<p>The problem with the Israel Lobby is the way it stifles dissent in a totalitarian fashion. The important thing to remember is that it is a Israel Lobby and NOT a Jewish lobby. Many Evangelical Christians are part of the network.
It’s horrible to call it a Jewish Lobby because many Jews I know are not pro-Israel and want to have nothing to do with it. Chomsky comes to my mind. Even Madeline Albright was annoyed by the power of the Israel Lobby.
The way the lobby stifles debate is they call it a jewish lobby themselves and then attack anyone who criticizes the lobby as anti-Semitic. If this thread goes on any longer you’ll see that happening here also. That train is never late.</p>
<p>“The only country that has no inspection of a nuclear stockpile is Israel.”</p>
<p>Source? I seriously doubt this is accurate or even relevant, because 1) Israel never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty so is not required to undergo inspections, and 2) Israel is a member of the IAEA. </p>
<p>“The problem with the Israel Lobby is the way it stifles dissent in a totalitarian fashion.”</p>
<p>In what way does it do this? Are there nasty people in black suits knocking on your door right now, threatening to take away your computer and throw you in jail for your comments? </p>
<p>Have you read this? <a href=“Harvard Kennedy School”>Harvard Kennedy School;
<p>It’s a rebuttal of the original paper you cited. I’d be interested in your thoughts on it.</p>
<p>“The paper was originally commissioned in 2002 by The Atlantic Monthly, which then rejected it.[3] The paper was finally published in March, 2006 by the London Review of Books. Philip Weiss discusses some of the background to the creation of the paper in an article in The Nation.[4] A third, revised version addressing some of the criticism was published in the Fall, 2006 issue of Middle East Policy. The authors state that “In terms of its core claims, however, this revised version does not depart from the original Working Paper.”[5]”</p>
<p>Did you notice that this paper was so poorly researched that the authors had to publish an explanation for its readers in th Nation, the Communist publication? The authors are allying with a group that I assume the people posting here also believe in. Are you singing the Internationale today?</p>
<p>By the way, the US and UN have not stopped aid to the Palestinians contingent upon their not using Gaza as a launching pad for missles against Israel. There was another recent award to them. I assume it was used to buy missles. </p>
<p>The Palestinians had a chance, with Gaza, to take some developed territory left from Israel and have a good base upon which to grow economically and agricuturally. Instead they destroyed what had been left and use it instead for another military zone. There would be a lot more aid to them if they could actually do something positive, instead of just fighting with each other and anyone else that they find handy to shot and kill.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I think if you dig around a little you’ll find that ardent supporters of aid to Israel are responsible for a staggering percentage of all political donations to candidates for Federal office in the US. That’s not an excuse, but it’s an explanation. That’s how our system works. If you don’t like it, you are free to start an Anti-Israel PAC and start raising money. (But you’ll have to use a different acronym.)</p></li>
<li><p>The vast majority of the aid to Israel is targeted to purchasing U.S.-manufactured military equipment, and basically constitutes a subsidy to the U.S. defense industry. Which, by the way, also contributes a staggering percentage of the money raised by federal candidates. Not an excuse, but an explanation. Aid to poor countries, by the way, is usually structured to benefit American farmers, something that often has quite negative effects on agriculture in the country we’re supposedly helping. Farmers have not been as effective as the defense industry at lobbying, though.</p></li>
<li><p>From the mid-70s until fairly recently, the U.S. intelligence services had basically abandoned human intelligence (i.e., spies). The Mossad hadn’t. I suspect assistance from the Mossad was critical to U.S. intelligence for decades, and probably still is (although the Mossad seems not to be as great as it once was). If it wasn’t for help from the Mossad, how would the Department of Defense know what the CIA was really doing?</p></li>
<li><p>For many years – but not so much recently, for obvious reasons – the Israeli Defense Forces did much of the “field testing” of U.S. sophisticated military technology under actual battlefield conditions.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>EDIT: Whoa, collegialmom! The Nation is NOT a “communist publication”!</p>
<p>"The Nation (ISSN 0027-8378) is a weekly [1] U.S. periodical devoted to politics and culture, self-described as “the flagship of the left”. [2] Founded on July 6, 1865 as an Abolitionist publication, it is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. It is published by the Nation Company, L.P. at 33 Irving Place, New York City.</p>
<p>The Nation has bureaus in Budapest, London, and Southern Africa and departments covering Architecture, Art, Corporations, Defense, Environment, Films, Legal Affairs, Music, Peace and Disarmament, Poetry, and the United Nations. The circulation of The Nation is rising and was last placed at 184,296 (2004), surpassing the neoliberal The New Republic, the neoconservative The Weekly Standard, and the conservative National Review. The Nation magazine has lost money in all but three or four years of operation and is sustained in part by a group of more than 25,000 donors called The Nation Associates who donate funds to the periodical above and beyond their annual subscription fees.</p>
<p>The publisher and editor of The Nation is Katrina vanden Heuvel. Former editors include Victor Navasky, Norman Thomas (associate editor), Carey McWilliams, and Freda Kirchwey. Notable contributors to The Nation have included Albert Einstein, Martin Luther King, Jr., Gore Vidal, Hunter S. Thompson, Langston Hughes, Ralph Nader, James Baldwin, Clement Greenberg, Tom Hayden, Daniel Singer, I.F. Stone, Leon Trotsky, Franklin D. Roosevelt, James K. Galbraith, John Steinbeck, and Jean-Paul Sartre.</p>
<p>History</p>
<p>Abolitionists founded The Nation in July 1865 on “Newspaper Row” at 130 Nassau Street in Manhattan. At the time, Joseph H. Richards was the publisher and E.L. Godkin, a classical liberal critic of nationalism, imperialism, and socialism [4], was the editor. The magazine would stay at Newspaper Row for the next ninety years. Wendell Phillips Garrison, son of William Lloyd Garrison, was literary editor of the periodical from 1865 to 1906.</p>
<p>In 1881, newspaperman-turned-railroad-baron Henry Villard acquired The Nation and converted it into a weekly literary supplement for his daily newspaper the New York Evening Post. The offices of the magazine were moved to the Evening Post’s headquarters at 210 Broadway. The New York Evening Post would later morph into a tabloid: the New York Post was a left-leaning afternoon tabloid under owner Dorothy Schiff from 1939 to 1976, and has been a conservative tabloid owned by Rupert Murdoch since that time, while The Nation became known for its left-liberal politics.</p>
<p>In 1918, Henry’s Villard’s son, Oswald Garrison Villard, took over as editor of the magazine and sold the Evening Post. He remade The Nation into a current affairs publication and gave it a liberal orientation. Villard’s takeover of The Nation prompted a roughly 50 year monitoring of the magazine by the FBI. The FBI had a file on Villard since 1915. Almost every editor of The Nation from Villard’s time to the 1970s was looked at for “subversive” activities and ties.[5] When Albert Jay Nock, not long later, published a column criticizing Samuel Gompers and trade unions for being complicit in the war machine of the First World War, The Nation was briefly suspended from the U.S. mail.[6]</p>
<p>During the late 1940s and again in the early 1950s, a merger was discussed among Kirchwey - on The Nation’s side (later McWilliams when he took over) - and Michael Straight of The New Republic. The two magazines were very similar at that time - both were left of center (The Nation further left than TNR); both had circulations around 100,000 (TNR had a slightly higher circulation); and both lost money - and it was thought that the two magazines could unite and make the most powerful journal of opinion. The new publication would have been called The Nation and New Republic. Kirchwey was the most hesitant, and both attempts to merge failed. The two magazines would later take very different paths, with The Nation having a higher circulation and The New Republic moving more to the right.[7]"</p>
<p>Above quoted from Wikipedia, as it apparently is becoming “the source.” The Nation has been well-known over the years for its publication of left-wing and Communist doctrines and manifestos, such as by Leon Trotsky (see above.) It has had many other left-wing writers over the years, but was considered a notable American journal for Communism during that movement’s peak in the US during the 20th century.</p>
<p>JHS makes excellent points. A good deal of the money that Israel is given in aid is used to purchase American defense equipment (well more than $7B in the last decade). So, basically, this “aid” comes right back into the American economy.</p>
<p>And the notion that “The Nation” is a communist publication is beyond ludicrous. I guess anything that isn’t “The National Review”, “The Weekly Standard” or “Frontpage” would seem left leaning!!</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Leaving aside the “communist” claim, describing The Nation as leftist would be a claim as outrageous as saying that grass is green. I assumed that Collegialmom was using hyperbole to make a point.</p>
<p>To say that The Nation is leftist is uncontroversial. To say that it is Communist (with a capital C, no less), is irresponsible and silly. I don’t think collegialmom was purposefully using hyperbole, and I don’t think her last post shows much awareness that the history she quotes undercuts, rather than supports, her original statement.</p>
<p>I never said it wasn’t leftist…I said it wasn’t communistic. Last I checked, there still was a difference.</p>
<p>collegial"mom" you cite the paper when it was in the Atlantic Monthly and that there were revisions, so you assume that means there was poor research. I am not sure what your academic experience is, although I can make a safe guess from your comment about the Nation being a Communist paper. But those revisions, its called PEER REVIEW. All serious research goes through that stage. I won’t address the part about israel/palestine because this is the thread to focus on the Israel Lobby, which is a separate issue, although somewhat linked.</p>
<p>JHS very interesting points. But didn[t you kind of prove my point?</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I never said the Lobby should be banned, they played a political game and are quite successful. However it’s not illegal to point out that they hold such influence over our government in policy-making decisions. I have no contention with what you said.</p></li>
<li><p>Let’s leave the military-industrial complex for another thread.</p></li>
<li><p>Mossad SPIED on us. I doubt that helped the United States reputation wise much. Plus Mossad had little spying capability outside of the Levanthan. It’s kind of circular. Palestinians ,Jordanians, and Egyptians hate the USA for supporting Israel and Israeli spies tell us what they are up to. </p></li>
<li><p>Fieldtesting can be done in other ways.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The Israel Lobby convinces US Federal Gov. politicians that we should ally with Israel. Let’s start with the Strategic Asset? How has the United States strategically benefited from allying with Israel?</p>
<p>Has it made us friends with the people who we depend on for our energy?
Have they given us millions in aid and grants?
Have they increased our popularity in the world arena?</p>
<p>I don’t see a problem with an allignment between the US and Israel, a country that’s </p>
<p>– the only democracy in the region
– the only country in the region that doesn’t treat women as chattel
– the only country in the region that shares much of our euorpean-based past.</p>
<p>Some other comments for rationalwar:</p>
<p>Has it made us friends with the people who we depend on for our energy?
– Maybe we shouldn’t depend on those people so much… </p>
<p>Have they given us millions in aid and grants?
– They have given us culture, scientific breakthroughs and learning; I’d say plenty.</p>
<p>Have they increased our popularity in the world arena?
And you think cosying up to the Arab world will increase our popularity in the world arena? (Dream on.)</p>
<p>“'collegial"mom” you cite the paper when it was in the Atlantic Monthly and that there were revisions, so you assume that means there was poor research. I am not sure what your academic experience is, although I can make a safe guess from your comment about the Nation being a Communist paper. But those revisions, its called PEER REVIEW. All serious research goes through that stage. I won’t address the part about israel/palestine because this is the thread to focus on the Israel Lobby, which is a separate issue, although somewhat linked."</p>
<p>No, it was rejected by the Atlantic Monthly, which had commissioned it. That information was in the Wikipedia article originally cited by “rational war.” Rejection by the magazine (Atlantic Monthly) that commissioned it is a good example of peer-review, especially as they may have already paid an advance for it. They read it and rejected it, and one can assume that was because it was either not well-researched or it was poorly written.</p>
<p>As to the Nation, it’s about as far left as one can go. The article I cited above refers to it being left of the old version of the New Republic, which in the past was about as left as one could get without falling off the diving board. It moved more to the center subsequently, as I think THEY THOUGHT that would sell more magazines.</p>
<p>Below are excerpts from a review of the Nation, which is how I remembered it (I did not write this, but it rings true):</p>
<p>"There are few things in this gray world that can make the editorial positions of the New York Times appear reasonable. The Nation magazine is one of those few things. For umpteen years, this drumbeater for Stalinism* has been beating the drum for “progressive” causes around the world.</p>
<p>And what a world it is. For when you open the pages of The Nation, you stumble into a fifth dimension in which up is down, in is out, Che and Fidel are heroes, Walter Duranty is a journalist, Howard Zinn an historian, America the Great Satan, and Stalin was only misunderstood. This magazine is really something. Its rhetoric is so overheated as to make the American Spectator look phlegmatic. And while among its self-proclaimed missions include the revelation of the hypocrisies in the middle and (especially) on the right, this magazine commits so many errors of omission and commission as to remove any credibility it might have as a critic of mainstream American policy…</p>
<p>You probably get the idea that I don’t like this magazine. You’re right: I don’t. And one of the reasons is that for decades, this beacon of leftist light was a strong supporter of communism in general and Stalinism in particular. For these people, the anti-anti-communists remain heroes and those who “stood up” to McCarthyism in the 50’s are saints. Ignored in this sewage is the fact, known for decades and again confirmed by the Venona Papers, that the Soviet Union actively financed the American Communist Party and its front organizations and that treason was rampant among the its members and its fellow travelers."</p>
<p>And why does Egypt need aid?</p>
<p>As soon as they get the chance, Israel’s neighbors will drive it into the sea. They’ve already tried several times. This is the reality. Personally I believe it will happen, eventually.</p>
<p>Allying with these people, to try to keep them from being driven into the sea by their neighbors, as has already been attempted several times, is a moral choice. IMO.</p>
<p>You are, of course, free to choose otherwise.</p>
<p>Any influence by a foreign government on our national interests is, by definition, a bad thing. Period!</p>
<p>“Any influence by a foreign government on our national interests is, by definition, a bad thing. Period!”</p>
<p>So do you want to stop our agreements and alignments with:</p>
<p>Mexico (YES!)</p>
<p>Japan</p>
<p>Germany NO MORE BASES OR MILITARY HOSPITALS THERE, LET’S STOP SUPPORTING THAT GOVERNMENT!</p>
<p>Egypt LET THEM GET FUNDING FROM IRAN, THEY DON’T NEED US!</p>
<p>Canada NO MORE MILITARY OR TECHNICAL COOPERATION, BAN BILL GATES FROM BUILDING A NEW TECH CENTER IN VANCOUVER. STOP ALL FLIGHTS IN AND OUT OF BRITISH COLUMBIA!</p>
<p>France</p>
<p>the UK NO MILITARY FLYOVERS ANYMORE, GO STRAIGHT OVER ANTARCTICA AND THEN DOWN, BUT NOT OVER CNANDA</p>
<p>Pakistan THE WAR THERE ISN’T WORKING ANYHOW</p>
<p>Jordan AGAIN, LET IRAN FUND THEM</p>
<p>The UN in general, this would certainly wipe a lot of alignments.
NO MORE CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE UN. KICK THEM OUT OF NYC AND MOVE THEM TO KENYA!</p>
<p>GET RID OF THE WORLD BANK AND IMF FUNDING FROM THE US!
WE GIVE WAY TOO MUCH TO POORER COUNTRIES AND ALL THEY DO IS SEND THE US IMMIGRANTS ANYHOW, LET THEM FUND THEMSELVES.</p>
<p>MOST OF ALL, DO NOT HELP ANY DEMOCRACIES, ANYWHERE. HOW ABOUT WE JUST STOP FIGHTING TERRORISTS AND FUND THEM, TOO?</p>
<p>I do think that total and absolute isolationism has its argument. It certainly saves a lot of money, and helps those pesky enemies of the US, who are people with mothers, too. I think the US tried it before WWII. Results of that experiment satisfactory?</p>
<p>^Wow - from what rock did you crawl out under, Cruella? I guess we’re all anti-Semitics, communist propaganda supporters and isolationists then. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t see a problem with alignment between the US and Israel either - I do see a problem with throwing them large amounts of aid and allowing our healthy questioning of such practices to be shot down by people who push an Israeli agenda over a US one. Protect your own people - everyone else comes after that. Israel subscribes to this philosophy, why aren’t we?</p>
<p>The difficulty of the publishing of the initial paper has more to do with the influence of the Israel Lobby than the quality of the work.</p>