THEY
DARE TO
SPEAK
OUT-
PEOPLE AND INSTITUTIONS CONFRONT ISRAEL'S LOBBY
PAUL FINDLEY
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Findley, Paul, 1921-
They dare to speak out: people and institutions confront Israel s lobby/ Paul Findley.— 3rd ed. p. ; cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 1-55652-482-X
1. United States—Foreign relations—Israel. 2. Israel—Foreign relations— United States. 3. American Israel Public Affairs Committee. 4. Jews—United States—Politics and government. 5. Zionists—United States—Political activity. 6. Arab-Israeli conflict. I. Title. *. # E183.8.I7F56 2003
327.7305694—dc21 2002155505
Cover and interior design by Rattray Design
©1985, 1989, 2003 by Paul Findley All rights reserved Third edition Published by Lawrence Hill Books An imprint of Chicago Review Press, Incorporated 814 North Franklin Street Chicago, Illinois 60610 ISBN 1-55652-482-X Printed in the United States of America 5 4 3 2
To our grandchildren Andrew, Cameron, Henry, and Elizabeth. May they always be able to speak without fear.
"Straightforward and valid."
— Washington Post
"A responsible effort to re-assert the importance of free speech for our national institutions and well-being."
— Library Journal
"In Congress and in the White House, in the Pentagon and in the university, [Findley] finds the pro-Israel forces wielding remarkable power to suppress free debate, compromise national secrets and shape American foreign policy."
— Booklist
The first book to speak out against the pervasive influence of AIPAC" (American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee) on American politics, policy, and institutions resonates today as never before. With careful documentation and specific case histories, Kindlev demonstrates how the Israel lobbv helps to shape important aspects of U.S. foreign poliev and influences congressional, senatorial, and even presidential elections. He describes the stranglehold AIPAC exerts in the House and the Senate and the undue pressure the lobbv brings to bear on university professors and journalists. This completely updated edition includes details on the current administration and brings together all the new voices speaking out, including former President Jimmy Carter, U.S. Representative Cvnthia McKinncv, Senator Robert Bvrd, prominent Arab American Dr. Ziad Asali, Rabbi Michael Kerner, and journalist Charley Reese. Kindlev laments the lack of open debate among politicians with regard to U.S. policy in the Middle Kast and blames AIPAC. He also draws connections between America's unconditional support of Israel and raging anti-American passions around the world —and ultimately the tragic events of 9/11.
Paul Findley served as an Illinois congressman for 22 years and was a senior member of the House Middle Kast Committee. He is the author of Silent \o More: Confronting America's False Images of Islam and Deliberate Deceptions: lacing the Facts About the V.S.-Israeli Relationship. Kindlev lectures on foreign policy and makes frequent trips to the Middle Kast, where he has personal acquaintance with most heads of government.
Contents
Preface vii
1 Rescue and Involvement 1
2 King of the Hill 27
3 Stilling the Still, Small Voices 51
4 The Deliberative Body Fails to Deliberate 81
5 The Lobby and the Oval Office 117
6 Penetrating the Defenses at Defense and State 147
7 The Assault on Assault 187
8 Subverting Academic Freedom 209
9 Paving the Way for the Messiah 249
10 Not All Jews Toe the Line 281
11 Scattering the Seeds of Catastrophe 313
12 What Price Israel? 349
Acknowledgments 375
Notes 379
Index 395
Preface
Shortly after World War II, a small band of United States partisans for Israel marshaled self-discipline and commitment so effectively that they succeeded in ending free and open debate in America whenever Middle East issues are considered.
Their primary goal was to assure broad, substantial, unconditional, and ultimately blind support for Israel by the U.S. government. In seeking that goal, these partisans forced a severe anti-Arab and anti-Muslim bias into U.S. Middle East policy that has since raised costly economic, political, and military barriers to the American national interest. The most harmful part of this process was the disappearance of unfettered discussion of the United States' relationship to the Arab-Israeli conflict. These biases and restrictions, though unwritten, are as effective as if they had been carved in stone. Even in the legislative chambers on Capitol Hill, the nation's highest and most hallowed halls of debate, discussion on the Middle East is virtually nonexistent.
In a 1983 interview for the first edition of this book, the late I. F. "Izzy" Stone, a widely respected author, commentator, and self-styled radical, told me why many of his fellow Jews work so aggressively to stifle free speech. He explained that, because Jews in Israel seem constantly at war with Arabs, Jews in America feel that they are in the same war. To them, free speech is a luxury that can be sacrificed where debate might weaken U.S. support for an Israel at war. Stone summed it up, "When people are at war, it is normal for civil liberties to suffer." As long as Israel is at war, most U.S. Jews "feel they have to fight and keep fighting." Nowhere has this been more obvious than in Israel's post-September 11 incursions into the occupied territories.
5
5 Preface
This reaction is almost instinctive, prompted by deeply felt anxieties, fears, and outrage that arise mainly from the common bond of religion and the knowledge of unspeakable Jewish death and suffering in the Nazi Germany Holocaust during World War II. It is not confined to people of the Jewish faith. To Muslims and many non-Muslims worldwide, the present suffering of Palestinians—to them, a latter-day holocaust—evokes a similar reaction in which free speech and other basic rights are sometimes casualties.
April 2002 provided evidence that strong passions persist on both sides. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, well known for his bias in favor of Israel, received a lesson in anti-Palestinian fervor when addressing a large crowd of people gathered for a pro-Israel rally at the U.S. Capitol. He tried to tell the crowd, "Innocent Palestinians are suffering and dying as well, and it is critical that we recognize and acknowledge that fact." His words were drowned out by boos and the shouted slogan "No more Arafat."1
A third of the way around the world, U.S. Ambassador Donald Neumann was booed for making a similar plea to a crowd of Bahraini citizens gathered to protest Israel's latest invasion of Palestine. After standing with the protesters for a minute of silence for the victims of the Israeli onslaught, Neumann remained standing and asked for a moment of silence for innocent Israeli victims of Palestinian terrorism. The crowd turned hostile and shouted back its refusal.2
Six weeks later, the scene in Bahrain remained hostile. Neumann issued an advisory, suggesting that U.S. citizens avoid crowds and vary their travel routes when away from home. He reported several beatings of U.S. military personnel, American vehicles being pelted with eggs, and local vehicles swerving near U.S. cyclists and pedestrians.3
Open Season on Palestinians
The Patriot Act brought about many changes in America, but it did not alter Israel's total domination of Capitol Hill. In 2001 Israel quickly endorsed President Bush's war on terrorism and Congress applauded Israel's war on Palestinians, accepting Israeli Prime Minister Sharon's duplicitous argument that eradicating "terrorists" from the occupied territories was an essential part of Bush's worldwide military campaign.
Preface 5
Supporting Israeli wars was normal procedure on Capitol Hill. Thanks to the effectiveness of the pro-Israel lobby, the United States had long been the key, indispensable ally in all of Israel's military victories over Arabs. Despite frequent claims over the years that it sought only policies that were fair to both sides—the "honest broker" role—the U.S. government provided critical support to Israel's expansionist campaigns without interruption since President Lyndon B. Johnson gave clandestine aid to Israel's June 1967 war against the Arabs. The American people remain largely unaware of U.S. complicity in these wars, although it is widely recognized in all countries outside the United States. To this day, Americans are poorly informed about the level of U.S. military and economic aid to Israel, not to mention our government's record of near-perfect support of Israel in critical votes in the United Nations Security Council.4
In April 2002 Sharon ordered the invasion of the territories on the pretext of rooting out the leaders who organized suicide bombings carried out inside Israel by individual Palestinians. The bombings spread fear throughout Israel, not just in areas adjacent to the occupied territories. Even armed Israeli soldiers and police officers did not feel safe. The bombers could rarely be identified in advance, as they were of both sexes and varied ages.
Sharon's counterattack was brutal and massive, utilizing tanks, helicopter gunships, and other arms—all donated to Israel through the U.S. government's military assistance program. It left major cities in the occupied territories heavily damaged and the Palestinian authority headquarters in shambles and isolated. Accurate casualty statistics may never emerge, but the UN Report on Jenin put the Palestinian death toll in Jenin alone at 52. It reported that 497 people had been killed and 1,477 were wounded during the entire military sweep. These figures were compiled from a distance, because the Israeli government, supported by Washington, refused to permit the UN inspection team to visit Jenin.
The invasion did not halt suicide bombings, but it left the Palestinian population more tightly repressed than ever before. It also left Palestinians and their sympathizers outraged at the crucial support provided to the invaders by the U.S. government.
For twelve days following the assault, Israeli forces barred a UN relief mission headed by special envoy Terje Roed-Larsen, from entering the Jenin refugee camp. During this period ambulances were routinely
5 Preface
turned away, and scores of injured Palestinians bled to death. After finally being allowed to enter and tour the camp, Roed-Larsen said, "We have expert people here who have been in war zones and earthquakes, and they say they have never seen anything like it. It is horrifying beyond belief." He told reporters that 300 buildings had been destroyed and 2,000 people were left homeless.5
The Israelis did everything they could to prevent reports of the immense destruction from reaching American eyes and ears. Riad Abdelkarim, a Los Angeles physician who writes commentaries on the Middle East for U.S. newspapers and who served as a relief worker during the assault on Jenin, was arrested and held for several weeks by Israeli authorities after sending an eyewitness report on the devastation in the camp to U.S. newspapers.
Outraged by U.S. complicity in the assault, Palestinian officials in Jenin rejected a U.S. Agency for International Development shipment of tents, food, and children's toys. Their reason: the camp had been destroyed by U.S.-donated weapons.6
"A Special Relationship with Israel"
During Israel's month-long invasion, President Bush publicly demanded that Sharon order the immediate withdrawal of Israeli forces. Given Bush's position as chief executive of the United States, Israel's chief benefactor, one would have expected Sharon to offer at least a touch of conciliation. Instead, with supreme arrogance, he announced simply that his war measures were not finished, and that withdrawal would not occur until they were. Faced with this defiance, Bush unaccountably praised Sharon as a "man of peace" and reminded reporters of the obvious: the United States has "a special relationship with Israel." He failed to explain what this relationship entails: letting Israeli prime ministers defy the demands of U.S. presidents, control Palestinians and their land by force of arms, and violate with impunity international laws and conventions on human rights.
Sharon's 2002 war on Palestinians was in several ways reminiscent of the bloody 1982 massacres he waged on the Palestinian refugee camps at Sabra and Shatila. Sharon called both of them assaults on terrorism. In both wars, the U.S. president—in 1982, Ronald Reagan—demanded that Israel stop the war. In both, the prime minister of Israel—in 1982, Men-achem Begin—defied the presidential demand. In the greatest irony of all,
Preface 5
when both assaults came to an end, Congress promptly appropriated funds to resupply Israels war machine—$150 million in 1982, $200 million in 2002. To free up funds for the bonus to Israel, the House Appropriations Committee, in a curious reordering of priorities, cut $75 million from a project to reinforce cockpit doors to guard against intrusions by hijackers.7 Sharon's war prompted huge anti-Israel and anti-American protests worldwide. One in Rabat, Morocco, drew an estimated 1.5 million people—fully 6 percent of the nation's population. Surprisingly large protests also took place in Washington, D.C., New York, and other major U.S. cities. They received little media attention.
"Laughingstock of the World"
A Time-CNN poll showed that 60 percent of Americans favored reducing or completely eliminating aid to Israel if Sharon failed to withdraw his troops from Palestinian areas. The same poll showed 75 percent favoring Bush's diplomatic initiatives for Middle East peace.8
That sentiment was not represented on Capitol Hill in Washington, where both the House of Representatives and the Senate acted as if they were committees of the Israeli Knesset. During deliberations on Sharon's war, almost all speeches were sympathetic to Israel, echoing Sharon's "war of survival" theme.
On May 2, 2002, both the Senate and the House of Representatives adopted resolutions that praised Sharon's war and pledged full support of Israel. Although the House resolution was slightly more hostile to the Palestinian cause than the Senate version, the Atlanta Constitution columnist Martha Ezzard wrote that "Republican leaders in the House and Democratic leaders in the Senate entered into a schoolyard-like contest to see who could be the best pro-Israel cheerleader, approving resolutions that made Sharon appear as blameless for the loss of any innocent lives as Mother Teresa."9
In the House, Representative Peter DeFazio (D-OR), one of twenty-one who voted "no" on the resolution, declared that it put the House of Representatives on record "to the right of Ariel Sharon and the Likud Party." Representative Nick J. Rahall (D-WV), who also voted against it, predicted that the resolution would make the House "the laughingstock of the world." Earlier, DeFazio had found only thirteen colleagues willing to sign a balanced resolution.
5 Preface
In the end, 352 of the 435 members voted yes. Twenty-one voted no. Twenty-eight others heeded the advice of Representative Marcy Kap-tur (D-OH), by voting "present." During the House debate, Kaptur warned of a "corrosive" effect: "This one-sided resolution will only fan the killing frenzy. ... I fear it represents crass domestic politics in this election year. . . . Let us be a true partner for peace, not just with Israel but as well with the Arab states in the region."10
In the Senate, only Democrats Ernest Hollings (D-SC) and Robert Byrd (D-WV) voted against the resolution. Hollings told his colleagues that Sharon "is making more terrorists than he is getting rid of."11
Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR), responded, "It is truly disturbing to see American elected officials falling over themselves in an unseemly attempt to 'pledge allegiance' to a foreign government and its domestic lobby."12
Unprecedented War-Making Authority
What a difference a year can make. Within twelve months, America became, for the first time, the target of a massive, lethal assault by foreign terrorists on its own soil. Congress subsequently granted the president unprecedented authority to make war and police the world. Bush used that authority to launch a costly war in Afghanistan, with a larger one expected to follow against Iraq. Meanwhile, at home, Congress curbed precious civil liberties. All the while, several fundamental questions begged for attention:
• Why America? What, if anything, did the United States do to provoke 9/11?
• Do grievances against America remain? If so, what should America do to redress them?
• Why did almost every other nation reject or ignore President Bush's call for a multinational assault on Iraq?
These are urgent questions. They reach into the heart of the frantic, wrenching ordeal in which America finds itself, and yet, incredibly they are left unanswered—or worse, are largely unasked.
Welcome to my quest for the answers, a search that began unwittingly midway through my congressional career. It continues to this day.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
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