War Without End

Alpha · Last edited by Alpha on Sat May 14, 2005 6:11 pm; edited 2 times in total

From: RePorterNoteBook@aol.com

Date: Mon, 7 Feb 2005 19:18:06 EST
Subject: Ex-Congressman with "Great Balls of Fire"
To:

They Dare To Speak Out
Author: Paul Findley ©1985 Publisher: Lawrence Hill & Co. ISBN No.
0-88208-179-9

Book excerpts from a courageous United States Congressman, Paul
Findley, who
served from 1960-1982:

Page 1 -- Early Naiveté

I had already begun to doubt the wisdom of United States policy in the
Middle
East when I first joined the subcommittee. For the most part, I kept
these
doubts private, but not because I feared the political consequences. In
fact I
naively assumed I could question our policy anywhere without getting
into
trouble. I did not realize how deeply the roots of Israeli interests
had penetrated
U.S. institutions.

Page 17 -- Personal Friend Could Not Ignore the Lobby

No event, before or since, disclosed to me so forcefully the hidden
leverage
of the Israeli lobby on the U.S. political scene. This great, kind,
generous
Jewish elder statesman, a personal friend for twenty years, could not
ignore
the lobby and say a public good word for my candidacy. I report this
episode
because, when a great man like Arthur Burns feels he must keep his
views private,
lesser men and women who would speak out face an enormous challenge.

Page 19 -- Bob Hope Backs Out

The “panic” even spread to Hollywood. Bob Hope, who never wavered
under
enemy fire on war fronts in World War II and Korea and withstood heavy
criticism
for his support of President Nixon’s Vietnam policies, encountered a
new and
more devastating line of fire when he agreed to appear at a
fund-raising event
for me in Springfield. ...

... Coast-to-coast pressure quickly brought a change. Don Norton
recalls an
urgent telephone message he received from Hope’s manager:

Grant told me that Hope was getting tremendous pressure from Jews and
non-Jews all over the country. He said it’s gone to the point where
Hope’s lawyer of
35 years, who is Jewish, has threatened to quit. The pressure was
beyond
belief, like nothing they had ever experienced before, and Bob Hope
just couldn’t
come.

Page 20 -- Lobby Pressures Gerald Ford

Lobby pressure also intruded when former President Gerald R. Ford
agreed to
appear in my behalf, this time in Alton, Illinois.

The first sign of trouble was a call From Palm Springs in which
Ford’s
secretary reported that the former president had to cancel his date
because his
staff had mistakenly booked him to speak at a meeting of the Michigan
Bar
Association the same day. There was no other time that Ford could help
me, the caller
said, before election day. To determine if some accommodation was
possible, my
assistant, Bob Wichser, called the Michigan Bar Association, only to
learn
there was no conflict — no event was scheduled.

Page 21 -- Emotion Drives Israel’s American Supporters

When election time came around again two years later, I was unopposed
in the
primary, but a strong Democratic opponent, Richard Durbin, emerged in
the
general election. More experienced and popular, he quickly picked up
the resources
Robinson had amassed, including Robinson’s list of nationwide
contributors.
The Associated Press reported that: “Israel’s American supporters
again are
pouring money into an emotional drive to unseat Central Illinois
Representative
Paul Findley.

Page 22 -- Puzzlement At Attitude of Pro-Israel Activists

After my twenty-two years in Congress, losing was, of course, a
disappointment. But my main reaction was wonderment. I was puzzled by
the behavior of the
Pro-Israel activists. Why did they go to such trouble to eliminate me
from
Congress? Why did people from all over the country who did not know me
personally
and very likely knew little of my record dig so deeply in their own
pockets —
many of them contributing $1,000 to my opponents? What sustained this
commitment for a four-year period?

Page 23 -- Make an Example

... Surely they realized that I posed no serious threat. Could
Israel’s
supporters not tolerate even one lonely voice of dissent?

Or was the lobby’s purpose to make an example of me in the
Elizabethan
manner? (According to legend, Queen Elizabeth occasionally hanged an
admiral, just
as an example to the others.) Was I chosen for a trip to the political
gallows
to discourage other Congressmen from speaking out?

Page 25 -- AIPAC the Preeminent Power in Washington Lobbying

Washington is a city of acronyms, and today one of the best-known in
Congress
is AIPAC. The mere mention of it brings a sober, if not furtive look,
to the
face of anyone on Capitol Hill who deals with Middle East policy. AIPAC
— the
American Israel Public Affairs Committee — is now the preeminent
power in
Washington lobbying.

Pages 25, 26 -- AIPAC Means Power

Almost without exception, House and Senate members do its bidding,
because
most of them consider AIPAC to be the direct Capitol Hill
representative of a
political force that can make or break their chances at election time.

Whether based on fact or fancy, the perception is what counts: AIPAC
mean
power — raw, intimidating power. Its promotional literature regularly
cites a
tribute published in the New York Times: “The most powerful, best-run
and
effective foreign policy interest group in Washington.” A former
Congressman, Paul N.
“Pete” McCloskey puts it more directly: Congress is
“terrorized” by AIPAC.
Other Congressmen have not been so candid on the public record, but
many House
and Senate members privately agree.

Page 26, 27 -- Lobby Group ‘Extension of Israeli Government’

In practice, the lobby groups function as an informal extension of the
Israeli government. This was illustrated when AIPAC helped draft the
official
statement defending Israel’s 1981 bombing of the Iraqi nuclear
reactor, then issued
it the same hour as Israel’s embassy.

No major Jewish organization ever publicly takes issue with positions
and
policies adopted by Israel. Thomas A. Dine, executive director of
AIPAC, spoke
warmly of President Reagan’s peace plan when it was announced in
September 1982,
but as soon as Israel rejected the plan, Dine fell silent.

Page 27 -- Even the President Turns to AIPAC

Over the years the pro-Israel lobby has thoroughly penetrated this
nation’s
governmental system, and the organization that has made the deepest
impact is
AIPAC, to whom even the president of the United States turns when he
has a
vexing political problem related to the Arab-Israeli dispute.

Page 35 -- AIPAC Publishes ‘Enemies List’

AIPAC’s outreach program is buttressed by a steady stream of
publications. In
addition to “Action Alerts” and the weekly Near East Report, it
issues
position papers and monographs designed to answer, or often discredit,
critics, and
advance Israel’s objectives.

The most controversial publication of all is an “enemies list”
issued as a
“first edition” in the spring of 1983. A handsomely printed
154-page paperback
entitled The Campaign to Discredit Israel, it provides a “directory
of the
actors”: 21 organizations and 39 individuals AIPAC identified as
inimical to
Israeli interests.

Included are such distinguished public servants as former
Undersecretary of
State George W. Ball, retired ambassadors Talcott Seelye, Andrew
Kilgore, John
C. West and James Atkins, and former Senator James Abourezk. There are
also
five Jewish dissenters and several scholars on the list.

Seemingly unaware of the AIPAC project, the Anti-Defamation League of
B’nai
B’rith almost simultaneously issued its own “enemies list”:
Pro-Arab
Propaganda in America: Vehicles and Voices. It too is identified as a
“first edition,”
and lists 31 organizations and 34 individuals. These books are nothing
more
than blacklists, reminiscent of the worst tactics of the McCarthy era.

A similar “enemies list” is employed in AIPAC’s extensive program
at
colleges and universities.

Page 36 -- Effectiveness of AIPAC

Paul Weyrich, who worked as a Senate aide before becoming a political
analyst, details the effectiveness of AIPAC:

It’s a remarkable system they have. If you vote with them, or make a
public
statement they like, they get the word out fast through their own
publications
and through editors around the country who are sympathetic to their
cause.

Of course it works in reverse as well. if you say something they
don’t like,
you can be denounced or censured through the same network. That kind of
pressure is bound to affect Senators’ thinking, especially if they
are wavering or
need support.

Page 37 -- ‘Our Access is Amazing’

... Encountered in a Capitol corridor one day, an AIPAC lobbyist said,
“Tomorrow I will try to see five members of the House. I called this
morning and
confirmed every appointment, and I have no doubt I will get in
promptly.” Two
days later, even he seemed somewhat awed by AIPAC’s clout. He
reported, “I made
all five. I went right in to see each of them. There was no waiting.
Our
access is amazing.”

Page 43 -- NatPAC

The largest pro-Israel PAC is the national Political Action Committee
(NatPAC), headquartered in New York with Marvin Josephson, head of a
theatrical and
literary talent agency, as chairman. Its Washington-based executive
director is
Richard Altman, who previously worked as political director of AIPAC.
It
draws money heavily from the entertainment industry and got off to a
fast start in
1982 when Woody Allen signed its first nationwide fund-raising appeal.
The
National Journal rates it as the nation’s largest non-labor,
non-business
political action committee.

Page 49 AIPAC Relentless

An Ohio Congressman speaks of AIPAC with both awe and concern:

AIPAC is the most influential lobby on Capitol Hill. They are
relentless.
They know what they’re doing. They have the people for financial
resources.
They’ve got a lot going for them. Their basic underlying cause is one
that most
Americans sympathize with.

But what distresses me is the inability of American policy-makers,
because of
the influence of AIPAC, to distinguish between our national interest
and
Israel’s national interest. When these converge — wonderful! But
they don’t
always converge.

Page 54 -- B’nai B’rith Published Report ‘A Complete
Fabrication’

An article in the B’nai B’rith Messenger charged that McCloskey had
proposed
that all rabbis be required to register as foreign agents, declaring
that he
had made the proposal in a meeting with the editors of the Los Angeles
Times.
The author assured his readers that the tidbit came from a “very
reliable
source,” and the charge was published nationally. The charge was a
complete
fabrication, and the Times editor Tony Day was quick to back up
McCloskey’s denial.

The Messenger published a retraction a month later, but the accusation
lingered on. Even the Washington office of the Israeli lobby did not
get the
retraction message. In an interview about McCloskey two years later,
Douglas
Bloomfield, legislative director for AIPAC, apparently unaware of the
retraction,
repeated the accusation as fact.

Page 57 -- McCloskey Hounded Through ‘Tracking System’

A tracking system initiated by the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai
B’rith
assured that McCloskey would have no peace, even as a private citizen.
the group
distributed a memorandum containing details of his actions and speeches
to
its chapters around the country. According to the memo, it was designed
to
“assist” local ADL groups with “counteraction guidance”
whenever McCloskey
appeared in public.

Page 70, 71 Congressmen’s Reaction to Israeli Pressure Groups

A veteran Ohio Congressman observes:

When [Stephen] Solarz and others press for more money for Israel,
nobody
wants to say “No.” You don’t need many examples of intimidation
for politicians
to realize what the potential is. The Jewish lobby is terrific.
Anything it
wants, it gets. Jews are educated, often have a lot of money, and vote
on the
basis of a single issue — Israel. They are unique in that respect.
For example,
anti-abortion supporters are numerous but not that well educated, and
don’t
have that much money. The Jewish lobbyists have it all, and they are
political
activists on top of it.

This Congressman divides his colleagues into four groups:

For the first group, it’s rah, rah, give Israel anything it wants.
The second
group includes those with some misgivings, but they don’t dare step
out of
line; they don’t say anything. In the third group are Congressmen who
have deep
misgivings but who won’t do more than try quietly to slow down the
aid to
Israel. Lee Hamilton is an example. The fourth groups consists of those
who openly
question U.S. policy in the Middle East and challenge what Israel is
doing.
Since Findley and McCloskey left, this group really doesn’t exist
anymore.

He puts himself in the third group: “I may vote against the bill
authorizing
foreign aid this year for the first time. If I do, I will not state my
reason.” Solarz has never wavered in his commitment to Israel.

Page 77 -- Many Jews Mistake Criticism of Israel for Anti-Semitism

“What is tragic is that so many Jewish people misconstrue criticism
of Israel
as anti-Jewish or anti-Semitic.” He speaks admiringly of the open
criticism
of Israeli policy that often occurs within Israel itself: “It is
easier to
criticize Israel in the Knesset [the Israeli parliament] than it is in
the U.S.
Congress, here in this land of free speech.”

Pages 78, 79 -- AIPAC Caught Napping -- Fail To Detect Rebellion in
Congress

For once, both the House Democratic leadership and AIPAC were caught
napping.
Usually in complete control of all legislative activities which relate
to
Israel, AIPAC failed to detect the brewing rebellion. Concern over the
budget
deficit and controversial provisions in the bill for Central America
led these
freshman democrats to oppose their own leadership. unable to offer
amendments,
they quietly agreed among themselves to oppose the whole package.

When the roll was called the big electric board over the Speaker’s
desk
showed defeat — the resolution was rejected, 206 to 203. Twenty-four
first-term
Democrats had deserted the leadership and voted no. Voting no did not
mean they
opposed Israeli aid. Some of them, concerned over the federal deficit,
viewed
it as a demand to the leadership to schedule a bill raising taxes. For
others,
it was simply a protest. But for Israel it was serious.

“The Jewish community went crazy,” a Capitol Hill veteran recalls.
AIPAC’s
professionals went to work. Placing calls from their offices just four
blocks
away, they activated key people in the districts of a selected list of
the
errant freshmen. They arranged for “quality calls” to individuals
who had played
a major role in the recent Congressional election. Each was to place an
urgent
call to his or her Congressman, insist on getting through personally
and use
this message:

Approval of the continuing resolution is very important. Without it,
Israel
will suffer. I am not criticizing your vote against it the first time.
I am su
re you had reasons. However, I have learned that the same question will
come up
for vote again, probably tomorrow. I speak for many of your friends and
supporters in asking that you change your vote when the question comes
up again.

... The urgent telephone messages from home carried the day. When the
roll
was called, 14 of the freshmen — a bit sheepishly — changed their
votes.

... To give the freshmen an excuse they could use in explaining their
embarrassing shift, the leadership promised to bring up a tax bill.
Everyone knew it
was just a ploy: the tax bill had no chance to become law. But the
excuse was
helpful, and the resolution was approved, 224 to 189. the flow of aid
to
Israel continued without interruption.

Page 95 -- ‘Israel Controls the Senate’: Fullbright

Appearing on CBS television’s “Face the Nation” in 1973, [Senator
William
J.] Fullbright declared that the Senate was “subservient to Israeli
policies
which were inimical to American interests. He said the United States
bears “a
very great share of the responsibility” for the continuation of
Middle East
violence. “It’s quite obvious [that] without the all-out support by
the United
States in money and weapons and so on, the Israeli couldn’t do what
they’ve been
doing.”

Fullbright said the United States failed to pressure Israel for a
negotiated
settlement because

The great majority of the Senate of the United States — somewhere
around 80
percent — are completely in support of Israel, anything Israel wants.
This has
been demonstrated time and time again, and this has made it difficult
for our
government.

The Senator claimed that “Israel controls the Senate,” and warned,
“We
should be more concerned about the United States’ interests.”

Page 101 -- President Ford backs Down Under Pressure

... It was a historic proposal, the first time since Eisenhower that a
United
States president even hinted publicly that he might suspend aid to
Israel.

Israel’s response came, not from its own capital, but from the United
States
Senate. Instead of relying on a direct protest to the White House,
Jerusalem
activated its lobby in the United States, which, in turn, signed up as
supporters of Israel’s position more than three-fourths of the
members of the United
States Senate.

A more devastating — and intimidating — response could scarcely be
conceived. The seventy-six signatures effectively told Ford he could
not carry out his
threatened “reappraisal.” Israel’s loyalists in the Senate —
Democrats and
republicans alike — were sufficient in number to reject any
legislative
proposal hostile to Israel that Ford might make, and perhaps even enact
a pro-Israeli
piece of legislation over a presidential veto.

The letter was a demonstration of impressive clout. Crafted and
circulated by
AIPAC, it had been endorsed overnight by a majority of the Senate
membership.
Several Senators who at first had said “No” quickly changed their
positions.
Senator John Culver admitted candidly, “The pressure was too great. I
caved.” So did President Ford. He backed down and never again
challenged the lobby.

Page 102 -- TV’s ‘Holocaust’ Series ‘Simplifies Lobbying’

The Israeli lobby pulled out all the stops. It coordinated a nationwide
public relations campaign which revived, as never before, memories of
the genocidal
Nazi campaign against European Jews during World War II. In the wake of
the
highly publicized television series, “Holocaust,” Capitol Hill was
flooded
with complimentary copies of the novel on which the TV series was
based. The
books were accompanied by a letter from AIPAC saying, “This chilling
account of
the extermination of six million Jews underscores Israel’s concerns
during the
current negotiations for security without reliance on outside
guarantees.”
Concerning the book distribution, AIPAC’s Aaron Rosenbaum told the
Washington
Post: “We think, frankly, that it will affect a few votes here and
there, and
simplify lobbying.”

Page 102, 103 -- AIPAC ‘Demands 100 Percent’ Loyalty

[William] Hathaway was one of the forty-four who stuck with AIPAC, but
this
was not sufficient when election time rolled around. AIPAC wanted a
Senator
whose signature — and vote — it could always count on. Searching
for unswerving
loyalty, the lobby switched to Cohen. Its decision came at the very
time
Hathaway was resisting pressures on the Saudi issue. The staff at the
Democratic
Senatorial Campaign Committee was outraged. One of them declared to a
visitor:
“AIPAC demands 100 percent. If a fine Senator like Hathaway fails to
cooperate
just once, they are ready to trade in his career.” A staff member of
a Senate
committee declared: “To please AIPAC, you have to be more pure than
Ivory soap
— 99.44 percent purity is not good enough.” Lacking the purity
AIPAC
demanded, Hathaway was defeated in 1978.

Page 106 -- Israeli Lobby Exerts ‘More Constant Pressure’

[Charles] Mathias cited the Israeli lobby as the most powerful ethnic
pressuer group, noting that it differs from others in that it focuses
on vital
national security interests and exerts “more constant pressure.”
Other lobbying
groups “show up in a crisis and then disappear” and tend to deal
with domestic
matters. Mathias continued:

With the exception of the Eisenhower administration, which virtually
compelled Israel’s withdrawal from the Sinai after the 1956 war,
American presidents,
and to an even greater degree Senators and representatives, have been
subjected to recurrent pressures from what has come to be known as the
Israel lobby.

Page 114 -- JFK ‘Insulted’ by Jewish Offer

The night before, Kennedy had gone to dinner with a small group of
wealthy
and prominent Jews in New York. An episode of the evening had troubled
him
deeply. Describing it to Bartlett as an “amazing experience,” he
said one of those
at the dinner party — he did not identify him by name — told him he
knew his
campaign was in financial difficulty and, speaking for the group,
offered “to
help and help significantly” if Kennedy as president “would allow
them to
set the course of Middle East policy over the next four years.” It
was an
astounding proposition.

Kennedy told Bartlett he reacted less as a presidential candidate than
as a
citizen. “He said he felt insulted,” Bartlett recalls, “that
anybody would
make that offer, particularly to a man who even had a slim chance to be
president. ...”

Page 119 -- No Protestant Support ‘All We Get Is A Battering From the
Jews’

A determined president [Eisenhower] took his case to the American
people in a
televised address in the spring of 1957:

Should a nation which attacks and occupies foreign territory in the
face of
the United Nations disapproval be allowed to impose conditions on its
own
withdrawal? If we agreed that armed attack can properly achieve the
purposes of the
assailant, then I fear we will have turned back the clock of
international
order.

Letters and telegrams poured into the White House, but almost all of
the
communications came from Jews, 90 percent supporting Israel’s
position. Dulles
complained, “It is impossible to hold the line because we get no
support from the
Protestant elements in the country. All we get is a battering from the
Jews.”

Page 127 -- Power From Willingness to Make Use of Charge of
Anti-Semitism

[George W.] Ball believes the lobby’s instrument of greatest power is
its
willingness to make broad use of the charge of anti-Semitism.
“They’ve got one
great thing going for them. Most people are terribly concerned not to
be
accused of being anti-Semitic, and the lobby so often equates criticism
of Israel
with anti-Semitism. They keep pounding away at that theme, and people
are
deterred from speaking out.”

In Ball’s view, many Americans feel a “sense of guilt” over the
extermination of Jews by Nazi Germany. The result of this guilt is that
the fear of being
called anti-Semitic is “much more effective in silencing candidates
and public
officials than threats about campaign money or votes.”

Page 180-- Making It ‘Hot Enough’ on Campus

In 1979 AIPAC established its Political Leadership Development Program,
which
trains student activists on how to increase pro-Israeli influence on
campus.
Coordinator Jonathan Kessler recently reported that in just four years
“AIPAC’s program has affiliated over 5,000 students on 350 campuses
in all 50 states.

They are systematically monitoring and comprehensively responding to
anti-Israeli groups on campus. They are involved in pro-Israel
legislative efforts, in
electoral campaign politics as well.

Page 239 -- Christian Affinity to Israel

Virtually all Christians approach the Middle East with at least a
subtle
affinity to Israel and an inclination to oppose or mistrust any
suggestion that
questions Israeli policy. The lobby has drawn widely upon this support
in
pressing its national programs. More important, fresh perspectives
which challenge
shibboleths and established prejudices regarding the Middle East are
often
denounced by both the lobby and many of its Christian allies as
politically
extremist, anti-Semitic or even anti-Christian.

The religious convictions of many Americans have made them susceptible
to the
appeals of the Israeli lobby, with the result that free speech
concerning the
Middle East and U.S. policy in the region is frequently restricted
before it
begins. The combination of religious tradition and overt lobby activity
tends
to confine legitimate discussion within artificially narrow bounds.

Page 239 -- Conservative Christians Rally to the Cause

Fundamentalist and evangelical groups have been active in this campaign
to
narrow the bounds of free speech. Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson
proselytize
tirelessly for ever-increasing U.S. backing of Israel, citing
scriptural
passages as the basis for their arguments. As the membership of
conservative
Protestant churches and organizations has expanded over the last
decade, this
“Christian Zionist” approach to the Middle East has been espoused
from an increasing
variety of “pulpits”: local churches, the broadcast media and even
the halls
of Congress.

Page 240 -- Jerry Falwell Embodies Christian-Zionist Connection

Jerry Falwell, leader of the Moral majority, and a personal friend of
Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, has been described by The Economist
of London as
“the silk-voiced ayatollah of Christian revivalism.” Acclaimed in a
Conservative Digest annual poll as the most-admired conservative
outside of Congress
(with President Reagan the runner-up). Falwell embodies the growing
Christian-Zionist connection. He has declared: “I don’t think
America could turn its back
on the people of Israel and survive. God deals with nations in relation
to how
those nations deal with the Jew.” He has testified before
Congressional
committees in favor of moving the U.S. embassy from Tel Aviv to
Jerusalem. Falwell
is perhaps the best known of the pro-Israel fundamentalist spokesmen,
but he is
by no means the only one.

Page 241 -- Televangelists Proclaim ‘Sanctity of Israel’

Radio and television broadcasts by Jim Bakker, Kenneth Copeland,
Roberts,
Swaggart and others routinely proclaim the sanctity of Israel through
scriptural
quotations, usually from the Old Testament, and then reinforce it with
political and strategic arguments supplied by the broadcaster.

Page 263 -- Catholic Nun Smeared by Jewish Publication

Sister Miriam Ward, a professor of humanities at Trinity College in
Vermont
and a Catholic nun, has a long record of humanitarian concern for
Palestinian
refugees. By her own description, her role in LaGrange II wasmodest.
“I had
doubts about whether i could justify the expense of going,” she
recently
recalled. Sister Miriam moderated a panel discussion and received an
award for her
humanitarian endeavors. Like Mr. Wagner, she knew from experience the
price of
speaking out on Palestinian questions. Her activities had also
attracted hate
mail and personal innuendoes. Still, she was not prepared for the smear
which
resulted from her participation at LaGrange.

Sister Miriam was singled out for a personal attack in The Jewish
Week-American Examiner, a prominent New York City Jewish publication.
The June 21, 1981,
issue gave prominent coverage to a scheme to disrupt Israeli policy on
the
occupied West Bank which Sister Miriam had supposedly advanced at the
conference.
The article claimed that she had urged that “churches finance a
project with
staff in the U.S. and fieldworkers in Israel and the West Bank for the
purpose
of ‘spying on the Israelis.’ ” She was reported saying, “By the
time the
Israelis caught on to what was going on and expelled a fieldworker,
they
[presumably Sister Miriam and her co-conspirators] would have a
replacement ready.”
The Jewish Week article added that “the proposal was accepted without
dissent,
and ways of obtaining church funds for it were discussed.”

The report was a complete fabrication. No one at the LaGrange
Conference had
suggested such a plan, least of all Sister Miriam, and she was stunned
when
Wagner telephoned from Chicago informing her of the printed
allegations.

Page 265 -- American Jews Made to Feel Guilty

In its efforts to quell criticism of Israel, the pro-Israel
community’s first
goal is to still Jewish critics. In this quest it receives strong
support
from the Israeli government.
Every government of Israel gives high priority to maintaining unity
among
U.S. Jews. This unity is regarded as a main line of Israel’s defense
— second in
importance only to the Israeli army — and essential to retaining the
support
Israel must have from the United States government.

American Jews are made to feel guilty about enjoying safety and the
good life
in the United States while their fellow Jews in Israel hold the
ramparts, pay
high taxes, and fight wars.

Page 269 -- Noam Chomsky One of Few Able to Criticize Israel

In my 22 years in Congress, I can recall no entry in Congressional
Record
disclosing a speech critical of Israeli policy by a Jewish member of
the House or
Senate. Jewish members may voice discontent in private conversation but
never
on the public record. Only a few Jewish academicians, like Noam
Chomsky, a
distinguished linguist, have spoken out. Most, like Chomsky, are
protected in
their careers by tenure and thus are able to become controversial
without
jeopardizing their positions.

Page 284 -- ‘One Word of Sympathy’ Can Bring Jewish Hate Mail

Those who speak up pay a price, says Stone, noting that journalists
with long
records of championing Israeli causes are flooded with “Jewish hate
mail,
accusing them of anti-Semitism” if they dare express “one word of
sympathy for
Palestinian Arab refugees.”

Page 287 -- Lobby Tentacles Reach Even to ‘Main Street’

Efforts by the pro-Israel lobby to influence American opinion and
policy most
often focus on national institutions, particularly the federal
government.
yet the lobby in its various forms branches out widely into American
life beyond
the seat of government on the Potomac River. Local political leaders,
businesses, organizations and private individuals in many fields
experience unfair
criticism and intimidation for becoming involved in the debate over
Middle East
issues. Many on “Main Street” have pad a price for speaking out.
Particularly
distressing are instances of discrimination against Americans of Arab
ancestry.

Page 295, 296 -- Possible Accusation of Anti-Semitism Keeps Journalists
in
Line

The Israeli lobby works diligently to keep journalists from rowing
against
the tide of pro-Israel orthodoxy. This mission is accomplished in part
through
carefully arranged, “spontaneous” public outcries designed to
intimidate.
Columnist Rowland Evans writes: “When we write what is perceived to
be an
anti-Israeli column, we get mail from all over the country with the
same points and
phrasing. there is a consistent pattern.”

The ubiquitous cry of “anti-Semitism” is brought to bear on short
notice,
and it is this charge which has been most responsible for compelling
journalists
to give Israel better than equal treatment in coverage of Middle East
events.

Page 296 -- American Media ‘Overwhelmed’ by Lobby Pressure

Journalist Harold R. Piety observes that “the ugly cry of
anti-Semitism is
the bludgeon used by the Zionists to bully non-Jews into accepting the
Zionist
view of world events, or to keep silent.” In late 1978, Piety,
withholding his
identity in order not to irritate his employer, wrote an article on
“Zionism
and the American Press” for Middle East International in which he
decried “the
inaccuracies , distortions and — perhaps worst— inexcusable
omission of
significant news and background material by the American media in its
treatment of
the Arab-Israeli conflict.”

Piety traces the deficiency of U.S. media in reporting on the Middle
East to
largely successful efforts by the pro-Israel lobby to “overwhelm the
American
media with a highly professional public relations campaign, to
intimidate the
media through various means and, finally, to impose censorship when the
media
are compliant and craven.” He lists threats to editors and
advertising
departments, orchestrated boycotts, sanders, campaigns of character
assassination,
and personal vendettas among the weapons employed against balanced
journalism.

Page 301 -- Radio Producer ‘Terminated’ For Trying to Balance
Coverage

On a Saturday morning in 1977 producer Debbie Gage encountered peril of
a
different sort when she put on a one-hour program of interviews with
local people
of Palestinian origin on Minneapolis Public Radio. The station’s
switchboard
was promptly swamped with calls demanding equal time for the Israeli
viewpoint. Gage demurred, responding that she had decided to do her
program because of
the heavy coverage being given to the Israeli view in the local press.
She saw
her broadcast as “simply a small attempt to redress that
imbalance.”

The following Monday news director Gary Eichten informed Gage that her
job
would be terminated in three weeks and that a program devoted to
pro-Israelt
views would be aired the following Saturday. Eichten denied that he was
pressured
into doing the follow-up program, but, as station intern Yvonne Pearson
observes, “If dozens of angry phone calls aren’t pressure, I
don’t know what is.”

Page 303 -- ‘Army of Workers’ Swamp Congressmen, Editors

Major national media have not escaped these pressures. Organized letter
campaigns are a favored tactic of pro-Israel groups. Lawrence Mosher, a
staff
correspondent for the National Journal, observes that such groups have
a seemingly
indefatigable army of workers who will generate hundreds or thousands
of
letters to Congressmen, to newspaper editors, etc., whenever the
occasion seems to
warrant it.

. . . Editors are sometimes weighed down by it in advance and inhibited
from
doing things they would normally do if they didn’t know that an
onslaught of
letters, cables and telephone calls would follow if they write or show
such and
such.

Page 311, 312 -- Holocaust Museum Director Berenbaum (Former Lobbyist)
in the
Newsroom

Fairness in reporting Middle East events has been a special concern of
the
Washington Post over the last several years. Complaints from pro-Israel
groups
about its coverage of Lebanon — especially the nassacres at Sabra and
Shatila
— led to the unprecedented placement of a representative from a
pro-Israel
group as an observer in the Post newsroom.

The idea arose when Michael Berenbaum, executive director of the Jewish
Community Council of Greater Washington, council president Nathan
Lewin, and Hyman
Bookbinder, area representative of the American Jewish Committee, met
with
Post editors to inform them that the paper had “a Jewish problem.”
The meeting
followed substantial correspondence between the Washington Post and
Jewish
community leaders. As an accommodation, executive editor Benjamin C.
Bradlee
agreed to have Berenbaum observe Post news operations for one week,
provided he not
lobby or “interfere with the editorial process in any way.”

Page 313 -- Pressure to ‘Stop the Ads’

Direct pressure to reject paid advertising unsympathetic to Israeli
interests
was applied beginning in late 1982 against major media in Maryland,
Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia. The National Association of
Arab Americans
(NAAA), a Washington-based private membership organization, purchased
radio air
time in these areas for commercials questioning the U.S. government’s
decision to increase aid to Israel.

Typical of the messages was this one aired in Pennsylvania:

While there are more than 12 million Americans unemployed, with over
half a
million from Pennsylvania alone, Congress decided to give Israel two
billion,
485 million of your tax dollars. Senator Arlen Specter [D-PA] is on the
Senate
Appropriations Committee that wanted to give Israel even more. Is
funding for
Israel more important than funding for Pennsylvania? Call your senators
and
ask them if they voted to give your tax dollars to Israel.”

Thirteen Pennsylvania stations contracted to carry the NAAA message,
but four
of these canceled the ads after only three days of an agreed-upon
five-day
run. Mike Kirtner, an ad salesman representing two stations in
Allentown,
informed the NAAA that its ads were being taken off the air because
“they were
getting a lot of calls, hate calls. and a lot of pressure was coming
down on the
station to stop the ads.” Station management refused to comment on
who was
pressuring the station to take the ads off the air.

Mike George, salesman for an Erie station which canceled the ads, was
more
frank. He informed the NAAA that the station owner had been called by
“a group
of Jewish businessmen who told him that if he did not cancel the ads
immediately, they were going to cause his radio and television stations
to lose hundreds
of thousands of dollars.”

+++++++

"Deep down, I believe that a little anti-Semitism is a good thing for
the
Jews - reminds us who we are." --Jay Lefkowitz (NYT Magazine. Feb.12,
1995. Page
65). Jay Lefkowitz is now Deputy Assistant to the President for
Domestic
Policy. A sick man! Don't you think?

+++++++

Peace is patriotic!
Michael Santomauro
Editorial Director
253 West 72nd street #1711
New York, NY 10023
http://www.RePortersNoteBook.com
Available for Talk-Radio interviews 24hours 212-787-7891
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The QUESTION:
To subscribe and grow with knowledge or
to unsubscribe and Die Stupid?
Send an E-mail to:
RePorterNoteBook@aol.com

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Paul Findley on Video

http://www.HonestMediaToday.com/Findley-wmv-large.wmv

Alpha

How Pro-Israel Lobby Corrupts US Government and Media

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/middle-east-and-asia/2002/06/01/how-israel-corrupts-and-controls-the-us-congress-and-media.php

Alpha

Still think AIPAC doesn't dominate the US political system and media, what happened to the AIPAC/Neocon espionage scandal at the Pentagon - IT WAS BURIED!!!!:

Treason in High Places: Pentagon Neocons, AIPAC and Israel

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2004/09/08/treason-in-high-places-pentagon-zionists-aipac-and-israel.php

Alpha · Last edited by Alpha on Wed Feb 09, 2005 8:54 am; edited 1 time in total

Alpha

The following article appears in the latest (December, 2004) issue of the Washington Report on Middle East Affairs magazine (www.wrmea.com ):

http://www.acjna.org/article_view.asp?article_id=336

AIPAC Comes Under Scrutiny as FBI Intensifies Israeli Espionage Probe
Allan C. Brownfeld, Editor

Special Interest Report
September - October 2004

It has been widely reported that the FBI is investigating the possibility that Lawrence Franklin, a Pentagon analyst , passed classified material to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), who then handed the information over to the Israeli Embassy in Washington.

The Economist (Sept, 4, 2004) reports that, “The unfolding saga surrounding Lawrence Franklin is ... that he gave classified, documents on Iran to Israel. But there is growing speculation that the FBI investigation of Mr. Franklin is the tip of an iceberg. The reported anger of federal agents at the leaking of the story indicates a bigger probe that may have been under way for at least a year. ... Mr. Franklin allegedly passed draft documents on American policy towards Iran to AIPAC, a hugely influential lobbying group in Washington, which in turn allegedly passed them to Israeli officials. Both AIPAC and Israel have denied any wrongdoing. The Israelis maintain that they have been ultra-careful since the huge embarrassment in 1985 when Jonathan Pollard, an American intelligence analyst, was caught spying for Israel. ... The scandal is difficult for Israel, which wields considerable influence on American foreign policy ... It is hard to put a positive spin on a spy in the Pentagon, even if he is talking to your friends.”

Writing in The American Conservative (Oct. 11, 2004), Philip Giraldi, a former CIA officer, notes that, “The Franklin case stems from investigations of Israeli diplomats that developed from the prosecution of spy Jonathan Pollard. Pollard’s conviction in 1987 provided little in the way of a resolution; the Israeli government never cooperated in the inquiry and did not provide an inventory of the documents that Pollard had stolen. The FBI also knew that a second spy, believed to be in the Pentagon, passed Pollard classified file numbers that were desired by the Israelis. Hoping to catch the second spy, the FBI continued its probe. Two years ago, the investigators began to suspect that highly sensitive National Security Agency documents were winding up in Israeli hands, possibly with the connivance of AIPAC. In the judgment of counterintelligence specialists, the Israelis did not wish a repeat of the Pollard case, so they decided against recruiting another U.S. official and turning him into a salaried spy. Instead, they opted to establish relationships with friends in the government who would voluntarily provide information. ... AIPAC would have served as a useful intermediary or ‘cut out’ in such an arrangement, limiting the contact between the American government official and the Israeli embassy.”

The entire affair, writes Ori Nir in The Forward (Sept. 3, 2004) “has cast light on the fine line that AIPAC walks between advocating a strong American-Israeli alliance and acting as the representative of a foreign government . Both activities are legal , but serving a foreign government requires registration with the Department of Justice and entails severe legal restrictions, not applied to pro-Israel groups, including AIPAC. AIPAC’s defenders ... insist that no evidence has emerged suggesting that AIPAC either violated American espionage laws or even crossed the line requiring it to register as a representative of a foreign agent. AIPAC enjoys the support, admiration and even awe of Jewish organizational officials, many of whom raced to AIPAC’s defense. Still, some pro-Israel activists in Washington are privately suggesting that the current scandal provides AIPAC with a chance, in the words of one communal official, for ‘some soul-searching and reappraisal’ regarding its general modes of operation.”

According to Nir, “some critics in the Jewish community say that AIPAC’s leadership is too closely identified with Israel’s ruling Likud Party ... Critics also have accused AIPAC of adopting an agenda that too closely mirrors the hawkish agenda of neo-conservatives in the Bush administration, thereby fueling conspiratorial notions that President Bush was duped into invading Iraq in order to advance Israeli interests. Now, critics say, with its increasing focus on Iran, AIPAC risks fueling the claims of those who would accuse the Jewish community of working with Washington neoconservatives to convince the White House to pursue regime change in Tehran.” Several Jewish communal leaders complain that AIPAC officials have not done enough to maintain a clear wall between the lobbying group and Israel. AIPAC officials have left the organization to serve in the Israeli government. Lenny Ben-David, formerly known as Leonard Davis, for example, worked at AIPAC for 25 years — first in Washington, then in Jerusalem — before he was tapped by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in 1998 to be the deputy chief of mission in Israel’s Washington embassy.

Many Jewish leaders have risen to AIPAC’s support. Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League, says: “The leaks are more serious than the charges because once you look at the charges, they don’t amount to anything. When things quiet down, we would be calling for hearings and investigations into the leaks.”

AIPAC and some of its supporters have suggested that the FBI and the CIA are pursuing a vendetta against Israel, the Pentagon, neoconservatives, and possibly Jews in general. The neoconservatives have lashed out in a memo drafted by Michael Rubin, of the American Enterprise Institute, alleging that the probe is motivated by anti-Semitism.

The Forward (Sept. 10, 2004) reports that, “Several Jewish activists, speaking on conditions of anonymity, cautioned against what they described as a defiant reaction on the part of some communal leaders who raised the specter of anti-Semitic conspiracy. ‘If every single time we get into trouble we cry anti-Semitism, no one is going to believe us when we confront the real problem of anti-Semitism,’ a senior official of a Jewish organization said. Another organizational official said: ‘It’s ridiculous to react like that before you know what happened there. In the absence of accurate knowledge, any comment is just silly.’”

The fallout for AIPAC, writes Doug Bloomfield in Washington Jewish Week (Sept. 9, 2004) could be serious: “There have been persistent charges ... that AIPAC directs the network of pro-Israel political action committees (PAC), campaign finance bundlers and individual contributors. AIPAC has successfully fought such accusations all the way to the Supreme Court to avoid being designated a PAC because of the impact that would have on the way it operates and raises money. The current probe could renew calls from the organization’s critics for new investigations by the Federal Elections Commission (FEC) and demands to know what has been uncovered by the FBI. ... There will be questions about AIPAC’s operations and internal accountability. A penchant for hubris and institutional mindset of secrecy — reflected in its hostile and contentious relationship with the media — add to the suspicion that there is something to hide. ...”

-Allan C. Brownfeld, Editor

Additional articles appear at the following URL:

http://www.acjna.org/article_result.asp

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Treason in High Places: AIPAC, Zionist Pentagon Neocons and Israel:

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2004/09/08/treason-in-high-places-pentagon-zionists-aipac-and-israel.php

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

How Israel Corrupts and Controls US Govt and Media

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/middle-east-and-asia/2002/06/01/how-israel-corrupts-and-controls-the-us-congress-and-media.php

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

AIPAC (Israel Lobby) Statement on Re-Election of Bush...

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2004/11/22/aipac-israel-lobby-statement-on-2004-election-of-bush.php

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Zionists and Torture in Iraq

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2004/09/09/the-zionists-and-torture-in-iraq.php

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Zionist Neocon Pentagon Turns Heat Up on Iran

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2004/11/23/zionist-neocon-pentagon-turns-heat-up-on-iran.php

Alpha · Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 7:17 am Post subject: ISRAELI SPYING

ISRAELI SPYING

http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/archives/cat_israeli_spying.html

Alpha · Posted: Wed Feb 09, 2005 11:54 am Post subject: Which Foreign Policy?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62109-2005Feb3.html

washingtonpost.com

Which Foreign Policy?

By David Ignatius

Friday, February 4, 2005; Page A17

Are the neoconservatives "up" or "down" in the second Bush administration? Will their agenda of transformational regime change in the Middle East be dominant in Bush II, or will their influence be reduced?

The truth is that nobody knows except George W. Bush. And the fact that nobody in Washington can be sure who really has the president's ear on foreign policy illustrates the delicate balance -- and potential for internal conflict -- that will shape the president's second term.

Certainly Bush's two big speeches this year have embraced the ambitious rhetoric of the neocons. When the president talked in his inaugural address about America's global mission to spread liberty, and when he admonished Syria and Iran in his State of the Union address Wednesday night, he certainly sounded like the neoconservative in chief.

Bush even seemed to be putting down a neocon marker for regime change when he proclaimed: "And to the Iranian people, I say tonight: As you stand for your own liberty, America stands with you."

Yet there are reasons not to take these bold words entirely at face value. Behind the rhetoric, the changes of personnel in Bush II seem, in fact, to be turning Bush more toward the neoconservatives' rivals, the foreign policy school known as the "realists." At the State Department, Condoleezza Rice has been signaling that she wants to follow Colin Powell in the GOP foreign policy mainstream; meanwhile, the leading neocon at State, Undersecretary John R. Bolton, is expected to leave that post soon.

At the Pentagon, one of the most powerful of the neocon figures, Undersecretary Douglas Feith, will be leaving this summer for personal reasons. And at the National Security Council, Rice's successor, Steve Hadley, appears to be steering a pragmatic "realist" course. He authored an op-ed piece in The Post last Saturday about Iraq that eschewed grand rhetoric altogether in favor of a nuanced discussion of that country's fragile ethnic balance.

Richard Perle, the neocons' intellectual godfather, certainly doesn't see the second Bush administration as neoconservative territory. "Bush is very much himself," Perle says. The advice reaching the president, Perle contends, "is probably not advice that would align him with the neoconservatives. Most advice would be quite contrary to that -- advice from the CIA, the State Department, the NSC. He gets conventional wisdom from the bureaucracy."

What adds a sharp edge to the Bush II ideological debate is the fact that the FBI is continuing an investigation of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC, which, like the neoconservatives, is strongly supportive of Israel. The investigation appears to have touched some prominent neoconservatives who are friendly toward AIPAC. Journalist Edwin Black discussed the fallout in a Dec. 31 article in the Forward newspaper, headlined "Spat Erupts Between Neocons, Intelligence Community." He described an apparent effort by the FBI to use the Pentagon official whose contacts with AIPAC triggered the investigation, Larry Franklin, in an unsuccessful "sting" operation to draw Perle into passing information to the neocons' favorite Iraqi leader, Ahmed Chalabi.

The FBI investigation has received surprisingly little publicity in the mainstream press, but it continues to rumble along. A prominent former government official with access to highly classified information told me this week that he was interviewed in late January by two FBI agents and quizzed about his luncheon meetings with Steve Rosen, AIPAC's director of foreign policy issues. He said he told the agents that he had never given Rosen classified information and that Rosen had never asked for it. The FBI investigation seemed, to this former official, to be largely a "fishing expedition."

The FBI has raided AIPAC's offices twice, most recently on Dec. 1, and at least four of its officials have reportedly been asked to testify before a grand jury. (AIPAC officials declined my request that they comment on the investigation. An FBI spokesman said the bureau couldn't comment on an ongoing investigation.) Meanwhile, I'm told that more than a half-dozen officials in the Bush administration who are apparently suspected of leaking classified information to AIPAC have had to retain defense lawyers.

"We do not want to cover up; if there was wrongdoing, let it be exposed. We are confident that there was none, and that the allegations will prove false," Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said in a recent statement. But he cautioned, "Neither AIPAC nor the Jewish community will be cowed into silence."

The FBI probe is a reminder of the subterranean battles that often take place in Washington. Even in an administration that appears united on policy, bitter fights sometimes swirl beneath the surface. The one thing that's certain with this administration is that nobody truly speaks for it, in the end, except the president himself. And as Perle rightly says, "George Bush's presidency is a response to 9/11, not to neoconservatives." It's the president's show, but where he will take it is still anybody's guess.

davidignatius@washpost.com

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

FBI AIPAC Probe Leads to Zionist Neocon Doorstep

http://www.warwithoutend.co.uk/wake-up-america-your-government-is-hijacked-by-zionism/2005/02/09/aipac-probe-leads-to-zionist-israel-first-neocon-doorstep.php

Alpha

http://desip.igc.org/1-27-05talk.html

The Israeli Palestinian Conflict and the spread of Empire and Desolation

A talk presented at the Friends Peace Center

San Jose, Costa Rica,

January 27, 2005

by Ronald Bleier[i]

Good evening. My name is Ronald Bleier. I'd like to begin with a few words about my background. I was born during the Second World War, in November 1942, on a tiny island called Lopud off the Croatian coastline near Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia, while my parents were escaping from the Nazis. Fifteen months later, my brother was born in February 1944 on yet another of these islands called Vis, as my parents continued their escape. In due course, we made it safely to a refugee camp in Italy from where were fortunate to find passage along with about 1,000 mostly Jewish refugees who were granted temporary asylum in the United States by President Roosevelt during the war. About a year after the war, our entire group was granted permanent residency leading to citizenship by an act of Congress during the Truman presidency. I grew up in Brooklyn, New York where I attended yeshiva elementary and high school and where I was indoctrinated in Zionism, an ideology that I didn't question for many years. After graduating from Brooklyn College, I spent two years with the Peace Corps in Iran.

It was only in the aftermath of the 1967 war when it became clear to me that the Israelis did not intend to withdraw from the territories they captured, and were bent on an indefinite military occupation, that my views slowly changed. In the fullness of time I was to meet with a series of disillusionments that culminated in my present anti-Zionist views. The horrific Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982 made me understand some of the depths of the savagery and the ruthlessness of Israeli policy. The first Palestinian uprising in December 1987 sparked tremendous interest and activism on the Palestinian issue and roughly coincided with the publication of several revisionist histories by such writers as Simcha Flapan, Benny Morris, Tom Segev, Avi Schlaim and others which opened my eyes to the myths surrounding the birth of Israel. It was then that I learned that Israel was born out of the expulsion of the Palestinian people, and that cruelty and oppression was required in order to retain control of a second class population. Around that time, I realized that I needed to determine for myself the meaning of Zionism. I deduced that it meant the ideology that a Jewish state should replace the former Palestine. From this I concluded that Zionism is manifestly racist in theory and in practice since it treats only Jews as first class citizens.

In my yeshivas we were taught ethical, universal Judaism. We learned about the Torah, the Law of Moses and the Talmudic tradition. I was imbued by my rabbis with the notion of Judaism as a religion embodying justice and human rights. Only much later did I begin to recognize the reality of Israel as a state like other states, engaging in the very worst atrocities of which it was capable in order to further its political goals. And later still I began to recognize the special, terrible way Israel was different from other states since it acted with the full diplomatic, economic and military support of the United States.

My next great disillusionment was to find that I was alone among my family and friends in taking an objective and critical view of Israeli policy. I can still recall the moment in the early 80s when I broached my new views of Israel with my father, a dedicated Zionist. We were in a restaurant and his first reaction was to laugh at my ignorance and naiveté. He couldn't believe that his son would take the side of the Arabs – that's how he saw it. His second reaction was to ask me to lower my voice lest others overhear my outlandish views. My father and I very quickly had to agree to disagree on the issue.

I underwent another disillusionment with regard to the role of the media. I had already been something of a critic of the press, not to mention TV news, but it was a completely new world to learn of the power of the “friends of Israel” lobby to obscure the reality of the crimes of Israel. As it happened, my first publications appeared in the now unfortunately defunct magazine, Lies of Our Times. The rumor going around when the magazine died was that its forthright stand on the Israeli Arab issue doomed its funding in the post Oslo period. On the power of the Israeli lobby to ruin careers, to stifle dissent and to procure political support and scores of billions of dollars in military and economic aid for Israel, I read Paul Findley, Moshe Menuhin, Donald Neff, Jeffrey Blankfort, Alfred Lilienthal and others who pointed to the dramatic and rigid control by Zionists and their supporters over the media and over Congress and the administration on Middle East Policy.

The Widening Gyre

Until the advent of the current Bush administration and the terrible events of 9/11, it may have been possible even for those sympathetic to the Palestinian struggle, to view events in Palestine and elsewhere in the Middle East, as confined to that area of the world, with relatively minimal effects on daily life elsewhere. Needless to say there was more than an element of denial in such a view as we had to put to one side the corruption of our national discourse and the censorship of information coming out of the Middle East, not to mention the raiding of the U.S. Treasury of $3-6 billion a year or more to satisfy Israeli demands.

But today, in the wake of 9/11 and the reinstallation of George W. Bush for a second term as president, once again, many believe through fraudulent means, we are confronted with an energized and radical neo conservative movement with nowhere to go but onward and down. I think my father said it best a few months before he died a year and a half ago, “they don't do anything good.” He was absolutely right. They are bent on an ideological destruction of the mission of government which is supposed to be by, for, and of the people.

One way to get some perspective on what is happening to the Palestinians and their prospects is to examine in some detail Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's Gaza Disengagement plan which was published in the Israeli papers April 16, 2004.[ii] The disengagement plan appeared at the height of the corruption scandal that engulfed Sharon and his sons and served to deflect domestic criticism as well as growing international opposition to Israel's construction of the Wall on Palestinian territory. Sharon's plan provided President George W. Bush with sufficient cover to reverse long-standing U.S. policy relating to the Palestinians. In particular, Bush brushed aside the critical principle, often reiterated at the U.N., of the inadmissibility of the acquisition of territory conquered by force. In his dramatic joint press conference in Washington with Sharon on April 14, 2004, President Bush, bowing, as he put it, to “new realities on the ground,” declared that Israel could permanently keep major settlements in the West Bank. Bush also rejected the Palestinian right of return to Israeli territory and froze the Palestinian leadership out of negotiations. At the same time, Bush effectively gave carte blanche to the continued Israeli construction of the Wall albeit with the meaningless reservation that it was to be regarded as a temporary structure. In June 2004, both houses of Congress, by lop sided majorities, followed up with resolutions unreservedly endorsing President Bush's giveaway to Sharon.

The disengagement plan provided Sharon with cover on the military front. A succession of ruthlessly brutal intensive major Israeli Defense Forces operations followed the March 2004 assassination of wheelchair bound Hamas political leader Sheik Yassin in Gaza and continued the next month with the murder of his successor, Dr. Abd al- Rantisi. This was only the beginning for Gaza residents as operations followed from May 2004 through October. Typical of the brutality, in a two-week period during Operation Rainbow in southern Gaza in May, at least 60 Palestinians were killed, almost 300 Palestinian homes demolished, and close to 4,000 people made homeless. Throughout these operations, large amounts of Palestinian farmland and property including olive groves were confiscated and bulldozed.

One reason that Sharon has continued to get a free ride on the strength of his disengagement plan, despite his long history as a tireless and powerful opponent of Palestinian national rights, is that many cannot believe that he would be so reckless as to propose the unilateral removal of Jewish settlements in Gaza without the intention of following through. But such a view of Sharon fails to take into consideration his willingness to take unprecedented risks, as well as his shrewd calculation of both the domestic and international political landscape. In Israel, there is no opposition to speak of. In the United States, Bush and his radical, pro Israeli neocon team is firmly in place for a second term and wholly supportive of Sharon's goals and vicious tactics. Moreover, as a veteran of more than 50 years on the Middle East scene, Sharon understands that pretexts can always be found to break, postpone and put off indefinitely agreements and treaties with the Arabs.

Thus far only a few lonely voices in Israel have pointed to the counterintuitive nature of the disengagement plan and have openly questioned Sharon's intention to remove the Gaza settlements. Israeli author and academic Tanya Reinhart has gone further than anyone else, providing invaluable documentation demonstrating the lack of any practical steps Israel is taking that would indicate a serious intent to remove the settlers. Despite the absence of such evidence, the media and the international community largely continue to take Sharon's disengagement plan seriously. Meanwhile Israel continues to pour resources into the settlements, suggesting that so far from evicting Jewish settlers from Gaza, the plan is to maintain them over the long term. In that case, it's not the Israeli settlers who will be leaving, but rather a million Palestinians who will be forced from Gaza.

As part of her expose, Tanya Reinhart also reveals that compensation to settlers willing to leave Gaza is to be postponed indefinitely. She explains that if the Israeli government were seriously interested in removing settlements, they would begin to compensate those willing to leave in order to isolate the remaining hardcore. Many believed that the compensation plan was approved by the Knesset in November. However, upon closer examination we find that the required 2nd and 3rd readings of the bill “will take place only after the government decides on actual evacuation, in March 2005 or later. Till then no one will be compensated.” [iii] Meanwhile, the Israeli press reported that in December, 11 more families moved into a Gaza settlement. [iv]

Kathleen Christison, a former CIA analyst who has been following Middle East issues for three decades, in a recent article, summarized some of the bitter reality Palestinians confront under the current regime. The picture she paints is important because it is evidence that Sharon is in the midst of a campaign to make civil life impossible for the Palestinian community. The current dimension of the situation, she writes, goes back to the April 2002 siege of the West Bank when

Israeli forces rampaged through the territory, destroying the entire infrastructure of Palestinian civil society: Israeli soldiers laid waste Palestinian civil ministries for education and health and agriculture; smeared feces throughout the Ministry of Culture; destroyed computers and hard disks and, with them, the entire written record of Palestinian society; ransacked Palestinian businesses and banks; bulldozed whole housing blocks; destroyed land registry maps and census records, as if to erase all trace of Palestinian existence. …

Gaza is largely in ruins, a Middle Eastern Dresden, thanks to repeated Israeli air and bulldozer assaults. Nearly two thousand homes have been demolished in Gaza since the [September 2000] intifada began, leaving many more thousands of innocent civilians homeless, and Israeli helicopter gunship attacks and assassination operations have wrought still more destruction.

Israel's separation wall has destroyed prime Palestinian agricultural land, bulldozed hundreds of thousands of Palestinian olive trees, destroyed or more often appropriated for Israeli use most Palestinian water wells, destroyed Palestinian markets [and] homes. Israeli closure policies have prevented most Palestinians from working inside Israel since the beginning of the peace process a dozen years ago. Israeli checkpoints throughout the West Bank impede movement and halt commerce. …Yet the West wonders why the Palestinian economy is not thriving.

Israel has reduced every Palestinian security headquarters throughout the West Bank and in Gaza to rubble. These structures, which served…as security headquarters [and also] as the center of municipal governance, with mayor's offices, jails, and health clinics [are] now mere heaps of concrete.[v]

Arafat's sudden illness and death in November [2004] briefly put a halt to some of Israel's most high profile deadly and destructive military operations. Yet, only a month later in mid December, using the pretext of rockets fired by the military wing of Hamas, Israel resumed its pitiless assaults in a two-day operation that killed 11 Palestinians in Khan Yunus in Gaza.[vi] Confiscations of Palestinian land also resumed. In early January, Dr. James Zogby appeared on BBC TV news, pointing out that in the previous two weeks, Israel had appropriated 3,000-4,000 acres of Palestinian land. [vii]

Arafat's death and the election of Mahmoud Abbas as new president of the Palestinian Authority spurred hopes that we might be entering a new period of reconciliation and movement toward a meaningful peace process. However, even the mildly positive atmospherics did not last beyond a week or two after the election as Sharon used a predictable “terror” incident as a pretext to “temporarily” end such discussions as had been envisioned. Nor is this a surprise since Sharon is dead set against giving up anything to the Palestinians in negotiations since he holds all the political and military cards. Sharon's immediate plan is to destroy any and all remnants of Palestinian resistance. He is embarked on a campaign to make civil life more and more impossible for the Palestinian community as he pursues the logic of Zionism, which foresees a land of Israel for Jews only. Such a plan would involve ethnic cleansing on a massive scale – the mass expulsion of the Palestinian people similar in scope to the events of 1948 when upwards of 750,000 Palestinians were expelled.

Turning now to US foreign policy and the origins of the Iraq war we see evidence of Israeli influence on US actions –what one writer called “The Fatal Embrace.” First I'd like to tackle the question of whether the Iraq war was fought for oil. I have always believed that the issue of US control over Iraqi oil was subsidiary to ideological goals. Now that we see oil prices near $50 with no apparent prospect of returning below $30, some are beginning to realize that if regime change in Iraq was about oil, it hasn't succeeded. Had the Administration's purpose been about providing US drivers with a steady and cheap supply of Middle East oil, the last thing they would have done was go to war against Iraq. Rather, I argue, war against Iraq was driven by a coterie of neoconservatives who have a long record of supporting a Likudnik agenda of destabilizing and fragmenting all of Israel's potential enemies.[viii] Those like Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Doug Feith, Eliot Abrams and others in senior government positions are interested in extending U.S. military power abroad not in the interests of democracy as they claim, but in order to sow chaos, confusion, and violent conflict.

They aim to maintain and grow the military budget and starve domestic social spending. In order to maintain an aggressive posture and ensure maximum freedom of action they are determined to subvert the international order that has been the foundation of the stability that has allowed the US and many other nations to grow and prosper over the last century. They eschew conflict resolution and diplomacy because that would threaten to bring peace, which is their anathema. Their modus operandi is to create desolation and call it democracy.

We are confronted in the age of George W. Bush with the enormous success of the neocon program. Many of the neocons were former Democrats in the 70s who were opposed to the liberal agenda of demilitarization, social spending and criticism of Israel's military occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. From relatively modest beginnings we find today that they have achieved their goal of regime change in Iraq against the best advice of major elements of the Republican Party including George H.W. Bush, the father of the president. They have pursued the Iraq war against the greatest outpouring of protest in the US and the rest of the world since the Vietnam War, and against common sense and the best interests of the security of the United States. So the question becomes how did they pull it off? One part of the answer that concerns us tonight is the assistance provided by the powerful Israeli lobby in the United States. The ability of the Israeli lobby to smooth the way for war was highlighted by the furor over Virginia Congressman Jim Moran's response in early March 2003 to a constituent question during a town hall meeting.[ix] He said: that "if it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq we would not be doing this. The leaders of the Jewish community are influential enough that they could change the direction of where this is going and I think they should."

Congressman Moran was correct and extraordinarily courageous in pointing to the leadership of the major Jewish organizations, suggesting that they could have blocked the war. As a 13-year veteran member of the House, Jim Moran has been around long enough to understand how political power on Middle East issues operates in Congress. War against Iraq has so isolated the United States and made so little sense that were it not perceived as good for Israel, in all likelihood it would not have gained sufficient traction in the media or in Congress.

It's probably not possible to reconcile opposing sides on the question of whether Tel Aviv or Washington drives US Mideast policy, but one element of this issue may be worth emphasizing. I would stress the difference between Prime Minister Sharon's brutal and ruthless pragmatism as he drives forward toward his goal of a Greater Israel at the expense of the Palestinians and the Arab nation. From a Zionist perspective, it is a zero sum game with winners and losers. On the other hand, the Washington neocons, are bent on war for the sake of war, with tragedy, and death the only winners. Fallujah today is an excellent example of the desolation that the public relations people call democracy. Another example of the new dark age are the ruins of the Museum in Baghdad, the destroyed Baghdad Library, the ravaged Iraqi universities and archeological sites, the murder of scores of the cream of the Iraqi academic, professional and diplomatic classes, not to mention the deaths of a 100,000 and counting ordinary Iraqis.

The Dimensions of the present problem
There is no point in attempting to soften our description of the nature of the current crisis that we face with the reinstallation of George W. Bush for another four years. With the results of the election in place, the most radical of the neocons are entrenched and empowered to forward their extremist agenda. No doubt there are many like me in tonight's audience who first read George Orwell's 1984, awakened but at the same time confident that we would never live to see a US administration that could embody such evil. Lo and behold, we are now confronted with an administration bent on the continual creation of enemies and fighting endless war.

The current devastation and horror that Bush has made of Iraq while not exactly a PR bonanza, is not necessarily perceived by them as a total defeat. For example, if Iraq should wind up fragmented into its three main groups, that would play into neocon and Israeli hands since a potential area counterforce will have been eliminated. Moreover the anarchic climate in Iraq, a perfect breeding ground for terrorism suits their purpose by fomenting real, imagined and created enemies against whom the US leadership can rally and unify the populace, stifle dissent, and push through the most extreme of their radical domestic and international agenda.

The next target on the Bush-Cheney neocon agenda is Iran, now Israel's strongest enemy. On January 20th, the same day that George W. Bush was sworn in for a second term, Vice President Cheney with astonishing chutzpah, gave Israel the green light to attack Iran. In a radio interview, he said that Iran is “right at the top of the list” of the world's trouble spots and given that “Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards.” The naked irresponsibility and recklessness of such a statement is staggering. For added measure we learn from articles in current issues of the New Yorker by Seymour Hersh that plans have already been made for attacking Iran and reconnaissance for such an attack has already begun including on the ground infiltration of commando forces. (As an aside it may be interesting to speculate that US government leaks to Hersh were intended as a trial balloon in order to measure domestic US reaction as well as to spread confusion in Iran.)

One measure of the contretemps we are in is that there is no one in sight with the stature or courage to challenge Cheney's characterization of Iran's posture which is essentially defensive. If there was one thing that the Bush-Cheney wars against Afghanistan and Iraq have taught Iran and North Korea and the rest of the world it is that weak countries including those without a nuclear deterrent are vulnerable to threats from the US and/or Israel. Iran would be “crazy,” as one analyst elegantly put it,[x] if it did not seek a nuclear deterrent against threatening superpowers. Meanwhile, in Western circles, Israel's nuclear monopoly is ignored while Iran's nuclear potential is characterized as a threat to peace. [xi] Israel and the US neocon Likudniks are determined to maintain the nuclear status quo in the Middle East because an Iranian nuclear capability might serve as a brake to Israeli and US aggression.

One question raised by US-Israeli threats is whether an attack against Iran would lead to a wider Middle East war. But it is difficult to see who would be or could be waging war against the two superpowers. The military balance in the Middle East is not comparable to that of Europe for example of the 20th and earlier centuries where the various states worked to achieve balance through alliances and détentes. Especially now with Iraq effectively out of the picture, there is no foreseeable combination of Middle Eastern powers that could stand up to an Israel backed by the US. Moreover the latest version of Iran's Shebab 3 medium range missile, rumored to be able to reach Israel, carries no nuclear warhead and so its deterrent capability is strategically limited. Moreover, Iranian missile strikes against Israel, while doing relatively little damage would serve as pretexts for Israel's disproportionate retaliations, exactly as we see today in the Occupied Territories. Some analysts have pointed out that Israel's potential air attacks against Iran may originate in US controlled airbases in Iraq. Thus Israel's continued nuclear monopoly means that Iran is virtually defenseless against Israeli aggression. [xii]

Would an Israeli/US attack on Iran lead to a wider war? One radical faction, led by veteran neoconservative Michael Ledeen who heads the Coalition for Democracy in Iran seems bent on regime change in Saudi Arabia, but it is hard to see how such a change would benefit the US. A destabilized Saudi Arabia would put much of the world oil supply at risk and have nightmare ramifications for the international economy. The Bush-Cheney administration which has longstanding business and personal relations with the Saudi leadership seems to be resisting the concept of regime change there since such plans seem to pass the line of recklessness into pure stupidity. But since the administration seems determined to attack Iran (and Syria for some of the same reasons) we may be in a situation where events are in the saddle and pressures may build to the point where a shaky Saudi monarchy is toppled.

But here we are approaching the horizon of foreseeable events. Suffice it to say for now that the world faces a challenge similar to 1939 with the US and Israel bent on regime change, destabilization, tension, chaos, and endless war.

On the other hand, it may be useful to pull back and remind ourselves that the US is mired in a quagmire in Iraq and that neither the US or Israel have the forces to invade or occupy Iran. Perhaps just as important, on the economic front the US has become a debtor nation big time, no better than a banana republic. Even worse, the Bush Cheney regime shows every evident intention to apply foot to the pedal and drive the US further into bankruptcy by spending endlessly on the Iraq war, and on their military toys, spy satellites and Star Wars programs. Similarly on the domestic front they appear to be determined to continue destroying the economy, with more tax cuts for the wealthy and the huge costs involved in “strengthening” social security. Is it possible that such policies can be sustained another four years? Who knows?

One interesting historical footnote takes us back to the 1956 Suez war when France, England and Israel combined to attack Egypt and Gaza. At the time President Eisenhower – the only US president until Jimmy Carter to stand up to Israel -- was enraged and was able to reverse the tripartite attack by applying pressure on England which at the time was deeply in the US debt for World War Two costs. Is it possible that economically based constraints can save us from the most extreme military daydreams of the current gang in Washington? But even in that least worst case scenario, there will be much desolation, despair and suffering for hundreds of millions of people everywhere.

Solutions

How do we speak of solutions confronted as we are with the magnitude of the current challenges to peace and democracy? My own instincts are to begin by looking the devil – that is to say, reality – in the eye. Our job is first to describe and understand the situation we face as best and as clearly as we are able. That is exactly our purpose this evening. Our next step is to find ways to struggle for our visions and our dreams and our futures. One way to do this is to build community and that is the essential second element of our purpose tonight. From small local beginnings we can try to work to forge the unity and the leadership that we require to survive and prevail. There are certainly no easy answers and no single answer. There is only a difficult and puzzling and impossible process and we need to find ways to plug into that process and to make it happen. And for that task we are armed only with the hope that day will follow night and that we can toil our way toward a better future than the one we seem headed towards now.

The End

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[i] Ronald Bleier is a freelance writer based in NYC. He edits DESIP, an environmental and security website.

[ii] Uri Avnery, December 18, 2004. “The Mountain and the Mouse. Tanya Reinhart, “Sharon's disengagement” from Gaza,” March 30, 2004 and “What kind of state deserves to exist, Yediot Aharonot, April 20, 2004.

[iii] Tanya Reinhart, “Sharon's Gaza Pullout: Not Gonna Happen!” November 2004. http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article3331.shtml

[iv] Ha'aretz, December 17, 2004. Nadav Shraga, “11 new families settle in Gaza's Nissanit.”

[v] Kathleen Christison, January 3, 2005, “Patronizing the Palestinians: The Trouble with Optimism” http://www.counterpunch.org/christison01032005.html

[vi] Al Jazeera, December 19, 2004, “Israeli helicopters strike Gaza towns.”

[vii] BBC TV news, January 10, 2005.

[viii] Here and in some of the analysis below I am indebted to Stephen J. Sniegoski, “The Future of the Global War on Terrorism,” Current Concerns , September 3-5, 2004.

[ix] Others like Philip Zelikow, the Executive director of the 9/11 Commission, outgoing Senator Ernest “Fritz’ Hollings, Patrick Buchanan, Justin Raimondo and others have expressed similar views but Moran's case seemed to attract more media attention in part because, as a result of his remarks he was seen as vulnerable.

[x] Israeli military historian, Martin Van Creveld, International Herald Tribune, August 21, 2004. Cited in Khalid Amayreh, “Israel to U.S.: Now for Iran,” August 29, 2004.

[xi] Sniegoski, op.cit.

[xii] Based on 2004 analysis by Andrew Cordesman.

Alpha · Posted: Sat May 14, 2005 6:05 pm Post subject: Paul Findley on Video

http://www.HonestMediaToday.com/Findley-wmv-large.wmv

Alpha

Ethnic Cleansing in Jerusalem, Israeli Style

By Paul Findley

Israeli authorities are carrying out a process in East Jerusalem that may accurately be described as ethnic cleansing. It is plainly geared to uproot Palestinians from an area that historically has been known as Arab East Jerusalem and convert it into an integral, permanent part of the capital of the Jewish state.
The scandalous process is recognized and deplored by the major news media in Britain and elsewhere and even by some newspapers in Israel, but it is predictably ignored in the United States. Still worse, Washington provides the financial, political, and military support without which the cleansing could not go forward.
B'Tselem, a private organization of Israelis concerned about human rights, calls it "a policy of quiet deportation." In its report, subtitled Revocation of Residency of East Jerusalem Palestinians, the group notes that "perhaps thousands of people have been forced to leave" and warns that the worst is still to come.
The squeeze is not new; it has been underway for years, first under Labor Party leadership, intensified by the Likud Party when Menachem Begin became prime minister, and hardened recently in two major steps, first by the government of Labor's Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres, then by their Likud successor, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.
The first stage was a slow, little-noticed process of attrition, during which Jewish settlements that now ring East Jerusalem were built. The next was tightening the noose against Palestinians through two measures: control of entry into the city and restriction of construction permits.
For years, Israel has virtually prohibited Palestinians from remodeling old housing or constructing new. Only a handful of building permits-about 150 a year- are divided among the 155,000 Palestinians who until recently constituted the majority population. More than 20,000 families are virtually homeless.
At the same time, Palestinians who leave east Jerusalem for any reason can expect harassment when they attempt to return. Some of them, even those who have lived in Jerusalem all their lives, are denied re-entry.
Those who left for holidays sometimes find it impossible to return. Families are divided, some members are able to stay in East Jerusalem and others kept out.
Jewish settlers in East Jerusalem are exempt from municipal taxes for five years and then benefit from a reduced rate. Because of this bias, Palestinians living there pay taxes that are five times higher than many settlers.
The effect of these demographic pincers is rising anger, despair, and violence-or, as Israeli officials always characterize it, "terrorism."
The real terrorism is inflicted on the Palestinians, who live in constant fear of bulldozers leveling their homes without anything remotely resembling due process, eviction on the pretext that home repairs were made without proper permits, or confiscation for road construction or other public purposes.
And the latest form of terrorism is the voiding of Palestinian identity cards. Before Shimon Peres left the office of prime minister, he had already begun the use of identity cards-or lack thereof-as the main instrument of deportation from East Jerusalem. Under Netanyahu, the instrument became razor sharp. It now threatens to sever much of the remaining population of Palestinians from their homelands.
The Israeli Interior Ministry says that all identity cards must be renewed by August of this year, a deadline that will give officials almost unlimited opportunity to refuse renewal and force Palestinians on short notice to move elsewhere in the West Bank.
Patrick Cockburn of the Independent, a respected London newspaper, writes, "In two months' time, in a move likely to have more effect on the fate of Jerusalem than the building of a Jewish settlement at Jabal Abu Ghneim, Israel will start a meticulous examination of the right of every Palestinian resident to remain in the city. Those who are not issued the coveted Jerusalem identity card will have 15 days to leave."
The independent recites grim experiences that are likely to be replicated thousands of times in the next few weeks. For example: "Olga Matri Hana Yoaqim, 63, who has seven children, was born in Bethlehem but has lived in [Jerusalem] with her husband since 1952. 'In September 1995 I went to replace my identity card at the Interior Ministry office in East Jerusalem,' she aid. The clerk cut up her card and told her to come back in two weeks. When Mrs. Yoaqim returned, the clerk told her, 'You don't have an identity card. Co to the West Bank.'
"Her husband went back to the ministry 20 times but was refused. Mrs. Yoaqim said, 'I suffer from diabetes and have kidney problems. When I go to a clinic or hospital, they want to see my identity card. Because I have none, I can't receive treatment.'"
Even Palestinians who have moved from the Old City to adjoining suburbs are in deep trouble. B'Tselem reports, "Some 18 months ago, the Interior Ministry began to revoke the residency status of persons who moved outside the municipal borders of Jerusalem."
Palestinian residency problems began the moment Israeli forces took control of East Jerusalem in the June 1967 war. Over 50,000 Palestinians have been denied permanent residency rights because they were away from home in June 1967, for whatever reason, or moved, even temporarily, to a different location.
Young people often find their residency rights blocked when they attempt to return from attending schools overseas. Only Palestinians bearing proof that they, or their parents, have resided in East Jerusalem since 1967 can move freely to and from the city, and now even that right is in jeopardy. The Palestinians may enter East Jerusalem only if they receive special permits from Israeli authorities.
This policy sharply restricts religious practice, as a practical matter blocking most Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza from visiting holy places in Jerusalem.
It stands as a cynical reversal of Israel's long-proclaimed guarantee that all people will have free access to religious places in Jerusalem. A civil rights attorney, Eliahu Abrams, put it bluntly: " It is a true crisis in human rights. Israel is forcibly getting rid of Palestinians not by pulling them out by the hair, but by quiet, slow, sophisticated deportation."
He says the "essence of the new policy is to demand that all Palestinians who cannot give documentary proof that they have always lived in Jerusalem must leave. According to The Independent, Israeli officials sometimes demand as many as 12 different documents before a Palestinian can secure a new identity card.
____________________________________
Former Congressman Paul Findley (R-IL) is
the chairman of the Council for the National
Interest.

War Without End

The global war against terror, news about the illegal invasion of Iraq, the corporate puppet presidents, the war criminal Tony Blair, September 11th 2001, the USS Liberty and New World Order crimes against humanity.

Former Congressman Findley Nails Pro-Israel (AIPAC) Lobby