Have You Heard of
'The Jewish/Israeli Lobby'?
"In the Middle East, where is our sense of proportion?
Where is our sense of perspective? Where is our
sense of decency? And,
finally, just how smart are we?"
Lou Dobbs, CNN
MiddleEast.Org - MER - Washington - 20 July 2006: Now of course Lou Dobbs of CNN has heard of 'The Jewish/Israeli Lobby'. He's probably even read The London Review of Books
cover article by Professors Mearsheimer and Walt that has brought the
subject out of the closet in recent months. But then Dobbs works for
CNN; and even a flag-waving America-firster star like him has to be
looking over his shoulder lest he go too far for those who hold the
real power.
So no mention of the Israel Lobby nor of American Jews in what Mr.
Dobbs had to say yesterday on air (just imagine what he must really
think and say when the cameras aren't rolling). But for every
question mark Dobbs so rightly uses the power and influence and
fear-factor of The Israeli/Jewish Lobby is a significant part of every
answer.
Dobbs: Not so smart when it comes to the Middle East
By Lou Dobbs
NEW
YORK (CNN) - 19 July 2006: We Americans like to think we're a pretty smart people,
even when evidence to the contrary is overwhelming. And nowhere is that
evidence more overwhelming than in the Middle East. History in the
Middle East is everything, and we Americans seem to learn nothing from
it.
President Harry Truman took about 20 minutes to recognize
the state of Israel when it declared independence in 1948. Since then,
more than 58 years of war, terrorism and blood-letting have led to the
events of the past week.
Even now, as Katyusha rockets rain down
on northern Israel and Israeli fighter jets blast Hezbollah targets in
southern Lebanon, we simultaneously decry radical Islamist terrorism
and Israel's lack of restraint in defending itself.
And the U.S.
government, which wants no part of a cease-fire until Israel is given
every opportunity to rescue its kidnapped soldiers and destroy as many
Hezbollah and Hezbollah armaments as possible, urges caution in the
interest of preserving a nascent and fragile democratic government in
Lebanon. Could we be more conflicted?
While the United States
provides about $2.5 billion in military and economic aid to Israel each
year, U.S. aid to Lebanon amounts to no more than $40 million. This
despite the fact that the per capita GDP of Israel is among the highest
in the world at $24,600, nearly four times as high as Lebanon's GDP per
capita of $6,200.
Lebanon's lack of wealth is matched by the
Palestinians -- three out of every four Palestinians live below the
poverty line. Yet the vast majority of our giving in the region flows
to Israel. This kind of geopolitical inconsistency and shortsightedness
has contributed to the Arab-Israeli conflict that the Western world
seems content to allow to perpetuate endlessly.
After a week of
escalating violence, around two dozen Israelis and roughly 200 Lebanese
have died. That has been sufficient bloodshed for United Nations
Secretary General Kofi Annan and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to
join in the call for an international security force, ignoring the fact
that a U.N. force is already in Southern Lebanon, having failed to
secure the border against Hezbollah's incursions and attacks and the
murder and kidnapping of Israeli soldiers.
As our airwaves fill
with images and sounds of exploding Hezbollah rockets and Israeli
bombs, this seven-day conflict has completely displaced from our view
another war in which 10 Americans and more than 300 Iraqis have died
during the same week. And it is a conflict now of more than three years
duration that has claimed almost 15,000 lives so far this year alone.
An
estimated 50,000 Iraqis and more than 2,500 American troops have been
killed since the insurgency began in March of 2003, which by some
estimates is more than the number of dead on both sides of the
Arab-Israeli conflict over the past 58 years of wars and intifadas.
Yet
we have seen no rescue ships moving up the Euphrates for Iraqis who are
dying in their streets, markets and mosques each day. French Prime
Minister Dominique de Villepin has not leaped to Baghdad as he did
Beirut. And there are no meetings of the Arab League, and no U.S.
diplomacy with Egypt, Syria and Jordan directed at ending the Iraqi
conflict.
In the Middle East, where is our sense of proportion?
Where is our sense of perspective? Where is our sense of decency? And,
finally, just how smart are we?
http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/18/dobbs.july19/index.html