I can’t really improve on this superb post by occasional TAC contributor Glenn Greenwald. Among the main points: how the slavish, every T crossed and I dotted adhesion to the Israeli line by virtually every member of Congress is not the position desired by a majority of the American people. And he notes that Washington rushed shipments of cluster bombs to Israel in time for this offensive. The idea that America isn’t implicated, and won’t pay a price, for Tel Aviv’s slaughter of innocents is terribly naive. Make sure to follow the link to Nir Rosen’s powerful, and oh so true, column on the matter.
What will the blowback be?
13 Responses to What will the blowback be?
-
Corie Whalen says:
Both Scott, and the last person to post, Bill, have points, but I think that a fusion of the two views would be best.
Scott is correct in saying that America will be implicated. As we know, entangling (and worse, unconditional) alliances are a terrible idea. I don’t advocate America giving weapons to Israel – not by a long shot. The LAST thing this country should be doing is getting involved in the Middle East if we value our own domestic tranquility.
On the other hand, I wouldn’t go so far as to say what Israel is doing is ‘slaughtering innocents’ – yes, there have been civilian casualties, which no matter what, is tragic, but Bill is right about Israel having the right to defend herself … The issue, however, is that the U.S. is so intimately involved in the scenario. THAT, more than any other thing (from an American perspective) is the major issue at hand.
Let the country defend itself as it chooses – but not with American weapons.
-
Bill Pearlman says:
Corie:
Got a question. Israel makes its own drones and missiles. Tanks, guns and numerous other things. Yes the F-16′s and certain other things are made in America. And if you want to cut, that talk to production line workers in a lot of American cities. But I digress. The alternative to hitting a Hamas leader in his apartment is lining up the tanks and killing everybody in your path. What say you. -
Scott McConnell says:
Bill,
To answer you requires longer than I have to spend, and a full answer requires some acknowledgement that an Islamist irredentist government in Gaza did not just appear overnight and begin firing rockets at Israel. The inhabitants of Gaza, are, of course refugees and their descendants from the part of the former Palestinian mandate– which is now Israel. There has to be some acknowledgement and compensation for their displacement. Had their been that — a genuine Palestinian state and some kind of general solution to the refugee problem–Hamas wouldn’t be relevant and popular or even exist. The organization, remember, was originially funded by Israel as an alternative to the nationalist PLO. Anyway, that’s the beginning of my answer: more generally, I think the only long term solution to Israel’s security dilemma it to try to make peace with the Arabs–both the Palestinians and the neighboring states, rather than continually fighting them. There’s a decisive majority of the Arab world that wants to co-exist with Israel, but Israel wants no part of it. It seems to prefer “peace” on its own terms–expanded West Bank settlements, apartheid conditions on the West Bank, the encirclement of Bethlehem. Not surprisingly, it’s not acceptable. -
TomB says:
Fair questions Bill, even if you do posit some assumptions that seem unwarranted. (E.g., that by Israel giving up the West Bank it is “taking away Israeli’s right of self-defense.”)
But what then are *your* thoughts as to what, if anything, Israel should do? Hang on to the West Bank in perpetuity? Okay, but how do you then think that could happen without … a perpetuity of this terrible violence?
I’m with Corie in terms of firstly saying that whatever, the U.S. ought not be involved in any of this, period.
But aside from that don’t you think that if Israel was to return the West Bank at least and agree to a divided Jerusalem that this would hugely change the situation for the better? The world I think would joyously grasp Israel’s right to defend it’s ’47 borders, and this includes the arab world to as shown by the Arab League’s *unanimous* endorsement of the recent Abdullah proposal. And so almost whatever the nuts amongst the Palestinians did in Gaza and the West Bank it seems to me Israel wouldn’t face more than a smidgen of criticism for defending itself then. And in the worst-case scenario I suspect the world wouldn’t even mind putting in an international force to prevent those nuts from doing what they want and bringing down a terrible Israeli response at that point given the situation, which response I again think would be almost universally understood as being legitimate given that very different situation.
So at the very least don’t you think that giving back the West Bank and agreeing to a divided Jerusalem is a big big big step in the right direction? Indeed, doesn’t it seem that this is what Olmert himself even is hinting at?
The world has moved beyond whatever happened in ’48 and before I think. THE biggie that I think history confirms in importance that it simply isn’t going to get over what happened in ’67 and afterwards with the settlements and occupation, no?
So where do you think my thinking has gone wrong here?
-
“How do you sell that scenario to you average Israeli. [sic]”
You remind them that only by separation from the West Bank can they demographically secure themselves. If the status quo is sustained then the majority of “Israelis” will in fact be Palestinians.
This will leave Israel in a rather awkward position given that they will only be able to sustain themselves as a democratic country via ethnic cleansing.
See here:
-
Bill:
I wasn’t claiming that Israel does not contribute to her own self-defense. I was simply commenting on the fact that America DOES aid, and that makes us tacitly complicit in whatever Israel is doing – whether or not individual American taxpayers endorse it. And, as Scott notes, that has the potential to rile up terrorist groups who, for whatever reasons, legitimate or not, hate Israel.
Now, simple laws of association play themselves out: Israel attacks Gaza (you may or may not think they have the right to – personally, I say let Israel defend itself. Who am I to claim it can’t?). Israel attacks Gaza with full U.S. backing and aid. The use of U.S. aid makes us complicit in the attacks in the eyes of Hamas – which, in turn, leads to blowback; HOPFEULLY not in the form of an attack on American soil – but possibly …. Therefore, I genuinely want to know: WHY is America so intent on aiding Israel unconditionally when, by doing so, we are putting our own country at risk? This is not a question that seeks to be ‘anti-Israel’ – in fact, I think what Israel is doing is warranted – it’s simply the U.S. aid part that worries me.
Personally, I won’t be presumptuous enough to claim that I have enough knowledge about this situation to put forth a legitimate solution. I’m speaking, as an American, from a purely non-interventionist perspective – why should we endanger ourselves by providing Israel with aid when it puts our own security at risk? You’ve already made it clear that Israel has the ability to defend herself, Bill – so why doesn’t she continue to do so, without the U.S. involving itself so intimately?
-
If settlement makes a nation illegetimate, or at least makes any and all terrorism against that sate legitimate, then Mr. McConnel has just called for terrorism against American, Australia and New Zeeland. It is nice to see just how quickly pathalogical hatred of Israel turns into treason. What is conservative about undermining the legitimacy of the United States?
As for TomB’s assertion, he is a little confused. The Arab League plan demands that Israel accept an unknown number of refugees and give up territory. That amounts to suicide. Add a call for the Jizya and it would be Khaibar all over again.
The simple fact is taht Israel, in a fit of leftist delusion and malaise from conflict, gave Gaza to the PLO. Hamas was then voted in and started to attack Israel. The peace agreements are proven worthless by Hamas as well as Arafat’s launch of the Second Intefada as a negotiating ploy in 2000.
What would you have Israel do? It gave up land, only to have this used to attack Israel. -
Ron wrote:
“As for TomB’s assertion, he is a little confused. The Arab League plan demands that Israel accept an unknown number of refugees and give up territory. That amounts to suicide.”
Well firstly if the Arab League/Abdullah plan is all that bad how come any number of prominent, middle-of-the-road Israelis have said it is well worth exploring and Israel itself said it “welcomed” it? (As did the U.S.?)
The reason is because it essentially offers exactly what Israel has always said it really really wants, desires and requires: Formal recognition by the great bulk of the arab states. And again the Arab League *unanimously* endorsed that.
And the reason it is an anathema to folks like Ron is because it takes Israel up on its long-standing formal position which is that it *is* willing to give up the occupied territories given the right situation, which is why Israel hasn’t formally annexed them.
But to folks like Ron, to quote him again, giving up territory “amounts to suicide.”
No wonder Rabin was assassinated.
Interesting question though for folks like Ron. Given that even the U.S. would never support Israel if it openly took his position, what do they advocate Israel doing? Lying about it to the U.S.?
And no, settlements on occupied territories don’t necessarily render a nation illegitimate. As the vast majority of countries and the U.N. has said the Israel established in ’47 and ’48 is entirely legitimate, and I think that Walt and Mearsheimer are entirely right that while the founding of Israel wasn’t the prettiest thing in the world, it was no uglier than the founding of many if not most other modern countries.
But what’s clear though is that it is Israel itself that is calling that legitimacy into question by its settlement policies. By hanging on to them for so long now and appearing to avoid any peace deals that would require their return it makes it look like the very nature of Israel is that of an essentially aggressive, expansionist and ugly apartheid state, so causing many people to start talking about how even Israel proper ought to be regarded as illegitimate.
Not right I don’t think, even terribly wrong and unfair, but you can’t go and do something wrong such as taking and holding those territories and then dictate the limits of other people’s reactions and outrage.
And to say that the exceedingly mild comments here—all of which are obviously concerned with the interests of the U.S. above all and none of which really even object to the continued existence of Israel—shows some “pathological hatred of Israel” doesn’t exactly help your cause, Ron.
Some people have somewhat of a “pathological love” for their country the U.S.A. And for you to go slamming them for that is not the most attractive bit of chutzpah.
-
eep says:
The US needs to stay out of the Israeli and Palestinian race war. It hasn’t been worth the blow back so far. Death, lost liberty, war, and debt has been the price. They are going to be fighting until one of them is driven to extinction. If people want to fight over a worthless piece of desert they can. It is none of my business unless it is made my business through US involvement.
There are better places to live in the world. Our neighbors aren’t bulldozing and shooting up our homes. Canada isn’t firing rockets in our cities. I don’t fear being ethnically cleansed. People can migrate. The Iraqis learned how to real quick. What happened to them was a tragedy but they valued their lives and weren’t stupid enough to stay in harms way.
-
daveg says:
Ron, your analogy is faulty on many, many levels. The US, Australia were settled during a time when the moral code of the west (and the world) was very different. That is just a fact of life.
Are you suggesting Israel be judged by these older values, Ron, while the rest of the world must use modern days value systems? Seems like a double standard to me.
And the way we deal with disputes over territory have changed as well. Witness the way the IRA was dealt with as well as the way the Basque are handled in Spain. We are just not in the same old days of scorched earth that you obviously pine for.
There are other more serious differences that make you analogy faulty as well. In particular, The US and Australia don’t hold some three million people in a quazi prison camp without right of voting or ability to control their own destiny. And they have not done so for 40 years.
Why not incorporate the natives into your country the way the indians have been in the US, and get with modern times?
But beyond even these obvious failings to your analogy, Ron, if Israel want to really settle Israel then why don’t they just do it. Drive the 3 million plus pals out of the west bank and Gaza and take it over.
And then man up and deal with the consequences, instead of belly aching and asking the US to bomb Iran for you.
What many American’s can’t state is having the US back this ‘settlement,’ especially without receiving any of the benefits and much of the costs.
-
Pingback: Eunomia » Not Our Problem
-
Some of the almost insane misdirection here regarding the history of Palestine is almost disturbing. Is Israel paying people to lie or are they misinformed to such a degree that they are blind to an apartheid regime involved in over six decades of ethnic cleansing thinly veiled in propagandizing in the media.
A people with this kind of sociopathic disorder will not go unnoticed forever.
Scott:
I put this question to you. Say you were PM of Israel. You have an entity on your southern border that constantly bombards the southern half of your country and is constantly improving the range of their missiles. And is allied with a country ( Iran) that is pushing for a nuclear bomb and is constantly calling for your extermination. And this entity is governed by an organization that is committed to your destruction. Without ambiguity. So, I ask you what do you tell the people of your country and what is your plan. Please tell me. And may I remind you of perhaps the most pertinent fact. I’m assuming based on what I read that your totally in favor of a complete withdrawal from the west bank with an ensuing hamas takeover. If you take away Israel’s right of self defense. Which you advocate doing. How do you sell that scenario to you average Israeli. I really would like to know your thoughts.