Great work, Israel:
The U.S. has lodged a strong protest over the savage beating delivered to an American teen from Florida was attending the funeral of his cousin who was murdered in Israel this past week, according to Haaretz.
The teen, identified by the State Department as Tariq Khdeir, 15, of Tampa, Florida, alleged to be the person seen in two different videos, laying passively on the ground as two Israeli Border Police officers punch and kick him before carrying his unconscious body away.
“We are profoundly troubled by reports that he was severely beaten while in police custody and strongly condemn any excessive use of force,” State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement. “We are calling for a speedy, transparent and credible investigation and full accountability for any excessive use of force.”
“We reiterate our grave concern about the increasing violent incidents, and call on all sides to take steps to restore calm and prevent harm to innocents,” the statement read.
And when you do nothing and the AIPAC wing of Congress starts sending off nasty letters to the President condemning the State Department, we’ll slowly drop the matter and send you some more weapons and money. I mean, basically, if you can send commandos on a boat in international waters and slaughter people and get away with it (cough, cough, USS Liberty), beating a teenage American is really no big deal.
Ronnie Pudding
Never forget the GHWB suspended funding of Israel for a time. Unthinkable nowadays.
And the kid better of been an angel, otherwise the line will be that he deserved it.
Cassidy
Silly Israel. Only America gets to beat brow. People with no repercussions.
⚽️ Martin
Typical liberal lies. Right before the video, which was conveniently edited out, you can hear one of the Israelis shouting (in Hebrew) “Look out, he’s got Skittles!”
Totally justified.
Corner Stone
Morzer
@Ronnie Pudding:
Looking at the kid’s name, how long will it be before the GOP starts howling about Obama intervening to protect teenage terrorists?
Corner Stone
I just don’t get it. How big could the Likudnik body be in US elections?
Why do they scare any politician?
James E. Powell
You remember how Dick Durbin said the banks “frankly own the place” when he was trying to give bankruptcy judges the ability to make equitable adjustments to home mortgages? Well, it’s just like that only it’s AIPAC and it’s any modification of US policy toward Israel.
I fully expect Hillary Clinton to condemn the US governments failure to condemn Palestinians who are to blame for the whole thing. They are, right? Isn’t that what every US elected official always says?
debbie
I heard earlier that the Palestinian teen kidnapped and killed by Jewish settlers was burned alive, according to the autopsy.
What the hell has Israel become?
jayboat
Shit is fucked up and bullshit.
Corner Stone
@debbie: Pictures of that kid (while alive) break my fucking heart. Who could hate so hard that they want to hurt a child like that?
Violet
@Ronnie Pudding: There will be an inspection of his family’s countertops right quick.
James E. Powell
@Corner Stone:
I just don’t get it. How big could the Likudnik body be in US elections?
Why do they scare any politician?
Have you ever noticed that the Democratic candidate always gets a super-majority of the Jewish vote? Even landslide losers like Mondale and Dukakis got 67% and 64% of the Jewish vote, respectively.
Carter, the architect of the Camp David Accords, got 45%. I don’t know what the figures would be for the campaign donations, but I’d guess it was even worse. If you were a Democratic candidate, would that scare you?
Violet
@debbie:
Don’t think it’s “become”. It’s been that way for quite some time.
debbie
@Corner Stone:
Only Jewish settlers could.
debbie
@Violet:
I always felt Israel died the day in 1995 when Itzak Rabin was assassinated by a Jewish settler. Today, hearing this news, I believe Israel is now beyond any redemption at all.
I’m not religious, but I feel like crying.
Corner Stone
@James E. Powell:
I don’t know. Would it?
gene108
@Corner Stone:
I get it if you represent NJ, NYC and surrounding areas, Philadelphia, maybe parts of Baltimore, even parts of Connecticut, because they have large Jewish populations.
Hell, the U.S. has almost as many Jews living here as Israel does. And has more people with Jewish ancestry. Link
Why people not representing large Jewish population centers bow down to Israel is something I do not understand. Supporting Israel has led to more trouble in the Muslim world than any actual help Israel has given us.
I do not understand why politicians can not understand something so obvious.
Roger Moore
@debbie:
It hasn’t become anything; you’ve just become aware. Israel was founded on the principle that it was fine to drive the Palestinians out of their land to benefit the Jews because that’s what the Bible says to do. That has never changed. It’s just now there are faces on the Palestinian bodies.
debbie
@Roger Moore:
No, I have been aware since 1967 when Israel started that long slide down their own slippery slope. It wasn’t an overnight process, but I think they’ve now gone beyond the point of any sort of redemption. They’ve become worse than those they sought to never face again.
And what is with Netanyahu’s silence all of a sudden?
Roger Moore
@debbie:
Lots of people could. Imagine if he had been the same age but a black kid who looked the wrong way at a white woman in the pre-Civil Rights Era South. Or a Jewish kid in WWII-era Warsaw. Or a Vietnamese kid in 1968. Or plenty of other circumstances. There’s more than enough hate to go around.
Joseph Nobles
AAWLP – Acting American While Looking Palestinian
FlipYrWhig
@gene108: it’s “the Holy Land.” It’s the white (or whitish) people holding the swarthy (or swarthier) hordes at bay. US support for Israel is sky high because of whiteness and Christianity, not just “what is best for the Jews.”
Roger Moore
@Corner Stone:
The point you’re missing is that the Likudniks have allied themselves with the Talibangelicals. That gives substantial pressure on both parties.
Mr Stagger Lee
@Corner Stone: Because if you oppose Israel, you oppose JEEEEEZZZZZUSSSSS!!! And God will send some plagues upon the land(Evangelical Fundie logic). Also if you even look at Israel funny, you might as well break out the SS uniform according to AIPAC.
Corner Stone
@Roger Moore: I haven’t missed the rapture folk. But how does that capture so many from both parties?
Fundies don’t vote D.
Outside of the NE corridor, for lack of a better geographic, where do they vote en masse?
Corner Stone
I get the rhetoric and the tough talk. Where does their money and legislative scare tactics reside?
JPL
@debbie: Someone on the site recommended the book “The Lemon Tree” by Sandy Tolan. It’s a short history of the settlement of Israel and the unlikely friendship of a Palestinian and Jewish girl.
gene108
@FlipYrWhig:
Yeah. I hear there are a bunch of Fundie sects, who feel Jews need to control Israel to bring on the End Times and the return of Jesus.
There’s a lot of crazy reasons to support Israel, but the blow back from supporting them is not worth the support they give us.
If we stayed out of the 1973 War, the Oil Embargo would not have happened. We could have avoided the worst of stagflation, which helped set the stage for Reagan and supply-side economics.
Israel does realize we trashed our economy for a decade, in order to resupply them in 1973?
A little gratitude would be appreciated.
big ole hound
Evangelicals support Israel about 90%. That is why most politicians support them. Israel must exist for the end times or rapture to occur. How fucked up is that the jew’s best ally are far right American christians ?
Neldob
Those who have suffered terrible things do terrible things. Plus there are the religious fanatics. Israel is based on the horror of Hitler and like the child of abusers they now abuse. Israel has a very strong lobby and tries to destroy anybody who doesn’t support it completely (Jimmy Carter, et al). Plus there are the religious fanatics. Also remember Rachel Corrie.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: Israel is where “people like us” and Holocaust victims who made the desert bloom are surrounded by hostile neighbors intent on their destruction. That myth is super popular to white America both secular and religious.
Gator90
@debbie:
Yes, only Jews are capable of horrific violence against innocents, as any review of history and/or contemporary events will readily confirm. Nice going.
JPL
@big ole hound: You do know that the jews can be saved if they become born again.
rikyrah
this is absolute insanity.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: I think it’s just internalized. It’s what politicians understand as What’s Right.
ruemara
@debbie: Us.
JPL
@Neldob: I’m surprised the right hasn’t vilified the teenager yet in the same way they did Rachel Corrie.
⚽️ Martin
@Corner Stone:
Upwards of 40M. Remember, the rapturists are convinced that they need to keep Jerusalem intact and the Jews in charge so that they can all die so that all Republicans can go to heaven.
Also, Israel is considered by some people to be an aryan state.
debbie
@Gator90:
Explain to me in what way their actions are better than those which were committed against them.
That’s what makes it even worse.
gene108
@Neldob:
The impetuous to create a Jewish state out of the British controlled Trans-Jordan (left over from carving up the remnants of the Ottoman Empire from WW1), was driven because of resettlement problems in Europe for all the Jews Hitler dispossessed of worldly possessions, including homes.
The Zionist movement, to create a Jewish state in Palestine, goes back to the 19th century, when European Jews started to move to Palestine to escape persecution in Europe. They initially started by buying Palestinian land, but a numbers increased they became more and more militant.
By the time the 1948 war rolled around, the Jewish population in Palestine, had spent the post-WW2 years arming themselves and organizing themselves into a better fighting force than the newly forming Arab* states around them had the time or resources to do.
*The Arab states, including Egypt, were just coming out of being controlled by the Ottomans and then the French and British, so they were not full fledged states in the 1940’s that had established militaries and governments. The 1948 war was an organized Jewish militia fighting a disorganized motley of Arab militias.
Corner Stone
Yes, I get that. Rapturists and Fundies do not vote D. Why are both parties so fucked on Israel?
Someone tell me it’s just money and XYZ funds the D party because of ABC.
Stop telling me about fucking right wing nut jobs who will never, ever, vote for a D candidate. I get it. Thanks.
Corner Stone
@JPL: Give them just a skosh. It’s coming.
debbie
@JPL:
Thanks, I’ll take a look. A couple of years ago, I read Philip Roth’s “Operation Shylock.” Published in 1993, it includes a number of lengthy Israeli and Palestinian arguments, justifications, and defenses. It was more than a little depressing to see that after almost 20 years, zero had changed and zero progress had been made.
Litlebritdifrnt
@⚽️ Martin: And one of the major voices for that idea is Sarah Palin, she may be out of office and out of ideas but she still has a large platform within the GOP/Tea Party. They have to keep Israel a viable country because without it the Rapture cannot happen.
Gator90
@debbie: I don’t have to explain anything to you. You stated that “only Jewish settlers” could do something so awful.
There is a lot of discussion about if and when criticism of Israel crosses the line into something more ugly. Your comment was a useful illustration.
Poopyman
@gene108:
Haaaaa!Hahahahahahahahha…aaaaaaaah.
(Passes out from hyperventilation.)
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: No one who would question supporting Israel gets into politics for either party in the first place. It’s like “supporting the troops.” It has the ring of a truism. It’s not about self-interest or votes or money, it’s the height of conventional wisdom.
debbie
@Gator90:
You don’t know what you’re talking about.
Dorthy
I’m surprised that nobody has mentioned Max Blumenthal’s book Goliath yet. If you want to read about what Israel has become and why, that’s the go-to book.
FlipYrWhig
@Corner Stone: Basically, Americans really like the myth of Israel. If you don’t support Israel, you’ve taken the side of terrorists against Holocaust victims. That’s why it’s beyond question for both Democratic and Republican politicians, especially the Dems, who as a rule are exceptionally risk-averse.
Gator90
@debbie: No? Well, what if, after the recent murders of the 3 Jewish teenagers by one or more Palestinians, someone said that “Only Palestinians could do such a thing.” That OK with you?
Kropadope
@Gator90: It was only implied, so I don’t blame you for missing it, but a major part your missing is “and get away with it.”
JPL
@Gator90: There’s some truth to your statement but I don’t believe that most on the this site think the entire Jewish population is to blame. What happened to Tariq Khdeir by the police needs to be investigated and the police involved need to be punished. Israel needs to arrest the people responsible for the burning of Muhammad Abu Khdeir in order to show they consider his death to be just as bad as the Jewish teens.
mdblanche
@debbie:
The analyses I’ve read say Netanyahu doesn’t want a renewed military conflict with the Palestinians right now. Which is something he should have thought of before doing his part to raise tensions so much. At this point a war neither side’s leadership really wants may be inevitable thanks to earlier idiocy.
Mnemosyne (iPad Mini)
@JPL:
It’s a holiday weekend. I’m sure all of the talking points will be distributed first thing Monday morning.
Cacti
Israel is our bestest friend ever.
They’re always there whenever they need us.
⚽️ Martin
@FlipYrWhig: Yeah, I think a lot of it is this. I think some of it too is that Israel provides some convenient services for us. Their intelligence services in that area are better than ours, and they share to some degree, so they’re seen as an asset by our elected officials.
But our government must also be aware that our track record is hardly any better. Yeah, we don’t usually get our border patrol agents on video killing immigrants, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t happening. FBI, etc. So while this kind of thing looks bad, and of course we’ll object to one of our own, the administration isn’t going to be all that morally outraged.
Gator90
@Kropadope: The question asked was, “Who could hate so hard that they want to hurt a child like that?” Debbie’s response was “Only Jewish settlers could.” I don’t know where any perceived implication about “getting away with it” would come from. Her statement was quite clear. (In any event, it remains to be seen whether the perpetrators will “get away with it.”)
Trentrunner
Let them all kill each other off.
Then let God and Allah fight over sorting them out.
debbie
@mdblanche:
Haaratz has a headline to the effect that Hamas is hoping Netanyahu doesn’t want an all-out war. That shouldn’t prevent him from publicly condemning the settlers’ actions. And where are their fellow settlers’ condemnations?
H.K. Anders
Why are you such an anti-Semite, John Cole? Criticizing the Israeli government is Hitler. And, since there is no difference between Israel and the U.S., it’s un-American, too. And Kenya.
muddy
@H.K. Anders: Both Israelis and Palestinians are Semitic. What a bind!
Botsplainer
About 20 years ago, a nice kid from my Antiochian Orthodox parish went for his first trip to Palestine. He’s a goofy, good natured kid (I taught him Sunday School when he was a 4th grader, don’t judge me) who, despite his parents being Palestinian Christians, spoke about 100 words in Arabic. Anyway, he was about 15, as American as Cole, a football player at one of the bigger Catholic high schools in the area, and didn’t have a mean bone in his body (he’s a dentist nowadays, practices here locally).
Israeli border security treated him shamefully. Singled him out, braced him, screamed at him in the Arabic he didn’t understand, smacked him and threatened him with weapons, basically for the crime of visiting extended family,
Needless to say, there’s no love lost from him; an indelible memory is etched. Frankly, if that entire government gets executed for crimes against humanity and Eretz Israel gets reduced to a disarmed multicultural UN protectorate/rump state consisting of Tel Aviv, Haifa and some portions of Jerusalem, I won’t give much of a shit and the world will be a better place. They’ve spent all their legitimacy on the occupation, denial of autonomy and reckless militarism.
Villago Delenda Est
@debbie:
The very monster it was created in response to.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gator90: You’re a perpetual apologist for these vile racist shits, aren’t you?
Botsplainer
Oh, I’ll add – his mom is a hairdresser, his dad was an assistant principal at a Louisville public school. Super nice, apolitical family.
J R in WV
As a youngster I discovered the reality of the holocaust during WW 2 – young like 10 or so. Had a hard time understanding the actual history.
Then about the same time I doscovered the historical novels by Leon Uris, which I read more or less in historical order. He told of the Warsaw ghetto uprising against the Nazi warlords with hand guns and molotov cocktails against tanks and machine guns.
Then a novel about smuggling survivors from Europe to Zion, and old war surplus freighters full of beat-up war surplus weapons. Most of those were captured by the new enemy, the British rulers of TransJordanian Palestine. So there were underground factories building sten guns etc.
And the Zionists blew up the King David Hotel, where the British high command was. Uris was a genius, he could make that seem like a good thing! He didn’t mention the civilian casualties… I’m too old to look it up again now that I’ve finally forgotten some of the details.
There was blame to go around. The various arab tribal chiefs of course hated the jews, and warned their subjects that they woul be tortured if they remained in their homes when the battle passed over them. So they all ran before the jews could capture them for unholy rites.
I was pretty much a zionist, as much as a son of Presbyterians and Baptists could be… and an athiest, too. But then there were wars started by both sides!!! And then the USS Liberty was attacked, I forget (again, still) how many American boys were killes by the IDF, won’t look it up!
So there are no good guys, not the leadership anyway. There are good people, individuals who care about every death, doctors who will treat anyone. But the leadership of both sides is despicable.
The day after the Liberty was attacked we should have either drawn a line in the sand, and just told the IDF that they were on their own now, good luck bitches! That was deliberate state terrorism – the ship didn’t have any effective weapons, it was a radio listening post …
Singular
Years later, this is still the most horrify thing I’ve read…
The talk about a new Shoah is particularly disturbing. We are all about to see another eye.. for an eyelash.
CaseyL
I don’t know about “most American Jews,” but I vote the straight Democratic ticket, and always will, because I care about what happens in this country. I am not Israeli, have no interest in going there, and frankly would not mind if we cut them loose.
I used to be a Zionist. Now I really don’t give a rat’s ass. That entire region, Israeli and Arab, is more trouble than it’s worth.
Gator90
@debbie: Just for the record, Netanyahu has described the murder of the Palestinian teen as “despicable” and “abominable.” (This can be confirmed with the google-thingy.) One might question his sincerity, but he did say it.
Debbie
@Villago Delenda Est:
Exactly. Yet that makes it that much worse.
KXB
Don’t hold your breath. As John pointed out, when Israeli can get away with killing US Navy personnel in international waters, does anyone think the U.S. will do anything for some American teenager from an Arab family?
srv
The day Michigan become a swing state, that’s the day Presidential candidates will stop towing the Likud line.
rda909
I’m withholding judgment on this situation until Glenn Griftwald tells me what to think about it. His motives and intelligence are as pure as the white, white snowden.
Gator90
@Villago Delenda Est: I don’t think I’m an apologist for anyone, let alone any vile racist shits, and I think you’d be hard-pressed to demonstrate that I am.
scav
The Israeli government(s) has(have) certainly been woking hard at earning its (their) growing international reputation. Their coalition of local hard-liners and foreign hard-liners have made for an unusually toxic brew.
Just Some Fuckhead
It would be nice if we could get that sorta strong condemnation for our own regular police-administered beatings in the US.
Helen
@Cacti: This. I can never get he question “why are we allies with Israel?” answered. When I ask I am called an anti-Semite. Who was it who said “there are no friends in foreign policy; only national interests?” I see Israel’s national interest in being our ally – $3 billion a year in armaments and cash. But what’s in it for us?
Botsplainer
@Helen:
They’re our bestest friends ever on matters regarding their own security.
Haven’t you heard?
Gator90
@Helen:
As far as I can tell, two things: (1) the US alliance with Israel gives a non-trivial portion of the US population warm, fuzzy feelings; and (2) US weapons manufacturers reap billions for the armaments Israel is required to purchase from them as a condition of US aid.
Heliopause
@Helen:
An outpost that is heavily armed, including with nuclear weapons, run primarily by white Europeans, nominally within western social democratic norms if you discount the occupation, located in the heart of the Islamic world.
LanceThruster
from: http://recollectionbooks.com/bleed/Encyclopedia/PerlmanFredy/antisemitism.htm
The trick of declaring war against the armed resistance and then attacking the resisters’ unarmed kin as well as the surrounding population with the most gruesome products of Death-Science — this trick is not new. American Pioneers were pioneers in this too; they made it standard practice to declare war on indigenous warriors and then to murder and burn villages with only women and children in them. This is already modern war, what we know as war against civilian populations; it has also been called, more candidly, mass murder or genocide.
Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised that the perpetrators of a Pogrom portray themselves as the victims, in the present case as victims of the Holocaust.
Herman Melville noticed over a century ago, in his analysis of the metaphysics of Indian-hating, that those who made a full-time profession of hunting and murdering indigenous people of this continent always made themselves appear, even in their own eyes, as the victims of manhunts.
The use the Nazis made of the International Jewish Conspiracy is better known: during all the years of atrocities defying belief, the Nazis considered themselves the victimized.
It’s as if the experience of being a victim gave exemption from human solidarity, as if it gave special powers, as if it gave a license to kill.
~ Fredy Perlman
The Sailor
Um, about the same percentage as Muslims in the US. 1.7% 5 million, not 40 million.
MazeDancer
The horror stories about the treatment of this child have been on Twitter for quite some time now. At least a day. Maybe two.
if you have any people with whom you tweet who are In any mid-East countries, you have seen many, many screaming outrage tweets about this story.
Also, you frequently see tweets of Israeli teens holding up hate signs. Or some report, sometimes with video, of some Isreali atrocity.
It has been difficult to know what to believe. But if the State Department is – finally – weighing in at all, about this, it is now hard to believe nothing happened. Because so much has been screamed about this for quite a bit.
gbear
I was listening to the BBC interview two representatives from each side of this issue the day after the boy had been kidnapped. The interviewer kept trying to get both sides to take some blame for the situation but the two sides just kept saying that they were totally right and the other side was totally wrong and the BBC interviewer needed to completely reject the other side’s position because they were pure evil. The BBC reporter provided tons more pushback than any American reporter would, but it was still pretty awful and I’m surprised the BBC guy didn’t end the segment by saying ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, this is why we can’t have nice things.” I’m sick of both sides. Anyone in a position of power seems to be a total dick.
Bob In Portland
@Corner Stone: I would be curious to understand why the Likud or whatever they’re calling themselves now has such power over US policy. A lot of people over there call it the “Anglo-Zionist alliance”. There certainly is no obvious strategic reason for continuing to support Israel when it clearly violates international law and antagonizes the rest of the Middle East.
It’s a curious relationship. The US has had deep covert relationships with the fascist residua after WWII, but also was a supporter of Israel throughout its history.
For people who look at the covert history of post-WWII US we know that our intelligence services worked in concert with Mossad while working with ex-Nazis.
There is certainly plenty for which Israel can blackmail the US (its involvement with Iran-contra and all the detritus involving arms shipments and drug importation would sure make for interesting reading and would be quite embarrassing for those who passed through the Reagan-Bush administrations), but it’s hard to believe that that particularly steers US foreign policy, especially in an area so vital to our energy companies’ interests (which seems to be driving our wars).
I’d be curious for an explanation about these apparent inconsistencies but most mainstream analysis assiduously avoids both America’s deep history with WWII fascists and its deep history with Israel.
Higgs Boson's Mate
I’m confident that Israel’s answer to our protest will be to build a few thousand more squatter homes on the West Bank.
Interrobang
The problem with the entire argument about Muhammad Abu Khdeir is that settlers didn’t fucking do it, unless you seriously believe that settlers would kidnap someone from the middle of an Arab neighbourhood in the middle of the night, in front of a mosque.
I don’t have any love for settlers, but I’ve fucking been to Israel, and I know a ton of Israelis (Jews and Arabs), and I know how the Jews talk about Arab neighbourhoods. Jews in Israel don’t go to Arab neighbourhoods, not during the day, not during the night. And yes, you can tell the difference between even a (male) Sfardi Jew and a light-skinned Arab by sight — they dress differently, and they have different body language.
If you’re seriously willing to believe that settlers — even as fucking crazy as they are — would be willing and able to go into an Arab neighbourhood in East Jerusalem during Ramadan at fastbreak time and kidnap a teenager from in front of a mosque with people around, I got nothing. I think someone with a grudge against the family did it, and wants to blame it on Jews.
Here’s an article that lays out both viewpoints (settlers/not settlers): Algemeiner article.
The Sailor
@Interrobang:
I totally believe it.
They are invaders that kill and destroy anything in their path. Homes, people, food …
Comrade Dread
Personally, I think Abbas should tell the Israeli government that if they’re not going to move forward on a two-state solution, that he and his party will no longer put up with the charade of ‘self-governance’ and that if the Israeli government plans on holding the land in perpetuity that they must formally annex it and immediately give Palestinians full citizenship in the Israeli state.
About as likely as a two-state solution to be sure, but I would like to see the Israeli government’s reaction to the Palestinians not only recognizing Israel’s right to exist, but demanding to be full partners and participants in building its future.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@Interrobang:
In the middle of the night is the best time for crime. If the young man had been kidnapped in broad daylight you’d have a point. As it stands, despite your protestations, you sound very much like an apologist for the settlers.
Mandalay
@Just Some Fuckhead:
It would indeed. Only slightly O/T, this video shows a California cop pounding the shit out of a woman on the ground. There are at least ten powerful punches to her head by the cop on the video.
And then at a press conference, the police claim: The report indicated that the individual was not injured and that the officer didn’t notice any injuries on the individual,” O’Quinn said.
How is is possible for a man to land ten powerful punches to a woman’s head and there are no injuries? The State department raise a stink when police in Israel beat the shit out of a US citizen. Who in government is raising a stink when our own police beat the shit out of a US citizen? American police are way out of control, and it’s getting worse.
Mandalay
@Interrobang:
Heh. Nice try, but you overplayed your hand at the end, and gave yourself away.
Nutella
All sides? Or just the side that is beating the shit our of an American citizen lying on the ground?
El Caganer
@Helen: Easy answer: we don’t have an alliance with Israel. Various US governments have tried to make a formal agreement, but the Israelis don’t want one.
mark
@Bob In Portland: Great post ! Wish I could figure this out myself. My best friend since 1st grade is Jewish and has been hanging with wingnuts and RW catholics for the last 10-15 years (I’ve moved away) and I can’t understand why he doesn’t see the fascism and get nausea. I’m convinced he has been slowly brainwashed to where he is now unreachable. The horrible irony is I hate fascist (did a history masters course final on it) propaganda and wholly reject the dogma of Christianity BECAUSE my best buddy is Jewish.
mdblanche
@Nutella: All sides. The side that is beating the shit out of an American citizen lying on the ground and the side that abducted and killed an American citizen almost the same age last month.
dmbeaster
@debbie
What has Israel become? Israel has always behaved this way. Maybe you could say they are more open about it in recent years, but this has been the dominant behavior of Israel since its founding in 1948 by the ethnic cleansing of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians.
Chris
@debbie:
The slippery slope didn’t start in 1967. Israel was created a few years after World War Two. It may be that what was then “Israel” had the blessing of the UN while the settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem don’t, but in neither case did anyone care what the non-Jewish inhabitants of the region wanted or what would happen to them. And before Israel existed as a country, you had the decades of terrorist activity by Zionist groups directed at the British and Arabs alike. As with all colonial projects (yes, including the U.S), the sin pretty much goes right back to the beginning.
Chris
@FlipYrWhig:
This.
Basically a perfect storm of Christian fundamentalist psychosis, World War Two legacy/Holocaust guilt (whatever you want to call it), and geopolitics – that last one meaning, the Arab nationalist movement was on our enemies’ side in both World War Two and the Cold War, and now the main supporters of the Palestinian cause are islamists, so we’ve never been inclined to be sympathetic to them.
Race, as with everything else in U.S. politics, is probably a factor too, given that Jews, like Catholic “ethnics,” basically became white during the 20th century, and Arabs, like blacks and Latinos… didn’t. So watching Israel bomb Lebanon and Gaza is kind of the international version of watching an Irish cop beat up a black inner city dweller. And you’re right, it goes beyond religion. Ayn Rand didn’t like Israel, thought it was a socialist/religious abomination, but she still thought it should be supported because (not even paraphrasing much) Jews were civilized people who turned a desert into an oasis, and Arabs are savages who just want to break things.
It helps too that in our current political context, people who care about Israel really, REALLY care about Israel, be they fundiegelicals, Jewish Zionists, or neocons. It’s a make or break issue for them. There’s no equivalent fervor on the Palestinian side. Partly because liberals and civil rights supporters who in general might sympathize with the plight of Palestinians aren’t comfortable ending up “on the same side” as groups like Arafat’s PLO or, later, Yassin’s Hamas that are about as far removed from liberal values as it gets, and aren’t sure who else there is to support.
Bottom line: Israel is the foreign policy version of the gun control debate. The right wing has won the argument so thoroughly that even not-fanatic-enough versions of their own argument are now suspect. Chris Christie’s “gaffe” earlier this year pretty much illustrates it – he came back from Israel repeating the gospel of how important the security issue was for Israel, and instead of agreeing with him, Sheldon Adelson and the rest of the AIPAC nuts opened up on him with both barrels because he dared to use the word “Palestine” instead of “Judea and Samaria,” or whatever. There are some politicians who know better, but the odds of them making headway against the consensus are basically nonexistent.
debbie
@Chris:
I know it didn’t start in the year 1967, but that was the year I first became aware of the hypocrisy after sitting through a very graphic film about the camps in my Sunday School class. I was in 9th grade and not at all worldly, but I still knew someone was trying to manipulate my beliefs and sympathies.
Matt McIrvin
I don’t remember where I read it, but I recall seeing somewhere the statement that Americans basically imagine Israel/Palestine to be a scenario out of an old Western movie, with peaceful white settlers in an arid wilderness constantly besieged by the equivalent of savage Indians. Combine that with the place’s status as The Holy Land and as a powerful ostensible American friend in the Middle East, and it becomes impossible to disengage.
Infamous Heel-Filcher
@Gator90: Don’t forget the U.S.’ foreign policy interest in having the middle east be unstable. Why do you think the British (and French) drew the borders of the region so that no existing proto-national group was left intact?
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Ronnie Pudding:
“angel” as in “he better have been white” Sadly the victim made the life style choice of being born with a non-Anglo Saxon name so clearly he is a dangerous criminal.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Matt McIrvin:
The old west sounds about right – “these unreasonable savages keep on holding a grudge over us stealing their land and giving them small pox”
yopd1
@dmbeaster: I love when people accuse the Israeli’s of ethnic cleansing. Why don’t you come right out and say it. The Israeli’s are committing genocide. Never mind that the Palestinian population in the territories has never decreased since the Israeli’s took over Gaza and the West Bank. They just really suck at killing folks, when compared to the other western countries. But please continue as they make Israel supporters think you are a serious person with serious ideas.
pharniel
Right. ‘Cuase the Settlers who just go, setup shop and squat on land until even the Israli Supreme court gives it back and then is told “you come enforce it” isn’t ethnic cleansing.
I mean…it’d be one thing if the Palastinians were alleging these things but the Settlers put it on Youtube.