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The current issue of J., the Jewish news weekly of Northern California, has an illuminating article on the misguided agenda of AIPAC, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. The article describes AIPAC’s “consensus issue” as Iran’s alleged nuclear threat, and states how Dick Cheney and others won applause by linking the Iraq war to combating the “menace that is posed by the Iranian regime.” But AIPAC members appear to have forgotten that the chief enemy of Iran was Saddam Hussein, who the U.S. overthrew to install an pro-Iranian Iraqi government. And Iran’s other chief opponent in the region was the Taliban of Afghanistan, also overthrown by the Bush Administration. With half the US Senate and more than half of the House attending AIPAC’s dinner, you would think that someone would have offered the group a recent history lesson.
While progressives frequently criticize AIPAC, nobody has accused the group of being politically naïve. But that’s the only conclusion that can be reached after many of the group’s members gave huge applause to the Bush Administration warmongers who linked the Iraq war and “surge” to the struggle to contain Iran.
Bush’s role in eliminating Iran’s enemies is undisputed, but the media has failed to connect the Iraq war to White House claims that the Iranian “threat” is escalating. Nor have many politicians. For example, longtime Iraq war backer Hilary Clinton announced last week that American should keep troops permanently in Iraq, precisely because of this alleged threat from Iran.
But the media may finally be catching on. New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof wrote a scathing column on March 20 describing how the Iraq war has empowered Iran. In “Iran’s Operative in the White House,” Kristof wondered if Dick Cheney is “an Iranian mole,” given how much his agenda has helped Iran.
As Kristof puts it in describing the U.S. invasion and the pro-Iranian policies that followed, “If Iran’s ayatollahs had written the script, they couldn’t have done better---so maybe they did write the script…”
Kristof has never been accused of being an Israel-basher. And he does not connect his analysis of how “we fought Iraq and Iran won” to AIPAC’s recent convention.
But what in heavens has happened to Israel’s hawkish wing both at home and in the United States? Has the same intellectual debilitation that has destroyed the conservative movement in America struck hard-line, pro-war Israel backers as well?
The United States failure in Iraq, and Israel’s acknowledged disastrous war in Lebanon, shows that on Middle Eastern strategic issues, neither AIPAC nor Joe Lieberman speak for America or Israel’s best interests.
As Kristof puts it, “our national interests are as vulnerable to incompetence as to malicious damage.” By continuing to endorse the US war in Iraq, and America’s propping up of a pro-Iranian, anti-Israel government, AIPAC has descended to a level of strategic incompetence likely surprising to even its harshest detractors.
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3 comments:
Trust me. They are not that naive. As soon as they nuke Iran to teach the Arabs a "lesson" -- they'll move on to Syria and then Lebanon. The threat of nuclear strikes will keep the rest of the Arab world in line and allow Israel to grab all the land of the defeated.
If things go badly, as long as they keep stoking the fires of sectarian violence, they can keep the Arabs busy fighting each other so they can implement their "Final Solution" of the "Palestinian problem".
A united Arab front is the only real threat to Israel at this point. And if the Arabs ever manage to achieve that, Israel will take out the whole region rather than give in.
Instead of being just a Palestinian holocaust, it will be a nuclear catastrophe in the Mid East. But, the world -- due to its dependence on oil -- would have no choice but to step in on Israel's behalf. Israel knows this. In the foreign policy game of chess -- Israel has always been 3 or 4 steps ahead. It is time to realize that we've lost. Maybe if we hadn't kept electing stupid and immoral leaders, we wouldn't be in this position. At least I'll be able to tell my grandkids what democracy was like, though there is a good chance I'll be telling it in Russian or more likely Chinese.
Nice post. So right. If you run google trends, you can find out who is thinking and who is not. It seems the whole world is in a stupor. Not many people are trying to findout about AIPAC and the nefarious con artists, The Neocons. Sad, sad. America is in a death grip.
Israel might have nuclear weapons, but so does Pakistan. Neither country will risk nuclear warfare, because of the repercussions this will have on global economy. The US economy is already on the brink of death and solely relying on foreign powers who lend dollars. If there would be nuclear war, those foreign powers (China, Europe)could easily destroy the US economy by simply selling their bonds. With absolutely no one to protect and to serve Israel anymore, I very much doubt it will stay on the map for long after a global economy crash. There is no oil under its land, so the strategic value of the land of Israel is low. When the world runs out of oil, there will be nothing to gain in the Middle-East, one more reason to drop Israel like a brick. Already many nations in Europe become more and more critical of Israel's actions. So either way, after a nuclear war or after the oil wells have dried up, I doubt Israel will still exist after whichever comes first...
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