On this morning’s McLaughlin Group, U.S. World & News Report editor Mortimer Zuckerman said that the legislation to recognize the Armenian genocide of 1915-19 poses a foreign policy "disaster" for the United States and is the result of a well-heeled "Armenian lobby" that is giving money to politicians to win their support.
These statements are a tira misu of hypocrisy. Let us count the layers. The lobby stuff would appear to be a coded crack at Walt and Mearsheimer. How many times has the Israel lobby even been mentioned on McLaughlin? But oh that fearsome Armenian lobby. How many Armenians own important daily newspapers and weeklies? How many Armenians are on talking heads programs on Sunday morning? How many of the Democratic presidential candidates depend on Armenian money? In fact it’s the Israel lobby that would seem to have a strong position against recognizing Armenian genocide. Turkey is one of Israel’s few allies in the Middle East. Abe Foxman took Zuckerman’s stance a few weeks back.
Oh, what has happened to Jewish identity!
Of course then there’s Holocaust hypocrisy, the capital-H Holocaust. Zuckerman would go nuts if anyone denied the Jewish Holocaust in Europe. It is important to remember the 6 million so that it will never happen again… etc. But as many as 1.5 million Armenians died at the hands of the Turks 90 years ago and people are merely trying to remember it now, let alone build a museum in Washington or create an industry of reparations. If memory is such a significant issue for European Jewry, why not for the Armenians? Are they not human beings? If memorializing atrocities prevents them from happening again, as the Holocaust Museum maintains, isn’t it wise and humane to make this recognition? In France it is a crime to deny the Armenian holocaust. Here it’s a badge of honor.
Zuckerman’s attitude is so cynical that it makes you wonder about some of the energy behind the recognition of the Jewish Holocaust. How much does that recognition serve larger political aims–as Zuckerman would have the Armenian non-recognition do? To what extent does Holocaust recognition serve to ennoble the existence of the Jewish state?
I noticed that too. Zuckerman is as everyone knows one of the israel lobby's A listers and was out front in supporting the iraq war in 02 and 03.
for him to criticize another country's lobbying efforts as harmful to americas interests is about as preposterous as it gets.
and they aren't even asking for money or soldiers, just recognition. if only israel were satiated by a recognition of the holocaust.
Muslims Against Sharia commend House Democrats and Speaker Pelosi for pressing ahead with an Armenian genocide bill. Republican opposition to the bill is pure manifestation of moral relativism.
Muslims Against Sharia condemn Turkish government for refusing to acknowledge Armenian genocide and recalling its US ambassador in response to the bill.
Source: link to dailystar.com.lb
– AFP
link to muslimsagainstsharia.blogspot.com
– Post
But shouldn't Walt and Mearsheimer, for the sake of theoretical and practical consistency, still be the first to reject the Armenian lobby's efforts? After all, Armenia has zero strategic value, and Turkey is crucial to our Middle East position. If one's going to be a realist about it, why draw a line? And why does this issue, from an American national security point of view, have anything to do with Israel and American Jews? Isn't this posting the ultimate in Judeocentrism? Let realism be realism!
Tom Lantos, Holocaust survivor and chairman of the House Foreign Affairs committee, supported the resolution acknowledging the Armenian genocide. It was his vote, which pulled several other congressmen with him, that allowed the the resolution to pass.
I wonder what his thinking was, given that both Israel and the Israel lobby opposed the bill. Maybe Lantos just thought it was time someone opposed Abe Foxman and took a principled stand.
Oh, the hypocrisy! George Orwell's term "doublethink" comes to mind. If you seek to diminish the Jewish Holocaust you're anti-semitic, but if you DON'T seek to diminish the Armenian Holocaust you're unpatriotic, since it's against U.S. foreign policy interests.
Ironically, I hear that Christian Armenia has great relations with Iran, perhaps because unlike Muslim Azerbajan the Armenian minority in Iran isn't a problem.
The root problem is that both the Jewish and Armenian lobbies are putting the lives of American soldiers in jeopardy.
The same congress that sent the soldiers to the Middle East in the first place, partially to please the Jewish lobby, is endangering those same soldiers to please another lobby, this time Armenian.
The question begins to be: is the United States itself still a nation in any meaningful sense?
Has America become Bosnia-Herzegovina on steroids?
This is a resolution with absolutely no bite. Interviews with some of the congress members that voted yes said that they are for the acknowledgment of the genocide but are are against reparation of any kind. So unless that "Armenian lobby" does some serious arm twisting, nothing is going to come out of it.
Summing up: Zuckerman, schmukerman (or its Armenian equivalent) how frivolous and self-absorbed can ethnic minorities be in time of war?
The "bite" comes from the Turks, not Congress. Congress supplies the "bark" in this case.
And lets not forget the statements about Taiwan wanting to change its name under the UN. Zuckerman going on calling Taiwan's leader some radical freak that wants to destabilize the whole region and US being obliged to save Taiwan will be forced into this war, and US should stop its obligation to defend Taiwan. I thought the China lobby is much stronger than the "non-existent" Israel lobby, so why don't Taiwan just tell the US to go fetch the bone they threw into China?
The (Nationalist)China lobby went out with John Foster Dulles and tailfins on cars. Still, with elections coming who knows what the "hos on the hill" might vote.
Phil – I think Zuckerman is wrong here, and I agree with you that he is kicking W&M beneath the table with his comments about the Armenian Lobby, and of course the Holocaust has been exploited by people seeking to excuse bad Israeli policies and rights abuses, but one could argue that you really have become like the crazy uncle you can't take out in public. Any time a Jew does or says anything you seem to hold them up as representative of some sort of collective conspiracy, when in each instance there seem to be Jews on both or multiple sides of the matter. While this may not be your intent, it is how it comes across, at least to me. I'm sure there is some crank in Istanbul right now typing away about how this whole Armenian Holocaust bill is a trick by the Jews since A Jew congressman sponsored the bill and some prominent jewish congresspeople are supporting it. He will not refer to Zuckerman or Foxman, or any of the Jews who are speaking out against it, and his readers will be indignant that after all Turkey has done for Jews and Israel this is the thanks they get. Am I wrong here?
One thing I believe I can say is true is that Jews are very active in intellectual and political circles, and tend to be as diverse in their perspectives as the United States is as a whole. While you may have outspoken highly influential right wing Jews, you have an equal, if not much greater number of outspoken and highly influential left wing Jews. Since the current Administration is right wing, those right wing jews have the ear of the president, and when we elect a left wing president, those left wing jews will have his or her ear, and if we elected a radically left wing President some radically left wing Jews would have his or her ear. The President ends up listening to Jews of some political variety not because of some plan hatched by the elders, but because many Jews are drawn to those professions that conduct analysis that is useful to Presidents. There are a whole lot more non-Jews doing these same analyses and speaking with the President and who have an equally diverse perspective. I'm curious – Has there been a prominent non-Jew that has said something similar to what Zuckerman has said regarding this Armenian genocide bill?
It's as if the Red Sox were to lose to Cleveland in the series you would blame it all on Youkilis, the Jew, rather than see him as one of 25 guys on the team. Or for every decision that Trent Lott makes you have someone somewhere saying that this is representative of all Americans. How would you like to be thrown into the same pool as Trent?
I may be pointing out the obvious here, and my apologies if I've misinterpreted you, but one could say that you, like some jewish supremacists and actual "jew haters" are so judeocentric in your focus that you confuse your personal perceptual foreground with the larger perceptual background.
About 70 percent of U.S. air cargo headed for Iraq goes through Turkey as does about one-third of the fuel used by the U.S. military there. U.S. bases also get water and other supplies carried in overland by Turkish truckers who cross into Iraq's northern Kurdish region. In addition, C-17 cargo planes fly military supplies to U.S. soldiers in remote areas of Iraq from Incirlik, avoiding the use of Iraqi roads vulnerable to bomb attacks. U.S. officials say the arrangement helps reduce American casualties.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-ex-turkey15oct15,0,4576435.story?coll=la-home-center
From the Los Angeles Times
Zuckerman Schmukerman. We are talking about endangering the lives of US armed forces personnel in time of war in order to commemorate something that happened 90 years ago. Never was treason so frivolous.
David Seaton: "The root problem is that both the Jewish and Armenian lobbies are putting the lives of American soldiers in jeopardy."
David – Is it possible the 'real' reason we are in Iraq is not because AIPAC wants us there, but for other considerations?
Better off for the world that we lose Turkey as a tool. Using them as a forwarding base in the Iraq conquest (as opposed to the uselessness of our resident pit-bull, Israel) and as our counter to Europe's influence (either by diluting their influence in the EU or NATO). If the congress could only do something that would so enrage Israel that they go on and find some sugar daddy, especially given that the power of the Israel lobby are said to be a myth.
I think the whole Jews in China meme was in a different comment string WM..
David – Is it possible the 'real' reason we are in Iraq is not because AIPAC wants us there, but for other considerations?
***********
Of course it is possible. Not *only* AIPAC caused the war in Iraq, but it played a huge part in cooking the hasbara for it.
Invading Iraq was a thieves banquet, there was supposed to be something for everybody, defense industry, Haliburton, oil companies, you name it…. AIPAC's role was in the media climate created before the war and in the backroom political work.
David Seaton – what do you think Congress should do right now with this Bill?
As Montag notes, the Iranian dimension is interesting, although it's been largely absent from other analyses. Iran and Armenia enjoy very close relations, where Iran and Azerbaijan have often clashed over Azerbaijan's US bases and competition for resources in the Caspian Sea (these being more of a factor than restiveness among Iranian Azeris). Ironically, while Ahmadinejad disingenuously calls for more research on the Nazi Holocaust, the Iranian government has long acknowledged the Armenian genocide and Armenians in Iran publicly commemorate it.
In a strange echo of the irony shown in Ahmadinejad's abuse of the Holocaust, Condi Rice's statement after the congressional resolution basically called for more research on the Armenian genocide. If only this statement merited a similar level of outrage in the media – "Foreign Minister of Nuke-power denies genocide, calls for 'more research'" – etc.
Finally – Armenian-Americans DO have a very formidable lobby, but it does not function to advance the perceived interests of the foreign nation of Armenia. It is a truly ethnic lobby – just as a "Jewish-American lobby" could be were it not subservient to a different and more powerful "Israel lobby". Armenian-Americans generally have little interest in identifying with Armenia beyond as a kind of vague ancestral homeland (even if most Armenians in the US don't even come from the area now called "Armenia") but almost all do have an interest in having their own historical identity recognized, crucially including the 1915 genocide. They have organized effectively to promote this interest, and the congressional vote is a sign of this effectiveness. It's a classic example of ethnic lobbying in the US, in the more admirable sense.
Of course it is possible. Not *only* AIPAC caused the war in Iraq, but it played a huge part in cooking the hasbara for it.
I would imagine that it closer to the truth than the lone gunman (lobby) theory, but my comments regarding confusing the perceptual foreground with the much larger background apply here as well. If you're judeo-centric (i.e. you think about jews all the time, either in a positive or negative way) you are likely to overestimate the role of jews. This goes for both positive and negative things. There were plenty of pro-war 'conservatives' in this country who were itching to "kick Saddam's Ass!" and finish up what Daddy started years ago. Indeed when NASCAR joins forces with the New Republic it is a potent mix, but lets not just burn our issues of TNR.
Very good points Kevin.
"Are they not human beings?"
BINGO !!!!
One of the most interesting things that comes out of the Armenian vote is that it is obvious that AIPAC is NOT repeat NOT an Israel lobby. AIPAC is not even really a *Jewish* lobby, it's an AIPAC lobby.
Israel is the last country in the world that wants problems with Turkey. You could say that in the long run Israel's survival in the Middle East depends more on Turkey than on the USA.
If AIPAC had really put Israel first they would have blocked the resolution, but they didn't because that would have put a major dent in *their* Holocaust shakedown. So this affair at least has the merit of showing us everybody's true colors.
In a sort of perverse way the Armenian resolution has put to rest the "double loyalty" accusation. AIPAC's loyalty is only to AIPAC, not to Israel. For AIPAC Israel is simply another instrument in its moral-blackmail toolbox, to be sacrificed to "higher" interests whenever necessary. All you can say to the Israelis is mazel tov, with friends like these…
FOR THE RECORD:
One thing I'd like to make clear in this group therapy session is that I don't begrudge in any way the success that Jewish people enjoy in the USA. I am not really worried about the influence that such an industrious minority has carved out for themselves. Rather I am worried about my own tribe.
Mine is a tribe that once produced, in no particular order, Emerson, Melville, Edison, Ford, Graham Bell, Carnegie, Jefferson, Franklin, Thoreau, Whitman, William and Henry James, John Dewey, Oliver Wendell Holmes jr., Lincoln, Roosevelt, Hemingway and John Ford to name just a few. Now about all we can cough up is a parasitic geek like Bill Gates.What has happened to my tribe? Is it something "they" put in the hamburgers?
I am grateful to the America's Jews for taking up the slack and filling the vacuum produced by the decadence of my tribe. Without its Jews, the United States would be like an obese version of Australia .
"filling the vacuum produced by the decadence of my tribe."
DS, are you sure the vacuum was a product of the decadence of your tribe? Or was the decadence of your tribe the result of certain "empty spaces" in it's cultural fabric being filled by ideas comming from a people not all that interested in the cultural advancement of your society as a whole?
For example: is the enslavement of the american mind to the zionist worldview a consequence of american elites having nothing in their minds worthy of talking about or a consequence of the conqueering of the media spaces by a people interested in the development of society different than yours? Is american society less decadent because it has a pack of zionists filling the empty vision of a benevolent american superpower with the greedy expectations of Greater Israel?
DS – Last I checked your "tribe" was still doing pretty damn well. People call Wall Street a Jewish place, but anyone who has ever spent any time there knows that it is still predominantly a WASP establishment.
American Jews will soon be saying the same things, only this time about the Asian and Indian minorities that are the latest wunderkind workalholic immigrant class.
David Seaton wrote:
"We are talking about endangering the lives of US armed forces personnel in time of war…"
Yes. Exactly. So bring them home now. Especially because this 'war' is not a war of defense, but of imperial conquest.
WM- i agree. the cold war is over. we don't NEED any allies in that region. In fact, we need NOT to have them. what we do in our legistlature is none of turkeys business. Wea re an independent nation and won't be blackmailed into going along with turkeys attempt to rewrite history.
Oarwell,
Yes lets' bring them home (yesterday if possible), but if you study the problem of bringing them home you'll soon see that the cooperation of Turkey would be essential. Fight or leave, Turkey is a key ally. Offending Turkey puts American servicemen and women in needless danger. That in wartime usually constitutes treason.
**********
Allahstein,
If you notice, the list of my tribal titans that I give is packed with poets, philosophers, statesmen, inventors and captains of industry who gave useful employment to millions… nary a lawyer or a stockbroker in the mix. That's what I mean by decadence.
(sings) "Where have all the philosophers, poets and inventors gone? Gone to Wall Street every one. When will they ever learn? When will they ever learn?"
Lester,
At this moment there are thousands of young Americans dangling at the end of a prodigious supply line that ends in the middle of a war zone. Until they are removed from that danger the USA needs all the friends it can get in the region. If Israel is a strategic liability, Turkey is an important asset. Birds don't dirty their nest.
W/O puppets that in every pocket of the world, we are much less likely to go around the world smashing countries. If the occupiers finds out one day that they don't have that country they have beaten to a bloody pulp surround by its cronies ready to hand him the next piece of weapon to smash its inhabitants, they might realize it is not open season on the indigenous people anymore. They just might scoot out of there before they get their Custer's last stand.
Even though I think the genocide by the Ottoman empire should be acknowledged (probably even acknowledging Armenians' role in inciting it), it is probably more important to look into one's own country and see its own crimes against civilization instead of constantly looking to seek other people's faults. The massacre of practically the whole western hemisphere's population is a crime that makes even the devil envy.
So 6 million Jews died over 50 years ago, and 1.5 million Armenians a few years before that.
That's history. 4 million Congolese died in the last 10 years from the effects of war. I've never seen a front page about it…. and that's surely a form of denial. Why no coverage? The wars were over resources – diamonds going to orthodox jewish diamond merchants in holland, and coltan going to east asian industry…
How come American foreign policy in the modern era always focuses on propping up regimes and nations that have nothing in common with American values? I've been to Turkey. Turks don't think like us, and they never will. Instead, they will always look for excuses to hate us and our way of life. The same is true for all the other nations in that region except Israel and Armenia. Israel is already a proven ally. Yet, it amazes me that nobody has ever considered the possibility that Armenia could become America's second most trusted ally in the region. Why? Because Armenians are co-religionists with Americans, and share largely the same values of intense individualism, capitalism and a desire for real and lasting democracy. Lastly, Armenians are known to have a deep interest in pragmatic, capitalistic BUSINESS. How else do you think a Christian minority can be successful and tolerated in a nation like Iran? Let them do business, and they will be happy: no suicide bombings, no jihads, no nuclear threats, no burning American flags. Have our foreign policy geniuses ever thought of this?
In the end it's arguable the moral highground determines everything. Due to selfish moneybags, communication of this high ground takes a long time. Americans, the most conceptual of citizens formed into an entity in history, can be kept ignorant only so long.
Any way you look at it, the humanistic cry against Armenian and Jewish genocide is the moral high ground for my family to die as soldiers in the Middle East. Who look out for American GIs? Our establishment could care less. I, a tax-payer, pay for my own principled genocide in the interest of tribes not my own.
So, what is so bad about Australia? And, compared to what country?