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Melissa Ethridge - Bonsoir , Montreal 1994
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Monday, 11 January 2010
The Israel Lobby by John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt (2006)
For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread ‘democracy’ throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides.
Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical.
Since the October War in 1973, Washington has provided Israel with a level of support dwarfing that given to any other state. It has been the largest annual recipient of direct economic and military assistance since 1976, and is the largest recipient in total since World War Two, to the tune of well over $140 billion (in 2004 dollars). Israel receives about $3 billion in direct assistance each year, roughly one-fifth of the foreign aid budget, and worth about $500 a year for every Israeli. This largesse is especially striking since Israel is now a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income roughly equal to that of South Korea or Spain.
Other recipients get their money in quarterly installments, but Israel receives its entire appropriation at the beginning of each fiscal year and can thus earn interest on it. Most recipients of aid given for military purposes are required to spend all of it in the US, but Israel is allowed to use roughly 25 per cent of its allocation to subsidise its own defence industry. It is the only recipient that does not have to account for how the aid is spent, which makes it virtually impossible to prevent the money from being used for purposes the US opposes, such as building settlements on the West Bank. Moreover, the US has provided Israel with nearly $3 billion to develop weapons systems, and given it access to such top-drawer weaponry as Blackhawk helicopters and F-16 jets. Finally, the US gives Israel access to intelligence it denies to its Nato allies and has turned a blind eye to Israel’s acquisition of nuclear weapons.
Washington also provides Israel with consistent diplomatic support. Since 1982, the US has vetoed 32 Security Council resolutions critical of Israel, more than the total number of vetoes cast by all the other Security Council members. It blocks the efforts of Arab states to put Israel’s nuclear arsenal on the IAEA’s agenda. The US comes to the rescue in wartime and takes Israel’s side when negotiating peace. The Nixon administration protected it from the threat of Soviet intervention and resupplied it during the October War. Washington was deeply involved in the negotiations that ended that war, as well as in the lengthy ‘step-by-step’ process that followed, just as it played a key role in the negotiations that preceded and followed the 1993 Oslo Accords. In each case there was occasional friction between US and Israeli officials, but the US consistently supported the Israeli position. One American participant at Camp David in 2000 later said: ‘Far too often, we functioned . . . as Israel’s lawyer.’ Finally, the Bush administration’s ambition to transform the Middle East is at least partly aimed at improving Israel’s strategic situation.
This extraordinary generosity might be understandable if Israel were a vital strategic asset or if there were a compelling moral case for US backing. But neither explanation is convincing. One might argue that Israel was an asset during the Cold War. By serving as America’s proxy after 1967, it helped contain Soviet expansion in the region and inflicted humiliating defeats on Soviet clients like Egypt and Syria. It occasionally helped protect other US allies (like King Hussein of Jordan) and its military prowess forced Moscow to spend more on backing its own client states. It also provided useful intelligence about Soviet capabilities.
Backing Israel was not cheap, however, and it complicated America’s relations with the Arab world. For example, the decision to give $2.2 billion in emergency military aid during the October War triggered an Opec oil embargo that inflicted considerable damage on Western economies. For all that, Israel’s armed forces were not in a position to protect US interests in the region. The US could not, for example, rely on Israel when the Iranian Revolution in 1979 raised concerns about the security of oil supplies, and had to create its own Rapid Deployment Force instead...
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Lieberman And McCain In Israel Back Netanyahu Against Obama
Senator and former presidential candidate John McCain and fellow senator Independent Joe Lieberman said today they would oppose any move to withold loan guarantees to pressure Israel. The pair are in Israel and were meeting with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
“I don’t think it’s helpful and I don’t agree with it,” McCain said in Yerushalayim. Lieberman said there would be a fight in Congress if a move to pressure Israel was initiated. “Any attempt to pressure Israel, to force Israel, to the negotiating table by denying Israel support will not pass the Congress of the United States,” Lieberman said.
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RIP Blasta
Just heard that someone I knew way back from my time in Amsterdam passed away in Cambodia on Xmas day.
If anyone out there knows more details could they get in touch.
Thank you.
A Film By Aron Ranen
From a comment left at the blog:
Please take a moment to watch my documentary film POWER AND CONTROL: LSD IN THE 60'S.
It features a new interview with Ram Dass about the Harvard days...
Plus, an actual participant in Tim Leary's Miracle of Good Friday Experiment....btw..when I interviewed him..he was the DEAN & President of the Divinity school where Leary recruited the original participants!
Lots more, CIA & LSD with Marty Lee, Groucho Marx's LSD trip with Paul Krassner....Free Speech Movement and ACID.
It features a new interview with Ram Dass about the Harvard days...
Plus, an actual participant in Tim Leary's Miracle of Good Friday Experiment....btw..when I interviewed him..he was the DEAN & President of the Divinity school where Leary recruited the original participants!
Lots more, CIA & LSD with Marty Lee, Groucho Marx's LSD trip with Paul Krassner....Free Speech Movement and ACID.
Israel needs to rethink its Gaza strategy before it's too late
After a year of relative quiet in the south following the cease-fire that ended Operation Cast Lead, there has been a marked escalation in violence along the Israel-Gaza border. Qassam rockets and mortars are being fired from Gaza, and the Israel Air Force retaliated by attacking targets in the Strip, killing several Palestinians. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Hamas that Israel would "respond forcefully" to any fire on its territory.
Incidents involving live fire have aggravated relations between Hamas and Egypt, which is tightening the siege on Gaza. The Egyptians are building an underground steel wall to thwart smuggling through tunnels into Sinai, and are prohibiting supply convoys from entering Gaza through the Rafah crossing. Foreign peace activists who wanted to show support for Gaza were stopped in Cairo.
Gaza erupts whenever Israelis begin to feel that the Strip and its troubles have been forgotten. There is no easy solution to the troubles of 1.5 million poor Palestinians under double blockade, by Israel and Egypt, and whose government is being boycotted by countries around the world. A renewal of rocket fire shows that even a major military operation that brought death and destruction cannot ensure long-term deterrence and calm.
Incidents involving live fire have aggravated relations between Hamas and Egypt, which is tightening the siege on Gaza. The Egyptians are building an underground steel wall to thwart smuggling through tunnels into Sinai, and are prohibiting supply convoys from entering Gaza through the Rafah crossing. Foreign peace activists who wanted to show support for Gaza were stopped in Cairo.
Gaza erupts whenever Israelis begin to feel that the Strip and its troubles have been forgotten. There is no easy solution to the troubles of 1.5 million poor Palestinians under double blockade, by Israel and Egypt, and whose government is being boycotted by countries around the world. A renewal of rocket fire shows that even a major military operation that brought death and destruction cannot ensure long-term deterrence and calm.
Israel has an interest in stopping escalation at the border so as not to find itself caught up in another belligerent confrontation with Hamas. Netanyahu's threats have not attained this goal. Like his predecessor, he risks placing his imprimatur on public commitments that will only push Israel toward another military operation to "strengthen deterrence" and teach Hamas a lesson."
The time has come to rethink Israeli strategy in Gaza. The economic embargo, which has brought severe distress to the inhabitants of Gaza, has not brought down Hamas, nor has it freed kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit. The siege has only damaged Israel's image and led to accusations that it has shirked its humanitarian responsibilities in Gaza under international law.
Instead of erring by invoking the default solution of more force, which does not create long-term security or ease the distress of the Palestinians in Gaza, the crossings between Israel and the Gaza Strip should be opened and indirect assistance rendered to rebuild its ruins. The same logic that dictates the government's actions in the West Bank - creating an economic incentive to prevent terror - can and must work in the Gaza Strip as well.
The time has come to rethink Israeli strategy in Gaza. The economic embargo, which has brought severe distress to the inhabitants of Gaza, has not brought down Hamas, nor has it freed kidnapped soldier Gilad Shalit. The siege has only damaged Israel's image and led to accusations that it has shirked its humanitarian responsibilities in Gaza under international law.
Instead of erring by invoking the default solution of more force, which does not create long-term security or ease the distress of the Palestinians in Gaza, the crossings between Israel and the Gaza Strip should be opened and indirect assistance rendered to rebuild its ruins. The same logic that dictates the government's actions in the West Bank - creating an economic incentive to prevent terror - can and must work in the Gaza Strip as well.
Iran Panel Rebukes Official for Abuses
An Iranian parliamentary committee found Tehran's former prosecutor responsible for the decision to house protesters in an unsuitable detention facility where at least three detainees died from alleged torture, Iranian state media reported Sunday.
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, right, arrives to deliver a speech to parliament in Tehran on Sunday. A parliamentary committee blamed a former prosecutor for the decision to detain protesters in a facility where they were allegedly tortured and where at least three died.
The finding by lawmakers represents the highest specific rebuke so far of a government official in the handling of domestic unrest that followed contested June 12 presidential elections.
The committee's findings aren't binding, but they underscore the subtle role the body has played so far in questioning the actions of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's government amid postelection unrest.
In the weeks and months that followed the disputed vote, many parliament members demanded an investigation of alleged abuses at Kahrizak, a holding facility where some protesters were detained. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered the detention center closed amid allegations of abuse, including rape, of detained protesters.
Last month, military prosecutors said at least three detainees at the facility died due to torture, and they charged 12 prison officials with unspecified offenses related to the deaths. The charges marked a dramatic reversal by the government, which had for months denied any significant abuse, blaming the deaths on an outbreak of meningitis.
On Sunday, the Iranian Students News Agency reported that the parliamentary committee's spokesman had released the full report to lawmakers. It said the report found the decision to move detainees to Kahrizak, despite inhospitable conditions there, was that of Tehran's former prosecutor Saeed Mortazavi.
"The officials in Kahrizak initially refused to receive prisoners but because the judicial official -- Mortazavi -- insisted, they were forced to admit" 147 prisoners into a 750-square-foot space, the Associated Press quoted the report saying. The fact-finding panel "directly blames" Mr. Mortazavi for ordering the transfer, Press TV, the state-run, English-language news outlet reported Sunday. The panel, however, didn't find evidence of rape or sexual abuse at the detention facility, Press TV reported.
Mr. Mortazavi was removed from his post as Tehran prosecutor in August and appointed instead as Iran's deputy prosecutor general. Technically, the move was a promotion, but it also removed him from his high-profile prosecutorial role.
Mr. Mortazavi hasn't commented about his role in transferring detainees to Kahrizak.
The Harvard Psychedelic Club
AP Photo In 1960, Timothy Leary set up an infamous institute at Harvard to experiment with psychedelic drugs. An exclusive excerpt from Don Lattin’s new book on how lifestyle guru Andrew Weil and other freshmen started tripping.Andy Weil and Ronnie Winston were friends and dorm mates in Claverly Hall. They were both incoming Harvard freshmen when they walked into Leary’s office on Divinity Lane and volunteered to be research subjects in his psychedelic research project. Weil had grown up in a middle-class family. Winston was the son of Harry Winston, the wealthy diamond and jewelry manufacturer whose creations hung around the necks of trophy wives and Hollywood starlets from coast to coast. Neither of them would officially take part in the project, but they would both play an important, little-known role in the rise and fall of Richard Alpert and Timothy Leary.
Winston would eventually be brought into the psychedelic family. Weil would not, and the implications of that unequal treatment would forever alter the careers and life paths of Timothy Leary and Richard Alpert.
He didn’t see the experiences as just an excuse to get high. He wasn’t rebelling against anything. He was just curious, eager to understand what was going on inside his own brain.
Weil and Winston had both read The Doors of Perception, Huxley’s book about the insights the British writer gleaned from his 1953 mescaline trip. They walked into Leary’s little office on Divinity Avenue eager to fly off on their own mystical journey.They were a bit nervous when they sat down, but Leary soon put them at ease with his soft-spoken charm.
“Yes,” Leary said, “Huxley was the trailblazer. You know, I didn’t have a clue as to the potential of this research until I had my own experience with psilocybin mushrooms over the summer. At its core, you have to understand that this is not an intellectual exercise. It is experiential. It is, and I’m almost embarrassed to say it, religious. But it is more than religious. It is exhilarating. It shows us that the human brain possesses infinite potentialities. It can operate in space-time dimensions that we never dreamed even existed. I feel like I’ve awakened from a long ontological sleep.”
Weil and Winston were on the edge of their seats.
“Anyway,” Leary continued, “the research is pretty straightforward. Our subjects take a controlled dose of synthesized psilocybin. We make sure they are in a safe and comfortable setting. We’re trying to get people from all walks of life, not just graduate students. We’re giving this stuff to priests and prisoners and everyone in between. They do a session about once a month and are expected to write up a two-to three-page report describing the experience. Between sessions, we get together and discuss whatever insights we’ve gleaned from all this. Now, I assume neither of you have had any experience with these substances.”
“No, sir, we have not,” Weil replied. “But we are ready, willing, and able.”
“I can see that,” Leary said. “But I think we may have a little problem. How old are you boys?”
“Eighteen.”
“That’s what I was afraid of. You see, our agreement with the university does not allow us to use undergraduates in this research.”
“That’s what we were afraid of,” Weil said. “To tell you the truth, some of us over at Claverly were thinking of running our own series of tests, and we were wondering if you could clue us in on how we might obtain some of these pills.”
“Well, I could, but I’d better not do that, boys,” Leary replied. “But if you’re persistent, I’m sure you can find your own source.”...
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The Americanization of Mental Illness
Americans, particularly if they are of a certain leftward-leaning, college-educated type, worry about our country’s blunders into other cultures. In some circles, it is easy to make friends with a rousing rant about the McDonald’s near Tiananmen Square, the Nike factory in Malaysia or the latest blowback from our political or military interventions abroad. For all our self-recrimination, however, we may have yet to face one of the most remarkable effects of American-led globalization. We have for many years been busily engaged in a grand project of Americanizing the world’s understanding of mental health and illness. We may indeed be far along in homogenizing the way the world goes mad...
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