Dual Loyalties

[Armen]

Dual Loyalties

by Juan Cole

 

ProgressiveTrail.org, OR

Sept 10 2004

 

Many readers have written me to express concern about my safety

and/or reputation since I have spoken out frankly on the horrible

Likud policies of stealing Palestinian lands and brutalizing them

with occupation. I'm not a babe in the woods, and I know very well

that saying these things is taboo in American political culture. In

fact, whenever anyone comes on a cable television news show and is

anything but hostile to the Palestinians, he or she is made by the

interviewer to denounce terrorism. It is an outrageous implication,

and not the job of a news interviewer. But pro-Israeli speakers are

never made to denounce land theft or state terror.

 

I received a very weird phone call from a prominent Jewish-American

investigative journalist the other night. He kept muttering about

bias against Sharon and how the Israeli security wall is no different

from the wall near the Rio Grande (which isn't true: did the US annex

Mexican land to build that?) He kept hinting around that he thought

I must have some link to some hate group, or to the Ford Foundation,

which he coded as linked to "hate groups," which in turn seemed to

signify for him Palestinians. It was all very conspiracy theorist

oriented. I tried to have a straightforward conversation with him,

but it was probably a mistake, since it seems fairly obvious he

intends to do some sort of hatchet job. I finally had to end it when

his paraphrases of what I said became more and more outrageous and

inaccurate.

 

Another journalist named Eli Lake has now begun coming after me, as

many readers predicted, using innuendo to suggest that I am to the

right of Pat Buchanan and that it is irresponsible of American media

outlets to have me on television and radio. One of his charges is that

I am accusing the Neoconservatives in the Pentagon of "dual loyalties."

 

That is true, but not in the way Lake imagines. I believe that Doug

Feith, for instance, has dual loyalties to the Israeli Likud Party

and to the U.S. Republican Party. He thinks that their interests are

completely congruent. And I also think that if he has to choose,

he will put the interests of the Likud above the interests of the

Republican Party.

 

I don't think there is anything a priori wrong with Feith being

so devoted to the Likud Party. That is his prerogative. But as an

American, I don't want a person with those sentiments to serve as

the number 3 man in the Pentagon. I frankly don't trust him to put

America first.

 

Political dual loyalties have nothing to do with any particular

ethnicity. It is natural for Armenian Americans to have a special

tie to Armenia, for Greek Americans to have a special tie to Greece,

for Iraqi Americans to feel strongly about Iraq. For them to take

pride in the achievements of their homeland is right an natural,

and unexceptionable. There is no reason on the face of it to even

bring up their ethnicity with regard to public service.

 

But if a Syrian American is a strong devotee of the Baath Party,

would you appoint him Undersecretary of Defense?

 

The Likud Coalition in Israel does contest elections. But it isn't

morally superior in most respects to the Syrian Baath. The Likud

brutally occupies 3 million Palestinians (who don't get to vote for

their occupier) and is aggressively taking over their land. That

is, it treats at least 3 million people no better than and possibly

worse than the Syrian Baath treats its 17 million. The Likud invaded

Lebanon in 1982 and killed 18,000 or so people, 9,000 of them innocent

civilians. This is, contrary to what Bernard Lewis keeps implying,

just about equivalent morally to the Syrian Baath's crushing of

the Islamists in Hama the same year, which killed an estimated

10,000. Many in the Likud coalition are commited to "transfer,"

or the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians. At the least they want

to keep Palestinians stateless and without basic human rights and

dignity. The vast majority of Palestinians has never commited an act

of violence, but Likud propaganda justifies their expropriation on the

innuendo that they are all terrorists. Likud aggression is invisible

in American media, and the way in which it provokes violence is off

limits for discussion.

 

So I don't see a big difference between having a fanatical Syrian

American Baathist as the number three man in the Pentagon and having

a fanatical Jewish American Likudnik.

 

Lake wants to suggest that I am a racist, and that the implication of

my argument is that there should be an ethnic litmus test for public

office. There is no point in replying to such slurs. Anyone who tries

to defend himself from charges of being a racist just looks silly. I

simply think that we deserve to have American public servants who are

centrally commited to the interests of the United States, rather than

to the interests of a foreign political party. So my position implies

a political litmus test for high public office. And, of course there

is such a litmus test. Why bother to have Congress confirm or reject

appointees otherwise?

 

Of course, Lake's salvo is only the first of what will be a campaign to

vilify me and misrepresent my views, and to ensure as far as possible

that I am silenced. So, why do I do it?

 

It is September 11. It is obvious to me that what September 11 really

represented was a dragooning of the United States into internal Middle

East political conflicts. Israel's aggressive policies in the West

Bank and Gaza have poisoned the political atmosphere in the Middle

East (and increasingly in the Muslim world) for the United States. It

is ridiculous to suggest that radical Islamists don't care about the

Palestine issue.

 

Now, if it were a matter of Israel's simple existence causing trouble

for the U.S., then I would say, "Too bad! We stand with our friends,

and won't allow you to harm Israel." But if it is Israeli expansionism

and aggression that is causing trouble for the United States, then

my response would be to put pressure on Israel to get used to its

1949 borders, which are its only legal ones.

 

Unless the Israeli Palestinian issue is resolved, there will be more

September 11s on US soil. So they should resolve it already. And,

it is resolvable. If there were a Palestinian state with leaders who

would certify that they are happy with Israel, then 99% of Muslims

would accept that.

 

It can't be resolved as long as the Likud Party has an aggressive

colonialist agenda. It cannot be resolved as long as the United States

government is afraid to say "boo" to Ariel Sharon. The taboo erected

against saying what I have been saying is a way of ensuring that the

Likud gets its way without American interference, even if it means

America suffers from the fall-out of Likud aggression.

 

In addition, what the Likud government is doing is ethically wrong.

It has put hundreds of thousands of colonists into the West Bank,

stealing land, water and resources from the Palestinians there. It

has made the Palestinians' lives miserable with a dense network of

checkpoints, highways, and other barriers to ordinary commerce and

movement. And what possible claim could the Likud have on the West

Bank of the Jordan? The original Zionist colonizers put almost no

settlers there. It was not the part of Palestine that the United

Nations awarded Israel in the partition plan. The United Nations

Charter, to which Israel is a signatory, forbids the acquisition

of territory by warfare, so the mere fact that the West Bank was

conquered in 1967 gives Israel no rights in it.

 

Sharon and other Likudniks keep demanding that the Arabs "recognize"

Israel's "birthright" to the Holy Land. This language is bizarre.

First of all, "peoples" don't have "birthrights" to "land." There are

no peoples in the 19th century racist sense, and there is no link

between Land und Volk the way the Likud imagines. Israel should be

recognized because its people deserve to live like everyone else,

not because of any superstitious and frankly racist "birthright."

(Population geneticists have shown that the entire human population

becomes related over 50 generations, so Isaac and the other Patriarchs

are by now the common ancestors of us all. If the birthright is

genetic, then it is in everyone by now. If it is based on halakhah or

Jewish law, well that didn't exist in Isaac's time. Abraham probably

wasn't even really a monotheist in the contemporary sense of the term.)

 

You can't break down taboos unless you challenge them. Of course,

there is the danger that if you challenge them, you will be attacked,

and destroyed politically or marginalized. Perhaps it is even likely.

 

But our country is in dire danger from the conflicts in the Middle

East. If I had been a younger man (I am 51) I would have gone to

fight al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. The very least I can do is to speak

out about the dangers, and urge solutions of the problems generating

the terrorism. What good is freedom of speech if we don't use it?

[Jewish Friend]

I am slightly older than you, and agree with many of your points. However, I think even without an Israel, the U.S. on it's own has done enough in the view of many oppressed Muslims to incur a 911 reaction. I am against the current U.S. policy in Iraq, and as an army veteran support Kerry in his bid to allow the world together to solve the world's problems. I actually hate the draft dodging neocons..both Jew and Christian, who send our finest to war when they acted cowardly. I especially hate that five time draft dodging coward Cheney and his pushy wife. Maybe we will all wake up to a better beginning the day after election. Make sure you all vote. JF

 

 

edit note: Edited thequote out as it was the entire article from above

Edited September 15, 2004 by Azat

[Armat]

I am slightly older than you, and agree with many of your points. However, I think even without an Israel, the U.S. on it's own has done enough in the view of many  oppressed Muslims to incur a 911 reaction. I am against the current U.S. policy in Iraq, and as an army veteran  support Kerry in his bid to allow the world together to solve the world's problems. I actually hate the draft dodging neocons..both Jew and Christian, who send our finest to war when they acted cowardly. I especially hate that five time draft dodging coward Cheney and his pushy wife. Maybe we will all wake up to a better beginning the day after election. Make sure you all vote. JF

edit note: Edited thequote out as it was the entire article from above

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Welcome back!JF It is a breath of fresh air to hear a Jew say what you said.I plan to vote Kerry as well.

[THOTH]

Dual Loyalties

by Juan Cole

 

ProgressiveTrail.org, OR

Sept 10 2004

Sharon and other Likudniks keep demanding that the Arabs "recognize"

Israel's "birthright" to the Holy Land. This language is bizarre.

First of all, "peoples" don't have "birthrights" to "land." There are

no peoples in the 19th century racist sense, and there is no link

between Land und Volk the way the Likud imagines.

 

Funny - I wonder how many of our nationalist Armenian friends here would agree with such...

 

Article made some good points IMO - thanks for the post.

 

And Amat - i think it is a big mistake to assume that all Jews (and perhaps even that most Jews) just lockstep support the policies of Sharone and some of the more extreme Israeli policies. However that many do should be no surprise either. Again I can only imagine if the hyper-nationalistic (Diasporan) Armenians were in similar shoes. Even her in the states. A few terrorist attacks of more symboloc then actual magnitude and the nation is already turnign reactionary. I don't support the extreme Israeli policies - but I certainly understand their mindset and why such positions have come about...and I think most of us - if we were in a similar situation - might think similarly to they...not excusing the extremism...(the opposite in fact as each side's extremism has and is feeding the other)...and again - not all Israelis or Jews support such...the trick is - how can we get them out of the mode of continuing to support extremist policies...short of a nuke going off in Tel Avieve? Perhaps less of a blank check (in every sense of the word) from the US would help a bit eh...but this required policy makers of courage and vision...instead we are stuck with mostly insecure panderers...

[Armen]

I am slightly older than you, and agree with many of your points.

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Those were Juan Cole's points, Jewish Friend. I agree with some of them...

Edited September 15, 2004 by ArmenSarg