Iraq: A War for Israel?

[hangloose]

The United States Invasion of Iraq in March-April 2003, and the occupation of the country since then, has cost more than a thousand American lives and many tens of billions of dollars, and has brought death to many thousands of Iraqis.

Why did President Bush decide to go to war? In whose interests was it launched?

<SNIP>

Whatever the secondary reasons for the Iraq war, the crucial factor in President Bush’s decision to attack was to help Israel. With support from Israel and America’s Jewish-Zionist lobby, and prodded by Jewish "neo-conservatives" holding high-level positions in his administration, President Bush — who was already fervently committed to Israel — resolved to invade and subdue one of Israel’s chief regional enemies.

This is so widely understood in Washington that US Senator Ernest Hollings was moved in May 2004 to acknowledge that the US invaded Iraq "to secure Israel," and "everybody" knows it. He also identified three of the influential pro-Israel Jews in Washington who played an important role in prodding the US into war: Richard Perle, chair of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Board; Paul Wolfowitz, Deputy Defense Secretary; and Charles Krauthammer, columnist and author. <1>

Hollings referred to the cowardly reluctance of his Congressional colleagues to acknowledge this truth openly, saying that "nobody is willing to stand up and say what is going on." Due to "the pressures we get politically," he added, members of Congress uncritically support Israel and its policies.

<SNIP>

http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/article.asp?ID=2639

[cali]

1. While considerations of Israel

may have figured tangentially into plans to invade Iraq, it's pretty clear that they were not the chief motivating factors. Oil, a plan to remake the Middle East, were. Frankly, I found this article pretty distasteful, and yes, bordering on anti-semitic. Blaming Israel and Jews for bushco's war isn't grounded in reality.

[hangloose]

7. There's nothing anti-semantic about this post, it is an opinion

that Israel played a significant part in the decision to good to war in Iraq

[cali]

8. Anti-semantic?

You mean anti-semitic. Had you slipped but once, I'd ignore the error. Look, I'm deeply critical of Israel. I've criticized it often, but blaming Israel and jews for bush's policies, really does border on something very unsavory. It's really sailing off the deep end. Imagine there was no Israel. You really think bushco wouldn't be attempting to control the oil rich mid east?

[hangloose]

9. Pardon the flub. You misunderstand I'm not explicitly blaming

Jews in Israel for our involvement in Iraq. However, there are very Hawkish pro Israel participants in the Bush administration that appear to put Israel's security before our own and I believe were able to blindly push us in a direction we shouldn't have gone had Bush not been "elected" in 2000. These individuals are not Israeli's they are US citizens, but they are Jewish.

[dand]

2. Everybody knows that this President is a Sharon puppet.

Any one who doesn't see this has their head in the sand. Because of their combined stupidity we are all less secure, a hundred thousand innocent Iraqis are dead, 1400 US Service men and women are dead, our country has a wrecked economy and the entire civilized world thinks we are all Fascists.

[eauclaireliberal]

3. RE: "Iraq: A War for Israel?"

Watch your ass. Last time I mentioned Israel on DU, I got flamed...CHARBROILED for it, actually.

Besides, many Jews will tell you that there is a BIG difference between being Jewish and being an Israeli. Especially Orthodox Jews.

Additional link: Torah Jews Reject Zionism

[hangloose]

6. Yeh I have been the butt of several comments over time with regards

to any criticism of Israel or questioning why they hold such a grip on US policy in the middle east. Debate is good and I'm not more anti-semantic for posts these opinions they I am liberal for questioning the policies of the Bush administration.

I like DU it is an open forum for debate, I'll take the hits and come out swinging if I feel the need to.

[necso]

4. Link to the printer friendly version.

http://www.thetruthseeker.co.uk/print.asp?ID=2639

The use of the word "Zionist", etc, etc, in this piece is ill advised. And using Pat Buchanan's narrow definition of the neocons is similarly ill advised. Pat uses this narrow definition as a device to let him attack policies (and a few key players) without attacking the real powers behind those policies. (And the neocons are primarily Christians, although only nominal ones.)

This is a clever device, it works to Pat's personal interests, it is a way of bashing liberals (his "neocons" are also mostly "ex-liberals"), it does not unduly upset fellow right wing "Christian" activists, and it is a relatively safe thing to do. But it also leaves him (and his hard-nosed perspective) open to accusations of being anti-Semitic.

I have never met Mr Buchanan, and I have no idea if he is anti-Semitic or not. But I firmly believe that anti-Semitism is not the reason that he identifies neocons in the narrow manner that he does. -- He is far too crafty for that. (And I do not view this statement as being a compliment -- but rather as a frank "appreciation" of an enemy.)

And Pat has certainly has opened the door to runaway anti-Semitism by this artifice (his bold-faced deceit in defining the neocons the way that he does), and anti-Semitism is something that all well intentioned people must stand against.

But I suspect that this is only more artifice, effectively covering up the actual circumstances (of broad Christian -- and of the powerful generally -- involvement in neocon schemes), and leaving the (his) remaining narrow viewpoint inevitably subject to the broad-brush tarring of anti-Semitism. -- The net effect of all this is that while his voice is heard, widespread acceptance (with all its potential repercussions) of the truth underlaying the lies that he so carefully constructs, is effectively self-limited (as is, of course, acceptance of what he does say).

But I am probably giving him too much credit -- still he is a slippery one. -- And we had better count our fingers if we are to shake his or his cohort's hands.

[Darranar]

5. The United States does not need Israeli encouragement...

to launch wars of aggression. A brief look at the history of US foreign policy indicates this rather clearly.

[JohnyCanuck]

11. Of course, they'll take their help where they can find it.

The Spies Who Pushed For War

<snip>

The OSP was an open and largely unfiltered conduit to the White House not only for the Iraqi opposition. It also forged close ties to a parallel, ad hoc intelligence operation inside Ariel Sharon's office in Israel specifically to bypass Mossad and provide the Bush administration with more alarmist reports on Saddam's Iraq than Mossad was prepared to authorise.

"None of the Israelis who came were cleared into the Pentagon through normal channels," said one source familiar with the visits. Instead, they were waved in on Mr Feith's authority without having to fill in the usual forms.

The exchange of information continued a long-standing relationship Mr Feith and other Washington neo-conservatives had with Israel's Likud party.

In 1996, he and Richard Perle - now an influential Pentagon figure - served as advisers to the then Likud leader, Binyamin Netanyahu. In a policy paper they wrote, entitled A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm, the two advisers said that Saddam would have to be destroyed, and Syria, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Iran would have to be overthrown or destabilised, for Israel to be truly safe.

www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,999737,00.html

[hansolsen]

10. The great irony, of course, is that war in Iraq has been a disaster for

Israel. America's inevitable defeat in this unjust war will ultimately rebound against the neocons who sponsored it, but more directly, it will rebound against Israel.

Sharon and Likud saw Saddam Hussein as a great threat when in reality he was a toothless old camel. The jihadists who survive the war in Iraq and emerge victories over America will be a thousand times more powerful than Hussein ever was.

Demonstrating once again that age old adage -- "Take care what you wish for, you may get it."

[bemildred]

12. Duh. Well said. nt