chairmen of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – Democrat J. William Fulbright of Arkansas and Republican Charles Percy of Illinois. The list of other Senators and House members for whose election defeats AIPAC takes credit is too long to recount.
There is good evidence also that had it not been for complex maneuvers by the Israel lobby, including encouragement of third party candidates and unrelenting partisanship by pro-Israeli syndicated columnists and other media figures, Democratic President Jimmy Carter probably would have been reelected in 1980, and Republican President George Bush almost certainly would have been reelected in 1992.
The cost to our political system of losing national figures who refused to allow U.S. domestic political interests to dictate U.S. foreign policy has been enormous. So long as AIPAC and other powerful lobbies continue to thwart meaningful efforts on behalf of campaign finance reform, Americans will continue unknowingly paying such costs.
Finally, there is the cost of Israel in American lives. References to the attack by Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats on the USS Liberty in which 34 Americans were killed and 171 wounded on the fourth day of the Six-Day War of June 1967 often are met by disbelief. Very few Americans seem to have heard of the attack on the ship operated by the U.S. Navy for the National Security Agency to monitor Israel and Arab military communications during the fighting.
The Israeli government claimed it was a case of mistaken identity. The members of the crew and other naval officers who were stationed in the Mediterranean and in Washington at the time state that it was a deliberate attempt to sink the ship and blame Egyptian forces for the disaster. It is the only such event in U.S. Naval history the cause of which has never been formally investigated either by Congress or by the Navy itself.
Major losses of American lives at the hands of Arab forces opposing Israel are better known. These include the loss of 141 U.S. service personnel in the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in 1984. They also include the loss of several U.S. diplomats and local employees of the U.S. government in two bombings of the American Embassy in Beirut. Other such events include the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait, the taking of U.S. hostages in Beirut of whom three were killed, the deaths of Americans in a series of Middle East related skyjackings, the deaths of 19 U.S. service personnel in the bombing of the Al Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, and the 1997 assassination of four U.S. accountants working for an American company in Karachi.
All of these incidents, and many more in which Americans have died, resulted directly from one-sided U.S. support for Israel in its refusal to participate in the land-for-peace settlement with the Palestinians and its other Arab neighbors envisioned in U.N. Security Council Resolution 242. The U.S. has given lip service to that resolution since November 1967. But in practice the U.S. has done nothing to force Israel to comply, even though the resolution has been accepted by the members of the League of Arab States. That U.S. hypocrisy fuels rage and frustration throughout the Middle East and South Asia which will continue to take a toll of American lives until Israel finally gives back the lands it occupied in 1967, or the U.S. stops subsidizing Israeli intransigence.
Claims that there are positive aspects of the U.S.-Israeli relationship seldom stand up to scrutiny. During the Reagan administration it was labeled for the first time a “strategic relationship” conferring benefits on the U.S. as well as on Israel. The idea that Israel – smaller in both area and population than Hong Kong – can offer the United States benefits sufficient to offset the hostility that relationship arouses among 250 million Arabs living in a 4,000-mile strategic swath of territory stretching from Morocco to Oman is ludicrous. It becomes even more ludicrous when one realizes that the relationship also has alienated another 750 million Muslims who, together with the Arabs, control more than 60 percent of the world’s proven oil and gas reserves. Apologists for Israel also describe the U.S.-Israeli cooperation in weapons development. The fact is that the one or two successful joint weapons programs have been largely U.S. financed, while for their part the Israelis have repeatedly sold to rogue nations U.S. weapons turned over at no cost to Israel.
It is a sad but proven fact that the Israeli government also has obtained secret U.S. military technology which Israel has sold to other countries. For example, after the U.S. sent Patriot missile defense batteries on an emergency basis to help defend Israel during the Gulf War, the Israelis seem to have sold the Patriot missile technology to China, according to the U.S. State Department’s inspector general. As a result, the U.S. has been forced to develop a whole new generation of missile technology able to penetrate the defenses China has developed as a result of the Israeli treachery.
Perhaps the most hypocritical rationalization offered by friends of Israel is that U.S. special treatment is justified because Israel is “the Middle East’s only working democracy” and that Israel and the U.S. have many basic institutions in common. In fact, Israeli democracy does not work for non-Jews. In contrast to the United States, where by law all citizens have equal rights regardless of religion or ethnic origin, Muslim and Christian citizens of Israel do not have equal rights with regards to military service, the extensive social benefits available to veterans of Israeli military service, or even in terms of Israeli tax rates imposed on Arab citizens and Israeli government expenditures in Arab communities within Israel.
Further, Israeli citizenship is not available to the Muslim and Christian Palestinians driven from their homes in Israel in 1948, nor to their descendants. But a Jew, born anywhere in the world, can have Israeli citizenship for the asking.
Perhaps most shocking is the little-known fact that by now 90 percent of the land in Israel proper is held under restrictive covenants barring non-Jews, even those with Israeli citizenship, from owning the land or from earning a living on it. Unfortunately, the land held under such covenants is increasing, not decreasing. It would be difficult, therefore, to find two countries more profoundly different in their approaches to basic questions of citizenship and civil and human rights as are the United States and Israel. Ì
Palestine, Jerusalem and the American Public by Mr. Ra’afat Dajani
Making Israel Blink by Dr. Murhaf Jouejati
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By Richard H. Curtiss
Former U.S. Foreign Service Officer
Speech at the Al Hewar Center for Arab Culture and Dialogue
May 20, 1998
By now many Americans are aware that Israel, with a population of only 5.8 million people, is the largest recipient of U.S. foreign aid, and that Israel’s aid plus U.S. aid to Egypt’s 65 million people for keeping the peace with Israel has, for many years, consumed more than half of the U.S. bi-lateral foreign aid budget world-wide.
What few Americans understand however, is the steep price they pay in many other fields for the U.S.-Israeli relationship, which in turn is a product of the influence of Israel’s powerful U.S. lobby on American domestic politics and has nothing to do with U.S. strategic interests, U.S. national interests, or even with traditional American support for self-determination, human rights, and fair play overseas.
Richard H. Curtiss enlisted in the U.S. Army in World War II, and served as a military correspondent in Berlin, Germany after the war. After earning a B.A. in journalism from the University of Southern California and working on newspapers and for the United Press, he served as a career Foreign Service officer with the Department of State and the U.S. Information Agency throughout the world and in Washington D.C. During his U.S. government career he received the U.S. Information Agency’s Superior Honor Award and the Edward R. Murrow award for excellence in Public Diplomacy, U.S.I.A.’s highest professional recognition.
Curtiss is currently the Executive Editor of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs.
Read his full bio.
Besides its financial cost, unwavering U.S. support for Israel, whether it’s right or wrong, exacts a huge price in American prestige and credibility overseas. Further, Israel’s powerful U.S. lobby has been a major factor in delaying campaign finance reform, and also in the removal from American political life of some of our most distinguished public servants, members of Congress and even presidents.
Finally, the Israel-U.S. relationship has cost a significant number of American lives. The incidents in which hundreds of U.S. service personnel, diplomats, and civilians have been killed in the Middle East have been reported in the media. But the media seldom revisits these events, and scrupulously avoids analyzing why they occurred or compiling the cumulative toll of American deaths resulting from our Israel-centered Middle East policies.
Each of these four categories of the costs of Israel to the American people merits a talk of its own. What follows, therefore, is just an overview of such losses.
First is the financial cost of Israel to U.S. taxpayers. Between 1949 and 1998, the U.S. gave to Israel, with a self-declared population of 5.8 million people, more foreign aid than it gave to all of the countries of sub-Saharan Africa, all of the countries of Latin America, and all of the countries of the Caribbean combined – with a total population of 1,054,000,000 people.
In the 1997 fiscal year, for example, Israel received $3 billion from the foreign aid budget, at least $525 million from other U.S. budgets, and $2 billion in federal loan guarantees. So the 1997 total of U.S. grants and loan guarantees to Israel was $5.5 billion. That’s $15,068,493 per day, 365 days a year.
If you add its foreign aid grants and loans, plus the approximate totals of grants to Israel from other parts of the U.S. federal budget, Israel has received since 1949 a grand total of $84.8 billion, excluding the $10 billion in U.S. government loan guarantees it has drawn to date.
And if you calculate what the U.S. has had to pay in interest to borrow this money to give to Israel, the cost of Israel to U.S. taxpayers rises to $134.8 billion, not adjusted for inflation.
Put another way, the nearly $14,630 every one of 5.8 million Israelis had received from the U.S. government by October 31, 1997, cost American taxpayers $23,241 per Israeli. That’s $116,205 for every Israeli family of five.
None of these figures include the private donations by Americans to Israeli charities, which initially constituted about one quarter of Israel’s budget, and today approach $1 billion annually. In addition to the negative effect of these donations on the U.S. balance of payments, the donors also deduct them from their U.S. income taxes, creating another large drain on the U.S. treasury.
Nor do the figures above include any of the indirect financial costs of Israel to the United States, which cannot be tallied. One example is the cost to U.S. manufacturers of the Arab boycott, surely in the billions of dollars by now. Another example is the cost to U.S. consumers of the price of petroleum, which surged to such heights that it set off a world-wide recession during the Arab oil boycott imposed in reaction to U.S. support of Israel in the 1973 war.
Other examples are a portion of the costs of maintaining large U.S. Sixth Fleet naval forces in the Mediterranean, primarily to protect Israel, and military air units at the Aviano base in Italy, not to mention the staggering costs of frequent deployments to the Arabian Peninsula and Gulf area of land and air forces from the United States and naval units from the Seventh Fleet, which normally operates in the Pacific Ocean.
Many years ago the late Undersecretary of State George Ball estimated the true financial cost of Israel to the United States at $11 billion a year. Since then direct U.S. foreign aid to Israel has nearly doubled, and simply adjusting that original figure into 1998 dollars would send it considerably higher today.
Next comes the cost of Israel to the international prestige and credibility of the United States. Americans seem constantly astounded at our foreign policy failures in the Middle East. This stems from a profound ignorance of the background of the Israeli-Palestinian dispute, which in turn results from a reluctance by the mainstream U.S. media to present these facts objectively.
Toward the end of the 19th century when political Zionism was created in Europe, Jews were a tiny fraction of the population of the Holy Land, much of which was heavily cultivated and thickly populated, and certainly not a desert waiting to be reclaimed by outsiders.
Even in 1947, after half a century of Zionist immigration and an influx of Jewish refugees from Hitler, Jews still constituted only one third of the population of the British Mandate of Palestine. Only seven percent of the land was Jewish-owned. Yet when the United Nations partitioned Palestine in that year, the Jewish state-to-be received 53 percent and the Arab state-to-be received only 47 percent of the land. Jerusalem was to remain separate under international supervision, a “corpus seperatum” in the words of the United Nations.
One of the myths that many Americans still believe is that the initial war between the Arabs and Israelis broke out on May 15, 1948 when the British withdrew and military units from Egypt, Jordan, Iraq and Syria entered Palestine, allegedly because the Arabs had rejected a partition plan that the Israelis accepted.
In fact, the fighting began almost six months earlier, immediately after the partition plan was announced. By the time the Arab armies intervened in May, some 400,000 Palestinians already had fled or been driven from their homes. To the Arab nations the military forces they sent to Palestine were on a rescue mission to halt the dispossession of Palestinians from the areas the U.N. had awarded to both the Jewish and the Palestinian Arab state. In fact history has revealed that the Jordanian forces had orders not to venture into areas the U.N. had awarded to Israel.
Although the newly created Israeli government didn’t formally reject the partition plan, in practice it never accepted the plan. To this day, half a century later, Israel still refuses to define its borders.
In fact, when the fighting of 1947 and 1948 ended, the State of Israel occupied half of Jerusalem and 78 percent of the former mandate of Palestine. About 750,000 Muslim and Christian Palestinians had been driven from towns, villages and homes to which the Israeli forces never allowed them to return.
The four wars that followed, three of them started by Israel in 1956, 1967, and 1982, and one of them started by Egypt and Syria to recover their occupied lands in 1973, have been over the portions of Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Egypt which the Israelis occupied militarily in those wars, the other half of Jerusalem, and the 22 percent of Palestine – comprising the West Bank and Gaza – which is all that remains for the Palestinians.
It is the unwillingness of successive U.S. governments to acknowledge these historical facts, and adjust U.S. Middle East policies to right these wrongs, that has resulted in such a devastating loss of international credibility. Americans, who once were identified with the modern schools, universities and hospitals they had established throughout the Middle East starting more than 150 years ago, now are identified with U.S. misuse of its veto in the United Nations to condone Israeli violations of the human rights of the Palestinians living in the lands Israel has seized by force. The Israeli occupation violates the preface to the United Nations Charter banning the acquisition of territory by war. What the Israeli government has been doing in the occupied territories also violates the Fourth Geneva convention, which forbids the transfer of populations to or from such areas.
Governments of Middle Eastern countries which once looked to the United States as their protectors from European colonialism, now find it very difficult to justify maintaining cordial relations with the United States at all. Friendly Arab governments are jeopardized by their U.S. alliances, and the fall of one, the Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, was directly attributable to its premature withdrawal of its armed forces from Palestine during the 1948 fighting, and its subsequent membership in a military alliance with the U.S. and Britain.
Even our European and Asian allies have joined in deploring the perpetual American tilt toward Israel. In a recent vote on a U.N. General Assembly resolution calling upon Israel to curb further encroachments on Palestinian lands by Jewish settlers, only the United States and Micronesia voted with Israel. Of the 185 U.N. member nations, all of the others, without exception, voted against Israel or abstained.
Yet Americans seem oblivious to such examples of how their Israel-centered Middle East policies are isolating the United States in the world.
Next is the cost of Israel to the American domestic political system. In December 1997, Fortune magazine asked professional lobbyists to select the most powerful special interest group in the United States. They chose the American Association of Retired Persons, which lobbies on behalf of all Americans over 60.
In second place, however, was the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, Israel’s official Washington, D.C. lobby, with a $15 million budget – the sources of which AIPAC refuses to disclose – and 150 employees. AIPAC, in turn, can draw upon the resources of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, a roof group set up to coordinate the efforts on behalf of Israel of some 52 national Jewish organizations.
Among those organizations are groups such as B’nai B’rith’s Anti-Defamation League (ADL), with a $45 million budget, and Hadassah, the Zionist women’s group, which spends more than AIPAC and sends thousands of Americans every year to Israel on Israeli government-supervised visits.
Both AIPAC and the ADL maintain secret “opposition research” departments which compile files on politicians, journalists, academics and organizations, and circulate this information through local Jewish community councils to pro-Israel groups and activists in order to damage the reputations of those who dare to speak out and thus have been blackballed as “enemies of Israel.” In the case of ADL, police raids on the organization’s Los Angeles and San Francisco offices established that much of the information they had compiled was erroneous, and thus slanderous, and some also was illegally obtained.
In the case of AIPAC, this is not the organization’s most controversial activity. In the 1970s members of AIPAC’s national board of directors set out to form deceptively named local political action committees (PACs) which could coordinate their efforts in supporting candidates in federal elections. To date, at least 126 pro-Israel PACs have been registered, and no fewer than 50 PACs, like AIPAC, can give a candidate who is facing a tough opponent and who has voted according to AIPAC recommendations up to half a million dollars. That’s enough money to buy all the television time needed to get elected in most parts of the country.
What is totally unique about AIPAC’s network of political action committees is that they all have deceptive names. Who could possibly know that the Delaware Valley PAC in Philadelphia, San Franciscans for Good Government in California, Cactus PAC in Arizona, Chili PAC in New Mexico, Beaver PAC in Wisconsin and even Ice PAC in New York are really pro-Israel PACs. 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.
Some of America’s wisest and most distinguished public servants have been kept from higher office by the blackballing of the Israel lobby. One such leader was George Ball, who served the Kennedy administration as Under Secretary of State and the Johnson administration as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations. Given his unmatched brilliance in forecasting international developments, there is no doubt that he would have become secretary of state had he not publicly expressed the skepticism about the U.S. relationship with Israel which most Americans involved in foreign affairs privately feel.
In membership meetings which journalists are not allowed to attend, AIPAC presidents have boasted that the organization was responsible for the defeats of two of history’s most distinguished chairmen of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – Democrat J. William Fulbright of Arkansas and Republican Charles Percy of Illinois. The list of other Senators and House members for whose election defeats AIPAC takes credit is too long to recount.
There is good evidence also that had it not been for complex maneuvers by the Israel lobby, including encouragement of third party candidates and unrelenting partisanship by pro-Israeli syndicated columnists and other media figures, Democratic President Jimmy Carter probably would have been reelected in 1980, and Republican President George Bush almost certainly would have been reelected in 1992.
The cost to our political system of losing national figures who refused to allow U.S. domestic political interests to dictate U.S. foreign policy has been enormous. So long as AIPAC and other powerful lobbies continue to thwart meaningful efforts on behalf of campaign finance reform, Americans will continue unknowingly paying such costs.
Finally, there is the cost of Israel in American lives. References to the attack by Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats on the USS Liberty in which 34 Americans were killed and 171 wounded on the fourth day of the Six-Day War of June 1967 often are met by disbelief. Very few Americans seem to have heard of the attack on the ship operated by the U.S. Navy for the National Security Agency to monitor Israel and Arab military communications during the fighting.
The Israeli government claimed it was a case of mistaken identity. The members of the crew and other naval officers who were stationed in the Mediterranean and in Washington at the time state that it was a deliberate attempt to sink the ship and blame Egyptian forces for the disaster. It is the only such event in U.S. Naval history the cause of which has never been formally investigated either by Congress or by the Navy itself.
Major losses of American lives at the hands of Arab forces opposing Israel are better known. These include the loss of 141 U.S. service personnel in the bombing of the U.S. Marine barracks in Beirut in 1984. They also include the loss of several U.S. diplomats and local employees of the U.S. government in two bombings of the American Embassy in Beirut. Other such events include the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Kuwait, the taking of U.S. hostages in Beirut of whom three were killed, the deaths of Americans in a series of Middle East related skyjackings, the deaths of 19 U.S. service personnel in the bombing of the Al Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, and the 1997 assassination of four U.S. accountants working for an American company in Karachi.
All of these incidents, and many more in which Americans have died, resulted directly from one-sided U.S. support for Israel in its refusal to participate in the land-for-peace settlement with the Palestinians and its other Arab neighbors envisioned in U.N. Security Council Resolution 242. The U.S. has given lip service to that resolution since November 1967. But in practice the U.S. has done nothing to force Israel to comply, even though the resolution has been accepted by the members of the League of Arab States. That U.S. hypocrisy fuels rage and frustration throughout the Middle East and South Asia which will continue to take a toll of American lives until Israel finally gives back the lands it occupied in 1967, or the U.S. stops subsidizing Israeli intransigence.
Claims that there are positive aspects of the U.S.-Israeli relationship seldom stand up to scrutiny. During the Reagan administration it was labeled for the first time a “strategic relationship” conferring benefits on the U.S. as well as on Israel. The idea that Israel – smaller in both area and population than Hong Kong – can offer the United States benefits sufficient to offset the hostility that relationship arouses among 250 million Arabs living in a 4,000-mile strategic swath of territory stretching from Morocco to Oman is ludicrous. It becomes even more ludicrous when one realizes that the relationship also has alienated another 750 million Muslims who, together with the Arabs, control more than 60 percent of the world’s proven oil and gas reserves. Apologists for Israel also describe the U.S.-Israeli cooperation in weapons development. The fact is that the one or two successful joint weapons programs have been largely U.S. financed, while for their part the Israelis have repeatedly sold to rogue nations U.S. weapons turned over at no cost to Israel.
It is a sad but proven fact that the Israeli government also has obtained secret U.S. military technology which Israel has sold to other countries. For example, after the U.S. sent Patriot missile defense batteries on an emergency basis to help defend Israel during the Gulf War, the Israelis seem to have sold the Patriot missile technology to China, according to the U.S. State Department’s inspector general. As a result, the U.S. has been forced to develop a whole new generation of missile technology able to penetrate the defenses China has developed as a result of the Israeli treachery.
Perhaps the most hypocritical rationalization offered by friends of Israel is that U.S. special treatment is justified because Israel is “the Middle East’s only working democracy” and that Israel and the U.S. have many basic institutions in common. In fact, Israeli democracy does not work for non-Jews. In contrast to the United States, where by law all citizens have equal rights regardless of religion or ethnic origin, Muslim and Christian citizens of Israel do not have equal rights with regards to military service, the extensive social benefits available to veterans of Israeli military service, or even in terms of Israeli tax rates imposed on Arab citizens and Israeli government expenditures in Arab communities within Israel.
Further, Israeli citizenship is not available to the Muslim and Christian Palestinians driven from their homes in Israel in 1948, nor to their descendants. But a Jew, born anywhere in the world, can have Israeli citizenship for the asking.
Perhaps most shocking is the little-known fact that by now 90 percent of the land in Israel proper is held under restrictive covenants barring non-Jews, even those with Israeli citizenship, from owning the land or from earning a living on it. Unfortunately, the land held under such covenants is increasing, not decreasing. It would be difficult, therefore, to find two countries more profoundly different in their approaches to basic questions of citizenship and civil and human rights as are the United States and Israel.
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Shirl McArthur
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs
November 2008, pages 10-11
TABLE 1: Direct U.S. Aid to Israel (millions of dollars)
Year Total Military
Grant Economic
Grant Immigrant ASHA All Other
1949-1996 68,030.9 29,014.9 23,122.4 868.9 121.4 14,903.3
1997 3,132.1 1,800.0 1,200.0 80.0 2.1 50.0
1998 3,080.0 1,800.0 1,200.0 80.0 ? ?
1999 3,010.0 1,860.0 1,080.0 70.0 ? ?
2000 4,131.85 3,120.0 949.1 60.0 2.75 ?
2001 2,876.05 1,975.6 838.2 60.0 2.25 ?
2002 2,850.65 2,040.0 720.0 60.0 2.65 28.0
2003 3,745.15 3,086.4 596.1 59.6 3.05 ?
2004 2,687.25 2,147.3 477.2 49.7 3.15 9.9
2005 2,612.15 2,202.2 357.0 50.0 2.95 ?
2006 2,534.53 2,257.0 237.0 40.0 ? .53
2007 2,500.24 2,340.0 120.0 40.0 ? .24
2008 2,423.8 2,380.6 0.0 39.7 3.0 .5
Total 103,614.67 56,024.0 30,897.0 1,557.9 143.3 14,992.47
Notes: FY 2000 military grants include $1.2 billion for the Wye agreement and $1.92 billion in annual military aid. FY 2003 military aid included $1 billion from the supplemental appropriations bill. The economic grant was earmarked for $960 million for FY 2000 but was reduced to meet the 0.38% rescission. Final amounts for FY 2003 are reduced by 0.65% mandated rescission, the amounts for FY 2004 are reduced by 0.59%, and the amounts for FY 2008 are reduced by .81%.
Sources: CRS Report RL33222: U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel, updated Jan. 2, 2008, plus the FY ’08 omnibus appropriations bill, H.R. 2764.
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This estimate of total U.S. direct aid to Israel updates the estimate given in the July 2006 issue of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs. It is an estimate because arriving at an exact figure is not possible, since parts of U.S. aid to Israel are a) buried in the budgets of various U.S. agencies, mostly that of the Defense Department (DOD), or b) in a form not easily quantifiable, such as the early disbursement of aid, giving Israel a direct benefit in interest income and the U.S. Treasury a corresponding loss. Given these caveats, our current estimate of cumulative total direct aid to Israel is $113.8554 billion.
It must be emphasized that this analysis is a conservative, defensible accounting of U.S. direct aid to Israel, NOT of Israel’s cost to the U.S. or the American taxpayer, nor of the benefits to Israel of U.S. aid. The distinction is important, because the indirect or consequential costs suffered by the U.S. as a result of its blind support for Israel exceed by many times the substantial amount of direct aid to Israel. (See, for example, the late Thomas R. Stauffer’s article in the June 2003 Washington Report, “The Costs to American Taxpayers of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: $3 Trillion.”)
Shirl McArthur, a retired U.S. foreign service officer, is a consultant based in the Washington, DC area.
Especially, this computation does not include the costs resulting from the invasion and occupation of Iraq—hundreds of billions of dollars, 4,000-plus U.S. and allied fatalities, untold tens of thousands of Iraqi deaths, and many thousands of other U.S., allied, and Iraqi casualties—which is almost universally believed in the Arab world to have been undertaken for the benefit of Israel. Among other “indirect or consequential” costs would be the costs of U.S. unilateral economic sanctions on Iran, Iraq, Libya and Syria, the costs to U.S. manufacturers of the Arab boycott, and the costs to U.S. companies and consumers of the 1973 Arab oil embargo and consequent and subsequent soaring oil prices partially as a result of U.S. support for Israel.
Among the real benefits to Israel that are not direct costs to the U.S. taxpayer are the early cash transfer of economic and military aid, in-country spending of a portion of military aid, and loan guarantees. The U.S. gives Israel all of its economic and military aid directly in cash during the first month of the fiscal year, with no accounting required of how the funds are used. Also, in contrast with other countries receiving military aid, who must purchase through the DOD, Israel deals directly with the U.S. companies, with no DOD review. Furthermore, Israel is allowed to spend 26.3 percent of each year’s military aid in Israel (no other recipient of U.S. military aid gets this benefit), which has resulted in an increasingly sophisticated Israeli defense industry. As a result, Israel has become a major world arms exporter; the Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports that in 2006 Israel was the world’s ninth leading supplier of arms worldwide, earning $4.4 billion from defense sales.
Another benefit to Israel are U.S. government loan guarantees. The major loan guarantees have been $600 million for housing between 1972 and 1990; $9.2 billion for Soviet Jewish resettlement between 1992 and 1997; about $5 billion for refinancing military loans commercially; and $9 billion in loan guarantees authorized in FY ’03 and extended to FY ’10. Of that $9 billion, CRS reports that Israel has drawn $4.1 billion through FY ’07. These loans have not—yet—cost the U.S. any money; they are listed on the Treasury Department’s books as “contingent liabilities,” which would be liabilities to the U.S. should Israel default. However, they have been of substantial, tangible benefit to Israel, because they enable Israel to borrow commercially at special terms and favorable interest rates.
Components of Israel Aid
Israel is the largest cumulative recipient of U.S. aid since World War II (not counting the huge sums being spent in Iraq). The $3 billion or so per year that Israel receives from the U.S. amounts to about $500 per Israeli. Most of this money is earmarked in the annual Foreign Operations (foreign aid) appropriations bills, with the three major items being military grants (Foreign Military Financing, or FMF), economic grants (Economic Support Funds, or ESF), and “migration and refugee assistance.” (Refugee assistance originally was intended to help Israel absorb Jewish refugees from the Soviet Union, but this was expanded in 1985 to include all refugees resettling in Israel. In fact, Israel doesn’t differentiate between refugees and other immigrants, so this money is used for all immigrants to Israel.)
Not earmarked but also included in congresssional appropriations bills is Israel’s portion of grants for American Schools and Hospitals Abroad (ASHA) and monies buried in the appropriations for other departments or agencies. These are mostly for so-called “U.S.-Israeli cooperative programs” in defense, agriculture, science, and hi-tech industries.
Before 1998, Israel received annually $1.8 billion in military grants and $1.2 billion in economic grants. Then, beginning in FY ‘99, the two countries agreed to reduce economic grants to Israel by $120 million and increase military grants by $60 million annually over 10 years. FY ’08 is the last year of that agreement, with military grants reaching $2.4 billion (reduced by an across-the-board rescission), and zero economic grants. Then, in August 2007, U.S. and Israeli officials signed a memorandum of understanding for a new 10-year, $30 billion aid package whereby FMF will gradually increase, beginning with $2.55 billion in FY ’09, and average $3 billion per year over the 10-year period.
Methodology
TABLE 2: Foreign Aid and DOD Appropriations
Legislation Since FY 2004
Basic Documents Conference Report Public Law
FY ’04 Defense H.R. 2658 H.Rept. 108-283 P.L. 108-87
Omnibus H.R. 2673 H.Rept. 108-401 P.L. 108-199
FY ’05 Defense H.R. 4613 H.Rept. 108-662 P.L. 108-287
Omnibus H.R. 4818 H.Rept. 108-792 P.L. 108-447
FY ’06 Defense H.R. 2863 H.Rept. 109-359 P.L. 109-148
Foreign Aid H.R. 3057 H.Rept. 109-265 P.L. 109-102
FY ’07 Defense H.R. 5631 H.Rept. 109-676 P.L. 109-289
Foreign Aid H.J.Res. 20 P.L. 110-5
FY ’08 Defense H.R. 3222 H.Rept. 110-434 P.L. 110-116
Omnibus H.R. 2764 H.Rept. 110-497 P.L. 110-161
Notes: H.R.=House Resolution; S.=Senate Resolution; H.Rept.=House Report; the “public law” is the final, binding version, as signed by the president. In FY ’04, ’05, and ’08 defense was passed separately and foreign aid was included in the consolidated or “omnibus” bill. In FY ’07 defense was passed separately and foreign aid was included in the continuing resolution, H.J. Res. 20, which continued ’07 appropriations at the ’06 level with some exceptions—including, of course, for Israel.
As with previous Washington Report estimates of U.S. aid to Israel, this analysis is based on the annual CRS report, U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel, which uses available and verifiable numbers, primarily from the foreign operations appropriations bills. Although the CRS report does include such things as the old food for peace program, the $1.2 billion from the Wye agreement, the $1 billion in FMF included in the FY ’03 Emergency Supplemental appropriations bill, the subsidy for “refugee resettlement,” and money from the ASHA account, it does not include money from the DOD and other agencies. Nor does it include estimated interest on the early disbursement of aid.
The January 2008 CRS report on aid to Israel shows a total of $101.1908 billion through FY ’07. Table 1, on the previous page, is drawn from the summary table of that report, plus $2.4238 billion from the FY ’08 omnibus appropriations bill and estimates for ASHA and “other” amounts in FY ’08, for a total of $103.6147 billion through FY ’08.
To that has been added $10.2407 billion, as detailed below, for a grand total of $113.8554 billion.
Estimated Amounts Not Included in Table 1:
$10.2407 Billion
Defense Department Funds: $7.694 Billion. For previous estimates, a search going back several years was able to identify $6.794 billion from the DOD to Israel through FY ‘06. Adding $450 million from the FY ’07 DOD appropriations and $450 million from the ’08 appropriations gives a total of $7.694 billion. (The FY ’08 appropriations bill earmarks $155.6 million for Israel. However, AIPAC’s Web site reported that the total for earmarked and non-earmarked programs was $450 million—and who would know better than the Israel lobby itself?)
The military aid from the DOD budget is mostly for specific projects. The largest items have been the canceled Lavi attack fighter project, the completed Merkava tank, the ongoing Arrow anti-missile missile project, and several other anti-missile systems, most recently the “David’s Sling” short-range missile defense system. Haaretz reported in June that a senior U.S. defense official has said the U.S. will support and help Israel’s development of the advanced Arrow 3 designed to intercept advanced ballistic missiles. The fact that the U.S. military was not interested in the Lavi or the Merkava for its own use and has said the same thing about the Arrow and the other anti-missile projects would seem to jettison the argument that these are “joint defense projects.” The FY ‘01 appropriations bill also gave Israel a grant of $700 million worth of military equipment, to be drawn down from stocks in Western Europe, and the FY ’05 defense appropriations bill includes a provision authorizing the DOD to transfer an unspecified amount of “surplus” military items from inventory to Israel. In addition, since 1988 Israel has been designated a “major non-NATO ally,” giving it access to U.S. weapons systems at lower prices, and preferential treatment in bidding for U.S. defense contracts.
Interest: $2.089 Billion. Israel receives its U.S. economic and military aid in a lump sum within one month of the new fiscal year or the passage of the appropriations act. Applying one-half of the prevailing interest rate to the aid for each year (on the assumption that the aid monies are drawn down over the course of the year), the July 2006 estimate arrived at a total of $1.991 billion through FY ’06. To that, using an interest rate of 4 percent, is added $50 million for FY ’07 and $48 million for FY ’08, for a cumulative total of $2.089 billion through FY ’08.
Other Grants and Endowments: $457.7 Million. The July 2006 report included $456.7 million in U.S. grants and endowments to U.S.-Israeli scientific and business cooperation organizations. The two largest are the BIRD (Israel-U.S. Binational Research & Development) Foundation and the BARD (Binational Agriculture and Research and Development) Fund. While these are mostly self-sustaining, the BARD Fund gets about $500,000 a year from the Agriculture Department. Adding $0.5 million for each of FY ’07 and ‘08 to the ’06 total gives a new total of $0.457.7 billion.
For the convenience of those who wish to look up more details, citations for the foreign aid and DOD appropriations bills for the past five years are given in Table 2 above.
First Article in Booklet: The Cost of Israel to the American Public | Final Article in Booklet: The Costs to American Taxpayers of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: $3 Trillion
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