1. Ted Belman said:

Unfortunately this analysis fails to factor in other risks. Who can Israel count on to veto UNSC resolutions? If the US in response were to put the blocks to Israel, the EU would have common cause to do the same.

The resl question is would Congress support the State Department or Israel?

2. Badge 2211 said:

Dany's post is right on the money.

Israel gets slapped around for doing upgrades on PRC Harpy drones, which the US had no objections to the original sale and is deployed by Turkish, Korean, Chinese and Indian Armies, as we too easily forget an American President complicitly enhancing the PRC's nuclear ICBM capabilities for campaign donations (see Hughes Space and Communications Company).

Leverage is a two-way street. If Israel would get off America's tit the only leverage left would be diplomacy. Israel would be able to leverage an America that arm's the Arab militaries with more and more advanced weapon systems by simply doing the same with China or still an unrealiable India or an very increasingly unreliable Turkey.

The UNSC? Well, their sixteen resolutions against Saddam sure did work, didn't it? The Arabs already economically boycott Israel and companies doing business with Israel, a boycott the US Administrations have consistently failed to counter. Now European and American Churches are doing the same, even after the Gaza Retreat.

Congress? When Israel's official capital is Jerusalem then we'll see.

In the meantime, we can watch the Bush Administration crucify AIPAC on trumped up espionage allegations to diminsh their prestige in the halls of Congress.

3. dany belinfante said:

I did think of the UN while writing my post. But visitors of my blog will know how I feel about the UN: They are as meaningful in world politics as is Luxembourg. I take that back, Luxembourg is a lot more influential than the UN. As the previous posted commented, the UN proved toothless against Iraq. They also prove to be irrelevant to Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons, etc.

No, I do not think the UN are a factor in this equation one way or another.

4. BobW said:

Re Dany's Preface:

Nothing can be successfully accomplished because the noun "Israel" is like Metternick's term for Italy, "A geographic expression". "Israel" is not a nation-state within the normal import of the words. There is a dysfunctional government with various blocks of inhabitants and little cohesion. Some of these blocks seek the destruction of the nation-state. Israel resembles the former Yugoslavia or British India - but lacking a modern, responsive government.

Re the history:

Israel's initial history shows US support for the new nation because Pres Truman would have lost the Presidental election to NY Governor Thomas Dewey had Truman not recognized Israel. The key was New York's Jewish vote needed to win the election.

During the Cold War, US and Israeli interests approached the identical.

I do not believe the pre 1973 Yom Kippur War involved CRUCIAL information being withheld by the US. Israeli indicators and warnings were collected and forwarded to Israel. The screwups were in Israel, by Israelis.

It is true the US stiffled Israeli military - and political - victories against the Arabs. This paragraph must inject the name Henry Alfred Kissinger.

US vetos on Israel's world trade contracts is partly Israel's fault. The US does the same with other allied nations also. Trees and cattle from Canada were going to cause a Club of Rome the sky is falling down over America if..... Israel, institutionally speaking, does not know how to select target markets for industries that won't cause trade wars. Meanwhile, back at the shtetl, Singapore is being molded into the hub of the new world pharmaceutical R&D and production center. This is notwithstanding, pharmaceuticals, medicine and medical care are known as synonyms for "Jewish".

Re the 'peace' deals: It's been reported Israel nearly had US approval to obtain half of the Sinai but PM Begin reneged and relenquished the area for certain reasons. Note that all of Sinai was not historic Egyptian territory; only part, about two thirds. The rest was Ottoman governed territory. Sadat nearly relinquished the eastern Sinai to Israel. This was quoted by Israeli veteran diplomat Yossi Ben-Ahron to Jewish Press's Israel Correspondent Avraham Shmuel Lewin.

America's policy makers have geometric leverage over Israel because GOI also supports the oil trade. Israel has excess engineers and the knowhow to obtain financing to develop domestic nuclear power plants and also nuclear power plant technology for export sales. It's a great export sales item to peddle. America's policy makers will contime to have geometric leverage over Israel because the noun "Israel" is an antique from Minsk.

Kol tuv,
BobW

5. Ed D said:

Dany, I agree with your assessment. I have and still advocate Israel learning to stand on it's own two feet. Like a child learning to ride a bike, it's scary at first, but afterwords, nothing to it. Israels is very strong in the fields of medicine, in the manufacture of armaments, growing the finest vegitables, fruitsm and flowers in the world, tourism and it has the strength of having the birth place of two of the main religions. Israel, also, has the ability to build military aircraft, such as the Kfir some years ago; however, fearing the loss of revenue, the US forced the Israelis to stop.The technology in Israel is capable of making it's own aircraft as good or better than the US and to think of the money to be made exporting to those that Israel deems friendly. One reason for the evacuation from Gaza is pressure from the US to stop the growth of Israel, is it's fear of Israel becoming an export giant. Truman was the only President of the US, that was favorable to Israel. The rest have spoken with a forked toungue.

6. Badge 2211 said:

Ed D wrote:

Israel, also, has the ability to build military aircraft, such as the Kfir some years ago; however, fearing the loss of revenue, the US forced the Israelis to stop.The technology in Israel is capable of making it's own aircraft as good or better than the US and to think of the money to be made exporting to those that Israel deems friendly.

The truth of it is that Israel would not have been able to field the Mirage V-modified Kfir without its GE J79-GE-17 jet engines or proceed with its wholly-designed and Israeli built Lavi without its Pratt & Whitney PW1120 jet engines. One got built and the other didn't. I don't believe this heavy industry deficiency/dependency has yet been solved.

7. hiddennook said:

To say that America is not a friend of Israel is like saying that North Korea is tolerant of other faiths.

No other nation on planet Earth (and perhaps history) has invested billions of dollars for Israel's success, come to the brink of a world war in order to defend Israel (Russia, during the cold war) and continually protects Israel from UN sanctions which would have not only brought about political devestation to the tiny nation but economic ruin as well.

You may disagree with what the current Administration is doing but never forget our history towards Israel. If you ask any Jew living there which nation would defend Israel if they were attacked the answer would be the US without hesitation. America is the LAST nation standing with Israel, and whether or not you like her current policies (something which I even have a dispute with) we are all that she has left in the world.

8. Dave Brochin said:

Danny forgets one huge,unspoken lever the USA has over Israel: the American Jewish population. That's right, and don't think for a minute conditions can't turn on a dime for/against the Jews in America. The powers that be wouldn't think twice about it. In today's world they can turn it on/off like a water faucet. Like I said, unspoken, but ever-present.

9. D said:

Hiddennook: This section is not the place to go into the history of US-Israel relations, but suffice it to say that US policy towards Israel is characterized by public good will, superceded by US State department betrayal of Israel. Continuously. This is not subject to debate, and it started long before the very UN SC session where voting was done on the founding of Israel. It almost didn't happen, only because (as a previous poster mentioned) Israels friend Truman at the last moment found out about an imminent No vote was he able to turn things around.

If you are unaware of actual US policy when it comes to the choice between the WW2 Germans or the Jews, or between the Arabs and the Jews, then you need to read up.



Dave Brochin: Even I am not (yet) that paranoid that I fear for Jews living in the US (fear from the authorities that is), should Israel decide to go it alone. But if you can make a convincing case, I can be made to change my mind.

10. davidbrochin said:

Oil interests have frequently trumped any moral compass the USA may have towards Israel. Is it really paranoia to consider they might put US Jews in harms way if push to came shove over ISrael's policies? You call it paranoia, I call it naiveite to not consider it. Off the top of my head I'd say take a look at the first 5 or so chapters of The Secret War Against the Jews. See some of the machinations of government for yourself. You don't have to be a Kahanist or anything similar to review all possibilities.

11. sk said:

As someone who battled Ted/Omri regarding the feasibility of an independent Israeli foreign policy (in the context of arguing that the Gaza expulsion was unnecessary), of course I agree with the thrust of Dany's post that such independence would be possible and beneficial to Israel.

It seems to me, though, that the US is RELATIVELY SPEAKING a friend of Israel. Consider, though, the countries the US is being compared to (e.g. Britain, France, Egypt). The thing is, US policies have seriously damaged Israel, even if one grants that Israel could have mitigated that damage but hasn't. However, even though I think the US is, relatively speaking, a friend to Israel, the US is so much more able to damage Israel than other countries that even when it is 1/8 as antagonistic as, say, Britain, it has much more effect than British antagonism.

That's why Israel needs to be independent. The US is not intrinsically anti-Israel, it just has some different interests. When Israel can bash back, I expect the US will be friendlier to Israel than it is now.