Opinion

Don’t fund Iron Dome

Giving Israel $1 billion in fungible money for a weapon system will only encourage further war crimes.

Editor’s Note: The following piece was submitted to The Forward in response to an opinion piece they published.  They declined to run the response.

Like Nora Berman (“I’m a leftist. Progressives’ move to strip Iron Dome from spending bill smacks of ignorance,” Forward, Sept. 22, 2021), I am a leftist. But unlike her, I think the attempt to remove Iron Dome from the spending bill was the moral thing to do.

Let me stipulate at once that I consider intentional or reckless attacks on civilians to be war crimes, violations of international humanitarian law, and of just war principles.

How can I oppose attacks on civilians and still support cutting funding from a program designed to protect civilians?

The first point to note here is that money provided to the Israeli government is fungible. That is, Washington is not sending technology to Israel, but dollars, and by reducing the amount of money that Israel needs to spend on Iron Dome, we are correspondingly increasing the amount of money that Israel gets to spend on the rest of its military budget, on its attack planes, tanks, rockets, and artillery that have slain so many Palestinian civilians. (Keep in mind, that according to the Israeli human rights group B’Tselem, in its various assaults on Gaza since 2008, Israel has killed 2,685 Palestinian civilians, while Palestinian rockets and mortars have killed 29 civilians in Israel – almost a 100:1 ratio.)

Many point out that any government has to prioritize the protection of its citizens. But consider what the Israeli government would do if the United States did not provide $1 billion in funds for Iron Dome. It could reduce its other military spending – spending on those attack planes, etc. – by $1 billion and transfer that money to Iron Dome spending. If it did that it would provide its population with a higher level of protection while reducing its own capacity to endanger Palestinian civilians. A win-win. If it did not transfer the money, well, that suggests that protecting its own citizens might not be its top priority.

How can we refuse to provide funding to protect civilians? Ms. Berman asks. But does this concern apply to all civilians, or only to Israeli civilians? For a lot less than $1 billion, we could protect the lives of many civilians by sending bomb shelter construction materials to Gaza, not to mention shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles.

Of course, it will be objected that better bomb shelters in Gaza would lead to more reckless behavior by Hamas and Islamic Jihad leaders. Being better protected they would have less reason to refrain from launching rocket attacks from Gaza.

But the same logic applies in the other direction. Following Israel’s 2008-09 Operation Cast Lead, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni commented that Israel had demonstrated “real hooliganism.” [1] The only thing that keeps Israeli leaders from pummeling Gaza even more often than they already do is the knowledge that their attack will unleash Palestinian rockets. If Israel were invulnerable to those rockets, it would be less deterred from bombarding Gaza.

A defensive weapon like Iron Dome, when combined with one of the world’s leading offensive military machines, is not defensive.

Iron Dome, bomb shelters, and so on seem like totally defensive measures. But it is a truism of peace research that “When combined with offensive arms, even apparently purely defensive arms can become highly offensive.” [2] That’s why the Kennedy and Reagan bomb shelter programs were so dangerous – they signaled to the Soviet Union that Washington was more willing to launch a nuclear strike. That’s why the peace movement opposed Reagan’s Star Wars program, which likewise threatened to render the Soviet retaliatory second-strike capability worthless. If a country decided to field only defensive weapons, that would be a wonderful thing. But a defensive weapon like Iron Dome, when combined with one of the world’s leading offensive military machines, is not defensive.

Pressure Israel to stop building settlements, says Ms. Berman. But giving them $1 billion in fungible money for a weapon system that will encourage further Israeli “hooliganism” is not likely to put much pressure on Israeli leaders.

The progressive legislators who wanted to remove those billion dollars from the spending bill were doing the right thing.

Stephen R. Shalom is professor emeritus of Political Science at William Paterson University and a member of Jewish Voice for Peace of Northern NJ. The views expressed are his own.

Notes

  1. Public Committee Against Torture in Israel (PCATI), No Second Thoughts: The Changes in the Israeli Defense Forces’ Combat Doctrine in Light of “Operation Cast Lead,” Nov. 2009, p. 28, citing an interview with Israel Channel 10 news, Jan. 19, 2009.

2. Dietrich Fischer, Preventing War in the Nuclear Age (1984), p. 58.

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If the Cuban government launched 3000 rockets and missiles aimed at Florida (as Hamas has done in Gaza, aimed at Israel), what do you think the response of America would be, or of any American President?

As has been demonstrated repeatedly, Iron Dome benefits Gaza as well as Israel. When the idiots who run (and control) Gaza choose to launch the odd missile at Israel civilians – successful interceptions do not require counter measures. In the absence of this purely defensive system, Gaza suffers when Israeli civilians are killed.

Further, Gaza already possesses the single most effective deterrent to Israeli weaponry, simply stop attacking Israel.

I find it interesting that the article was rejected by The Forward. It seems that with the new editor the former NYT’s Israel correspondent Jodi Rudoren has moved it significantly to the right. See

https://www.cjr.org/special_report/the-forward.php

Not surprisingly Peter Beinart has moved on from what was a leftist Jewish paper to another mainstream Zionist outlet

Written in 2016 but truer than ever –

https://www.thenation.com/article/archive/american-weapons-are-blocking-true-peace-between-israel-and-palestine/

“American Weapons Are Blocking True Peace Between Israel and Palestine”

OK, so. if Israel won’t have the Iron Dome missiles as agreed than:

1. Israel will also have to attack Hamas targets inside the cities of the Gaza Strip, when ever even one Gazan rocket hit Israel. It is more important to thwart an injury and prevent the killing of its civilians, than to hit the rocket launchers even at the cost of harming the lives of Gazan civilians. The Gazans will pay a high price. Immigration from Gaza, mainly to Western Europe, will increase.

2. As Islamic terrorism further harms Israel, Israel will be forced to occupy Gaza again, eliminating as many terrorist organizations as possible, and the rest will sure flee to Sinai. The civilian population will only suffer from the war that will be imposed on Israel and on them by their Hamas leaders.

3. Iron Dome is an original Israeli weapon system that includes a number of groundbreaking developments in rocket propulsion, agile navigation, and warhead. America wanted to get into this project much to gain these innovations, which also save billions of dollars and years of research and tests.

4. The Americans also set conditions for the missile assembly plant to be in America in partnership with Raytheon. The plant was established in Florida and provides jobs to thousands of Americans. Why should Biden now fire them?

5. The security cooperation between America and Israel is very large and wide and includes thousands of items a year. Both sides transmit intelligence, technology and train together throughout the year. This cooperation helps America technologically and saves it much of expenses.

6. Should America stop military aid unilaterally and suddenly, Israel will have to upgrade its strong defense industries. to produce its own planes and ammunitions, and will be able to forge alliances with other countries. Israel can help them too, as she does with the US. 

7. The American-Israeli alliance contributes to both sides . Only a small handful of members of Congress whose hatred exceeds their intelligence makes background noises but does not really affect reality. Meanwhile you can dream that Israel will disapear in 20 years. You should improve you Hasbarah to the lever of pro-Israel Hasbarah.