inside the glass house

Fighting a war on behalf of Israel
NEW YORK -- The US invasion of Iraq more than three years ago was apparently prompted by several factors: an attempt to transform an oil-rich anti-American country into a pro-US unwavering oil supplier; a hunt for weapons of mass destruction that eventually proved fruitless; a determination to remove a ruthless dictator; and a self-imposed divine right to spread the political gospel of multi-party democracy in the Middle East.
But one of the more plausible reasons that have received little or no play in the media is the covert role played by Israel to precipitate US military action against Iraq.

The Israelis perceived that Iraq was a potential military threat to the Jewish state -- and therefore had to be neutralised. The Israeli message was conveyed by supporters and lobbyists not only in the US Congress but also in the Pentagon and even inside the White House.

The pro-Israel lobby in the US, perhaps the most powerful of all lobbying groups in the country, is now on another vitriolic campaign, this time pushing the Bush administration to destabilise the government of Iran on the ground that it is close to developing a nuclear weapon. The choice is obvious: either a regime change in Tehran or bunker-busting bombs targeting Iran's nuclear facilities.

Just before the invasion by the US, Iraq denied it was building weapons of mass destruction (WMD), but still the US invaded Baghdad. North Korea's Kim Jong Il continues to boast he is on the verge of developing nuclear weapons. But he is no threat to Israel. So North Korea gets away (also because the North Koreans could easily retaliate against both South Korea and Japan, two strong US allies) but Iran is now a sitting target.

As New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd put it last week: "If you pretend to have WMDs, the US may come and get you. Ask Saddam. If you really have WMDs, you're bullet proof. Ask Kim Jong Il." Similarly, the Israelis, who possess nuclear weapons, are equally "bullet proof." The US has been pushing for nuclear-free zones worldwide, except in the Middle East. The reason: Israel should have the right to nuclear weapons in the Middle East but not Iraq, or Iran. The political hypocrisy is obvious.

The campaign against Iran is led by two influential lobbying groups, the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and the American Jewish Committee (AJC). Last week the AJC took out full-page ads in several US newspapers under the heading "A Nuclear Iran Threatens All." "Suppose Iran one day gives nuclear devices to terrorists," the ads warned. "Could anyone anywhere feel safe?"

The subtle hint about "terrorists" was an attempt to win over the majority of the American public brainwashed to believe that the Bush administratation is justified in doing anything — including a suspension of the rule of law and secret wire-tapping of telephones — in the name of fighting terrorism.

The politically-aggressive role by Israel and the Jewish lobby in American politics also comes amidst a raging controversy triggered last month by the publication of a 83-page essay titled "The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy" by two prominent academics: Stephen Walt of Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government and John Mearsheimer, a Professor at the University of Chicago.

The essay, one of the most forthright pieces on the power of the Israel lobby in the US, has generated (as usual) charges of anti-Semitism against the two academics. They have named names, and singled out AIPAC, the editorial pages of the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, along with think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and Brookings Institution, as some of the most prominent (but blind) supporters of Israel — irrespective of whether Israel is right or wrong.

The basic premise of the essay is that the Israel lobby has successfully campaigned to persuade successive US governments to set aside its own national security interests in favour of Israel. "No lobby has managed to divert US foreign policy as far from what the American national interest would otherwise suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US and Israeli interests are essentially the same,'' they argue. The academics admit that "the United States has a terrorism problem in good part" but this is primarily because "it is so closely allied with Israel, not the other way around."

The two academics say the Israel lobby derives its power primarily from its ability to gather financial support both for Democratic and Republican politicians-- holding a tight grip on both the ruling party and the opposition in the US Congress.

The lobby also succeeds in labelling every critic of Israel "anti semitic": a charge that has also been flung at the two US academics. While predominantly Jewish, the Israel lobby also includes Christian evangelicals and non-Jewish neo-conservatives.

The authors of the essay also say that the Israel lobby played "a critical role" in the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq by beating the war drums in advance of the attack. But even as far back at March 2003, the neo-conservative editor of the Weekly Standard William Kristol, wrote: "The liberation of Iraq was the first great battle for the future of the Middle East... But the next great battle -- not, we hope a military one -- will be for Iran."

According to Patrick Clawson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank created by AIPAC: "(Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) sees the West as wimps and thinks we will eventually cave in. We have to be ready to deal with Iran if the crisis escalates."

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