Iran?

[DaneGer]

what do u guys think we should do about Iran? or even North Korea for that matter?

[ForemanRules]

Nothing!!!!

[Baby Faced Assasin]

I think we should order a bunch of pizza and have it sent to their house.


~bfa~

[Grizzly]

Here's a very unpopular sentiment. Since both countries have professed an undying hatred for the US; since both countries have promised to do us harm; since both countries actively threaten us in order to extort money and food I propose we kick the dogshit out of them. Much like one would do if he was in a bar and a little prick was talking shit.

Osama bin Laden made it clear that he planned to do us harm. He did. So why would it be less believable when it come from the Islamic-fundamentalist gov't of Iran? Answer: it's not.

If a fight is imminent, it is always the best idea to get off first.

[joe shmoe]

i'm with grizzly.

give them 30 days to stop making nukes. if they dont, give them 7 more days. if they still dont, give them the "third strike" chance and offer up 3 more days. then bomb the fuck out of them. they had 3 chances. they didnt use them. that means they're stupid. they know what happened to saddam....they deserve a bombing if they dont take advantage of the three chances.

BTW...the three chance thing is just to appease the rest of the world. so they cant say we didnt try.

have a nice day

[Grizzly]

Fuck the rest of the world! Strike swift, strike hard and we won't have to fuck around ever again. Because the rest of the world is still pickled in their own pussy juice, they won't even do a goddamned thing.

Did the Brittish ever take opinion polls? No. Did Ghengis Khan? No. Did the Romans? No!

[Bob Smith]

Originally Posted by ForemanRules

Nothing!!!!

We would be pretty well fucked from one corner of the earth to the other if we do nothing. As Grizz said, Iran and North Korea both hate us with a passion and wouldnt hesitate to bomb us. The good thing is that our nuke aresnal is WAY bigger than theirs and is readily available all around the world within a few minute notice. The bad thing is that would mean worldwide nuclear war and I dont own a bomb shelter.

Another impending problem is the new Palestinian elections and the fact that they have pretty much vowed to wipe isreal/Jews off the face of the planet. Based on their past, I wouldnt be surprised if they attacked Isreal before the end of 2006. The Middle East just before much more volatile.

[Grizzly]

Originally Posted by Grizzly

Fuck the rest of the world! Strike swift, strike hard and we won't have to fuck around ever again. Because the rest of the world is still pickled in their own pussy juice, they won't even do a goddamned thing.

Did the Brittish ever take opinion polls? No. Did Ghengis Khan? No. Did the Romans? No!

And, while we're at it, let's annex the desert shithole. No more begging for oil. We'll TAKE IT! Is that wrong? I don't think so. If some guy tried to mug me on the street and I succeeded in beating him down, would I not take his money because it's his? Nope! I would take everything he owns. Including his shoes. Just because I can and he deserved it.

[Weatherlite]

Iran is already on the chopping block...we're just not sure if they're next or next after that. Do a quick search on the internet about Iran and terrorism and you'll find postivie proof that they are supporting the terrorists with weapons and cash. So, that means they're on our list anyway. Just a matter of time.

[ForemanRules]

Originally Posted by Bob Smith

We would be pretty well fucked from one corner of the earth to the other if we do nothing. As Grizz said, Iran and North Korea both hate us with a passion and wouldnt hesitate to bomb us. The good thing is that our nuke aresnal is WAY bigger than theirs and is readily available all around the world within a few minute notice. The bad thing is that would mean worldwide nuclear war and I dont own a bomb shelter.

Another impending problem is the new Palestinian elections and the fact that they have pretty much vowed to wipe isreal/Jews off the face of the planet. Based on their past, I wouldnt be surprised if they attacked Isreal before the end of 2006. The Middle East just before much more volatile.

Most of the problems other countries have with us are caused by our actions......America needs to stop oppression and warring with others......look at the history surounding the situation for several decades,,,,,,,not just a year or two.

[ForemanRules]

How America Determines Friends and Foes
Noam Chomsky
The Toronto Star, March 14, 2004

Every self-respecting president has a doctrine attached to his name. The core principle of the Bush II doctrine is that the United States must "rid the world of evil," as the president said right after 9/11.
A special responsibility is to wage war against terrorism, with the corollary that any state that harbours terrorists is a terrorist state and should be treated accordingly.

Let's ask a fair and simple question: What would the consequences be if we were to take the Bush doctrine seriously, and treat states that harbour terrorists as terrorist states, subject to bombardment and invasion?

The United States has long been a sanctuary to a rogues' gallery of people whose actions qualify them as terrorists, and whose presence compromises and complicates U.S. proclaimed principles.

Consider the Cuban Five, Cuban nationals convicted in Miami in 2001 as part of a spy ring.

To understand the case, which has prompted international protests, we have to look at the sordid history of U.S.-Cuba relations (leaving aside here the issue of the crushing, decades-long U.S. embargo).

The United States has engaged in large- and small-scale terrorist attacks against Cuba since 1959, including the Bay of Pigs invasion and the bizarre plots to kill Castro. Direct U.S. participation in the attacks ended during the late '70s — at least officially.

In 1989, the first president Bush granted a pardon to Orlando Bosch, one of the most notorious anti-Castro terrorists, accused of masterminding the bombing of a Cuban airliner in 1976. Bush overruled the Justice Department, which had refused an asylum request from Bosch, concluding: "The security of this nation is affected by its ability to urge credible other nations to refuse aid and shelter to terrorists, whose target we too often become."

Recognizing that the United States was going to harbour anti-Castro terrorists, Cuban agents infiltrated those networks. In 1998, high-level FBI officials were sent to Havana, where they were given thousands of pages of documentation and hundreds of hours of videotape about terrorist actions organized by cells in Florida.

The FBI reacted by arresting the people who provided the information, including a group now known as the Cuban Five.

The arrests were followed by what amounted to a show trial in Miami. The Five were sentenced, three to life sentences (for espionage; and the leader, Gerardo Hernandez, also for conspiracy to murder), after convictions that are now being appealed.

Meanwhile, people regarded by the FBI and Justice Department as dangerous terrorists live happily in the United States and continue to plot and implement crimes.

The list of terrorists-in-residence in the United States also includes Emmanuel Constant from Haiti, known as Toto, a former paramilitary leader from the Duvalier era. Constant is the founder of the FRAPH (Front for Advancement of Progress in Haiti), the paramilitary group that carried out most of the state terror in the early 1990s under the military junta that overthrew president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

At last report, Constant was living in Queens, N.Y.

The United States has refused Haiti's request for extradition. The reason, it is generally assumed, is that Constant might reveal ties between Washington and the military junta that killed 4,000 to 5,000 Haitians, with Constant's paramilitary forces playing the leading role.

The gangsters leading the current coup in Haiti include FRAPH leaders.

For the United States, Cuba has long been the primary concern in the hemisphere. A declassified 1964 State Department document declares Fidel Castro to be an intolerable threat because he "represents a successful defiance of the United States, a negation of our whole hemispheric policy of almost a century and a half," since the Monroe Doctrine declared that no challenge to U.S. dominance would be tolerated in the hemisphere.

Venezuela now presents a similar problem. A recent lead article in the Wall Street Journal says, "Fidel Castro has found a key benefactor and heir apparent to the cause of derailing the U.S.'s agenda in Latin America: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez."

As it happens, last month, Venezuela asked the United States to extradite two former military officers who are seeking asylum in the United States. The two had taken part in a military coup supported by the Bush administration, which backed down in the face of outrage throughout the hemisphere.

The Venezuelan government, remarkably, observed a ruling of the Venezuelan supreme court barring prosecution of the coup leaders. The two officers were later implicated in a terrorist bombing, and fled to Miami.

Outrage over defiance is deeply ingrained in U.S. history. Thomas Jefferson bitterly condemned France for its "attitude of defiance" in holding New Orleans, which he coveted. Jefferson warned that France's "character (is) placed in a point of eternal friction with our character, which though loving peace and the pursuit of wealth, is high-minded."

France's "defiance (requires us to) marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation," Jefferson advised, reversing his earlier attitudes, which reflected France's crucial contribution to the liberation of the colonies from British rule.

Thanks to Haiti's liberation struggle of 1804, unaided and almost universally opposed, France's defiance soon ended. But, then as now, the guiding principles of American outrage over defiance remain in place, determining friend and foe.

[ForemanRules]

Middle East Diplomacy: Continuities and Changes
Noam Chomsky
Z Magazine, December, 1991



On October 30, the US-brokered conference on the Middle East opened in Madrid. The conference was described on all sides as a "historic event," a remarkable achievement of George Bush's diplomacy and the tenacity of his Secretary of State James ***** in exploiting the "historic window of opportunity" opened by changes in the world order. These observations are not unrealistic, when understood within their historical and policy context -- a question of perspective and judgment, of course. I will review the way these matters look to me, contrasting that picture with a different one that dominates public discussion.
Three related questions arise at once about the current diplomatic efforts: First, why are they taking place right now? Second, do they signify a departure from the traditional US stand? Third, what is the meaning of the disputes between the US and Israel?

The answer to the first question is clear enough. The Bush administration desperately needs a foreign policy success to obscure the outcome of its war in the Gulf: hundreds of thousands killed and the toll mounting as a long-term consequence of the devastating attack on the civilian society; the Gulf tyrannies safeguarded from any democratic pressures; Saddam Hussein firmly in power, having demolished popular rebellions with tacit US support. US government interests and goals are hardly concealed. Washington seeks "the best of all worlds," New York Times chief diplomatic correspondent Thomas Friedman explains: "an iron-fisted Iraqi junta without Saddam Hussein," a return to the days when Saddam's "iron fist held Iraq together, much to the satisfaction of the American allies Turkey and Saudi Arabia," along with the Reagan-Bush administrations, which gave unwavering support to their murderous ally. These images, however, cannot be left in the public memory in the United States or elsewhere. The reality can be effaced by what the press describes as the "remarkable tableau" in Madrid, with its promise of a "sweet victory" built on the ruins of the Gulf slaughter.1

Furthermore, the Arab clients who lined up in the US war must be helped to maintain some credibility. This requires gestures to suggest that the US-led crusade aimed at something more than merely reinforcing US dominance over the oil-producing regions, with the family dictatorships of the Gulf playing their traditional role as an "Arab Facade," in the words of British imperialists of earlier days.

It is also necessary to divert the attention of the American public from the social and economic crisis resulting from Reagan-Bush domestic programs. Under such conditions, any powerful state would seek diversionary foreign policy exploits.

The second question is also readily answered: the available evidence reveals no departure from the traditional US stance on a Middle East settlement. In fact, another reason for the current diplomatic efforts is that the US monopoly of violence now offers a "historic window of opportunity" to advance traditional US goals.

The urgency of the current Bush-***** diplomacy is understandable. Not surprisingly, Washington refused to permit the Madrid conference to be derailed by the intransigence of Israeli hawks, even at the cost of a confrontation with the government of Israel and its domestic lobby.

That brings us to the third question, the Bush-Shamir conflict. Though real, it is narrowly circumscribed. There is no fundamental disagreement about the denial of Palestinian rights or US support for measures to extend Israeli control over the territories, just as both governments agree that Soviet Jews should be denied freedom of choice and directed to Israel, with the US paying the bill on humanitarian pretexts. Not an eyebrow is raised when the Jewish Agency meets in Jerusalem to demand that Jewish organizations "unite to sabotage" any efforts to open US doors to Soviet Jews, while in the Israeli press, Minister of Immigration and Absorption Michael Kleiner explains how he will induce Germany to reverse its decision to admit Soviet Jews but no other refugees: "Germany has already fulfilled its quota for discrimination concerning Jews in this century," Kleiner will inform these German criminals, "and the time has come for it to treat Jews just like other people" -- denying entry to Jewish refugees, so that they can be forced to Israel.2 The cynicism of the enterprise will surprise only those unfamiliar with the vastly more shameful practices of the 1940s, well into the post-Holocaust years when the miserable remnants of the extermination camps were treated in much the same way.

The Bush-Shamir conflict arose over the timing of US guarantees for loans -- which may eventually turn into grants -- for the theoretical purpose of absorbing Soviet immigrants, though in fact they will be used to expand settlement in the occupied territories, whatever formalism is adopted. Huge sums are being "spilled like water" into the territories by the Israeli government for "ordinary and deluxe settlements," including elegant subsidized villas for privileged settlers, the Israeli press reports, diverting the funds that Israel has available to absorb Soviet immigrants (thanks to US largesse). And while "Jewish immigration from the USSR may be a great accomplishment in Zionist or Jewish terms, there is nothing humanitarian about it.... The humanitarianism is one of the lies the two states have agreed upon," in full knowledge that "the Jews of the USSR are now better off than any other ethnic group in that country," protected by foreign powers, able to leave if they wish, permitted to obtain foreign currency from abroad, and so on -- surely far better off than the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and others fleeing torture and harsh repression in Kuwait, most of them crowding into impoverished Jordan, or numerous other examples that readily come to mind. Israel's 1992 budget calls for up to $2 billion for expanding settlement in the territories, an amount "equivalent to one year's installment of the loan guarantees that Israel wants from the United States," the New York Times reports, hence an amount that Israel can take from other sources if these funds are assured by US "humanitarian" assistance.3

An official US decision to provide financial support for these projects would have made it very difficult for the US Arab allies to attend the Madrid conference; a few months down the road, it is assumed, the matter can be handled without too much fanfare. Ariel Sharon and other Israeli extremists were unwilling to accept even a temporary delay in their ambitious settlement project, and were also intent on undermining the US-run negotiations, which might interfere with their annexationist plans. That is one reason why "official Israel was dead silent" about the August coup attempt in the Soviet Union, while "some influential Israelis found it advisable to extend to the conspirators their joyous greetings and good advice," possibly including Shamir's expert advisers, the Israeli press reported, noting that a successful coup in the USSR might have undermined the unwanted Madrid conference.4 After the Soviet coup, the US propaganda system produced the required gestures of outrage about the alleged support for the coup or vacillation about it on the part of assorted official enemies, while keeping "dead silent" about unwanted realities, the usual pattern when atrocities and crimes afford an opportunity for service to power.

The Bush-Shamir dispute goes beyond the timing of US financial support for Israeli settlement plans. There are real disagreements between Washington and the current Israeli government, serious and long-standing ones. But they concern the modalities of rejectionism, not its essence, a matter that merits a closer examination, to which we return.

To clarify what follows, by the term "rejectionism" I mean the rejection of the right to national self-determination on the part of one or the other of the contending parties in the former Palestine. This is distinct from US usage, which restricts the term to those who reject the rights of Israeli Jews, denial of the right of self-determination of the indigenous inhabitants being considered proper and natural.

The standard usage reflects the limits of US discussion, largely restricted to support for some version of Israeli rejectionism. At one extreme, we find those who suggest that Palestinians deserve nothing, like all of those who stand in the way of civilization. Others, like Times chief diplomatic correspondent and Middle East specialist Thomas Friedman, take a more forthcoming approach, because "only if you give the Palestinians something to lose is there a hope that they will agree to moderate their demands," abandoning the ludicrous hope for mutual recognition in a two-state settlement -- a "demand" that Friedman refused to report and consistently denied while producing the "balanced and informed coverage" for which he received the Pulitzer prize. "I believe that as soon as Ahmed has a seat in the bus, he will limit his demands," Friedman added, adopting the racist rhetoric used as a matter of course when dealing with the lower orders. He advised Israel to run the territories on the model of South Lebanon, controlled by Israeli troops and a terrorist surrogate army, with a hideous torture chamber in Khiam where hundreds are held hostage to ensure that the population will submit, Israeli administration of the flow and profits of heroin from the second largest drug production area in Lebanon (the most productive being the Bekaa valley, run by Bush's other friend, Hafez el-Assad of Syria), and regular bombardment beyond the borders to prevent resistance -- called "terrorism," a term that extends to attacks on drug cultivators protected by the Israeli army and its clients.5

At the time of the US-Israel confrontation, it took scarcely more than a raised eyebrow from the President for the Israeli lobby to collapse, while major journals that rarely veer from the Israeli Party line took the cue and began to run articles critical of Israeli practices and hinting that US support for them was not inevitable. That should also occasion little surprise. Domestic pressure groups tend to be ineffectual unless they line up with significant elements of state-corporate power, or have reached a scale and intensity that compels moves to accommodate them. When AIPAC lobbies for policies that the state executive and major sectors of corporate America intend to pursue, it is influential; when it confronts authentic power, largely unified, it fades very quickly.

The essential issues just reviewed are more or less recognized within the doctrinal system, though they are presented more obliquely. It is no great secret that alleged "foreign policy triumphs," quickly removed from view to obscure what has actually taken place, can help to divert the public from domestic crises, along with racist and jingoist appeals, manufacture of awesome foreign and internal enemies, and other familiar devices of population control. The utility of the Madrid conference in obscuring Gulf realities is outlined by New York Times diplomatic correspondent R. W. Apple in the column already quoted, as the conference opened: "Critics have suggested that the United States achieved far too little in the war, because Saddam Hussein was not overthrown, Iran remained as hostile and Kuwait as undemocratic as ever, and Saudi Arabia shed neither its isolation nor its archaic ways." But the "remarkable tableau" in Madrid revealed "that a very great deal had changed," thanks to the "diplomatic skills" of James ***** and the Gulf triumph. Thus "George Bush and the United States today plucked the fruits of victory in the Persian Gulf war, but it is still much too early to predict how sweet they will be."

To rephrase in more accurate terms, by limiting the options in the Gulf to violence, its strong card, Washington was able to determine the basic contours of what happened. It barred any challenge to the "iron fist" in the client states. It continues to torture the Iraqi people exactly as planned in the attack on the civilian infrastructure, which had no relation to the military conflict -- this was not a long war against Nazi Germany -- but did lay the basis for postwar US policies, including the current policy of holding the population hostage to induce some tolerable duplicate of Saddam Hussein to restore "the best of all worlds." Iraq aside, the US also intends to exploit the opportunity to teach valuable lessons to others who might have odd ideas about disobeying US orders, another standard policy; thus in mid-October, Washington once again blocked European and Japanese efforts to call off the embargo that the US imposed on Vietnam 16 years ago after direct conquest failed.6 Those who do not follow the rules must be severely punished, indefinitely, and others must learn these lessons -- though the lessons must remain invisible to the American public, who are to be regaled with tales about the nobility of our aspirations and the grand achievements of our leaders.

Crucially, the American public must not be allowed to perceive that the outcome in the Gulf reveals the priorities of the state that held all the cards, the state that could accurately proclaim that "What we say goes," in the President's words. The consequences of Washington's decisions must therefore be construed as a failure to achieve our noble goals, now to be compensated by Washington's diplomatic triumphs.

[ForemanRules]

The US Versus the Peace Process

Let us turn to the second question raised at the outset, and examine whether it is indeed correct to stress the continuity of US goals and policies.

For many years, the US has stood virtually alone in opposition to international efforts to initiate a "peace process" on the Middle East. The UN record brings out the issues with considerable clarity. The Security Council was eliminated as a forum years ago, thanks to the US veto. At its annual winter meetings, the General Assembly regularly passes resolutions calling for a conference on the Arab-Israel crisis, most recently, in December 1990 (144-2, US and Israel in opposition). In December 1989, the vote was 151-3, Dominica joining the two rejectionist states; a year earlier, 138-2; and so on. US international isolation dates to February 1971 -- coincidentally, the very month when George Bush achieved national prominence as UN Ambassador. The US has also barred other initiatives. Given US power, its opposition amounts to a veto. Accordingly, there has been no international effort to deal with the conflict. The peace process has been effectively deterred.

Again, the matter is described differently within the ideological system; in this case, just about universally, including scholarship. We read constantly that the Middle East is "littered with American peace plans" (editorial, Boston Globe),7 and that US efforts have continually run aground because of the fanaticism and irrationality of Middle East extremists. Such descriptions are accurate, if we bear in mind the literary conventions: the term "peace process" is restricted to US government initiatives, including moves to bar attempts to achieve peace. It then follows as a matter of logic that the US is always advancing the peace process, and if internationally isolated, as in this case, it is alone in this endeavor. Efforts that the uninstructed might misconstrue as "the peace process" are really attempts to obstruct peace, that is, to interfere with US plans. It is really quite simple, once the norms of political correctness are understood.

Departing from these norms, one should have no difficulty in understanding the traditional US opposition to the peace process. The UN resolutions call for an international conference, and the US brooks no interference in what President Eisenhower described as the most "strategically important area in the world," with its enormous energy reserves. This is US turf: no independent force is allowed, foreign or indigenous. As Henry Kissinger explained in a private communication, one of his major policy goals was "to ensure that the Europeans and Japanese did not get involved in the diplomacy" concerning the Middle East, a goal achieved at Camp David in 1978, and again in the current diplomacy -- that is, in the two cases that qualify as steps in the "peace process" in US rhetoric. Furthermore, UN and other initiatives endorse a Palestinian right of self-determination, which would entail Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories. While there has been an elite policy split over the matter, the prevailing judgment for the past 20 years has been that enhancement of Israeli power contributes to US domination of the region. For these reasons, the US has always blocked attempts at diplomatic resolution, apart from its own rejectionist initiatives.

It should be noted that the US opposition to diplomacy is not unusual. Southeast Asian and Central American conflicts provide examples familiar to those who have escaped the doctrinal system. The same has been true, quite often, of disarmament and many other issues, and US isolation at the UN extends far beyond the Middle East. These are natural concomitants of the role of global enforcer, committed to policies with little appeal to targeted populations but with ample force at the ready.

The basic terms of the international consensus on the Arab-Israel conflict were expressed in a resolution brought to the Security Council in January 1976, calling for a settlement on the pre-June 1967 borders (the Green Line) with "appropriate arrangements...to guarantee...the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of all states in the area and their right to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries," including Israel and a new Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The resolution was backed by Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and the PLO -- in fact "prepared" by the PLO according to Israel's UN Ambassador Haim Herzog, now President. It was strenuously opposed by Israel and vetoed by the United States, once again in 1980.

These events are -- automatically -- out of history, along with other facts unacceptable to US power, including repeated PLO initiatives through the 1980s calling for negotiations with Israel leading to mutual recognition. The facts have been distorted beyond recognition, often barred outright, particularly by the New York Times. Its Pulitzer prize-winning correspondent Thomas Friedman has shown particular dedication to the task, an achievement appreciated by the journal, which promoted him to chief diplomatic correspondent in recognition of his accomplishments. It is an interesting case, because he knows enough to understand exactly what he is doing. This stellar performance permits Friedman to spin wondrous tales about "the birth of a new pragmatism among the Palestinians" from the late 1980s, now raised "another important notch" through *****'s benign influence at Madrid. Until Madrid, Friedman continues, "both sides have hidden behind [the] argument...that there is no one on the other side with whom to negotiate" -- Timesspeak for the fact that the PLO has for years been calling on Israel to negotiate, but the US and Israel refuse, claiming there is no one with whom to negotiate, while Friedman loyally reports as truths the US-Israel propaganda which he knows perfectly well to be pure fabrication. The Palestinians admitted by the US to the Madrid conference called "explicitly for a two-state solution," Friedman writes admiringly -- so different from the despised PLO, which supported (or perhaps "prepared") the UN resolution calling for a two-state solution 15 years ago.8

The meaning of these shenanigans -- one of the more impressive achievements of modern propaganda -- is that the State Department and its spokesman believe that US-Israeli violence may at last have succeeded in bringing the Palestinians to heel. In the preferred rhetoric, the great achievement of Madrid was "the Palestinian self-adjustment to the real world," Palestinian acceptance of "a period of autonomy under continued Israeli domination," during which Israel can build the facts of its permanent domination with US aid. This willingness to follow US orders -- the real world -- has "tossed the negative stereotypes out the window," Times journalist Clyde Haberman observes approvingly. The "autonomy" offered at Madrid had been described two weeks earlier in Ha'aretz by Danny Rubinstein, one of the most acute observers of the occupied territories for many years: it is "autonomy as in a prisoner-of-war camp, where the prisoners autonomous' to cook their meals without interference and to organize cultural events."9

The most outspoken critic of US Middle East policy, Anthony Lewis, offered a new proof of the brilliance of Bush-***** diplomacy. Their "singular achievement" at Madrid "was quickly measured" by an election in Gaza in which moderates won a resounding victory over the fundamentalist extremists, sending "the message that Palestinians are ready to negotiate." This message is "of profound significance to Israelis," Lewis continues, telling the many doubters "that there are reasonable Palestinians, people ready to make peace, people not so different from themselves." In the past, "the ordinary Palestinians, with familiar aspirations for a decent life and a national identity, were drowned out by Palestinian terrorists," and "the Palestinian political leadership" was "reluctant to say plainly that it was ready to live in peace alongside of Israel." But now the dread PLO is no longer feared and the moderates can raise their heads, as shown by the Gaza elections in which the PLO won 13 of 16 seats contested.10

The internal contradiction is easily resolved. We need only recall the real world, in which the PLO had been calling for negotiations and a peaceful settlement with Israel for many years, while the US and Israel never countered with any "reasonable people ready to make peace," just as they do not today, and Israel supported the fundamentalist extremists in its efforts to fend off the PLO moderation that it has always feared. But that solution is unacceptable. In a well-run ideological system, internal contradiction is far preferable to politically incorrect reality.

Over the years, the US has continued to implement its rejectionist program without interference from meddling outsiders. The current circumstances afford an opportunity to carry the process further, with a diplomatic process run solely by the United States in accord with the principle that "What we say goes." Gorbachev's presence at Madrid was intended to provide a thin disguise for unilateral US control; in reality, he is acceptable as the powerless leader of a country that scarcely exists. The "peace process" is structured in accordance with US intentions. Palestinians are not permitted to select their own representatives, and those who pass US-Israel inspection are part of a Jordanian delegation. The US alone dictates the terms. I will turn to details and background directly, but the basic facts are surely clear enough.

The standard picture is, again, rather different. Few have been so critical of US Middle East policy as New York Times correspondent Anthony Lewis, who lauds the President for having had "the vision and the courage to commit himself to this conference," in which "Israel will meet face-to-face with each of its Arab neighbors -- and with representative Palestinians" -- namely, those acceptable to the US and Israel, whatever Palestinians might prefer. Diplomatic correspondent R. W. Apple expands in a typical paean to our leader's "vision of the future" as he made use of "the historic window of opportunity." He identifies two factors that have made it possible for Bush "to dream such great dreams" about Israel-Arab peace: First, there is now no fear that "regional tensions" might lead to superpower confrontation; Second, "no longer must the United States contend with countries whose cantankerousness was reinforced by Moscow's interest in continuing unrest."11

Both of Apple's points are correct, though translation is again required. The truth that lies behind his first point is that the withdrawal of the Soviet Union from the world scene has made it easier for the US to resort to force to gain its ends, a fact that has led to fear and desperation among the traditional victims throughout the Third World. One reason why the US insisted on war in the Gulf, deflecting the danger of a peaceful diplomatic settlement, was to demonstrate that it is now able to use extremes of violence against defenseless enemies without concern over the Soviet deterrent. As noted, the familiar lessons are again being taught in the postwar period.

To interpret Apple's second point, we must recall that the "cantankerous" agents of Soviet disruption include the US European allies, the major Arab states, the nonaligned countries, in fact, essentially the world, apart from Israel. Apple's formulation reflects the standard doctrinal assumption that the US position on any issue is necessarily RIGHT, as a matter of logic, so those who stand in our way are "cantankerous," probably Comsymps to boot.

There is an intriguing sidelight to the US-Israeli insistence that the political representatives of the Palestinians be excluded from negotiations. The official reason is that the PLO is a terrorist organization. Under Israeli law, anyone who has any dealings with it is subject to criminal penalties under the Law for the Prevention of Terror. The prime targets are Palestinians, but the law has also been used to punish Jews for contacts with the PLO, most recently, the courageous Abie Nathan, jailed once again.12 The background for the law was reviewed by one of Israel's leading legal commentators, Moshe Negbi, discussing a recent academic study of Lehi (the "Stern gang"), published on its 50th anniversary. Negbi's article is entitled "The Law to Prevent Meetings with the Head of State." As he explains, the Law for the Prevention of Terror was instituted on the initiative of Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion six days after the assassination of UN Ambassador Folke Bernadotte. Ben-Gurion's goal was to break up Lehi, known at once to be responsible for the assassination. One of the three commanders of Lehi was Yitzhak Shamir. The law not only barred any contact with Shamir, but was also applied against Menahem Begin's terrorist Irgun Zvai Leumi (Etsel), impelling Begin to dismantle his Jerusalem organization. It was also used to jail religious extremists, including Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, currently chief Rabbi. It was bitterly denounced as a "Nazi law, dictatorial, immoral" and hence illegal, by Menahem Begin and other civil libertarians. Despite efforts to have it modified under Labor governments, it remained in force, formally directed against Shamir and his Lehi associates, until 1977, when Begin was elected Prime Minister. Today the "Nazi law" still remains in force, but only to bar contacts with the PLO and to justify the US-Israeli refusal to permit Palestinians to select their own representatives for negotiations.13

Those who think that Shamir might have renounced his past enthusiasm for terrorism -- which reached quite interesting levels -- might usefully turn to his comments on the occasion of the anniversary of Lehi on September 4, 1991: "We believed in what we said, discussed and wrote," he said: "Therefore, it was correct." "From the moral point of view, there is no difference between personal terror and collective terror. Here and there blood is spilled, here and there people are killed. One must look and judge it from the point of view of the utility of that means, the use of personal terror, in leading to the goal."14

[ForemanRules]

A US Policy Shift?

Let us now turn to the standard assumption that Bush-***** diplomacy represents a considerable departure from traditional US policies. One argument offered to explain this alleged fact is that the end of the Cold War reduces Israel's role as a "strategic asset." Anthony Lewis and other doves also argue that "the gulf war showed that U.S. armed forces could act in the Middle East without Israel." The upbeat analyses of the doves are also much influenced by the conflicts that have arisen between the Bush and Shamir governments, which are taken to show that "a more detached relationship is developing in which America will more freely weigh its own values and interests," not just follow the Israeli lead (Lewis).15 None of these arguments is very persuasive.

The first rests on the general assumption that US policies towards the Third World have been motivated by concern over the Soviet threat. This is official doctrine for obvious propaganda reasons, but it is hardly sustainable, often the reverse of the truth, for reasons extensively documented elsewhere.. With regard to the Middle East, even before the Soviet pretext was lost serious analysts recognized that "radical nationalism" was the prime target of US intervention capacity (e.g., Robert Komer, the architect of President Carter's Rapid Deployment Force, in congressional testimony). By now it is conceded that the "threats to our interests" in that region "could not be laid at the Kremlin's door" (White House National Security Strategy report to Congress, March 1990).16 As for the lessons of the Gulf, surely no one ever doubted that the US could act without Israel, and in some circumstances would choose to do so. This has little bearing on Israel's perceived role as a strategic asset, particularly since the 1960s, when it was regarded by the US as a major barrier to Arab nationalist pressures against Saudi Arabia, led by Egypt's President Nasser.

The third point is based on a correct observation: there are conflicts between Bush and Shamir. But as noted, there is no reason to believe that these are any different from the ones that have arisen for many years, reflecting different approaches to a rejectionist settlement. Failure to sort out these matters properly has led to much confusion about what is happening.

Let us begin with the situation within Israel. There are two major political groupings, Likud and Labor, each a coalition. The position of Likud, now governing, has always been that Israel should extend its sovereignty over the occupied territories. Its central component, Prime Minister Shamir's Herut party, has never abandoned its claim to Jordan, regularly reiterated in its electoral programs. That was also the traditional position of a central component of the Labor coalition, based on the largest kibbutz movement, TAKAM (Ahdut Avodah, historically extremely expansionist), a position never officially abandoned, to my knowledge.

The logic of the Likud position has recently been outlined by Defense Minister Moshe Arens, by no means an extremist. "In the final analysis," he said in a recent interview, "the existence of the State rests on the principle that we have a right to be here. We are not here by kindness in a land that is foreign to us.... Any agreement, even conditional, that this right is limited -- touches on the essence of our existence here." Therefore, "the very existence of Israel depends on the settlements" in the occupied territories, and Israel's right to establish them at will.17 Scarcely concealed is the premise that the US taxpayer has the duty to pay the costs for Israel's "rights."

In conformity with this reasoning, "Since Mr. ***** launched his postwar peace mission in early March [1991], Israel has confiscated more than 18,000 acres of Arab-owned land as part of its continuing effort to develop the territories for Jews," the Wall Street Journal reports, and now has taken title to about 68% of West Bank land by various forms of legalistic chicanery.18 The Journal draws no conclusions about what this might imply concerning the nature and intent of "Mr. *****'s peace mission." The operative assumption of objective journalism is that the US stands by, a helpless victim, pouring in funds for activities that it is unable to influence.

The Labor coalition, which governed until 1977 and intermittently since, has preferred a different version of rejectionism. Its position, which has varied in details over the years, is based on the "Allon plan" adopted in 1968. It calls for Israel to take what it wants in the occupied territories: the resources, particularly West Bank water, on which Israel heavily relies; the usable land, including the area around a vastly expanded Jerusalem, now favored residential areas for the urban centers of Tel Aviv and Jerusalem; the Jordan valley; etc. Similarly, Israel must control the Golan Heights, in particular, its valuable water resources, now estimated to supply 25% of Israel's needs19; with regard to the Golan Heights, Labor is more hawkish than Likud. Earlier versions also called for Israeli control over Eastern and Northeastern Sinai. But Israel should not take responsibility for the Arab population concentrations, which are to remain stateless or administered by Jordan under effective Israeli control. The reason is "the demographic problem," the burden of dealing with too many Arabs in what is, by law, "the sovereign State of the Jewish people" in Israel and the diaspora, not the State of its citizens. A commitment to deprive too many citizens of rights carries costs that Labor considers too high. The prevailing assumption has been that if only a minority, less than 20%, are second-class citizens by law, the costs will be tolerable, and Western commentators will be able to marvel over Israeli democracy. But problems increase if the numbers rise high enough to evoke images of South Africa.

The US has tended to support the more rational Labor party form of rejectionism, a fact that brings it into occasional conflict with the government of Israel, as in the past few months. From the point of view of the Palestinians, there is little to choose between these two positions. Many Palestinians and Israeli doves regard the Likud version as potentially more hopeful; and in fact, Likud occupation policies have often been less harsh than those of the Labor party, contrary to the standard depiction of Labor doves versus Likud hawks.

The US has also objected to the defiant and brazen settlement programs of Likud, preferring Labor's technique of quietly "building facts" that will determine the shape of the final outcome. In this connection, the disagreements are more about method than goal, as we see when we take a closer look at the actual policies and the thinking that lies behind them.

The traditional Labor party doctrine was expressed by Prime Minister Golda Meir in addressing new Soviet immigrants in a meeting on the Golan Heights in September 1971: "the borders are determined by where Jews live, not where there is a line on a map." The guiding views were elaborated by her Minister of Defense, the influential planner Moshe Dayan, often considered something of a dove. He repeatedly emphasized that the settlements are "permanent," the basis for "permanent rule" by Israel over the territories: "the settlements are forever, and the future borders will include these settlements as part of Israel."

The leading figure of the Labor party, David Ben-Gurion, held essentially the same view during the period of his political influence. Israeli journalist Amnon Kapeliouk observed 20 years ago that "every child in Israel knows one of the most famous expressions of the founder of the Jewish state, David Ben-Gurion: It is not important what the Gentiles say, what matters is what the Jews do'." Ben-Gurion's conception, clearly articulated in internal documents and sometimes in public, was that "a Jewish state...will serve as an important and decisive stage in the realization of Zionism," but only a stage: the borders of the state "will not be fixed for eternity," but will expand either by agreement with the Arabs "or by some other way," once "we have force at our disposal" in a Jewish State. His long-term vision included Jordan and beyond, sometimes even "the Land of Israel" from the Nile to the Euphrates.

During the 1948 war, Ben-Gurion's view was that "To the Arabs of the Land of Israel only one function remains -- to run away." The words reflected traditional Zionist attitudes. Chaim Weizmann, the first President of Israel and the most revered Zionist figure, observed casually that the British had informed him that in Palestine "there are a few hundred thousand Negroes, but that is a matter of no significance." Weizmann had in turn informed Lord Balfour after World War I that "the issue known as the Arab problem in Palestine will be of merely local character and, in effect, anyone cognizant of the situation does not consider it a highly significant factor." Hen