Israel is the Issue

Looking at memeorandum today - one can't help but realize that the most important issue today, foreign or domestic, is Israel. Reading the blogs one can't help but see that we're doing a lousy job discussing it.

Some examples follow:
Krauthammer's piece in the WaPo argues for A Holocaust Declaration - that Bush announce that any attack on Israel will be treated as an attack on the U.S. He believes that this is the least that we can do for this valued ally. (An ally who spies on us, who has never fired a bullet to help the U.S., and whose vaunted intelligence help was clearly of no help in understanding Iraq.) His piece is dishonest in the extreme:

The problem is that Israel is a very small country with a small nuclear arsenal that is largely land-based. Land-based retaliatory forces can be destroyed in a first strike, which is precisely why, during the Cold War, both the United States and the Soviet Union created vast submarine fleets -- undetectable and thus invulnerable to first strikes -- that ensured a retaliatory strike and, thus, deterrence.

Israel has rarely admitted to the existence of its nuclear weapons program, although they have had one for close to 50 years, and helped South Africa develop it's own nukes as well. It's not such a small arsenal - larger than either India's or Pakistan's according to the Federation of American Scientists Estimate. And of course they do have submarines capable of firing nukes - much evidence suggests that they were tested in May 2000.

Ezra Klein notes Obama's apparent capitulation to the Israel Lobby, AIPAC, since the candidate from Chicago has started a blog in Israel - in Hebrew! YNet writes that:

All candidates are well aware of the fact that Israel – and by extension the Jewish vote – are an integral part of the US presidential election.

The Corner at the National Review is the most offensive by far. It refers to a study done by a totally partisan polling organization and triumphs the Protestantization of American Catholics, as supposed their support for Israel is almost as great as the Evangelicals'. He fears that Hispanic Catholics may be harder to fix:

It's not that Latin immigrants are uniquely anti-Semitic (I suspect they're more anti-Semitic than today's Asians or yesterday's Irish and Italians, but less so than Eastern European immigrants); rather, our ability to Protestantize them (in the sense I'm using it) has declined dramatically compared to a century ago.

The issue is Israel - and there has to be a more honest, objective way for us to discuss it.

Comments

[rick]

Did ya ever notice it's always Israel? Not 51% of the time; not 90% of the time; not 99% of the time; ALWAYS.
It's never the barbaric hordes surrounding them. I envy those who are able to use simplistic history because it requires no effort. To discuss anti Americanism, one only need go back to the beginning of the Bush administration. To discuss anti Semitism, one need not go further than 1967.

I often refer to Nasser and Haffas Hassad and other early Baathists. They managed to convince the world that Goliath (325 million greater Arabians) is really David and that David ( 7.2 million Israelis of which 1.5 million of them are Arabs) is really Goliath. It is one of the most astonishingly successful propaganda efforts ever. The left in the west bought it hook, line and sinker and they are utterly unaware that it has even occurred. This is all very well documented by correspondence between Arab leaders during the sixties and by transcripts of speeches delivered during Arab gatherings. It requires a little effort because the western press is blatantly pro Arab, so most just willingly repeat the propaganda of Nasser and his crowd. It is all terribly sad but intellectual laziness is epidemic in the west. Ignorance is easier to understand in the Islamic world as they have no real access to information.

[bbbustard]

Thanks for the comment - Great to hear from you. Cancer is not being very nice to Mme Bustard so far this year. They have had to install a mediport, no big thing, as well as a P.E.G. tube in her stomach - much more so.
You and I seem to be living on different planets - "the western press in blatantly pro Arab"??? You must be thinking of America's leading newspaper - the New York Times which in the late 60's and early 70's was run by noted anti-semite and pro-Arab A.M. Rosenthal. It must be the pro-Arab media that has convinced our government to make Israel the largest beneficiary of aid year after year after year. Huh?
Do you actually believe what you write?

[Rick]

You are correct in your analysis. Anyone who does not grasp that the west has tilted away from Israel and towards the Arab world is residing in a parallel universe. It will ultimately swing back however, as even the most liberal elites in places like Paris and Rotterdam and San Francisco will eventually be repulsed by the level of terror and barbarism. I did not say that our government tilts away from Israel. (aid?) Perhaps you read the comment hastily. I'm not sure how a Canadian Jew is evidence of something grandly political. It is rational and not irrational to believe that places that spawn terror should be bombed back to the stone age after innocent civilians are evacuated.
Perhaps you are more perceptive than I.

I have missed all the posts critical of inhumane acts committed by the other side. (Islamists) Perhaps you can point me towards those and I will realize that you are balanced after all.

I am always sorry to hear that Mesdames is having difficulties. I pray that she is able to put this behind her. Our best to her. She is always in our thoughts. We were having dinner Friday evening and my wife asked out of the blue, "how is Mrs. Bustard"? She always asks though.

[Rick]

By the way, I had lunch at the Stage on Thursday. I see that you took down your Christmas lights. Where do you park? I have often thought that if I lived in Manhattan, especially midtown, that I probably wouldn't bother buying a car at all. My company has a cargo van, as we do 'pick ups' in Manhattan. We (my son and I) parked it on west 31st and took a taxi to avoid having to deal with traffic.

Round trip taxi fare including tip: $26.00
Two sandwiches at the Stage and a medium cheesecake to go: $115.00
One hour parking for the van: $38.00
Watching New Yorkers being New Yorkers: priceless

[bbbustard]

Thanks for your kind wishes, and you're right.The lights are down, and we don't own a car. At two different points over the years we've had one, but it's absurd. Parking is exorbitant, as is insurance. We never used it during the week. We do go away a lot on weekends, especially in the summer, but if we can't take a train, we rent. The vast majority of the time we use the subway over a taxi - it's cheaper, and usually much quicker.

[bbbustard]

You did talk of the wildly biased media. A symptom of such bias would be a reduction in the support our government gives to Israel. Rosenthal was running what was probably the most important media outlet during the era when you argue that anti-semitism took over the media.
I hope you are right that the West's support for Israel will return - it has decreased as Israel stopped being the underdog, and has instead chosen to be the expansionist occupier.

[Rick]

I am envious that you are better able to make my point with your words than I can with my own. Kudos. Life is simple when you are content to begin history in 1967. That allows one to say that the Arab attack in 1973 was an attempt to recover occupied territory and the western world buys the fable because of its short memory. That and a befuddling predisposition to hate Jews. It is very easy to argue that much of Israel is occupied by Arab refugees from all over the Arab world who have decided to call themselves Palestinians in very recent years. Of course, that would require a tad bit of intellectual probing.

In May of 1967 Egypt had more than a million troops and hundreds of tanks massed on the southern Israeli border and Nasser was threatening to annihilate Israel and drown all the Jews in the Mediterranean. The Israelis believed him, to Nasser’s great misfortune as they had been attacked previously following the same threats and troop activities, and Israel preemptively struck. Look at the map of Israel in 1967. What, pray tell, do you believe Arabs had on their minds? What were their intentions? Do the same in 1956 and 1948. Have you ever given this a moment’s consideration? Who has been the aggressor? I know that’s a silly question as you have decided to stand with the beheaders and parents who dress their two year olds in headbands and camo with toy dynamite belts and raise the rascals to believe that God will reward them for walking into a Bar Mitzvah and blowing up themselves and old folks and children. I side with the civilized world and we are destined to never agree.