US Internal Politics and Isreal [Zionist] Lobby
Israel and Palestine
Most agree that the US is key to resolving the conflict but what are the US internal political ramifications? Is the US held hostage to its own internal politics and religious pressures? Recent discussion has brought the "Israel Lobby" more clearly into focus ...
Monday, January 31, 2005
Radical Jewish groups raise funds: banned group directs donors to a Borough Park, Brooklyn, address and 718 phone number.
New York Daily News - City News - Daily News Exclusive: Radical Jewish groups raise funds: "By LARRY COHLER-ESSES | DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

Violence-spewing Jewish radicals are raising big bucks in New York even though they're tied to groups identified by the U.S. as terror organizations.

In one money-raising appeal uncovered by The Daily News, a banned group directs donors to a Borough Park, Brooklyn, address and 718 phone number.

In Israel, Kahane Chai and other radical groups on the U.S. list are under increased scrutiny after the Shin Bet spy agency warned that extremists have put Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in their cross hairs and may blow up the Al Aqsa Mosque, holy to Muslims worldwide, on Jerusalem's Temple Mount.

Spokesmen for some of the groups deny the Shin Bet allegations but admit they're furious that Sharon is pushing a plan to give up Jewish settlements on occupied Palestinian land in Gaza and the West Bank.

Among the pro-settler Jews raising thousands in New York is David Haivri, who has long ties to the movement founded by Meir Kahane, the radical Brooklyn-born rabbi slain by an Egyptian Islamist in New York in 1990.
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The more than $100,000 Haivri raised on a recent U.S. speaking tour will go solely to "educational projects," Haivri insists. "It's mostly for publishing newsletters, books and posters," he said. He also denied he is an advocate of violence.
Christians give Bush ultimatum to ban gay marriage
Telegraph | News | Christians give Bush ultimatum to ban gay marriage: "By Philip Sherwell in Washington | (Filed: 30/01/2005)

Conservative Christian leaders who played a key role in securing President George W Bush's re-election have given the White House an ultimatum over outlawing same-sex marriages.
In an indication of tension among Mr Bush's backers, a new coalition of powerful Christian groups issued their warning last week in a letter to Karl Rove, the President's chief adviser.

Mr Bush has said that "nothing will happen" for now on the proposed federal amendment leading to a constitutional ban on gay marriages. He did not mention the amendment in his inaugural address and the issue was not listed in the 10-point legislative agenda unveiled by Republican leaders in Congress last week.

The Arlington Group, comprising some of the President's most important conservative backers, reacted by threatening to withhold much-needed support for one of his top domestic initiatives – overhauling America's pensions system – if he does not vigorously push their own political cause.

"We couldn't help but notice the contrast between how the President is approaching the difficult issue of social security privatisation, where the public is deeply divided, and the marriage issue, where public opinion is overwhelmingly on his side," the leaked letter said.

"Is he prepared to spend significant political capital on privatisation but reluctant to devote the same energy to preserving traditional marriage?

"If so, it would create outrage with countless voters who stood with him just a few weeks ago, including an unprecedented number of African-Americans, Latinos and Catholics who broke with tradition and supported the President solely because of this issue."
Thursday, January 27, 2005
We've Been Taken Over By a Cult: The rage there is enormous. I'm talking about our old-fashioned allies
Seymour Hersh: We've Been Taken Over By a Cult: "January 27, 2005 | The Military is Nowhere; the Press is Nowhere; the Congress is Nowhere... | By SEYMOUR HERSH

Editors' Note: This is a transcript of remarks by Seymour Hersh at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue in New York.
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There's a lot of anxiety inside the -- you know, our professional military and our intelligence people. Many of them respect the Constitution and the Bill of Rights as much as anybody here, and individual freedom. So, they do -- there's a tremendous sense of fear. These are punitive people. One of the ways -- one of the things that you could say is, the amazing thing is we are been taken over basically by a cult, eight or nine neo-conservatives have somehow grabbed the government. Just how and why and how they did it so efficiently, will have to wait for much later historians and better documentation than we have now, but they managed to overcome the bureaucracy and the Congress, and the press, with the greatest of ease. It does say something about how fragile our Democracy is. You do have to wonder what a Democracy is when it comes down to a few men in the Pentagon and a few men in the White House having their way. What they have done is neutralize the C.I.A. because there were people there inside -- the real goal of what Goss has done was not attack the operational people, but the intelligence people. There were people -- serious senior analysts who disagree with the White House, with Cheney, basically, that's what I mean by White House, and Rumsfeld on a lot of issues, as somebody said, the goal in the last month has been to separate the apostates from the true believers. That's what's happening. The real target has been "diminish the agency." I'm writing about all of this soon, so I don't want to overdo it, but there's been a tremendous sea change in the government. A concentration of power.
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since we have installed him on June 28, July, August, September, October, November, every month, one thing happened: the number of sorties, bombing raids by one plane, and the number of tonnage dropped has grown exponentially each month. We are systematically bombing that country. There are no embedded journalists at Doha, the Air Force base I think we're operating out of. No embedded journalists at the aircraft carrier, Harry Truman. That's the aircraft carrier that I think is doing many of the operational fights. There's no air defense, It's simply a turkey shoot. They come and hit what they want. We know nothing. We don't ask. We're not told. We know nothing about the extent of bombing. ...
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We have a President that -- and a Secretary of State that, when a trooper -- when a reporter or journalist asked -- actually a trooper, a soldier, asked about lack of equipment, stumbled through an answer and the President then gets up and says, "Yes, they should all have good equipment and we're going to do it," as if somehow he wasn't involved in the process. Words mean nothing -- nothing to George Bush. They are just utterances. They have no meaning. Bush can say again and again, "well, we don't do torture." We know what happened ...
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... The rage there is enormous. I'm talking about our old-fashioned allies. We could see something there, collective action against us. Certainly, nobody -- it's going to be an awful lot of dancing on our graves as the dollar goes bad and everybody stops buying our bonds, our credit -- our -- we're spending $2 billion a day to float the debt, and one of these days, the Japanese and the Russians, everybody is going to start buying oil in Euros instead of dollars. We're going to see enormous panic here. But he could get through that. That will be another year, and the damage he's going to do between then and now is enormous. We're going to have some very bad months ahead.
This Pollyanna army: Re-enlistment is collapsing, by 30% last year: "dysfunctional" policies are producing a crisis "more acute and hurtful"
Guardian Unlimited | Guardian daily comment | This Pollyanna army: "Sidney Blumenthal | Thursday January 27, 2005 | The Guardian "

Bush will not admit that his troops are too exhausted to sustain his vengeful global missions

The most penetrating critique of the realism informing President Bush's second inaugural address, a trumpet call of imperial ambition, was made one month before it was delivered, by Lt Gen James Helmly, chief of the US Army Reserve.

In an internal memorandum, he described "the Army Reserve's inability under current policies, procedures and practices ... to meet mission requirements associated with Operation Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom. The Army Reserve is additionally in grave danger of being unable to meet other operational requirements and is rapidly degenerating into a broken force".

These "dysfunctional" policies are producing a crisis "more acute and hurtful", as the Reserve's ability to mobilise troops is "eroding daily".
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The US force in Iraq of about 150,000 troops is composed of a "volunteer" army that came into being with the end of military conscription during the Vietnam war. More than 40% are National Guard and Reserves, most having completed second tours of duty and being sent out again.

The force level has been maintained by the Pentagon only by "stop-loss" orders that coerce soldiers to remain in service after their contractual enlistment expires - a back-door draft.

Re-enlistment is collapsing, by 30% last year. The Pentagon justified this de facto conscription by telling Congress that it is merely a short-term solution that would not be necessary as Iraq quickly stabilises and an Iraqi security force fills the vacuum. But this week the Pentagon announced that the US force level would remain unchanged through 2006.
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On the eve of the Iraqi election, neither the president's soaring rhetoric nor the new secretary of state's fantasy numbers touch the brutal facts on the ground.

Wednesday, January 26, 2005
Torture treaty doesn't bar `cruel, inhuman' tactics, Gonzales says
Torture treaty doesn't bar `cruel, inhuman' tactics, Gonzales says: "Torture treaty doesn't bar `cruel, inhuman' tactics, Gonzales says | By Frank Davies | Knight Ridder Newspapers

01/26/05 'Knight Ridder' -- WASHINGTON - Alberto Gonzales has asserted to the Senate committee weighing his nomination to be attorney general that there's a legal rationale for harsh treatment of foreign prisoners by U.S. forces.

In more than 200 pages of written responses to members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, who plan to vote Wednesday on his nomination, Gonzales told senators that laws and treaties prohibit torture by any U.S. agent without exception.

But he said the Convention Against Torture treaty, as ratified by the Senate, doesn't prohibit the use of 'cruel, inhuman or degrading' tactics on non-U.S. citizens who are captured abroad, in Iraq or elsewhere.
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Cal Jillson, a constitutional scholar who's followed the careers of Gonzales and Bush since they were in Texas, said Gonzales was following basic Bush administration policy: Don't admit mistakes or re-evaluate decisions.
The New York Times > Opinion > Editorial: The Wrong Attorney General
The New York Times > Opinion > Editorial: The Wrong Attorney General: "The Wrong Attorney General | Published: January 26, 2005

Alberto Gonzales's nomination as attorney general goes before the Senate at a time when the Republican majority is eager to provide newly elected President Bush with the cabinet of his choice, and the Democrats are leery of exposing their weakened status by taking fruitless stands against the inevitable. None of that is an excuse for giving Mr. Gonzales a pass. The attorney general does not merely head up the Justice Department. He is responsible for ensuring that America is a nation in which justice prevails. Mr. Gonzales's record makes him unqualified to take on this role or to represent the American justice system to the rest of the world. The Senate should reject his nomination.

The biggest strike against Mr. Gonzales is the now repudiated memo that gave a disturbingly narrow definition of torture, limiting it to physical abuse that produced pain of the kind associated with organ failure or death. Mr. Gonzales's attempts to distance himself from the memo have been unconvincing, especially since it turns out he was the one who requested that it be written. Earlier the same year, Mr. Gonzales himself sent President Bush a letter telling him that the war on terror made the Geneva Conventions' strict limitations on the questioning of enemy prisoners "obsolete."
Doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision of war and peace in the hands of the President
Doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision of war and peace in the hands of the President"Standing for the Founding Principles of the Republic" | by US Senator Robert C. Byrd | 01/25/05

This doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision of war and peace in the hands of the President and undermines the Constitutional power of Congress to declare war.
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In Federalist Number 77, Alexander Hamilton wrote:

“It will readily be comprehended, that a man who had himself the sole disposition of offices, would be governed much more by his private inclinations and interests, than when he was bound to submit the propriety of his choice to the discussion and determination of a different and independent body, and that body an entire branch of the legislature. The possibility of rejection would be a strong motive to care in proposing.”
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And so we are here today to fulfill our constitutional duty to consider the nomination of Dr. Rice to be Secretary of State. Mr. President, I have carefully considered Dr. Rice’s record as National Security Advisor in the two months that have passed since the President announced her nomination to be Secretary of State. That record, I am afraid, is one of intimate involvement in a number of Administration foreign policies which I strongly oppose. These policies have fostered enormous opposition -- both at home and abroad -- to the White House’s view of America’s place in the world.

That view of America is one which encourages our Nation to flex its muscles without being bound by any calls for restraint. The most forceful explanation of this idea can be found in "The National Security Strategy of the United States," a report which was issued by the White House in September 2002. Under this strategy, the President lays claim to an expansive power to use our military to strike other nations first, even if we have not been threatened or provoked.

There is no question that the President has the inherent authority to repel attacks against our country, but this National Security Strategy is unconstitutional on its face. It takes the checks and balances established in the Constitution that limit the President’s ability to use our military at his pleasure, and throws them out the window.

This doctrine of preemptive strikes places the sole decision of war and peace in the hands of the President and undermines the Constitutional power of Congress to declare war. The Founding Fathers required that such an important issue of war be debated by the elected representatives of the people in the Legislative Branch precisely because no single man could be trusted with such an awesome power as bringing a nation to war by his decision alone. And yet, that it exactly what the National Security Strategy proposes.

Not only does this pernicious doctrine of preemptive war contradict the Constitution, it barely acknowledges its existence. The National Security Strategy makes only one passing reference to the Constitution: it states that "America’s constitution" -- that is "constitution" with a small C -- "has served us well." As if the Constitution does not still serve this country well! One might ask if that reference to the Constitution was intended to be a compliment or an obituary?

As National Security Advisor, Dr. Rice was in charge of developing the National Security Strategy. She also spoke out forcefully in support of the dangerous doctrine of preemptive war. In one speech, she argues that there need not be an imminent threat before the United States attacks another nation: "So as a matter of common sense," said Dr. Rice on October 1, 2002, "the United States must be prepared to take action, when necessary, before threats have fully materialized."

But that "matter of common sense" is nowhere to be found in the Constitution. For that matter, isn’t it possible to disagree with this “matter of common sense?” What is common sense to one might not be shared by another. What’s more, matters of common sense can lead people to the wrong conclusions. John Dickinson, the chief author of the Articles of Confederation, said in 1787, “Experience must be our only guide; reason may mislead us.” As for me, I will heed the experience of Founding Fathers, as enshrined in the Constitution, over the reason and “common sense” of the Administration’s National Security Strategy.
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
our administration preferred to exclude me, like so many other Muslim intellectuals, in order to protect itself from debate and dialogue
Al-Ahram Weekly | Opinion | Open letter to President George W. Bush: "From an 'expelled' Muslim to an elected American | Tariq Ramadan
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Mr. President, I was banished from the United States by your administration. My visa was revoked, as I was about to assume my position as a Professor at Notre Dame University. To this day, I have not been told the reasons behind this action.

I do know, as does Homeland Security and the State Department, that my file is empty. The Patriot Act was put forward as an excuse and I was asked to reapply. Since then, there has been total silence. Why was this decision taken? What are you afraid of? Is it perhaps that academic freedom of expression has become a danger for you? Or is it perhaps the fact that it would have fortified criticism against you, no matter how constructive, especially coming from a Muslim intellectual?

What are you doing to your country, Mr. President?
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However, since September 11th, 2001 your administration has continued to accumulate shadowy dealings. Boards of inquiry were delayed or strangely constituted; state secrets and sinister silences mushroomed. In the name of the "war against terrorism", the ultimate reason for legitimacy, did you permit your officials to make decisions and to act illegitimately, without a hint of accountability? Under your watch, laws eradicating civil liberties have been enacted which put into question the rights of citizens. Discrimination against Arabs and Muslimshas been institutionalized and legalized. There is limitless scrutiny, individuals are arrested, and lying in the name of the State has become the norm.

Whatever the tone of your generous speeches, facts do not lie: this is not a good time to be a Muslim in the United States. The consequences of the Patriot Act has been exactly what its' most virulent detractors had predicted - an infringement of citizens' rights and legalized discrimination that is reminiscent of the McCarthy era.
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Inhumane treatment inflicted on the Guantanamo prisoners in a declared "no rights" area is scandalous. Your intervention in Iraq only confirmed these practices, characterized by lies, systematic manipulation and in the end, the death of tens of thousands of Iraqis and Americans. The horrors of Abu Ghuraib prison, which appeared as revelations of torture were in fact institutionalized, from Afghanistan to Guantanamo. The American soldiers in Iraq are not primarily responsible: someone at the head of your administration had undoubtedly given the green light. ...
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Your second mandate begins January 20th. You presented yourself to the American people as the solution but you are in fact the problem. You have not ceased to deepen the gap between the United States and the rest of the world - not only the Muslim world but also Europe. As a European Muslim, I had the hope that by relocating to your country, I would have been able to bring a critical and constructive contribution. Your administration preferred to exclude me, like so many other Muslim intellectuals, in order to protect itself from debate and dialogue. ...
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
65% believe Iraq has harmed US image, 39% think Iraq "worth going to war"
Another Poll, This One for 'LAT,' Finds War Support Eroding: "By E&P Staff | Published: January 19, 2005 3:30 PM ET
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The poll, conducted Saturday through Monday, found that the percentage of Americans who believe the situation in Iraq was "worth going to war over" has sunk to a new low of 39%, down 5% since October.

The Times also reported that 37% of the public advocates withdrawing at least some troops now, a position very few newspaper editorial pages have endorsed. Fifty-two percent want to wait and see what happens after the Iraqi elections. Just 4% would like to send more troops, a position supported by many newspapers, including The New York Times, along with legislators such as Sen. John McCain.

In addition, 47% said they would like to see most of the troops out within a year.

Among other findings: Almost half, or 45%, say they believed the war has destabilized the Middle East; 24% say they think it had a stabilizing effect. A large majority, 65%, say they believe the war in Iraq had harmed the United States' image around the world. ...
Tuesday, January 18, 2005
(DV) Rajiva: The Ideology of American Empire
(DV) Rajiva: The Ideology of American Empire: "by Lila Rajiva | www.dissidentvoice.org | January 17, 2005
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In an October 23, 2003 AP report, General Boykin, assistant to Undersecretary of Defense Stephen Cambone, described the battle against Islamic terrorists as a clash between Christianity and "a guy named Satan" and suggested that Christians needed to support the divine plan that had put Bush in office, “Why is this man in the White House?” he asked rhetorically. “The majority of Americans did not vote for him. He's in the White House because God put him there.” ...
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Boykin represents the enormous power of evangelicals in the Bush administration. ....

Franklin Graham, whose father Billy converted Bush, has called Islam evil and Graham’s decision to join other Christian evangelists in Iraq both to aid and convert Iraqis must bolster the Muslim perception of the invasion as an alliance of “Jews and Crusaders.” Bush claims to be unable to restrain him because of concern for civil liberties, but his reluctance may have more to do with the contribution that evangelicals like Graham, Jerry Falwell, and Pat Robertson have made to his election. And in private too, Bush has revealed his own conviction that his presidency is a mission given to him by God.

Was the abasement at Abu Ghraib crafted to sear the religious conscience?

... David Frum, until last year a speechwriter for Bush, claims in a recent book that he heard a staff member say to Bush's chief speechwriter, Michael Gerson, “Missed you at Bible study.” Christian fundamentalists who have the President’s ear include the Apostolic Congress, affiliated with the United Pentecostal Church, which in addition to its missionary work in Israel (illegal under Israeli law), is active in the increasingly Christian work of pro-Israel activities in the United States. In an interview with the Village Voice, its leader, Pastor Upton, claimed that he had coordinated the directing of 50,000 postcards to the White House to oppose the Middle East “Road Map, ” the plan which aims to create a Palestinian state. NSC Near East and North African Affairs director, Elliott Abrams, sits down regularly with the Apostolic Congress to assuage their fear that Israel might give up any of its Biblical claims to land.
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Christian Zionists constitute a vocal 3 million of America's 98 million evangelicals and with the 30 million other Christians who have Zionist beliefs of some kind have long been the mainstay of U.S. support for Israel, operating through such political groups as the powerful Council for National Policy, which was founded by LaHaye, a former head of the Moral Majority, and has included John Ashcroft, Ed Meese, Ralph Reed, the editor of The National Review, Robertson, Falwell, Grover Norquist, and Oliver North among its members. Ashcroft has been reported as saying: “Islam is a religion in which God requires you to send your son to die for him. Christianity is a faith where God sent his son to die for you.” Jerry Falwell has told the CBS news program “60 Minutes” that Muhammad is a “terrorist.” The only non-Jew ever to receive the Jabotinsky medal for services to Israel, from the militant Zionist's ardent disciple, Menachem Begin, Falwell was even permitted by President Reagan to attend NSC briefings while best-selling Armageddon author, Hal Lindsey, was allowed to speak on nuclear war with Russia to top Pentagon strategists.
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Israel First

But are Bush’s policies driven largely by the rise of the fundamentalist right? Don Wagner, an expert in fundamentalism believes that the current hard-line pro-Israel movement in the U.S. draws its strength from these evangelicals and is “predominantly gentile.” But he may be placing the cart before the horse. It is true that Christian Zionists are numerically powerful, but a look at history quickly lets us know that their rise in importance in American politics coincided with the desire of Jewish Zionists to broaden their constituency and goes back to the late 1960s and 1970s to the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, the Arab defeat, and then during the Yom Kippur War in 1973 an oil crisis caused by an embargo by OPEC, the oil cartel, of the western nations that supported Israel in that war. ...
In 1980, the wooing of the right received the official sanction of the Israeli government and an “International Christian Embassy” in Jerusalem was established whose function was and remains to coordinate worldwide Christian support for Israel and its policies and which raises funds to help finance Russian Jewish immigration to Israel and settlement in the West Bank. Enter Christian Zionism to the center stage of American politics.

Jewish Zionism
...After all, many non-Jewish commentators take as hard-line a position on the Palestinians as Jewish Zionists -- among them Cal Thomas, Michael Novak, Bill Bennett, and George Will. Thomas, who has even called for the expulsion of the Palestinians from Israeli territory, is of course a Christian Zionist, but Novak and Bennett are both Catholics and Will is an Episcopalian. Some would say that their voices are an indication that Zionism in America is merely the expression of support for the natural security concerns of an ally.

That argument is not tenable on several counts. First, the record indicates that on certain issues the American media apparently takes its cue from the Israeli lobby and does not operate with genuine independence but in a prearranged concert.
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Elected officials who dare to criticize Israel, from Republican Senators Percy and Findley to black representatives Hilliard and McKinney, have been thwarted in their bids for office. On campus, the campaign for divestment of stock in Israel has been dubbed “anti-Semitic in effect, if not intent” by Harvard President Lawrence Summers.
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Zionism is an ideology of blood and soil and the ideology of even secular Zionism involves “Jewishness” even though there is no racially pure separate group of Jews. The most powerful and numerous group -- the Ashkenazi -- appear to be well-mixed with ethnic Eastern Europeans who converted in the middle ages. It is the Sephardic Jews and Arab and Christian Palestinians -- second-class citizens in Israel -- who are more closely linked ethnically to the original Israelites of the Bible. For this reason even while many religious Jews reject Zionism, secular Zionism itself needs religion for its raison d’etre for there is no pure tie of blood to which they can otherwise appeal.
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Charles Krauthammer writes in the Jewish World Review: Kofi Annan's personal representative in Iraq now singles out the policies of the world's one Jewish state, and the only democratic state in the Middle East, as “the great poison in the region.”

While the Los Angeles Times even editorializes that “Israel must remain a Jewish state.” (Oct 11, 2004)

Consider the policies of this bulwark of secularism, human rights, and democracy:

Employment, housing, and access to services follows a discriminatory pattern with Ashkenazi Jews from Europe getting the best, Sephardic -- Middle Eastern -- Jews the next, followed by Moslem, Druze and Christians, many of them the original inhabitants, and at the bottom “Israeli Arabs," that is, Palestinians within the 1948 borders. By the Law of Return, Israel must accommodate any Jews from anywhere who might at any time migrate to Israel but cannot accommodate the indigenous Palestinian population that fled Israeli terror in 1948 if they wished to return. Israeli identity cards can list the official ethnicity of a person -- Jewish, Arab, Druze ... -- but not the nationality - Israeli. Since 1967 to date, Israel has arbitrarily detained over 630,000 Palestinians. In 1989 alone, Israel detained 50,000 Palestinians, representing 16% of the entire male population of the West Bank and Gaza Strip between the ages of 14 and 55. By contrast, that same year, out of a total African population of 24 million in South Africa, no more than 5,000 or 0.2% were detained for security offenses under apartheid. Palestinians have the highest rate of incarceration in the world - approximately 20 percent of Palestinians in the occupied territories have, at one time, been arbitrarily detained by Israel.

The Language of American Exceptionalism

In this secular religion, to believe oneself “favored” rather than “blessed” is to believe that one's essence rather than one's acts set one apart. One's status as the chosen, whether American or Jewish, is thus derived from the success, not the rightness, of one's acts; from the power that makes one's representations alone real and others’ unreal. It is this power to which the will of our enemies is irrelevant that is behind both the shock and awe bombing of Iraq and its virtual counterpart, the pornographic torture of prisoners. ....
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From covenant theology also derives the literalism of the brand of nineteenth century evangelism -- dispensationalist -- that Falwell and Roberts practice which permeates even secular culture. Dispensationalists read the final book of the Bible, Revelations, as a literal account of a post-war progression to a world-consuming conflagration, Armageddon. In doing so, they discount the importance of reason, learning, or social consensus in their interpretations in favor of what they see as a literal reading of the Biblical text. ...

Monday, January 10, 2005
Warning From a Student of Democracy's Collapse: parallels with Hitler's propagandistic manipulation and current uses of Christianity
Warning From a Student of Democracy's Collapse: "By Chris Hedges | 01/06/05 'New York Times' --

FRITZ STERN, a refugee from Hitler's Germany and a leading scholar of European history, startled several of his listeners when he warned in a speech about the danger posed in this country by the rise of the Christian right. In his address in November, just after he received a prize presented by the German foreign minister, he told his audience that Hitler saw himself as 'the instrument of providence' and fused his 'racial dogma with a Germanic Christianity.'

'Some people recognized the moral perils of mixing religion and politics,' he said of prewar Germany, 'but many more were seduced by it. It was the pseudo-religious transfiguration of politics that largely ensured his success, notably in Protestant areas.'

... He stops short of calling the Christian right fascist but his decision to draw parallels, especially in the uses of propaganda, was controversial.

"When I saw the speech my eyes lit up," said John R. MacArthur, whose book "Second Front" examines wartime propaganda. "The comparison between the propagandistic manipulation and uses of Christianity, then and now, is hidden in plain sight. No one will talk about it. No one wants to look at it."


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