Diebert van Rhijn wrote:Dan, I do wonder if it's relevant to explore who exactly the 'US' is these days. A lot of Americans (the ones that still care) complain about their country being hijacked.
That's true of Israeli society as well, but I'll say something about that further down..
Perhaps it's not different from 1939 where all the fascists in the world networked together and 'bought' Germany into re-arranging the maps and spheres of influence.
I don't think it's unreasonable to make that comparison. Over the last 10 years there has certainly been a trend towards conservatism in western democracies, the US neo-cons arguably being the worst expression of it. In a sense there's nothing all that new in it; the world has always tended to be organised by networks of rich arseholes. But we are certainly seeing a trend of the undermining of the basic freedoms that are supposed to be the core thing that distinguishes us from theocratic and totalitarian states of various hues. I don't have much time for so-called "illuminati" conspiracy theories, but I do think there's a thread of truth running through the great gobs of exaggerated bullshit those people tend to speak.
We can see neoconservative elements in the US government work very well together with similar elements in not only Israel but also Italy, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, former communist states and a host of others. Often these elements are concentrated in some intelligence agency or a totalitarian regime. A similar network brought about WW2's "axis of evil".
Wealth and power is an ideology unto itself, which is why such networks can exist. It's kind of funny, really, that given the pretext of Islamofasicm for the eroding of rights and freedoms that we're experiencing (and the fast increasing trend towards Soviet style repression) that the US is so chummy with the Saudis (and more directly the Bushs and the Bin Ladens - I mean, how fucking ironic
is that?), who preside over the most fundamentalistic and terrorist producing Mulism state on the planet. It's just one of a number of reasons that the "Islamic" pretext is so obviously a fabrication. Civil rights in the US and here and in Britian and elsewhere are being eroded in ways that cannot be rationally justified by the threat of Islamic terrorism and often have no correlation to it at all. Most people seem rather oblivious to the various ways in which this is happening. Do most Americans, for example, have any idea how many "Signing Statements" Bush has actually put his name to? Have they examined the incredible trend in western culture of the militarisation of policing? Or that Bush wants to federalise the national guard? Do they know that the administration uses mercenaries in Iraq and has used those same mercenaries to "police" the streets of New Oleans after Katrina (i.e. the Blackwater firm)? There's lots of things that I could mention, some of which are echoed in changes in Australia and elsewhere. It's a rather disturbing trend.
By the way, I just made a post about the importance of water in the Israeli puzzle, but I made it in the oil thread and it's probably more on topic in this thread. Just seemed worthy of mentioning. The struggle for resources and wealth seems to be the main drive behind all rhetoric and pseudo-religion. Nothing shocking, I know.
Well, no, but it is a piece of the "Israel" puzzle worth examining. For Israel and its immediate neigbours, water is an extremely important matter, far more so than oil. Over the years attempted peace accords between Israel and "Palestine" have collapsed
explicitly over the water issue. Water and farmable land are arguably at the core of territorial disputes in that part of the mid-east (aside form the general issue of the Palestinians). One could easily wonder if Israel's current venture into Lebanon really has much to do with Hizbollah but rather has everything to do with access to the Litani River. Israel has always taken control of water resources in its occupied territories. It will be interesting to see what the eventual outcome of this current conflict is with respect to the Litani. It may be we'll never know Israel's actual intentions due to the UN ceasefire measures.
The problem both for Israel and its neighbours is that they can't just come out and admit that their conflicts and battles ever have anything directly to do with resource demands. No-one would be very accepting of that; I doubt that it would even fly with their various foreign benefactors (certainly not In Israel's case). So, an issue like water will always be one of those things that everyone in the region understands but whose name they shall never speak. Water is of course an important factor in the Palestinian dilemma and a matter all too often ignored by those who hold the insipid view that Arabs in that region reject modernity and live some sort of Ludittic liifestyle due entirely to attitude and religion. No-one seems to bother to consider that the non-oil-rich Arab nations are also seriously non-water-rich and that of itself makes the process of embracing modernity and all its techological and industrial splendour somewhat difficult.
I want to end this post by returning to what I said at the beginning. Israel is a country also in the grip of a conservative movement and it is that movement that I find problematic in terms of how Israel conducts itself (and its connection to foreign conservative agendas). It has, like most of the western democracies, a left/right political spectrum with all the usual in-between shades. The agenda and behaviour of the Israeli right not only towards neighbours and the OTs, but also domestically, is every bit as disconcerting as that of the leadership of the US and here. And, just as in those countries, it is difficult to determine how broadly that agenda and behaviour reflects popular will. Certainly not everyone in Israel agrees with the continued occupation of Golan, West bank etc. I don't lnow if anyone remembers the not insignifcant rebellion that occured within the IDF around 2002 when a lot of soldiers refused to be stationed in the OTs. Just as a reminder, here's some material from that episode:
May 2, 2002 Israeli Soldiers Resisting the Occupation
"Why We Refuse to Fight" by Rami Kaplan
Israel's occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip can in no way be considered democratic. It oppresses 3.5 million people, denying them their basic human rights. My refusal to militarily participate in this occupation, on the other hand, is most certainly a democratic act.
It exercises my right to protest, as I strive to hold on to the values of justice and peace, and it sends a message to my government that it cannot use me as a tool for attaining every goal it decides upon. In doing so I am fulfilling my obligations as a moral citizen of the world. Every man and woman must decide where the boundaries of conscience lie, and my conscience does not permit me to fight today in the occupied territories.
The refusal of the 435 signatories to the "Courage to Refuse" letter [the figure at the time of writing of this letter - D.R.], is a refusal to fight for continuation of the occupation, or, more precisely, for continuation of the settlements. It is a refusal to fight in a war of choice fueled by an extremist messianic ideology.
Make no mistake, Israel has no other reason for remaining in the occupied territories than to preserve the existing settlements, even when they are deep within Palestinian centers of population. Maybe the Palestinians are not interested in peace - one of the most commonly heard justifications for our recent invasions - and truly want to push us into the sea. Even then, we would be much better off defending ourselves from the 1967 borders rather than from inside the narrow alleys of Jenin, Ramallah and Bethlehem. This is why I think that the occupation runs against the most basic interests of the state of Israel, even to the extent of threatening its very existence.
As a concerned and involved citizen in a democratic regime, I see it as my right and duty to do all I can to save my country, the country I am willing to die for, from this dizzy descent into violence and mayhem.
This kind of struggle is not one to wage alone, and so when I heard that a group of reserve officers were organizing with the intention of publishing an open letter stating their categorical refusal to don their uniforms in the service of the occupation, I knew I had to join them.
For me, as for the others who have signed our letter, the decision was at once terribly difficult yet glaringly simple.
Difficult, because I am a Zionist. I served in the standing army for six years, and have since spent upward of 50 days a year in the reserves, and I have always equated love of the country with loyal service in the army. It was difficult to break rank, to look my fellow officers and soldiers in the eye and tell them that I would not join in their next campaign, in the war for the settlements, a war we chose, not one we had forced upon us.
Yet the decision was also easy. Both as a democrat and as a patriot, I had no other choice. It took me a long time to realize, to understand that not everything I learned during my long years as an officer was correct. The turning point was a tour of duty in the Gaza Strip a year ago. My soldiers committed no atrocities, but I could see the futility of our military presence there, and the daily injustices inherent in it.
Today I stand firm, confident that I am doing the right thing, hopeful that the group of soldiers currently demonstrating their tremendous courage to refuse, and spending long weeks in military prisons as a result, will help bring an end to the occupation.
The occupation is destroying Israel from within, it is destroying the Palestinians, and it is destroying those two nations' common future.
# Rami Kaplan, aged 29, is a major in the Israeli armored corps and a leading activist in the Courage to Refuse group.
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This is the official letter from those servicemen that now has 550 signatories (which is a significant number):
* We, reserve combat officers and soldiers of the Israel Defense Forces, who were raised upon the principles of Zionism, sacrifice and giving to the people of Israel and to the State of Israel, who have always served in the front lines, and who were the first to carry out any mission, light or heavy, in order to protect the State of Israel and strengthen it.
* We, combat officers and soldiers who have served the State of Israel for long weeks every year, in spite of the dear cost to our personal lives, have been on reserve duty all over the Occupied Territories, and were issued commands and directives that had nothing to do with the security of our country, and that had the sole purpose of perpetuating our control over the Palestinian people. We, whose eyes have seen the bloody toll this Occupation exacts from both sides.
* We, who sensed how the commands issued to us in the Territories, destroy all the values we had absorbed while growing up in this country.
* We, who understand now that the price of Occupation is the loss of IDF’s human character and the corruption of the entire Israeli society.
* We, who know that the Territories are not Israel, and that all settlements are bound to be evacuated in the end.
* We hereby declare that we shall not continue to fight this War of the Settlements.
* We shall not continue to fight beyond the 1967 borders in order to dominate, expel, starve and humiliate an entire people.
* We hereby declare that we shall continue serving in the Israel Defense Forces in any mission that serves Israel’s defense.
* The missions of occupation and oppression do not serve this purpose – and we shall take no part in them.
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And also a open letter of support from various academics around Israel:
"We, faculty members from a number of Israeli universities, wish to express our appreciation and support for those of our students and lecturers who refuse to serve as soldiers in the occupied territories. Such service too often involves carrying out orders that have no place in a democratic society founded on the sanctity of human life.
For thirty five years an entire people, some three and a half million in number, have been held without basic human rights. The occupation and oppression of another people have brought the State of Israel to where it is today.
Without an Israeli declaration of an end to the occupation, accompanied by appropriate action--unilateral, if necessary--the present war is not being fought for our home but for the settlements beyond the green line and for the continued oppression of another people.
We hereby express our readiness to do our best to help students who encounter academic, administrative or economic difficulties as a result of their refusal to serve in the territories. We call on the University community at large to support them."
# This letter is being updated. So far, 358 faculty members have signed it.
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Israelis are in the same boat as many of us with regard to government doing as it pleases.
Dan Rowden
