Phil Weiss thinks the Israel lobby has been transformed by recent events, and we are seeing it in decline (even as the damage is done in the Middle East). J Street, a Lebanese-American envoy, Barack Hussein Obama, talking to Iran. Etc. Jeff Blankfort says the lobby's powers are still at their apogee:
Whereas there used to be a few
members of Congress who would challenge Israel, there is only Kucinich
now. I haven't even mentioned the problems of who is going to negotiate
for the Palestinians? Abbas is dead meat, Fayyad is seen as America's
man and Washington won't talk to Hamas, which is itself divided. What
needed to happen was that Obama should have forcefully condemned
Israel's bombing of Gaza with the US of US weaponry and declared a
moratorium on further arms shipments to Israel, which both Ford and
Reagan had done, and announced that in the interest of both Israelis
and Palestinians and for the entire world, this conflict has to be
brought to a peaceful and just conclusion. The world would have
applauded, as would have most Americans and the lobby would have been
shaken and run for cover as it did when Bush Sr. went on TV denouncing
the lobby's efforts to get $10bn in loan guarantees. Obama not only
didn't come anywhere close to that, he couldn't utter a word of
criticism of Israel. Mitchell, schmitchell, it don't make a bit of
difference, I'm afraid. But, again, we will see very soon, and may I be
wrong.
Exactly right. Please tell your friend Mohammad–he needs eye glasses.
I'm not sure if the 6 counties (aka N. Ireland) analogy is right. Granted, the *Irish* public wanted a deal, but the Irish American community is full (still) of hardcore Republicans. Fundraisers for the Provo's in Southie bars and so on…
I can sum up the reason that there is no chance of peace in the foreseeable future in three words "right of return".
No peace treaty that has the "right of return" will ever be acceptable to Israel, since it means the destruction of Israel rapidly followed by another Holocaust.
No peace treaty that lacks the "right of return" will be acceptable to the Palestinians for the foreseeable future, since they think they have a right to return to a country that most of them have never been in and they would rather fight a losing battle forever than give it up.
Here is a question to any Palestinians out there. Would you rather have peace with no right of return or eternal warfare with Israel kicking your asses as often as you kill and endanger enough of their citizens to get them over their reluctance to stomp you? Because those are your options. Pick one.
Many Jews think they have the eternal right of return to land they have not lived in for thousands of years, if ever. Goose, gander.
Many would also fight a losing battle forever than give it up.
Israel's ability to kick ass rests on a lone superpower bankrupt, and in decline. Power is shifting, globalization enmeshes all. Oil will remain king commodity for decades at least.
Israel's reluctance to stomp them hinges only on PR needs mandated
by the simple fact that even a lone superpower and its midget sidekick realize from time to time brute force needs "cover."
Time is not on Israel side.
Israel can keep moving towards slow suicide by following its current path, or it can reconcile with those it dispossessed. Pick one.
Many Jews know, legally, they have the right to live in Israel.
But you keep fighting your losing battle. It is quite humorous to watch your eyes pop open from time to time when you realize your moral bankruptcy.
Right of Return is a highly negotiable concept-and has been ever since the early 50's, when various Arab countries made peace feelers to Israel that were rejected. (Moshe Sharett wanted to pursue them, but he was usually out-maneuvered or over-ruled)
Basically Israel allows a small (symbolic, perhaps–or fairly substantial–it depends) number of refugees to return to their homes, and financial compensation for the remainder. No one is entirely satisfied, and no one is entirely humiliated. Israel gets to remain Israel, and FINALLY has a peace settlement.
That has been offered, and turned down by the arabs.
they think they have a right to return to a country that most of them have never been in
—–
"180 rule" to the rescue!
Under the Israeli Law of Return most people of Jewish heritage can immigrate to Israel and receive Israeli citizenship with all the privileges and obligations thereto.
~
Great!
Now maybe the Jews will have a place to go when the next Hitler, or Lance, raises his antisemitic head and tries to kill all of the Jews.
Columnist banned for approaching the truth: Is the truth anti-semitic?
February 7, 2009
Michael Backman, an Australian writer now living in London, was effectively booted from the pages of The Age, a Melbourne paper, for supposedly penning an “anti-semitic” column.
Below is the column in question. Is the truth anti-semitic?
Israel living high on the back of the USA
Michael Backman
The Age,
JAN 17 — There’s a memorable scene in the Stephen Spielberg film “Munich”. After the 1972 Munich Olympic Games killings of Israeli athletes, Prime Minister Golda Meir tells confidants she wants to show the plotters that killing Jews “is expensive”. She then organises for the assassination of each of the plotters.
Today, it is Israel itself that has become expensive. Most directly, it is very expensive to the US, which subsidises and arms it.
But Israel’s utter inability to transform the Palestinians from enemies into friends has imposed big costs on us all. We have paid for Israel’s failure with bombs on London public transport, bombs in bars in Bali, and even the loss of the World Trade Centre towers in New York.
It is not true that these outrages have occurred because certain Islamic fundamentalists don’t like Western lifestyles and so plant bombs in response. Rather, it is Israel — or more correctly the treatment of the Palestinians — that is at the nub of these events.
The world’s Muslims have no head: no overarching caliph or pope equivalent exists — no single power source with whom to negotiate. Instead, Islam is remarkably decentralised. So, how extraordinary that Israel and the West have managed to unite this headless, diverse, dispersed grouping without any institutional framework, around just one issue — anger at the treatment of the Palestinians.
Otherwise dispersed groups of Muslims do seem to feel for one another in a way that Christians and others do not. In this respect, the international Islamic community is like a body: kick it in the leg and the rest of the body feels it. Kick it hard enough and the entire body will be energised to defend itself. Pictures of distraught Gazan mothers beside the mutilated bodies of their children are circulating right now among Muslim communities worldwide. It is pictures like these that make them want to do something.
Consider Malaysia. Every citizen of this outpost of Islam has printed in his or her passport that the passport is not valid for Israel. And given that Malaysians are not allowed to hold dual citizenship, this essentially means that every Malaysian citizen, including the 40 per cent who are not Muslims, are banned from visiting Israel.
“When will Malaysia recognise Israel?” I once asked the then finance minister. “Once Israel treats the Palestinians better,” was his reply. How would he determine that? “When the Palestinians tell us,” he said. It is not Israel’s right to exist that is at issue.
The enmity many Muslims now feel for Israel has nothing to do with religion. The historical persecutors of the Jews have been Christians — their punishment for the death of Jesus. Jews and Muslims have lived in peace for hundreds of years in many parts of the Islamic world. When Catholic Spain and Portugal expelled its Jews, the Ottoman sultan in Istanbul invited them in. It is the Palestinian issue that has ruined all this.
Of course, today Israel must defend itself. If the residents of Bendigo started firing rockets into Melbourne you would expect Melbourne to retaliate. But what must Melbourne have done to Bendigo to make them do such a thing? Constantly slapping an opponent in the face, kicking it down to its knees, and watching it struggle in the dirt will not teach the opponent to love or respect you. It teaches only hatred.
Persecuting people does not weaken them. Israel should know that. The Jews have been persecuted for centuries. It didn’t destroy them but gave them the impetus to survive.
One characteristic that is common among persecuted groups is a strong investment in education — when people’s physical wealth is in danger of destruction from war and persecution one store of wealth that stays with individuals even when they must flee as refugees is education. It explains why such groups often insist on their own schools — education is too important to be entrusted to others.
Hamas did not enjoy the support of all the people of Gaza. It does now. Why does Israel keep getting it wrong?
Trekking in Nepal is fashionable among young Israelis. So much so that many shops in Kathmandu and Pokhara have signs in Hebrew. But once you get on the trekking circuit and speak with local Nepalese guides and guesthouse operators you soon discover how disliked the Israelis are. Many guesthouses in this poor country will even tell Israeli trekking groups that they are full rather than accept them. This has nothing to do with religion or politics: Nepalese people are some of the warmest, most hospitable in the world. Rather, they say that the young Israelis are rude, arrogant, and argue over trifling amounts of money even though they clearly have means.
Israel needs to change. The Parsees of India might provide a model. The Parsees are a very tiny, very rich ethnic and religious minority. They own perhaps most of the land in central Mumbai as well as the country’s largest conglomerate. And yet ordinary Indians admire and respect them. Violence against them is unthinkable.
How have they achieved this? They are not flashy or arrogant. Their overriding characteristic is a deep interest in the welfare of others. They have established hospitals, libraries, schools, museums and many other institutions and, most importantly, not for the Parsee community exclusively but for everyone. So the Parsees have peace and the Israelis do not. — The Age
Now maybe the Jews will have a place to go when the next Hitler, or Lance, raises his antisemitic head and tries to kill all of the Jews.
berel-bot
—–
Wow! I never knew someone could have a Napoleon complex *for* you. One minute, according to the berel-bot, non-Jews are impotent in the face of superior Jewish might, the next minute we're choosing to "kill all the Jews" and are only kept at bay because they have this Blofeld type secret enclave (I just saw a Bond marathon) that no one knows about. It *is* pretty cunning to hide in the middle of millions of Arabs, you devils!
Wow, sorry Phil. It appears that I must follow my destiny and disregard all the respect I have for you, your sense of justice, your courage in making your voice heard…and have you killed cuz the berel-bot sez I am only burying my murderous impulses for the moment (directed seemingly only at a select group based on race…I mean, religion…or maybe it was ethnicity…or was it nationality?).
Maybe Phil will be safe from my bloodlust because some have declared he is not a "real" Jew…or Jewish enough…or not observant…or was it because he married outside of his tribe?
F*ck this is hard! I don't know who to kill. Can I spare the self-hating Jews? I've really developed a warm relationship with Dr. Finkelstein (among MANY others btw) and his voice of sanity is one of the things that helped me see things more claerly as far as I'm concerned (chris – I used to think that the Israelis were 100%the "white hats," no doubt about it, and the Arabs wouldn't stop being mean – yes, I was a bit of a dumbass, I must say so myself).
The next Hitler…wow. Well, this time when I attack Russia in winter, it will go better. I'll give my troops those hot cocoa packets with the little freeze dried marshmellows in them (the secret is to sift the marshmellows out first because otherwise they dissolve before the cocoa itself is mixed). Maybe if Eva Braun knew a little Home Ec things might have turned out much different.
You make Godwin's Law turn over in his grave, berel-bot.
~