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WHO RULES: THE ISRAEL LOBBY OR UNCLE SAM? The answer at last! Uri Avnery, former Knesset member, assesses the Lobby's power. "If the Israeli government wanted a law tomorrow annulling the 10 Commandments, 95 U.S. Senators (at least) would sign the bill forthwith." But, yes, in the end the dog wags the tail. Fifty years ago Allen Ginsberg's "Howl" blew the cobwebs out of millions of young minds and drove a stake through the heart of Eisenhower's America. Lenni Brenner remembers Ginsberg in the East Village. Dr Mengele died in exile, in disguise. Dr Ishii died rich and recognized, in his own Tokyo home. Christopher Reed on Japanese WW2 medical tortures and how the U.S. covered them up. CounterPunch Online is read by millions of viewers each month! But remember, we are funded solely by the subscribers to the print edition of CounterPunch. Please support this website by buying a subscription to our newsletter, which contains fresh material you won't find anywhere else, or by making a donation for the online edition. Remember contributions are tax-deductible. Click here to make a donation. If you find our site useful please: Subscribe Now! |
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Today's Stories May 11, 2006 Edward S. Herman
/ David Peterson May 10, 2006 Werther Larry Birns / Michael Lettieri Ramzy Baroud Kevin Zeese Evelyn Pringle Amira Hass Michael Donnelly Ron Jacobs Sharon Smith Website of the Day
May 9, 2006 Ray McGovern M. Shahid Alam Moshe Adler Walter MIgnolo Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor William S. Lind Todd Chretien Dave Lindorff Ishmael Reed Website of the
Day
May 8, 2006 Kate McCabe Paul Craig Roberts Col. Dan Smith Norman Solomon Ingmar Lee Robert Jensen Ricardo Alarcon Will Youmans / M. Kay Siblani Alexander Cockburn Website of the
Day
May 6 / 7, 2006 Jeffrey St. Clair Ariel Dorfman Joe Allen Fred Gardner Jeff Taylor Saul Landau Stephen Philion Trish Schuh Ralph Nader Robert Fisk Paul Cantor John Holt James Ryan Lawrence R. Velvel Greg Moses Laray Polk Ron Jacobs Ben Tripp Mickey Z. Jeffrey St. Clair Poets' Basement Website of the Week
May 5, 2006 Vijay Prashad Robert Fisk David Swanson Mearsheimer / Walt Dave Lindorff Sarah Ferguson CounterPunch
News Service Corporate Crime Reporter Website of the
Day
May 4, 2006 John F. Sugg Jonathan Cook Roger Burbach Chris Dols Christopher Brauchli Tony Swindell Website of the Day
May 3, 2006 Robert Bryce Paul Craig Roberts James Petras Lee Sustar David Bolton Joshua Frank Jeffery R. Webber Website of the
Day
May 2, 2006 Evelyn Pringle Tariq Ali Saul Landau Paul Craig Roberts Gary Leupp Ron Jacobs Sen. Russell
Feingold Anthony Papa Website of the
Day
May Day, 2006 Norman Finkelstein Christopher Reed Michael Donnelly Dave Zirin Mike Whitney Gilad Atzmon Missy Comley Beattie Alexander Cockburn Website of the
Day
April 29 / 30, 2006 Peter Linebaugh Ralph Nader Robert Bryce Rev. William
Alberts Lee Sustar John Chuckman Eric Ruder Seth Sandronsky Ron Jacobs Ben Tripp Fred Gardner Don Monkerud Tommy Stevenson Lettrist International Contratiempo St. Clair, Vest
and D'Antoni Poets' Basement Website of the
Weekend
April 28, 2006 James Ridgeway Ramzy Baroud Sarah Knopp William S. Lind Werther April 27, 2006 Winslow T. Wheeler Robert Fisk Juan Santos Robert Jensen Dave Lindorff Jose Pertierra
April 26,2006 Robin Philpot Sherry Wolf Pratyush Chandra Joshua Frank Gary
Leupp Bill
Quigley
April 25, 2006 Gary
Leupp Paul
Craig Roberts Linda
S. Heard Ralph
Nader Mike
Whitney Michael
Donnelly Sharon
Smith Website
of the Day
April 24, 2006 Tim
Wise John
Stanton Dave
Lindorff Steve
Shore Amadou
Deme Mickey
Z. Ralph Nader Alexander
Cockburn Website
of the Day
April 22/23, 2006 Jeffrey
St. Clair Jeff
Halper Jeff
Klein Thomas
P. Healy David
Underhill Lee
Sustar Deb
Reich John
Chuckman Fred
Gardner Julian
Edney Seth
Sandronsky Brynne
Keith-Jennings Dave
Lindorff Catherine
Ann Cullen and Harry Browne Bill
Pahnelas Jim
French Ron
Jacobs David
Krieger Jeffrey
St. Clair Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
April 21, 2006 Jonathan
Cook Lawrence
R. Velvel Evelyn
Pringle Christopher
Brauchli Pratyush
Chandra Michael
George Smith Missy
Comley Beattie Sarah
Hines Website
of the Day
April 20, 2006 Chris
Kutalik Gary
Leupp Joshua
Frank Diane
Christian William
S. Lind Ramzy
Baroud Justin
E.H. Smith
April 19, 2006 P.
Sainath Norman
Solomon Anthony
Papa Mike
Ferner Stanley
Heller Rifundazione Christopher
Reed Alexander
Cockburn Website
of the Day April 18, 2006 Paul
Craig Roberts Eric
Wingerter Juan
Santos Greg
Weiher Sam
Bahour Behzad
Yaghmaian Website
of the Day
April 17, 2006 Kevin Zeese Uri Avnery Norman Solomon John Ross Laila al-Haddad Jeffrey Blankfort Website of the Day
April 15 / 16, 2006 Jeffrey
St. Clair Ralph
Nader Thaddeus
Hoffmeister Kevin
Prosen / Dave Zirin Thomas
P. Healy Kristoffer
Larsson Fred
Gardner Edwin
Krales Brian
Cloughley John
Holt Seth
Sandronsky Rafael
Renteria Michael
Ortiz Hill William
A. Cook Gideon
Levy Andrew
Wimmer Madis
Senner Michael
Kuehl Mark
Scaramella Nate
Mezmer Jesse
Walker Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
April 14, 2006 Col.
Dan Smith Saul
Landau Stan
Cox Kevin
Zeese Brian
McKinlay Howard
Meyers Ishmael
Reed Website
of the Day
April 13, 2006 CounterPunch
News Service Norman
Solomon Stanley
Heller Jeff
Birkenstein Evelyn
J. Pringle Michael
Donnelly Kamran
Matin Website
of the Day
April 12, 2006 Vijay
Prashad Alan
Maass Dave
Lindorff Ron
Jacobs Ramzy
Baroud Randall
Dodd Missy
Comley Beattie P. Sainath Website
of the Day
April 11, 2006 Al
Krebs Lawrence
R. Velvel Sonia
Nettinin Willliam
S. Lind Robert
Ovetz Pratyush
Chandra Grant
F. Smith Laray
Polk Francis
Boyle José
Pertierra Website
of the Day
April 10, 2006 Ralph
Nader Heather
Gray Uri
Avnery Joshua
Frank Seth
Sandronsky Michael
Leonardi Evelyn
Pringle Tom
Kerr Lucinda
Marshall Website
of the Day April 7 -9, 2006 Alexander
Cockburn Jeffrey
St. Clair Patrick
Cockburn David
Vest Dave
Lindorff Gary
Leupp Elaine
Cassel Saul
Landau James
Ridgeway Ron
Jacobs John
Walsh Ramzy
Baroud Christopher
Brauchli Todd
Chretien Jonathan
Scott John
Bomar Michele
Brand Ronan
Sheehan Mickey
Z. Don
Monkerud Michael
Dickinson Website
of the Weekend
April 6, 2006 John
Ross Dave
Lindorff Don
Monkerud Robert
McDonald Boris
Kagarlitsky Remi
Kanazi Niranjan
Ramakrishnan Robert
Fisk
April 5, 2006 Dick
J. Reavis Mark
Brenner Brian
Cloughley Jozef
Hand-Boniakowski Matt
Vidal Juan
Santos Alan
Maass JoAnn
Wypijewski Website
of the Day
April 4, 2006 Jackson
Thoreau Gary
Corseri Dave
Lindorff Paul
Craig Roberts Norman
Solomon Michael
Carmichael Winslow
T. Wheeler Ingmar
Lee Michael
Neumann Website
of the Day
April 3, 2006 Saul
Landau Richard
Thieme Timothy
B. Tyson Omar
Barghouti Iwasaki
Atsuko Julian
Edney Roger
Morris
April 1 / 2, 2006 Alexander
Cockburn Ralph
Nader Dave
Zirin David
Underhill Earl
Ofari Hutchinson Dave
Lindorff P.
Sainath Fred
Gardner Clancy
Chassay Heather
Gray Greg
Moses John
Chuckman Ron
Jacobs Jeffrey
St. Clair Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
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May 11, 2006 Israel's Road to "Convergence" Began with RabinA Short History of Unilateral Separation By JONATHAN COOK With his coalition partners on board, Israel's prime minister Ehud Olmert is plotting his next move: a partial withdrawal from the West Bank over the next few years which he and his government will declare as the end of the occupation and therefore also any legitimate grounds for Palestinian grievance. From hereon in, Israel will portray itself as the benevolent provider of a Palestinian state -- on whatever is left after most of Israel's West Bank colonies have been saved and the Palestinian land on which they stand annexed to Israel. If the Palestinians reject this deal -- an offer, we will doubtless be told, every bit as "generous" as the last one -- then, according to the new government's guidelines, they will be shunned by Israel and presumably also by the international community. Even given the normal wretched standards of Israeli double-dealing in the "peace process", this is a bleak moment to be a Palestinian politician. Olmert's "convergence" plan, his version of disengagement for the West Bank (except this time only about 15 per cent of the territory's 420,000 settlers will be withdrawn) has salved the West's conscience just as surely as did his predecessor Sharon's pullout from Gaza last year. The neighsayers will be dismissed, as they were then, as bad-sports, anti-Semites or apologists for terror. Olmert is not new to this game. In fact, there is every indication that he played a formative role in helping Sharon transform himself from "the Bulldozer" into "the Unilateral Peacemaker". In November 2003 Olmert, Sharon's deputy, all but announced the coming Gaza Disengagement Plan before it had earnt the official name. A few weeks before Sharon revealed that he would be pulling out of Gaza, Olmert outlined to Israel's Ha'aretz newspaper the most serious issue facing Israel. It was, he said, the problem of how, when the Palestinians were on the eve of becoming a majority in the region, to prevent them from launching a struggle similar to the one against apartheid waged by black South Africans. Olmert's concern was that,
if the Palestinian majority renounced violence and began to fight
for one-man-one-vote, Israel would be faced by "a much cleaner
struggle, a much more popular struggle -- and ultimately a much
more powerful one". Palestinian peaceful resistance, therefore,
had to be The logic of Olmert's solution, as he explained it then, sounds very much like the reasoning behind disengagement and now convergence: "[The] formula for the parameters of a unilateral solution are: To maximise the number of Jews; to minimise the number of Palestinians." Or, as he put last week, "division of the land, with the goal of ensuring a Jewish majority, is Zionism's lifeline". But though Olmert has claimed convergence as his own, its provenance in the Israeli mainstream dates back more than a decade. Far from being a response to Palestinian terror during this intifada, as government officials used to maintain, many in the Israeli military and political establishment have been pushing for "unilateral separation" -- a withdrawal, partial or otherwise, from the occupied territories made concrete and irreversible by the building of a barrier -- since the early 1990s. The apostles of separation, however, failed to get their way until now because of two obstacles: the cherished, but conflicting, dreams of the Labor and Likud parties, both of which preferred to postpone, possibly indefinitely, the endgame of the conflict implicit in a separation imposed by Israel. In signing up to Oslo, Yitzhak Rabin and his Labor party believed they could achieve effective separation by other means, through the manufactured consent of the Palestinians. Rabin hoped to subcontract Israel's security to the Palestinian leadership in the shape of the largely dependent regime of the Palestinian Authority, under Yasser Arafat. Palestinians resisting the occupation would be cowed by their own security forces, doing Israel's bidding, while Israel continued plundering resources -- land and water -- in the West Bank and Gaza and established a network of industrial parks in which Israeli employers could exploit the captive Palestinian labour force too. Sharon, Binyamin Netanyahu and the Likud party, on the other hand, refused throughout the 1990s to countenance a separation that would foil their ambitions of annexing all of the occupied territories and creating Greater Israel. Sharon notoriously told his settler followers to "go grab the hilltops" in 1998 in an attempt to thwart the small territorial gains being made by the Palestinians under the Oslo agreements. In the tradition of Vladimir Jabotinsky, the Likud rejected Labor's optimistic view that the Palestinians could be made willing accomplices to their dispossession. In this view, because they would always struggle for their freedom, the Palestinians had to be ruthlessly subjugated or expelled. Which of these two courses to follow has been the paralyzing dilemma faced by Likud ever since. So for a decade, separation was mostly forced on to the backburner. But not entirely. Rabin, it seems, was fully aware that the Oslo scam might not work quite as Israel planned. In that case, to avert the threat of the apartheid comparison, Rabin believed he would need to fall back on a wall to enforce a separation between the land's Jewish and Palestinian inhabitants. He made this clear to Dennis Ross, Clinton's Middle East envoy during the Oslo period. Ross admitted as much in 2004 when he told Thomas Friedman of the New York Times that shortly before Rabin's murder in 1995 the Israeli prime minister began contemplating building a wall as a way to contain the demographic threat posed by Israel's continuing occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. "[Rabin] said, 'We're going to have to partition -- there's going to have to be a partition here, because we won't be Jewish and democratic if we don't have a partition.' Now, his preference was to negotiate the partition peacefully to produce two states. But if that didn't work he wanted, as you put it, a separation fence or barrier to create what would be two states, or at least to preserve Israel as a state." In truth, Rabin was more persuaded of the need for a wall than Ross cares to remember. At a time when the ink on the Oslo agreements had barely dried, Rabin was entrusting the wall project to a committee headed by his public security minister, Moshe Shahal. Though the scheme was dropped by his two successors, Shimon Peres and Binyamin Netanyahu, it came of age again with Ehud Barak, a long-time Oslo sceptic, who entered office advocating unilateral separation. In May 2000 he put his ideas into practice by unilaterally withdrawing troops from Israel's "security zone" in south Lebanon. And two months later, a fortnight before departing for talks at Camp David, he articulated his vision of separation from the Palestinians: "Israel will insist upon a physical separation between itself and the independent Palestinian entity to be formed as a result of the settlement. I am convinced that a separation of this sort is necessary for both sides." In fact, Barak had been secretly devising a plan to "separate physically" from the Palestinians for some time. Uzi Dayan, the army's chief of staff at the time, says he persuaded Barak of the need for unilateral disengagement "as a safety net to Camp David". Ephraim Sneh, Barak's deputy defence minister confirms Dayan's account, saying he was asked to prepare the plans for separation in case Camp David failed. "I drew the map. I can speak about it authoritatively. The plan means the de facto annexation of 30 per cent of the West Bank, half in the Jordan Valley, which you have to keep if there is no agreement, and half in the settlement blocs." Shlomo Ben Ami, Barak's foreign minister, was given a sneak preview of the map: "[Barak] was proud of the fact that his map would leave Israel with about a third of the territory [the West Bank] Ehud was convinced that the map was extremely logical. He had a kind of patronizing, wishful-thinking, naive approach, telling me enthusiastically, 'Look, this is a state; to all intents and purposes it looks like a state'." It seems that Barak hoped to get the Palestinians to agree to the terms of this map or else impose it by force. But, following the collapse of the Camp David talks, Barak never got the chance to begin building his wall. Within a few months he would be ousted from office, and Ariel Sharon would be installed as the new prime minister. In keeping with his Greater Israel ambitions, Sharon was initially sceptical about both separation and erecting a wall. When he approved the barrier's first stages near Jenin in summer 2002, it was under pressure from the Labor party, which was shoring up the legitimacy of the national unity government as his military armour rampaged through the occupied territories. Many senior Labor figures had been converted to the idea of a wall by Barak, who relentlessly promoted unilateral separation while out of office. In one typical commentary in June 2002, some 18 months before Sharon's own proposals for disengagement were revealed, Barak wrote: "The disengagement would be implemented gradually over several years. The fence should include the seven big settlement blocs that spread over 12 or 13 per cent of the area and contain 80 per cent of the settlers. Israel will also need a security zone along the Jordan River and some early warning sites, which combined will cover another 12 per cent, adding up to 25 per cent of the West Bank." And what about East Jerusalem, where Israel is trying to wrestle control from the Palestinians? "In Jerusalem, there would have to be two physical fences, " Barak advised. "The first would delineate the political boundary and be placed around the Greater City, including the settlement blocs adjacent to Jerusalem. The second would be a security-dictated barrier, with controlled gates and passes, to separate most of the Palestinian neighborhoods from the Jewish neighborhoods and the Holy Basin, including the Old City." In other words, Barak's public vision of disengagement four years ago is almost identical to Olmert's apparently freshly minted convergence plan for the West Bank. Olmert's predecessor, Sharon, was not an instant convert to the benefits of Barak's ideas of separation. Though he needed to keep the Labor party sweet, progress on the early sections of the wall was painfully slow. Uzi Dayan, the general behind Barak's separation plans, complained that Sharon and his defence minister, Shaul Mofaz, were trying to sabotage the wall. They were "not working on the fence," he said. "They are trying not to do it." All that changed at some point in early 2003, when Sharon began talking about Palestinian statehood for the first time. By May 2003, he was telling a stunned Likud party meeting: "The idea that it is possible to continue keeping 3.5 million Palestinians under occupation yes, it is occupation, you might not like the word, but what is happening is occupation is bad for Israel, and bad for the Palestinians, and bad for the Israeli economy. Controlling 3.5 million Palestinians cannot go on forever." The reason for Sharon's change of heart related mainly to a belated realisation on his part that the demographic threats facing Israel could no longer be denied. Israel ruling over a majority of Palestinians would inevitably provoke the apartheid comparison and spell the end of the Jewish state's legitimacy. Also, Sharon had been backed into an uncomfortable corner by the Road Map, a US peace initiative unveiled in late 2002 that, unusually, required major concessions from Israel as well as the Palestinians, promised a Palestinian state at its outcome and was to be overseen by the Europeans, Russians and the United Nations as well as the Americans. A year later Olmert would be flying his trial balloon for a Likud-style separation on far better terms for Israel than the Road Map. And shortly after that, disengagement was officially born. It was, said Dov Weisglass, Sharon's adviser, "formaldehyde" for the Road Map,. It is clear that Sharon's disengagement from Gaza was only ever the first stage of his separation plans. His officials repeatedly warned that further disengagements, from the West Bank, would follow, based on the route of the wall, though Sharon -- cautious about alienating rightwing voters before the coming elections -- was more tight-lipped. But when Sharon finally realised he could not tame the Greater Israel diehards in his Likud party, and that they threatened to unravel his plans for the West Bank, he created Kadima, a new "centrist" party that attracted fugitives from both Labor and Likud. Its rapid success derived from its ability to transcend the enduring differences between the Israeli left and right or, rather, to consolidate both traditions. Like Likud, Kadima admitted that the Palestinians would never surrender their dreams of nationhood, but like Labor it believed a strategy could be devised in which the Palestinians, even if they did not accept the terms of separation, could be made powerless to resist Israeli diktats. Kadima squared the circle through a policy that maintained Likud's insistence on "unilateralism" while maintaining Labor's pretence of benevolent "separation" from the Palestinians. Before his conversion, Sharon was the last and the biggest hurdle to unilateral separation. His opposition was enough throughout the 1990s to stymie those in the security establishment -- possibly a majority -- who were pushing for the policy. Once he backed down, nothing was likely to stand in the way of implementing separation. The lesson of the Gaza disengagement is that withdrawals (partial or full) from occupied territory are insufficient in themselves to herald the end of occupation. The absence of Israeli settlers and soldiers from those parts of the West Bank to be handed over to the Palestinians will not ensure that the Palestinian people are sovereign in the territory left to them. The occupation will continue as long as Israel controls the diminished West Bank's borders and trade, its resources and airspace, its connections with Gaza and the Palestinian Diaspora, and as long as Israel blocks the emergence of a Palestinian army and enjoys the unfettered right to strike at Palestinian targets, military or otherwise. Olmert and Israel's security establishment understand this all too well. Unfortunately, a supine Europe and America appear all too ready to collude in the deception. Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. He is the author of the forthcoming "Blood and Religion: The Unmasking of the Jewish and Democratic State" published by Pluto Press, and available in the United States from the University of Michigan Press. His website is www.jkcook.net
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from CounterPunch Books! The Case Against Israel By Michael Neumann Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair Sick of sit-on-the-Fence speakers, tongue-tied and timid? CounterPunch Editors Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St Clair are available to speak forcefully on ALL the burning issues, as are other CounterPunchers seasoned in stump oratory. Call CounterPunch Speakers Bureau, 1-800-840-3683. Or email beckyg@counterpunch.org. |