The Israel Lobby is taking aim at another prospective Obama administration appointee deemed insufficiently supportive of Israel’s Likud policies, ex-Nebraska Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel. A similar campaign of vilification was waged against Ambassador Chas Freeman in 2009, as he recalls.
By Charles W. “Chas” Freeman Jr.
History is indeed repeating itself with Sen. Chuck Hagel; this time, as Marx predicted, as farce. All of the elements I noted in my statement of withdrawal in 2009 are there:
“The tactics of the Israel Lobby plumb the depths of dishonor and indecency and include character assassination, selective misquotation, the willful distortion of the record, the fabrication of falsehoods, and an utter disregard for the truth. The aim of this Lobby is control of the policy process through the exercise of a veto over the appointment of people who dispute the wisdom of its views, the substitution of political correctness for analysis, and the exclusion of any and all options for decision by Americans and our government other than those that it favors.”
Former U.S. Ambassador Charles W. “Chas” Freeman. (Photo credit: Chasfreeman.net)
None of this has changed, including the effort to make the campaign appear to be about something other than obeisance to Israel. (China in my case; so far gay rights, with more likely to come, in Sen. Hagel’s.) [For details, see Consortiumnews.com’s “Hagel: Neocons’ Last Stand?”]
There are some differences, however. I had been appointed. Hagel has not yet been nominated. Unlike Secretary of Defense, the head of the National Intelligence Council is not subject to Senate confirmation. If nominated, Sen. Hagel faces hearings in which he has the opportunity to clear his name and a process of voting in which politicians must take a stand rather than hide behind the Lobby.
Neither were available to me. The campaign against Hagel is also more open than the internet and corridor-whispering campaign against me.
The Secretary of Defense is a policy official, the head of the NIC is responsible for analytical input but not for policy decisions. The NIC is a subcabinet position, with a supervisor who reports to the President. The Secretary of Defense has no superior other than the President, who cannot disclaim responsibility or leave the decision whether to stand or fight to a subordinate.
Finally, Sen. Hagel appears actively to want to return to government service. I agreed only reluctantly to do so. Sen. Hagel’s appointment as Secretary of Defense would cap an honorable political career by elevating him to higher office. My return to government at the same level as my last position in it would have been an invisible afterward to 30 years of dignified but obscure public service.
The stakes seem at first glance to be surprisingly similar. In 2009, I noted that “the outrageous agitation [over my appointment casts] doubt on [the President’s] ability to consider, let alone decide what policies might best serve the interests of the United States rather than those of a Lobby intent on enforcing the will and interests of a foreign government.”
As I and others foresaw, my defeat was the first of many setbacks to Obama’s declared objective of righting U.S. policies in the Middle East and repairing our relations with the Muslim world.
The controversy over my appointment also politicized appointments to the intelligence community. But that over Hagel is far more important and potentially far-reaching in its effects. It threatens to extend the process of “borking” from the Supreme Court to the Cabinet appointment process and, if it appears to deter the President from nominating Hagel, it will confirm the domestic and international impression of President Obama as someone who confuses following from the front with leadership and who habitually yields rather than stands his ground.
Given the domestic political gridlock and constant retreat before AIPAC that characterized his first term, President Obama and the United States currently have very little credibility in the Middle East. Even without the impact of a fall off the “fiscal cliff,” starting a second term with yet another humiliation by the Israel Lobby would devalue Obama and American prestige for at least the next four years, leaving us at the mercy of decisions by others that we cannot influence.
Sen. Hagel is drawing on conservative political colleagues to defend himself. Much as I sympathize with what he’s going through, it seems best not to taint his case by appearing to wish to reopen my own.
Those opposing him are making arguments that demonstrate their obsession with Israel at the expense of all other American interests. In the process, they are isolating themselves by offending a widening circle of thoughtful American patriots. Their effective abetment of self-destructive impulses in Israel has helped to create an ever more potent existential threat to that country. Their hubris now threatens their credibility here.
Napoleon wisely said that one should never interrupt the enemy when he is making a mistake. These people are enemies of Israel as well as all that is decent in this country. Enough said.
Charles W. “Chas” Freeman Jr. had a 30-year career in the U.S. Foreign Service, the State Department and the Defense Department, including a stint as U.S. Ambassador to Saudi Arabia from 1989 to 1992. In February 2009, he was named by Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair to chair the National Intelligence Council. But appointment was withdrawn after several weeks of intense criticism from staunch supporters of Israeli policy. [This post derived from an e-mail exchange with ex-CIA analyst Ray McGovern and was posted with Ambassador Freeman’s approval as well as at LobeLog.com.]
Borat, you are truly amazing. You state that the worst smear against Jewish-Americans is “dual loyalty” You then go on to quote Carolyn Glick “American-Israeli” that works for the Jerusalem Post to buttress your argument against Hagel. Are you really that tone deaf to your own rhetoric?
Second, Hagel’s loyalty as a U.S. Senator should be first and foremost to the State of Nebraska(pre-17th Amendment style) and then to the United States. To say a senator is not loyal enough to any other country is a slap in the face to U.S. voters that send these people to Washington and an insult to the U.S. Constitution.
Let me add that the political selling ploy that obviously accompanies the promotion of Michele Flournoy over Hagel effectively serves to dupe the “feminist†contingent. The neo-cons are not dummies when it comes to using such identity politics and blind loyalty psychology to get their way on war. The last three Secretaries of State (and their wanna-bes) who have risen to become the most powerful females thus far in US history, the “first black President†and now even using the “gays†(against Hagel) are all examples. As is the first female to win the Academy Award for Best Director, the beautiful Kathryn Bigelow being used by the Military Industrial Congressional Media Hollywood Complex to sell war and torture. Figurehead members of gender, race (and probably eventually sexual identification) “minorities†are being exploited to effectively sell US-NATO-Israel’s permanent wars of aggression, killing and quest for “full spectrum dominance” to the “progressives.â€
Just what the CIA “Red Cell†psych-ops people figured out some time ago to keep the war machine going.
It could be the face of a new kinder gentler McCarthyism!
See https://consortiumnews.com/2012/06/18/amnestys-shilling-for-us-wars/ and https://consortiumnews.com/2012/05/14/reflecting-on-mothers-day-and-war/
The comments above which denigrate Freeman and Hagel show just how badly we nneede to prize the claws of Zionism from US policy
They never learn do they
Near the bottom of this link there’s a list of 65 resolutions by the U.N. condemning Israel.
Followed by a list of resolutions, (30), against Israel vetoed by AmeriKa
http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/expelled.htm
This seems rather odd, when you consider the U.N. recently called Israel a terrorist nation and AmeriKa is spending billions to fight it and sending “our boys” to die for it.
it is interesting to note the people who created israel came from europe just as the people who created us, canada, mexico,etc. all came from europe; people who colonized asia came from europe; people who basicallly invaded africa came from europe; i dont think jews are the problem—europeans are the problem
mike on December 28, 2012
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“it is interesting to note the people who created israel came from europe.” +
” i dont think jews are the problem—europeans are the problem.”
Mike –in Israel’s case the difference was that 98% of the colonizing was done by Jews.
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Although you are right that they were from Eastern Europe.
jews are not a nationality…neglected to say all the brutal colonizing done by europeans have been done by jews and christians…eurocentrism (including religion) must be swept away and we can develop another way of developing human relationships that don’t rely on dominance and violence and theft
the jews you refer to are/were european jews…muslims and jews lived together many years until the european jews came and ruined life in the region…i hope you are not denying the holocaust inflicted on the people outside europe by the europeans…this is what we europeans are good at—killing and stealing—-jew or christian both the same
You are a good man Mr Freeman. I applaud your courage. At last the truth is emerging about the activities of these assassins. You have committed a patriotic act Mr Freeman , as many in the broader community have also been subjected to the anti semitic smear for voicing opinions on the Middle East.
“Even when in a minority of one the truth is still the truth”
Gandhi
The genie is at last out of the bottle as more Americans,especially ones of stature like Mr Freeman speak out.
“warmongers like Douglas Feith” Is this person, allowed to reach a high position miles over his abilities under the GWBush administration , still pretending to function???
HRW??????? lol
borat The “nation” of Israel is theocratic, racist, cruel, vicious, mendacious. This is not antisemitic; it is truth against a State that cares about nobody but Jews, as defined by it. It helps nobody else, it avoids peace or any kind of dialogue while designating so many “enemies” without reason. If its chosen few would only act in a normal way as real humans not specially chosen supermen, there is no reason it could not survive without US weapons, UN vetoes and cash. Check a few good Israelis like Sher Hever and Uri Avnery.
A spokesman for Hamas, the Islamic militant group that controls Gaza, rejected the report as biased, telling Reuters that the Palestinians were defending themselves. ?
You mean Hamas the legally elected Palestinian Government ?
BTW ..Israeli archaeologists ( I. Finkelstein, N. Silberman, Z. Herzog, W. Denver, et al ) all agree that the great United Kingdom of Solomon and David circa 980-930BC is a complete fairy tale and Solomon and David were mere chieftains, with maybe 50 warriors to their name. This is now accepted FACT (“The Bible Unearthed” by Finkelstein).
Also there was no Moses, Abraham or covenant or Promised Land, just propaganda created 700 years after the “Moses era” to create a legacy for the benefit of a group based in Jerusalem circa 500 BC.
Jerusalem in that era had no walls, no monumental buildings & its people were mostly illiterate.
Askenazi Jew Netenyahu & many others falsely claim a mystical 3,000 year glorious history connection with Jerusalem when in fact its just another myth.
Prophetic comments by three eminent Jews:
Lessing J. Rosenwald, president of the American Council for Judaism, 1944: “The concept of a racial state – the Hitlerian concept- is repugnant to the civilized world, as witness the fearful global war in which we are involved. . . , I urge that we do nothing to set us back on the road to the past. To project at this time the creation of a Jewish state or commonwealth is to launch a singular innovation in world affairs which might well have incalculable consequences.â€
Albert Einstein, who also opposed the creation of a “Jewish state,” 1939: “There could be no greater calamity than a permanent discord between us and the Arab people. Despite the great wrong that has been done us [in the western world], we must strive for a just and lasting compromise with the Arab people…. Let us recall that in former times no people lived in greater friendship with us than the ancestors of these Arabs.â€
Lord Edwin Montagu, the only Jewish member of the UK cabinet at the time, objected vehemently to the 1917 Balfour Declaration: “All my life I have been trying to get out of the ghetto and you want to force me back there againâ€. He was overruled by his colleagues, some of them avowed anti-Semites.
Why do “certain biased” Americans want to claim Harry Truman as a great US President ?
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Not only was President Truman responsible for the totally “un thought out” creation of Israel but also the sole use ever of Atomic bombs.
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Israel was literally President Truman’s attempt to preserve a people by moving them from where they were despised to where they were/are actively, passionately hated and it resulted in the failure to promote US or Western interests.
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Truman in his book, says “The extreme Zionists threatened me.” Truman caved into threats that Zionist money could be transferred to support Mr. Dewey if Truman did not express open support for the creation of Israel.
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Because of Zionist control , US Middle East policy has committed blunder after blunder with policies supporting Israeli interests and against the interests of the USA
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Chuck Schumer , senior Dem. United States Senator & Zionist supporter chose Israel over America and was responsible for stopping the appointment of Chas Freeman and rejoiced with with this statement.
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“Charles Freeman was the wrong guy for this position. His statements against Israel were way over the top and severely out of step with the administration. I repeatedly urged the White House to reject him, and I am glad they did the right thing.â€
You are right. Truman was way out of his depth. A recent series on The Real News Network is about Wallace, who was the VP of FDR in his previous elections, but was replaced by the Dem.Party which preferred Truman to someone willing to work for the “working man”.
Mr Freeman mentions “character assassination”….I’m quite surprised that nobody recalls another US ambassador (to Lebanon, 1978-1981), John Gunther Dean
(born Dienstfertig in 1926,a Holocaust survivor)who was not so lucky. In 1980
Arab killers (possibly/most likely hired by Israel) tried to assassinate him in Beirut, because the Jewish state regarded him as a threat: too close to the PLO, on too friendly terms with Arafat. That’s what we learn from Dean’s book “Danger Zones” (2009 I think), kind of autobiography which was not widely reported at the time it seems “for good reasons”(rare exception: Barbara Crossette/The Nation)— Dean himself investigated the crime and traced the weapons used in the attack back to the US and Israel. After his return to Washington his superiors called him unfit and insane (he spent some time in a psychiatric clinic I think)
and the whole affair was officially hushed up – to save Israel’s “image”.
Dean now lives in France (in semi-exile?) presumably bitter and disillusioned.
Chuck Hagel is being nominated to the office of the United States Secretary of Defense, not the Israel’s Secretary of Defense. The moment any criticism, legitimate or otherwise, is made of Israel, the individual is charged as being ‘anti-semitic’. The charge is often sufficient to close down any discussion of American interests in any situation involving Israel. Too often the United States has had to take an Israel-right-or-wrong stance against our national interest. For all intents and purposes then, Israel has a veto of any and all offices of the the Executive Branch of the United States. This is simply not a tenable situation.
No one need ever take responcibities for thier own incompenties, oe failures as long as thiere are Jews to blame.
Learn to spell, please.
Mr. Ambassador, thank you for your courage, honesty and patriotism. You’re a Great American!
A Chuck Hagel appointment would pose a dilemma for Senators Lautenberg and Menendez.
On September 17, 1947, President Harry Truman appointed James Forrestal as the first United States Secretary of Defense. During his tenure, Mr. Forrestal fought vigorously against the establishment of the State of Israel on the grounds that it would infuriate the oil-rich Arab States. With regard to the American Jewish community, Mr. Forrestal stated, “…no group in this country should be permitted to influence our policy to the point it could endanger our national security.”
Fortunately for the embattled Jewish community of the-then Palestine, President Truman chose to disregard Secretary Forrestal’s advice and negative views on the American Jewish community. Instead, President Truman supported the November 29, 1947 partition resolution in the United Nations, dividing Palestine into Arab and Jewish states.
When the Jewish State declared its independence on May 14, 1948, the United States, under President Truman’s leadership, became the first nation to recognize the new State of Israel.
Now, as we approach Inauguration Day, President Obama is on the verge of appointing James Forrestal’s ideological heir, former Nebraska Republican Senator Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense. Mr. Hagel has the same hostility towards the American Jewish community and the same negative feelings towards Israel as James Forrestal.
In his Monday December 17, 2012 Wall Street Journal column, the highly respected journalist Bret Stephens described the Hagel record on Israel as follows:
“In 2002, a year in which 457 Israelis were killed in terrorist attacks (a figure proportionately equivalent to more than 20,000 fatalities in the U.S., or seven 9/11s), Mr. Hagel weighed in with the advice that ‘Israel must take steps to show its commitment to peace.’
This was two years after Yasser Arafat had been offered a state by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak at Camp David.â€
“In 2006, Mr. Hagel described Israel’s war against Hezbollah as ‘the systematic destruction of an American friend, the country and people of Lebanon’ He later refused to sign a letter calling on the European Union to designate Hezbollah as a terrorist organization. In 2007, he voted against designating Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps as a terrorist organization, and also urged President Bush to open “direct, unconditional” talks with Iran to create ‘a historic new dynamic in U.S.-Iran relations.’ In 2009, Mr. Hagel urged the Obama administration to open direct talks with Hamas.â€
One would be hard pressed to find a U.S. Senator more hostile to Israel than Chuck Hagel. Yet if one studies the rhetoric of Mr. Hagel, it becomes clear that his hostility extends to the American Jewish community as well. Hagel has spoken about how “the Jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people up here,” and how he is not cowed by it.
In an interview in 2006 with retired U.S. diplomat Aaron David Miller, Hagel said, “I’m a United States Senator, not an Israeli Senator. I’m a United States Senator. I support Israel. But my first interest is I take an oath of office to the Constitution of the United States. Not to a president. Not a party. Not to Israel. If I go run for Senate in Israel, I’ll do that.”
Stephens accurately appraises the Hagel rhetoric as follows: “Read these staccato utterances again to better appreciate their insipid and insinuating qualities, all combining to cast the usual slur on Jewish-Americans: Dual loyalty.â€
It is therefore not surprising that during his tenure as U.S. Senator, Hagel had a remarkably poor relationship with his Jewish constituents at home in Nebraska. An article in the Sunday, December 23, 2012 Algemeiner Journal, one of the nation’s leading Jewish community websites, has the title, “Nebraska Jews Recall Senator Chuck Hagel as ‘Unfriendly’ and ‘Unmovable’ on Israel, ‘Didn’t give a Damn About the Jewish Community’â€
One wonders why Obama would appoint a Defense Secretary with such a record of hostility towards Israel and the American Jewish community.
The answer is clear on its face: Obama intends to substantially downsize the American commitment to Israel during his second term, both in terms of priority and level of American military assistance. Chuck Hagel will provide Obama the cover to do this.
The best evidence of this new Obama administration second term policy can be found in its actions – or lack of same –in the recent United Nations General Assembly vote granting the Palestinians non-member state status. Caroline Glick, the highly acclaimed American-Israeli journalist and deputy managing editor of the Jerusalem Post, described the Obama UN policy shift as follows:
“Obama enabled the Palestinians to get their non-member state status at the UN by failing to threaten to cut off US funding to the UN in retaliation for such a vote.â€
“Both Presidents Reagan and George H.W. Bush issued such threats during their tenures in office and so prevented the motion from coming to a vote. Given that the Palestinians have had an automatic majority in the General Assembly since at least 1975, the only reason their status was only upgraded in 2012 is because until then, either the PLO didn’t feel like raising the issue or the US threatened to cut off its financial support to the UN if such a motion passed. This year PLO chief Mahmoud Abbas said he wanted to have a vote and Obama responded by not issuing a threat to cut off UN funding. So the Palestinians got their vote and, as expected, it passed overwhelmingly.â€
“Seeing the upgrade as a Palestinian move is a mistake. It was a joint Palestinian-American moveâ€.
The new ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Representative Eliot Engel of New York, has announced his opposition to the prospective Hagel nomination, stating that the former Nebraska Senator has an “endemic hostility towards Israel.” Departing Senator Joe Lieberman has also spoken out against it as well, noting the difficulties Hagel would face in confirmation proceedings.
For New Jersey’s two Democratic Senators, Frank Lautenberg and Robert Menendez, the prospect of Obama’s nomination of Hagel poses a most acute dilemma.
There is no question that both Lautenberg and Menendez have records of solid, consistent support for Israel. In the case of Frank Lautenberg, he also has been a major benefactor of good works in Israel, including hospitals and public parks. Prior to his election as United States Senator, he served as the national chair of United Jewish Appeal.
Yet both would face serious difficulties in defying the Obama White House on a Hagel nomination.
President Obama’s nomination of Massachusetts Senator John Kerry as Secretary of State clears the way for Bob Menendez to become the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. It is no small matter for such a chair to refuse to support confirmation of a Defense Secretary nominated by a president of the same political party.
For Frank Lautenberg, there is another dimension to the dilemma. If he accedes to the Obama White House request for support of the Hagel nomination, he may well face serious criticism from Newark Mayor Cory Booker on this issue in a 2014 Democratic Senate primary battle. Booker also has a strong relationship with the New Jersey Jewish community, and he could use the incumbent senator’s vote for Hagel as a means to diminish the Lautenberg Jewish vote in the primary.
Obama is about to begin his second term, and now he feels no political constraints in making cabinet appointments. He will feel free to play hardball to achieve his objectives, even if it means threatening to reduce federal funding for New Jersey projects in order to coerce Lautenberg and Menendez to support a Hagel nomination.
I have no doubt that both Senators Lautenberg and Menendez are hoping and praying that President Barack Obama changes his mind and does not nominate Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense.
Alan J. Steinberg served as Regional Administrator of Region 2 EPA during the administration of former President George W. Bush. Region 2 EPA consists of the states of New York and New Jersey, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and eight federally recognized Indian nations. Under former New Jersey Governor Christie Whitman, he served as Executive Director of the New Jersey Meadowlands Commission. He currently serves on the political science faculty of Monmouth University.
“Obama enabled the Palestinians to get their non-member state status at the UN by failing to threaten to cut off US funding to the UN in retaliation for such a vote.â€
In other words the US should violate all the principles and purpose of the United Nations by bullying that body just to put Israel’s interests above its own. This is the sort of attitude that has started many a war. You may recall that the main purpose of the United Nations is to prevent war and its creation was informed by World War II, which I am sure you will recall killed six million Jews.
Your comment reads like the very sanitized Wikipedia version of historical reality. You use the term “Jewish State”, which was by no means condoned by Harry Truman.In a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt dated August 23, 1947, Truman commented on some atrocity committed in Palestine by Zionist elements:
“I fear very much that the Jews are like all underdogs. When they get on top they are just as intolerant and cruel as the people were to them when they were underneath. I regret this situation very much because my sympathy has always been on their side.”
A letter of recognition giving de facto recognition to the new state and its government had been prepared for his signature. Truman crossed out the words “the Jewish State” and wrote “Israel.” And, he inserted the word “provisional” before the word “government.”
Ambassador Freeman speaks with great intelligence and knowledge in his defense of Senator Hagel. The same cannot be said for Alan J. Steinberg, whose comments betray a willful blindness that is typical of any who justify Israel’s self and other-destructive policies.
Steinberg refers to “highly respected journalist Bret Stephens,” who routinely vocalizes the same disinformation as Steinberg, which is why Steinberg respects Stephens so much.
In the same narcissistic tone with which others have referred to Israeli fatalities, Steinberg completely ignores far greater Palestinian fatalities as well as the documented fact that, according to a joint study between MIT and the University of Tel Aviv, “of the 25 periods of nonviolence lasting longer than a week, Israel unilaterally interrupted 24, or 96%, and it unilaterally interrupted 100% of the 14 periods of nonviolence lasting longer than 9 days.” To anyone who has actually and objectively studied the history of Israel-Palestine the results of this study are not at all surprising.
Another expression of gross ignorance is Steinberg’s claim that “Yasser Arafat had been offered a state by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak at Camp David.†No, Mr. Steinberg, if you would bother to do a little research, you would learn that not only did Barak not produce a single map or written proposal at Camp David, he refused to meet with Arafat except for tea and under the condition that nothing of substance be discussed. Furthermore, Shlomo Ben-Ami, Barak’s chief negotiator at Camp David, said that the ideas presented by Barak at Camp David “fell far short of even modest Palestinian expectations.â€
The suffering of so many innocent men, women and children, and the effect this has upon U.S. standing throughout the world, due to its reflexive support for Israel’s anti-democratic behavior, could easily be ameliorated if Israel Firsters like Alan Steinberg would take a moment to gather the facts instead of expressing their unconscious prejudices that favor one people at the expense of another.
There are many reasons to oppose Chuck Hagel besides Israel, anti-semitism and Iran.
To me he is the stereotypical Archie Bunker type bigot. His policies have been anti gay (even now after his late and self serving apology he doesn’t support equal benefits for gay military families. He is anti-African American (with a 17/100 rating from NAACP and admires Strom Thurmond as a great role model. anti Woman (vs choice and contraception)
and
Hagel has drawn additional heat from insiders who claim he lacks the credentials needed to manage a department as large and essential as the Pentagon.
“Yes, Hagel has crazy positions on several key issues. Yes, Hagel has said things that are borderline anti-Semitism. Yes, Hagel wants to gut the Pentagon’s budget. But above all, he’s not a nice person and he’s bad to his staff,†said a senior Republican Senate aide who has close ties to former Hagel staffers.
“Hagel was known for turning over staff every few weeks—within a year’s time he could have an entirely new office because nobody wanted to work for him,†said the source. “You have to wonder how a man who couldn’t run a Senate office is going to be able to run an entire bureaucracy.â€
Borat quotes journalist Bret Stephens regarding Hagel’s record on Israel as follows:
“‘Mr. Hagel weighed in with the advice that ‘Israel must take steps to show its commitment to peace.’
“‘This was two years after Yasser Arafat had been offered a state by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak at Camp David.’â€
In fact, working in tandem, Barak and Clinton tried to shove a very bad deal down Arafat’s throat during the 2002 Camp David Summit. It could only be rejected. Suffice to quote Shlomo Ben-Ami, then Israel’s foreign minister and lead negotiator at Camp David: “Camp David was not the missed opportunity for the Palestinians, and if I were a Palestinian I would have rejected Camp David, as well.” (National Public Radio, 14 February 2006.)
Oh yeah, the Clinton/Barak ‘burnt offerings’ 2002 Camp David ‘Piece’ plan to the downtrodden Palestinians. A clover-leaf bantustan surrounded by Settlers and IDF bases, where Israel controlled the air rights over NEW PALESTINE, the borders, got ownership of the Gaza and West Bank aquifers, allowed NO agreements with Arab countries: Military or Commercial, and Israel controlled the ingress and egress of all commerce entering NEW PALESTINE! Sounds like Jewish FREED GAZA, huh? :)
Your comments about former Sen. Chuck Hagel provide further confirmation that he would be a strong representative of U.S. as opposed to foreign interests, and that he would work to prevent the Administration from being steamrolled by any country that posed a threat to our national interests. Your apologia of Israel’s actions and intentions has been discredited by many Israelis, including many in positions of power in prior Israeli Administrations and many in the Israeli media. The fact that the Israeli government has sought to shut down dissent and often succeeded indicates that it is not the “beacon of democracy” that those who advocate it should run our foreign policy would like us to believe.
To avoid any confusion, my comment was directed at Borat.
It is interesting to read here a piece with exactly the opposite view (but well-expressed!) that any reasonable person would expect.
Your quote “With regard to the American Jewish community, Mr. Forrestal stated, “…no group in this country should be permitted to influence our policy to the point it could endanger our national security.â€
seems to me quite normal. Surely the USA is an independent country, and so should Israel be. btw I wonder why poor Forrestal had such an intimely and tragic end.