[Peace-discuss] Re: [Peace] Saturday's Flier

[Stuart Levy]

On Thu, Feb 05, 2009 at 12:32:35AM -0600, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
> You don't seriously think that Israel would have attacked Gaza against the 
> wishes of the USG or without its knowledge.  No one does.

No, but it does make a difference whether Israel felt the need
to seek specific US permission for the Gaza bombardment,
or just assumed (correctly) that the US would not object
(passive support).

Re assembling specific evidence, see Bob Naiman's column
from a month ago,
   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-naiman/calling-out-bushs-war-in_b_154825.html
   "Calling Out Bush's War in Gaza"

in which he points out a specific Israeli request last summer for
'bunker-buster' bombs which the US judged were intended for use against Iran.
They refused, but soon after agreed to sell Israel another model of
bunker-buster bomb, which ``Israeli military experts said
"could provide a powerful new weapon" in Gaza''.  And those bombs were
indeed used to destroy tunnels during the Gaza bombardment.

That's real evidence for something like permission,
or maybe better, "active support".


Also: we should be having this discussion on peace-discuss,
not on the peace announcement list.  Cc'ing peace-discuss instead.

Finally: the apostrophe police have struck.  I've changed the Subject line.

> Even John Mearsheimer (co-author of The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, 
> which makes the best case for the untenable thesis that the Israel lobby 
> forces US policy against the US "national interest") points out that
>
> "The Bush administration backed Israel’s creation of a major humanitarian 
> crisis in Gaza, first with a devastating blockade and then with a brutal 
> war."
>
> <http://www.lrb.co.uk/web/15/01/2009/mult04_.html>
>
>
> Brussel Morton K. wrote:
>> Comments follow.
>> On Feb 4, 2009, at 6:51 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
>>> There's no doubt that the attack on Gaza was done with US permission (and 
>>> would not have been done without it).
>> What is your evidence (not inference)?
>>> The Bush administration had withheld permission for an attack on Lebanon 
>>> until the summer of 2006, and they pointedly released the information 
>>> that they had withheld permission for an attack on Iran.
>> Yes, the U.S could have stopped it (if it knew what was to happen and 
>> wanted to stop it), but this is not equivalent in my view to saying that 
>> it gave its permission. How do you know whether permission was asked? It 
>> may have simply informed the U.S. that it was going to act, and the U.S. 
>> could have indicated that  "It's your affair"? I don't believe that 
>> everything Israel does requires U.S. permission. In any case, I don't 
>> think the permission word strengthens the pamphlet for its intended 
>> audience.
>>>
>>> And the suppression of the Palestinians is a central part of the US war 
>>> in the ME. Some say it's the central point.  Al-Qaeda said that its 
>>> 9/11/2001 attacks in the US were reprisals for (1) US troops in Saudi 
>>> Arabia; (2) sanctions against Iraq; and (3) the suppression of the 
>>> Palestinians.
>> So far as I know, the U.S. has not declared war on Gaza or the West Bank. 
>> That its policy is to weaken or destroy Hamas via its Israeli client is 
>> not quite the same thing. I simply found the statement is too imprecise, 
>> too blunderbuss.
>>>
>>> The US support for the suppression of the Palestinians -- i.e., US 
>>> rejection of the two-state solution -- is not just a favor to the 
>>> Israelis. A truly independent Palestinian state would surely be another 
>>> opponent to US domination of the region (one reason that right-wing Arab 
>>> governments are at best lukewarm supporters of the Palestinians).
>>>
>>> US support for Israel -- so strong that some think the control runs the 
>>> other way (cf. tail/dog) -- exists because of Israel's crucial aid in US 
>>> foreign policy, ever since their defeat of secular Arab nationalism in 
>>> 1967.  The "stationary aircraft carrier" as Chomsky says received weapons 
>>> shipments during the Gaza assault that were being positioned for use 
>>> elsewhere in the ME, as they regularly are.  --CGE
>> Yes, but not relevant to my objections.
>> I just think that the pamphlet would be more effective andno less true 
>> without those words. You are free to disagree.
>> --mkb
>>>
>>>
>>> Brussel Morton K. wrote:
>>>> My taste would be to omit the words in the heading:
>>>> */Permission/ *
>>>> and the phrase
>>>> *as Part of the US War in the Middle East** *
>>>> I don't know whether permission was actually requested, although the 
>>>> U.S. may have been informed and did nothing.
>>>> The "U.S. war in the Middle East" arguably does not literally encompass 
>>>> the Palestinians or even Hamas, despite our government's antagonisms 
>>>> and/or unconcern, and despite what our client there does. Apologies for 
>>>> replying at this late date.
>>>> --mkb
>>>> On Feb 4, 2009, at 9:27 AM, David Harley wrote:
>>>>> If this meets general approval I will have it printed.
>>>>> <Gazaposter4.pdf>_______________________________________________
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