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--------------------------------------------------------------------- MER FLASHBACK - Published by MER 7 Long Years Ago on 11 August 1997
To Understand the Present You Must Appreciate The Past ---------------------------------------------------------------------
HIDDEN HISTORY OF AMERICAN INVOVEMENT IN THE MIDDLE EAST
"There is no parallel between bombs and bulldozers...
We cannot have an environment in which people
believe
the way to get what they want is to kill innocent people..."
U.S. President Bill Clinton 8/6/97
MER - Washington - 8/11/97:
Never in history has there been such an Israeli-captured President in
the White House as Bill Clinton. The Israeli/Jewish lobby set out to
defeat George Bush, quite literally infiltrated the Clinton
headquarters in Little Rock with its people, pushed huge amounts of
"soft money" at both Clinton and the Democracy Party, and sure enough
their man Bill has done everything they ever dreamed ever since.
Bill's latest payoff to the Israelis and their American Jewish cadre is
to make a former Israeli lobby official -- a man who was an Australian
citizen when Bill was elected President, a man who lived in Israel and
served in the Israeli army -- Assistant Secretary of State (that's of
the UNITED STATES mind you!) for the Middle East!
It's not inordinate Chinese money and influence in American politics
the Congress should be investigating, it's how Israel manipulates
American politics with the help of some key Americans (most of them
Jewish), who are in fact, however distasteful it is to say it, "dually
loyal".
At Camp David back nearly 20 years ago the Israelis promised to stop
settlements in the occupied territories. Go back and read the speech
Jimmy Carter delivered to a joint session of the Congress in front of
the entire world heralding this tremendous breakthrough! Within months
the Israelis broke their promises, defied Carter (threatening his
reelection that still never was to be), and went about their old ways.
Sadat's assassination, revolution in Iran, the destruction of Lebanon,
American hostages, the "Intifada", and the rise of Hamas and Hizballah
ensued.
At Madrid and Oslo -- after the destruction of Iraq -- the Israelis
made more promises and gave more assurances. Even with those
conferences always weighted tremendously in their favor, even with the
Americans always defying near-unanimous world opinion and vetoing
various U.N. resolutions, Israelis have gone from one deception, one
subterfuge, and one massacre to another. Meanwhile Washington has
either looked the other way, or behind the scenes worked closely with
the Israelis while publicly soothing Arab sensibilities with
duplicitous, and meaningless, rhetoric.
Now in 1997, with the "native" Palestinians being corralled onto
"autonomous" reservations in the name of "peace process", the Americans
are at it again; blaming the victim rather than the aggressor; crying
over scenes of Israeli carnage while looking away and covering up when
rivers of Palestinian blood flow.
With Palestinian "autonomous" "population centers" now surrounded by
American-supplied tanks, Israeli Army roadblocks, and electrified
fences; and with what's left of Palestinian civil society now
"controlled" by an imported once-PLO militia now armed and financed by
Israel and the U.S. -- courageous Palestinians try to resist. But it is
THEY Bill Clinton repeatedly condemns.
No wonder Dr. Eyad Sarraj from Gaza now pleads with the world to
understand "Why We Have Become Suicide Bombers" -- (see
http://www.MiddleEast.org/Sarraj1.htm).
No wonder Professor Noam Chomsky decries the "peace process" as very
similar to Apartheid of old in South Africa -- (see
http://www.MiddleEast.org/Chomsky1.htm).
So let it be said clearly and succinctly: The Palestinians have been
lied to and tricked, deceived and battered by the U.S., Israel, and the
Europeans for generations now. The Palestinians have been dispossessed
and tortured, ravaged and bloodied by the Israelis for nearly 50 years
now. It is the Arabs who have been bombed time and time again; from
1948 to 1956, from 1967 to 1982 to Sabra and Shatilla to Qana -- the
list is lengthy indeed, the numbers of innocent Palestinians and Arabs
far far greater than that of innocent Israelis.
And so today the Palestinians are perfectly entitled to defend their
country and their vital interests, with stones, with guns, and if need
be with bombs. The Palestinians are entitled to fight back against
those who continually have used aggression against them, against those
who have militarily occupied and brutalized them for a generation now.
And if their tactics and choices are sometimes terrible to watch on TV,
let us remember very well what has been done to them; and let us
remember as well that to protect their "vital interests" it is the
Americans who have used nuclear weapons and napalm, agent orange and
2000-pound bombs, killing and maiming so many millions of innocents.
Let it also be said clearly and succinctly: The American President,
especially this Israeli American President, crying about the blood of
"innocent civilians" has no credibility whatsoever. And if the
Arabs regimes had any guts and dignity at all they'd tell the Americans
(starting with Dennis Ross, himself a former Israeli lobby personality)
to take a hike and start taking responsibility themselves for what is
going on in their part of the world.
Mark Bruzonsky*
* The author is Publisher of MER. His
edited books about the Middle East have been published by the Woodrow
Wilson International Center for Scholars at the Smithsonian,
Congressional Quarterly, and National Geographic (film).
Bruzonsky produces the weekly MER TV program and has visited the Middle
East region over 150 times. See http://www.MiddleEast.Org/mab.htm
for further information. Bruzonsky can be contacted at
Mark@MiddleEast.Org and (202) 362-5266.