Another Achievement of the AJC: 'The New Republic' Joins Me on Dual Loyalty Issue
Well now in The New Republic, John Judis has joined me in legitimizing this question. Here is the money quote:
On the one hand, Rosenfeld, Harris, and others want to deny that American Jews and American Jewish organizations like AIPAC suffer from dual loyalty in trying to influence U.S. foreign policy. It's anti-Semitic or contributes to anti-Semitism, they say, to make that charge. On the other hand, they want to demand of American Jewish intellectuals a certain loyalty to Israel, Israeli policies, and to Zionism as part of their being Jewish. They make dual loyalty an inescapable part of being Jewish in a world in which a Jewish state exists. And that's probably the case. Many Jews now suffer from dual loyalty--the same way that Cuban-Americans or Mexican-Americans do. By ignoring this dilemma--and, worse still, by charging those who acknowledge its existence with anti-Semitism-- the critics of the new anti-Semitism are engaged in a flight from their own political selves. They are guilty of a certain kind of bad faith.
This is intellectually valiant work, Judis should be applauded; and TNR praised for running the piece. As for the demand made on Jewish intellectuals to be loyal to Israel, it is one that anyone who has worked for the New Republic (I did it once, and carried Marty Peretz's anti-U.N. water for him) has experienced.
Wow, I'm just stunned by this. It's another achievement of the AJC report, which Judis's piece addresses (and of Walt-Mearsheimer, who broke the whole thing open). Don't you see what is happening? The dual-loyalty question is being mainstreamed. The degree to which neocons and neolibs and American Jewish journalists generally have been recruited in passive/unconscious identification with Israel is, as I've said here before, a legitimate issue. The suppression in the American Jewish community of any alternative discourse to Zionism—well, thanks to the AJC, the bridges are being dynamited...
Here is a must-read commentary on Iran, AIPAC and what the New York Sun calls the ATM for American politicians:
http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2007/02/enforced-orthodoxies-and-iran.html
"...So, according to The New York Sun (and the sources it cites): (1) financial support from groups like AIPAC is indispensable for presidential candidates; (2) the New York Jewish community of "influential" donors is a key part of the "ATM for American politicians"; (3) the issue which they care about most is Iran; and (4) they want a hawkish, hard-line position taken against Iran. And the presidential candidates -- such as Clinton and Edwards -- are embracing AIPAC's anti-Iran position in order to curry favor with that group.
If any public figure made those same points, they would be excoriated, accused of all sorts of heinous crimes, and forced into repentance rituals (ask Wes Clark). But this is what the New York Sun reported on Thursday.
...It is simply true that there are large and extremely influential Jewish donor groups which are agitating for a U.S. war against Iran, and that is the case because those groups are devoted to promoting Israel's interests and they perceive it to be in Israel's interests for the U.S. to militarily confront Iran. That is what the Sun and the Post have made clear.
There is just no point in denying that or pretending it is not the case, and in any event, the way in which these groups have ratcheted up their explicit anti-Iran advocacy has made it impossible for these facts to be concealed any longer (and, as I have noted before, neoconservatives have been increasingly arguing that American Jews of all political stripes are compelled to support the Bush administration because of its supposedly "pro-Israel" policies -- a claim grounded in the very "dual loyalty" theories which they claim to find so offensive and outrageous when advanced by others)."
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Here is the original New York Sun article:
http://www.nysun.com/pf.php?id=47843
Enjoy!
BTW, thanks to Ben for posting the link to Glenn Greenwald's blog a couple of weeks ago.
Alan, you guys, Phil included seem to thank every article is stuning, important, remarkable. Do you spend all your waking hours scouring the internet for this shit. The NY Sun is on sale at most news stands. I know you think that aipac has its tentacles, well everywhere, ah if only it was true. But of course that's exactly the thing I would say has a member of the cabal I suppose.
I looked at the follow-up NY Sun article, "Imagining a War With Iran"
"Iran will respond with .... attacks against American troops inside Iraq ....
"Tehran's most lethal weapon is manpower. From its army, it can marshal several hundred thousand troops along its borders with Iraq and Afghanistan to pressure American forces in those countries .....
"Two Iraqi Shiite militias allied with Iran, the Badr Brigades and Mahdi Army, led by Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim and Moqtada al-Sadr, respectively will launch large-scale attacks on American troops inside Iraq.
"Together, Messrs. Hakim and Sadr command some 80,000 to 100,000 men, who are armed, funded, and trained by Iran."
-- It looks like The Sun has got it figured out the same way as Col. Lang, but the difference is the value (or lack of it) attached to the American troops now present in the region.
Back to 'Imagining War'
"In an all-out war, the basic American military tactic will be air attacks, naval blockades, offshore bombardments, and the destruction of oil and power infrastructures and Iran's naval presence in the Persian Gulf."
-- Another important throw-away line from the NY Sun. Any interruption in the flow of oil anywhere in the world will, at this time of peak oil energy crisis, cause a world-wide economic depression with oil prices per barrel over $100 and gas prices here $6, $7, $8 and up per gallon.
And the reason the US would undertake to do this military attack on Iran is for what?
I made myself feel better by going back to the NY Sun article and reading the commentary. Out of a dozen comments, only two resonated with 'imagining war'. Here's an example of the majority reaction to this piece:
(title)"This Strikes Me As Simplistic"
Reader comment on article: Imagining A War With Iran
Submitted by Chasli, Feb 2, 2007 13:05
"It seems to me the author here is grossly simplifying this whole scenario. If the US is isolated in the world because of its Iraq fiasco, it would be even more so by an invasion of Iran. As far as I can tell there is no other country that thinks that an invasion would be reasonable -- except of course for Israel. A US invasion would be widely condemned internationally and most certainly by the UN. Domestically, while the democrats have been hesitant to de-fund the efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq, there is just no way they would fund an invasion of Iran. While the article touches on the certainty of Iranian terrorism in the Gulf region, it doesn't consider the possibility of Iranian terrorism in the US. There are many many Iranians living here in the US and it goes without saying that many are Iranian agents. The potential for terrorist havoc here at home would be very real. While the price of oil was indeed contained during the Iran-Iraq War, given the huge increase in oil demand since 1988 especially from India and China I find it presumptuous to think that the price of oil after an Iranian invasion could be contained at $75. What I am saying is that your scenario doesn't come close to taking into account all that an invasion of Iran would entail. It would give a whole new meaning to "imperial overstretch." It would be ugly beyond anything you apparently can imagine."
-- I don't think that imagining peace is any more unrealistic than imagining war at this point.
Here's the link:
http://www.nysun.com/article/47946
The vulnerability of the long, thin supply lines is of major concern to military planners.
Most poeple don't realize that once supply lines are compromised, armies vanish or surrender. See WWII and encirclement tactics (Eastern Front) that forced repeatedly the surrender of huge armies which had still weapons, ammunition and the willing to fight but no fuel and nothing to eat or drink.
It's a nightmare scenario.
Here is a pessimistic assessment of all this by the originator of Fourth Generation War theory:
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How to Lose an Army
Plow deep into Iraq and dare Iran to strike.
by William S. Lind
Lose a war, lose an election. What else did the Republicans expect? That is especially true for a
War Games look equally bad:
"September 2004
The Atlantic Monthly magazine commissions retired military officers, intelligence officials, and diplomats to participate in a war game scenario involving Iran. The three-hour war game deals
You've heard the expression ZOG, no doubt ...
Rice Briefs Jewish Groups as Palestinians Make Deal
Says U.S. Wants To Create
Ah kameraden Rowan, you must be sorry you missed those great days with the einzatsgruppen. Babi Yar, Ponar, marching behind the army to the Volga. What great days they were, right.