Jeff Blankfort at Counterpunch shows that the Council on Foreign Relations’ elite knows what’s going on in Israel/Palestine to a degree that the American public does not. It is further evidence of the media’s failure to inform the public what so many are saying behind closed doors:
What can be concluded from the answers to questions that dealt with the Israel-Palestine conflict is that the general public forms its opinions from what it hears and reads in the mainstream media which are largely biased towards Israel while CFR members have greater access to as well as interest in obtaining more accurate information and are less susceptible to pro-Israel propaganda. That apparently not a single US newspaper saw fit to report on the opinions of CFR members, under those circumstances, is not surprising.
The evidence…That on a list of countries that will be the "more important as America’s allies and partners" in the future, just 4 per cent included Israel which placed it in a tie with South Korea and far behinf China, 58 per cent, India, 55 per cent, Brazil, 37 per cent, the EU, 19 per cent, Russia, 17 per cent, Japan, 16 per cent, the UK and Turkey, 10 per cent, Germany, 9 per cent, Mexico, 8 per cent, Canada, Indonesia, Australia and France at 5 per cent. CFR voters were allowed to make up to seven selections…..
What was particularly revealing is that "in the dispute between Israelis and Palestinians," only 26 per cent of the CFR sided with Israel, compared with 51 per cent of 2000 members of the general public who were polled over the same period. While but 16 per cent of CFR members sided with the Palestinians compared to 12 per cent of the public, 41 per cent of the CFRers sided with "both equally" as opposed to 4 per cent of the public. Supporting neither was 12 per cent of the CFR and 14 per cent of the public…
That the CFR has not had a major hand in making US Israel-Palestine policy nor is it in agreement with those who did is strikingly revealed by the response of its members when asked their opinion of US Middle East policies. The problem, according to 67 per cent of CFR members (as compared to 30 per cent of the public) is that the US favored Israeli too much, while only 2 per cent (as opposed to 15 per cent of the public) believed that US policy overly favored the Palestinians.. Twenty-four percent of the CFR believed US policy "struck the right balance" as did 29 per cent of the public.
