The Washington Post Identifies Iraq War as a Pro-Israel Cause

Lihp, it's not just Phil …
http://tinyurl.com/2b44cb

Phil, you seem to be forgetting that many progressives on the left — and I am not talking about Paul Berman — were in favor of overthrowing Saddam on human rights grounds. One of these, whom I know you know well, cannot be called pro-Israel.

Intervention has a long and sordid history in U.S. foreign policy dating back to the Philippines. Do we intervene to grab territory or to do good? That has essentially been the question. And often the two goals have been confused in the minds of the proponents. It has made for some odd coalitions in recent years.

Hawkish Democrats formed the backbone of the Cold War foreign policy consensus — and thus dates back more than 50 years.

I agree with Lihp that you are oversimplifying. Lots of people of different stripes supported war in Iraq for a bunch of different reasons. The Neocons happened to be managing the policy and put together the pro-war coalition. I think their reasons went beyond just Israel.

But I agree that Gitlin's comments are pap. I expect much better from a guy as smart and experienced as he is.

Larry, Good analysis. And maybe I oversimplify, but the neocons I have known have always lived and breathed Jewish chauvinism. The stances I associate with the couple neox I know– anti-affirmative action, free Soviet Jewry, anti Soviet satellites– all involved Jewish questions. I have always wondered what else they cared about, and part of the fallout in the U.S. from the Iraq war is the (legitimate) suspicion they have cast over their motivation. Which is exactly what the anti-Zionist Jews predicted. In the end I think there's going to be an open discussion of all this, and that's to the good.

I think the reason there was so little opposition to going to war with Iraq was that Jewish commentators, writers, reporters, who generally set the tone in such matters, were too conflicted to take a stand. Normally they would have seen right though Bush's transparent rationales for war. But this time around, they wondered if perhaps the president's neocon chorus was right–"the war will help Israel."

I remembered in March of 2003 when Dem Rep. Jim Moran urged Jews to come out publicly against the war: "If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this," Moran had said at the time. "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."

We all know now that the leadership of most Jewish organizations favored attacking Iraq, but at the time Moran's statements were considered "shocking," by the White House, "offensive" by Democratic party leaders and anti-Semitic by some Jewish leaders, who also demanded that Moran resign. Moran apologized profusely to save his career. Thereafter no one would make the mistake of honestly explaining how and why the war got started.

some jews surely beleived, as did many non-jews, that taking out Saddam Hussein and enabling a democratic state to develop in Iraq would be a good thing. That it would be good for Israel for there to be a democratic state in the Middle East with greater hope for its youth and that a tyrant like Saddam who had fired missles into Israel and threatened to attack it, did not hurt either. Many people, both Jews and non-Jews, who want to see peace in the Middle East could see the value in taking out Saddam before he gained greater power. Remember, the oil for food scandal and Saddam's own campaign to convince his foes that he had WMDs gave those who were following events there reason to be concerned. Hindsight is 20/20 and of course if people knew that this is how the war would end up, they would opt for a different strategy.

Phil Weiss – your attempts to make it appear that world jewry tried to pull the wool over the eyes of the world is pathetic. Grow up already.