Bernie — Don't Go To AIPAC: Thousands Call On Sanders To Reject Invite From Pro Israel Lobby

Pink Floyd's Roger Waters is among 4,000 who have signed petition.ink Floyd's Roger Waters is among 4,000 who have signed petition.

By Sarah Lazare
Thousands are urging 2016 presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders to refuse an invitation from the right-wing American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) to speak at its upcoming policy conference in Washington, DC.

“As the main arm of the pro-Israel lobby in the United States, AIPAC has sworn to promote the racist, militaristic, and anti-democratic policies of the most right-wing government in Israel's history,” states a petition, which was created by AlterNet senior editor Max Blumenthal and has garnered 4,000 signatures in just four days. “Its conference this year will feature Islamophobes, anti-immigrant activists, and religious extremists.”

“With his promise to seek a 'level playing field' on Israel-Palestine, Bernie does not belong on the same stage as these figures,” continues the petition, whose prominent signatories include Roger Waters, well-known musician and co-founder of Pink Floyd. Israeli activist and author Miko Peled, Palestinian-American civil rights campaigner and commentator Linda Sarsour and scores of other leading campaigners for Palestinian human rights have lent their names to the initiative.

AIPAC invited every presidential candidate to speak at the conference, slated to take place March 20 through 22. Hillary Clinton was the first to confirm, with Donald Trump following closely behind her. Clinton has made her ardent support for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a cornerstone of her campaign – and vowed in a letter to mega-donor media mogul Haim Saban to crush the grassroots BDS movement calling for the boycott, divestment and sanctioning of Israel.

A growing number of advocates for Palestinian rights are among Sanders’ supporters, including Waters, Sarsour, and writer Kumars Salehi, who recently registered his concern with Clinton, “who grinned from ear to ear in photo-ops with Netanyahu and claimed Palestinians in Gaza are not trapped by Israel’s blockade so much as they are “trapped by their leadership.”

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Mid East Nukes and Hypocrisy: Israel Has Hundreds of Unregulated Nukes — Yet Prepares Media Blitz Over Iran's Non-Nuke Program

The prime minister of Israel is preparing an all out blitz of illegal interference in the affairs of the United States. The plan is to block the Iran Nuclear Agreement via the congressman in Israel's pocket.

While Israel screams about the possibility of Iran getting nuclear weapons, Israel already has hundreds of atomic weapons. The West has demanded—and achieved—inspections of Iran's nuclear facilities, and negotiations to limit Iran's ability to produce atomic weapons.  Meanwhile, Israel hasn't had a single inspection, is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (Iran is), and hasn't agreed to negotiate a damn thing with anybody regarding its nuclear arsenal.  In fact, Iran has signed treaties forsaking the possession of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons.  Israel has not.

The only thing more dangerous in the Middle East than ISIS, Saudi Arabia and the
United States is Israel and its unhinged prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Netanyahu prepares to fight world over Iran deal

With communications between Washington and Jerusalem all but severed, Netanyahu is hedging his bets and preparing to fight Obama on Capitol Hill once a nuclear deal is announced.

By Barak Ravid
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing for a world war. The reason, what else, is Iran's nuclear program. This offensive will not involve jet fighters descending on the nuclear facilities in Natanz or Fordow, but rather a frontal charge on Capitol Hill. Netanyahu's goal was and remains to enlist enough members from both houses of Congress to vote against the nuclear deal with Iran when President Obama puts it on the docket.

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The Third Temple's Holy of Holies: Israel's Nuclear Weapons
(Despite this study by a US Army officer, US officials—and corporate media
—must pretend Israel's nukes don't exist)

____________________

An Israeli source noted that Netanyahu seems optimistic about his chances. According to the source, Netanyahu recently told Jewish-American leaders that the battle is not lost. Those who heard the prime minister say it is hard to tell if he actually believes his own words or is only using the rhetoric to try to muster the forces. Either way, Netanyahu conveyed to his interlocutors that he believes that with the right steps, enough Democratic lawmakers with enough political clout can be swayed to stop the deal in its tracks.

The question remains of when the opening shot of this war will be fired. The assessment among Netanyahu and the Israeli establishment is that a comprehensive deal with Iran is a matter of days to a few weeks away. The issues that remain to be resolved between Iran and world powers cast in a doubtful shadow the chances of reaching a deal by the July 9 deadline – the final date Obama can submit the agreement to Congress before it takes its summer recess a month later.

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Department of Justice Covers Up Information on an Anti-Iran Neocon Front Group Likely Created by Israel and the CIA

The organization ran an "attack, discredit, and defame" operation against anyone advocating for better US relations with Iran

By Glenn Greenwald
A truly stunning debasement of the U.S. justice system just occurred through the joint efforts of the Obama Justice Department and a meek and frightened Obama-appointed federal judge, Edgardo Ramos, all in order to protect an extremist neocon front group from scrutiny and accountability. The details are crucial for understanding the magnitude of the abuse here. At the center of it is an anti-Iranian group calling itself “United Against Nuclear Iran” (UANI), which is very likely a front for some combination of the Israeli and U.S. intelligence services.

When launched, NBC described its mission as waging “economic and psychological warfare” against Iran. The group was founded and is run and guided by a roster of U.S., Israeli and British neocon extremists such as Joe Lieberman, former Bush Homeland Security adviser (and current CNN “analyst”) Fran Townsend, former CIA Director James Woolsey, and former Mossad Director Meir Dagan. One of its key advisers is Olli Heinonen, who just co-authored a Washington Post Op-Ed with former Bush CIA/NSA Director Michael Hayden arguing that Washington is being too soft on Tehran.

This group of neocon extremists was literally just immunized by a federal court from the rule of law. That was based on the claim — advocated by the Obama DOJ and accepted by Judge Ramos — that subjecting them to litigation for their actions would risk disclosure of vital “state secrets.” The court’s ruling was based on assertions made through completely secret proceedings between the court and the U.S. government, with everyone else — including the lawyers for the parties — kept in the dark.

In May 2013, UANI launched a “name and shame” campaign designed to publicly identify — and malign — any individuals or entities enabling trade with Iran. One of the accused was the shipping company of Greek billionaire Victor Restis, who vehemently denies the accusation. He hired an American law firm and sued UANI for defamation in a New York federal court, claiming the “name and shame” campaign destroyed his reputation.

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America's Pension Funds Are Being Used To Finance Illegal Settlements in Israel — That's Both Wrong and Illegal

Hebron demonstration against settlements and the marking of "Land Day." (Photo by ISM Palestine)

By JAMES ABOUREZK
The Minnesota State Board of Investment is honor bound when it invests monies from Minnesota’s public employee pension funds. Each of the Board members, which includes Governor Mark Dayton (Chair), State Auditor Rebecca Otto, Secretary of State Steve Simon and Attorney General Lori Swanson know, or should know, that the Board has violated its fiduciary responsibility to only invest public pension funds prudently by investing in Israel Bonds. Israel Bonds are government bonds issued by the State of Israel.

Earlier this month, I appeared before the Board members to urge them not to invest in Israel Bonds. Immediately after I ended my presentation, the Governor handed the other Board members a previously prepared written motion to continue investing the state’s pension funds in Israel Bonds. All of us in the packed hearing room understood that my testimony had been wasted. Facing members of the pro-Israel Lobby who had been seated in the front row, three of the four board members voted to invest. Only the State Auditor, Rebecca Otto, voted against the motion.

I’ve seen this pressure before. It usually consists of a subliminal threat by the pro-Israel Lobby to cut off any campaign money to those who defy what the Lobby wants. That is the same kind of threat that allowed Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to travel to the United States to dictate to our Congress how American foreign policy should be conducted. I believe that the 36 standing ovations for Bibi and the 47 Republican Senatorial signatures on the letter to Iran were eager messages to the Israeli Lobby telling them how much Congress appreciated the campaign money given each election cycle to its obedient members. When I served in the US Senate I well remember the threats directed against me for not being obedient enough to the Lobby.

The Board of Investment’s vote to use Minnesota pensioners’ money to buy the low-yield bonds issued by Israel is, without question, highly imprudent and illegal, especially because the Board knows how the money will be used. American money plunged into Israel Bond sales is fungible, meaning that the money is lumped into Israel’s General Fund, and then used for anything Israel wants, without restriction. That also means that the money sent to Israel is used for settlements. Israel’s settlements are illegal under Article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention, which prohibits an occupier from transferring any part of its civilian population into the territory it occupies.

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Obama Reevaluating US Position on Israel? — Don’t Bet on it!

Albert Einstein gives his opinion of Israeli terrorists. (Photo provided by gnuckx)

By Stephen Lendman
A so-called special relationship began in March 1948 when Harry Truman met secretly with Israel’s future first president Chaim Weizmann.

He pledged support for the future Jewish state. Minutes after midnight on May 15, 1948, America was the first country extending recognition.

A special relationship remains strong for strategic reasons. It developed politically, economically and militarily.

Leaders come and go. Names and faces change. Bumps in the road occasionally occur.

Obama put up with Netanyahu for over six years. Both leaders clearly dislike each other.

Geopolitics alone matters. Expect no substantive change in US/Israeli relations ahead.

Ignore rhetoric. It’s meaningless. It’s unrelated to policies. Politicians say one thing and do another with disturbing regularity.

On the stump campaigning, Netanyahu categorically rejected Palestinian self-determination.

“Whoever moves to establish a Palestinian state or intends to withdraw from territory is simply yielding territory for radical Islamic terrorist attacks against Israel,” he said.

Asked if he meant no Palestinian state on his watch, he responded: “Indeed.”

Reelected Netanyahu’s rhetoric changed. “I don’t want a one-state solution,” he said.

“I want a sustainable, peaceful two-state solution. But for that, circumstances have to change.”

He means unconditional Palestinian surrender to Israeli demands. His position is no different from all Israeli leaders preceding him.

Fact: In 1948, Israel stole 78% of historic Palestine.

Fact: In 1967, it stole the rest.

Fact: No government in Israeli history supported Palestinian self-determination.

Fact: None supported a so-called peace process.

Fact: No significant Israeli political party today supports granting Palestinians rights mattering most.

Fact: None favor treating Arabs and Jews equally.

Fact: None support Palestinian statehood.

Fact: None back ending militarized occupation harshness.

Fact: None endorse changing longstanding racist policies in place since 1948.

Fact: US/Israeli relations remain rock solid.

Fact: Personal relationships between leaders don’t matter.

Fact: Longterm strategic relations determine policies of mutual interest.

Washington is Israeli-occupied territory. AIPAC-led Israeli Lobby power owns Congress. No US president ever dared defy it.

Nothing politicians or their spokespersons say holds water. Netanyahu’s demagogic bluster matches Obama’s.

They say one thing. They do another. On Wednesday, State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said:

“Based on (Netanyahu’s) comments, the United States is in a position going forward where we will be evaluating our approach with regard to how best to achieve a two-state solution.”

“But that doesn’t mean that we’ve made a decision about changing our position with respect to the UN.”

Fact: Rhetoric aside, Washington never supported Palestinian statehood.

Fact: It never backed sustainable, durable, equitable Israeli/Palestinian peace.

Fact: It consistently vetoes Security Council resolutions inimical to Israeli interests.

Fact: Expect no change in longstanding US policy toward Israel ahead.

Foreign Policy magazine commented on what it called Netanyahu’s “flip flop flip.”

It said “US officials signaled a willingness to consider a UN resolution in the event that Netanyahu was reelected and formed a coalition government opposed to peace talks.”

An unnamed Western diplomat was quoted saying “(t)he more the new government veers to the right, the more you will see something in New York.”

Longterm Israeli governance is right of center. Most often it’s been hard-right – notably under Begin, Shamir, Sharon and Netanyahu.

Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, was notoriously racist. So were all Israeli leaders following him.

Netanyahu is the latest in a long line of rogue prime ministers. US/Israeli relations remain fundamentally unchanged.

Washington will continue generously funding its war machine. Both countries partner in each other’s high crimes against peace.

Palestinian rights don’t matter. The so-called peace process is pure fantasy. It’s been stillborn throughout decades of talks.

World public opinion and BDS-type initiatives are Palestinians’ best hope for change.

All Israeli leaders reflect its dark side. Netanyahu’s demagogic thuggishness does best.

His rhetoric, style, demeanor and policies reveal Israel’s true face better than any of his predecessors.

Palestinian BDS National Committee’s Mahmoud Nawajaa called his reelection “a victory for apartheid and colonialism.”

He urged “supporters of freedom and justice across the world to join us in intensifying our efforts to boycott Israel and to push governments to impose sanctions against Israeli apartheid, just as South African apartheid was isolated.”

BDS co-founder Omar Barghouti added:

“Israel, a belligerent nuclear power that completely disregards international law and basic human rights, will soon have its most fanatical government ever, with grave consequences for Palestinians as well as for world peace. Israel has dropped the mask.”

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Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.” http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com. Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. It airs three times weekly: live on Sundays at 1PM Central time plus two prerecorded archived programs.

Reprinted with permission from Center for Research in Globalization.

Senator Behind Traitorous Letter To Iran is Just Another Republican Moron: Says Iran Must be Stopped Because ‘They Already Control Tehran’

Sen. Tom Cotton. (Photo Screen captured from CBS video)

By David Edwards
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) said on Sunday cited Iran’s control of their own capital, Tehran, as a reason that the country had to be stopped from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

In a interview on CBS, Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer pointed out that Cotton’s letter to Iran, which was also signed by 46 other Republican senators, may have undermined President Barack Obama’s ability to get a nuclear deal with Iran.

“Let’s say the deal falls through, then what?” Schieffer wondered.

Cotton replied by quoting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

“The alternative to a bad deal is a better deal,” the freshman senator insisted. “The Iranians frequently bluff to walk away from the table. If they bluff this week, call their bluff. Congress stands ready to impose much more severe sanctions.”

“Moreover, we have to stand up to Iran’s attempts to drive for regional dominance,” he continued. “They already control Tehran and, increasingly, they control Damascus and Beirut and Baghdad. And now, Sena’a as well.”

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AIPAC Posts Biggest Lobbying Year in 2014 as Netanyahu Goes to Congress — Massive Payoffs Needed After Israel's Gaza Massacre?

Speaker Boehner invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu without
consulting President Obama. (BostonPeter7 via Flickr)

By Clark Mindock
Close to three dozen Democrats will boycott Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, angry that House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) invited the head-of-state without consulting President Obama.

The rift is emblematic of the tension between the White House and hard-line supporters of Israel on how to deal with Iran’s nuclear aspirations. The Obama Administration has urged patience as it attempts to finish negotiations with the Iranians, while Netanyahu is expected to warn against deals with Iran over its nuclear program. A preview his remarks was available Monday when Netanyahu spoke at the annual American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference.

“Ladies and gentlemen, the purpose of my address to Congress tomorrow is to speak up about a potential deal with Iran that could threaten the survival of Israel,” Netanyahu told AIPAC, the largest pro-Israel lobby in Washington by far and one that has been spending record amounts in recent years to influence a variety of interests including Iranian nuclear proliferation.

The slice of the Democratic caucus that is expected to miss Tuesday’s address is relatively small. What may be lost in the discussion surrounding the boycott is that Democrats have long been the favored party of pro-Israel interests. And just one of the Democrats named by Politico as planning to skip Netanyahu’s speech, Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, was a top 20 recipient from those interests in 2014.

In that cycle, Democrats received $6.5 million from pro-Israel interests, while Republicans saw just over $5 million. That works out to 56 percent of the cash coming from pro-Israel groups going to Democrats and 44 percent to Republicans. The spread isn’t unusual: Democrats regularly receive over 60 percent of the cash from pro-Israel groups. The only cycle going back to 1990 that Democrats received less than 50 percent of these contributions was 2006, when they pulled in just 48 percent of the money — but Republicans got even less, just 40 percent.

The numbers are somewhat deceiving, since AIPAC doesn’t make campaign contributions. Donations by pro-Israel interests are led, in fact, by JStreetPAC, a much more moderate organization that tends to favor liberals. In the 2014 cycle the group’s PAC and individuals associated with JStreet contributed almost $1.8 million, with the vast majority going to Democrats.

AIPAC, however, is huge in the lobbying world, and posted its biggest year yet in 2014 by spending $3.1 million to lobby the federal government; it beat its 2013 high water mark by $82,589.That was the seventh year in a row that AIPAC spent more than $2 million (and sixth in a row that it spent more than $2.5 million). While there are a handful of pro-Israel groups that lobby the federal government, AIPAC is the unquestioned big dog in this realm and accounts for most of the increased lobbying funds.

The committee has always lobbied on defense issues, but the increased spending corresponds with mounting concern over the Iranian nuclear issue and Israeli security concerns.

Lobbying by AIPAC in the first several years of the 21st century grew steadily as nuclear proliferation fears rose. Lobbying spending by the group spiked in 2006, the year of the first round of UN sanctions on Iran, to just under $2 million. The spending levels spiked again in 2008, a year in which the U.S. and Israel began cyberattacks on Iran’s nuclear operations and talks with Iran over its uranium enrichment collapsed. Lobbying outlays by the group have remained high during the Obama presidency.

In 2014, the bills most frequently listed by AIPAC in its lobbying reports were the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act, which has been reintroduced in the 114th Congress and would impose increased sanctions to stop Iran from enriching uranium that might be used to build a nuclear warhead; and the United States-Israel Strategic Partnership Act, a bill that was signed into law by Obama on Dec. 19 and extended authorization to place Department of Defense items in stockpiles in Israel.

Last August, the International Business Times reported that Israeli military forces had been using American weapons stockpiles in its war in Gaza.

The United States-Israel Strategic Partnership Act passed the Senate with unanimous consent and the House by a voice vote, meaning no individual voting records for either chamber were recorded. The law’s considerable support was evident from the number of lawmakers sponsoring the bill, however. Seventy-nine senators put their name on the bill.

 Reprinted with permission from Open Secrets.

Time to End the “Special Relationship” With Israel: The Strong Arm of AIPAC

By Chad Nelson
As expected, reaction to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Washington DC Congressional address broke pretty much along party lines, both in Israel and the United States. Those already susceptible to Netanyahu’s war fever heard a compelling, irrefutable case against any nuclear deal with Iran. Those familiar with Netanyahu’s “boy who cried wolf” routine weren’t persuaded. In Israel, Netanyahu’s expected election numbers remained virtually unchanged following the speech, while in the United States, the bipartisan neocon cabal in Washington and its media claimed “leadership envy” (Elisabeth Hasselbeck, R-Fox News), using the speech as a tool with which to bludgeon their supposedly weak President.

[...]

The growing disconnect between the US government’s staunch support of Israel and the American public’s disagreement with that support is best explained by Lysander Spooner’s No Treason No. 6, in which Spooner says of Congress, “these pretended agents of the people are really the agents of nobody.” For if members of Congress were legitimately acting as our agents, we would be “responsible for all acts done within the limits of the power entrusted to [Congress].” That constituents are not held legally responsible for the actions of their Congressional “representatives” says much about the purported agency, or lack thereof.

Applying a Spoonerite analysis to the American-Israeli “special relationship” exposes their respective governments’ war machines as classes unto themselves, entities separate and apart from their populations, on their own quest for financial and political power. As with all large, bureaucratic institutions, be they governments or corporations, they exist purely for the people running the institutions. The sooner we treat them as such, the more likely we are to lessen their body counts.

Read The Entire Article

Israel's PM Bibi Netanyahu — Ingrate: His Appeal to Israeli Anti-Americanism is Contemptible

"The US relationship with Israel has changed, in part, because Israel has changed – and not for the better. The growth of ultra-nationalist extremism, the openly racist policies toward Palestinians and African immigrants, the ruthlessness of Israeli military policy with its brazen disregard for innocent civilians, and the braying posturing arrogance of Netanyahu himself have all contributed to the growing unease with which Americans view their longtime ally-turned-frenemy."

Photo by Middle East Children's Alliance.

By Justin Raimondo
With Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tanking in the polls, and the election fast approaching, he and his right-wing Likud party are taking desperate measures to shore up their flagging support.

Their campaign is imperiled by Bibi’s underhanded tactics in inveigling an invitation to speak to the US Congress on the eve of the Obama administration’s delicate negotiations with Iran – an event sure to turn into a heavy-handed denunciation of the peace talks and a direct appeal to the Republican-controlled Congress to sabotage them. The whole arrangement was done behind the President’s back, and it has sunk US-Israeli relations to a new low. Meanwhile, in Israel, alarm rather than support for Netanyahu is the dominant reaction: the fear is that Bibi’s willfulness is endangering the "special relationship" with the US, which has been a vital lifeline for the Jewish state lo these many years.

Bibi, it seems to many Israelis, is the one who needs a "Bibi-sitter."

The opposition is scoring points and making gains – but the intransigent Netanyahu, characteristically, is digging in, and even going on the offensive. His campaign has released a new ad showing an image of David Ben Gurion, Israel’s founding Prime Minister, and text that reads:

"In 1948, Ben-Gurion stood before a fateful moment: The creation of the State of Israel. The U.S. secretary of state firmly objected [to the establishment of Israel]. Ben-Gurion – contrary to the State Department’s position – announced the establishment of the state… Would we be here today had Ben-Gurion not done the right thing?"

The ad ends with this exhortation: "Only Likud. Only Netanyahu" – and, I might add, only lies.

Aside from being a blatant appeal to growing Israeli anti-Americanism – a disturbing trend I pointed out long ago – the ad represents a considerable distortion of the historical record.

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Netanyahu Punks Obama as Congress Grovels - A Radio Commentary

President Obama got punked in his own Capitol by the leader of a country that gets more U.S. money, weapons, technology and diplomatic support than any other nation in the world

Listen to the commentary of read the transcript provided below:

By Glenn Ford, BAR
How could that happen?

Benjamin Netanyahu is the prime minister of a country that has been an appendage of U.S. imperialism since the day it was founded, and could not exist were it not joined at the hip of the superpower. And that is Israel’s greatest strength, because when two bodies are joined at the hip, the smaller one can wreak havoc, and even poison the larger one’s vital organs. President Obama is always saying that the United States is the world’s indispensable nation, but Netanyahu has once again demonstrated that Israeli cooperation is indispensable to any U.S. president.

Both Israel and the United States tell essentially the same lies to the world: that they are morally superior nations, when in fact both states were born in the cauldrons of mass murder, racial expulsion and genocide. Israel and the U.S. have learned to sing a perfect harmony of lies; they are the closest of co-conspirators. Neither one can rat out the other – which gives the weaker party great power over the stronger one.

The United States and Israel have told the very same lies about Iran: that it supports terror and aggression in the region, when it is actually Israel and the U.S. that have terrorized Iran through covert and proxy wars since 1979, while Iran has attacked no one for centuries. And, of course, there is the world’s greatest lie of omission: Israel’s refusal to acknowledge that it is a nuclear power, and Washington’s half century of collaboration in that lie. Having for so long weaved a common web of lies with Israel, Washington cannot easily extricate itself from Its co-conspirator in Tel Aviv. Israel, for its part, does not hesitate to use its veto power over the Americans.

“Israel and the United States tell essentially the same lies to the world.”

So, when President Obama attempted to tone down America’s lies about Iran’s alleged nuclear ambitions, so as to reach an advantageous deal for the United States, Netanyahu played his Republican card and screamed even bigger lies in front of a joint session of Congress – lies that Barack Obama cannot effectively rebut because Netanyahu’s lies about Iran are only slightly exaggerated versions of Washington’s lies about Iran. That’s why, after his emasculation on Capitol Hill, Obama had no choice but to pretend to agree with most of Netanyahu’s lying presentation. After all, Obama has told the same tall tales about non-existent Iranian nuclear weapons programs, and the real origins of the Islamic State. Obama’s in no position to contradict Netanyahu, who is determined to make it appear that the only path possible is everlasting war – which is Israel’s element.

The Americans are, of course, masters of fomenting war and chaos, but they do reserve the right, as a superpower, to call a truce when it suits them. Israel is telling Washington that it better get permission from Tel Aviv, or else Netanyahu will punk the U.S. president In his own house – especially if he’s Black.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com, and sign up for our weekly email notifications of new issues, each Wednesday.

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BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com. Click here to download this audio commentary.

 Reprinted with permission from Black Agenda Report.

'The Difference Between America and Israel?—There Isn't One': Netanyahu Knows He Can Get Away With Anything in America

Illustration by DonkeyHotey.

By Robert Fisk
Uri Avnery is without doubt the most intellectual, philosophical, prescient leftist Israeli seer I have ever met. Like TS Eliot, he has a habit of using the fewest words to tell the greatest truth. Every essay he writes, this reader always says the same thing: Exactly! Yet, for the first time in 40 years, I disagree with the great man.

He has just suggested that Benjamin Netanyahu’s agreement to address the US Congress at the invitation of Republicans tomorrow – two weeks before an Israeli general election – and Barack Obama’s decision not to see the old rogue, has destroyed Israel’s bipartisan support in America. For the first time, says Uri, Democratic politicians are allowed to criticise Israel.

Absolute Tosh.

Congressmen of both parties have grovelled and fainted and shrieked their support for Bibi and his predecessors with more enthusiasm that the Roman hordes in the Colosseum. Last time Bibi turned up on the Hill, he received literally dozens of standing ovations from the sheep-like representatives of the American people, whose uncritical adoration of the Israeli state – and their abject fear of uttering the most faint-hearted criticism lest they be called anti-Semites – suggest that Bibi would be a far more popular US president than Barack. And Bibi’s impeccable American accent doesn’t hurt.

And his aim – to earn votes for himself and to destroy the one foreign policy achievement within Obama’s grasp – will have absolutely no effect at all on Israeli-US relations. When Bibi made himself the laughing stock of the UN Security Council – by producing an infantile cartoon of an Iranian bomb with a red line in the middle, indicating that Iran could build nuclear weapons by the end of 2013 – his charade was treated with indulgence by the American media. These mythical deadlines have been expiring regularly for more than a decade, yet still we are supposed to take them seriously. Obama is struggling to reach an agreement with Iran which would protect the world from any nuclear weapon production by the Islamic Republic.

Bibi wants to destroy this opportunity. He wants more sanctions. He wants to win the Israeli elections on 17 March. He might even bomb Iran – which would bring an immediate military response against the United States.

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Meet the Billioanaire Pro-Israel War Mongers Preparing to Throw Tens of Millions Toward Total Control of United States in 2016

Sheldon Adelson (Top - Illustration by DonkeyHotey) and Haim Saban.

By Alex Kane
On November 9, the ugly face of America’s money-saturated election process was put on full display.

Sheldon Adelson and Haim Saban, two billionaires with right-wing, pro-Israel agendas, took the stage at the Israeli American Council’s inaugural conference in Washington, D.C. They fantasized about bombing Iran and about buying the New York Times because they said it’s biased against Israel. Both are bound to play an outsized role in the 2016 presidential elections by flooding the campaign with money to support their favored candidates. In a post-Citizens United world, Adelson and Saban are kings, and Israel will be the beneficiary of their largesse if the donors have the ear of a future president.

Saban and Adelson are on opposite ends of the mainstream (and narrow) political spectrum. Adelson is a casino mogul who bankrolled the 2012 presidential campaigns of GOP candidates Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney. Saban is in the entertainment business and is a major Democratic Party donor. But when it comes to U.S. foreign policy and Israel, Saban and Adelson take many of the the same positions, displaying an eagerness for war with Iran and a desire to keep the U.S. alliance with Israel rock-solid.

“There’s no right or left when it comes to Israel,” Saban said in what news reports called a joking reference to the moguls’ seating positions at the conference where they spoke.But the quip was more than just a joke. It was a nod to how the Democratic and Republican parties are united in singing Israel’s praise, backing its military actions and voting to give the country $3.1 billion in U.S. military aid annually.

If Adelson’s and Saban’s chosen candidates in 2016 get their way, that unity will shine through during the presidential campaign, with the debate being reduced to who would support Israel the most.

Saban, an Israeli-American famous for producing the TV show Power Rangers, is currently the CEO of the Saban Capital Group, which invests in media companies around the world. A 2010 New Yorker profile of Saban by Connie Bruck paints a portrait of a man who is heavily influential, charming and hawkish. “I'm a one-issue guy and my issue is Israel,” he told the New York Times in 2004.

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Will the Blackmail of Britain's Politicians By Jewish Funders Backfire?

Question: What’s the difference between the Zionist lobby in America and the Zionist lobby in Britain?

Answer: In America it gives money to politicians to make them. In Britain it denies them money to break them.

By Alan Hart
The headline in the Independent on Sunday was “Labour funding crisis: Jewish donors drop ‘toxic’ Ed Miliband” (the son of Jewish holocaust refugees and the leader of the Labour Party). The headline over the same story in the newsletter of Jews for Justice for Palestinians was “Rich Jews ditch Labour”.

What is Miliband’s crime in the eyes of wealthy British Jews who have been contributing to Labour Party funds?

He condemned Israel’s last war on the Gaza Strip which he described as “wrong and unjustifiable”. He also accused Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron of being wrong not to have condemned Israel; and he added that Israel was “losing friends in the international community day by day” (which is true).

Subsequently, Miliband further offended British Jewish supporters of Israel right or wrong when he decided to whip the non-binding vote in parliament calling for the government to unilaterally recognise Palestine. On this he was opposed by a number of senior Labour MPs, including at least two shadow cabinet ministers. They said he was changing Labour policy that recognition should only be given when a two-state solution had been negotiated. And they warned that Miliband’s stance would haemorrhage Jewish support. They were right.

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Pro-Israel Supporters Threaten British Labour Party Because of Its 'Aggressive Pro Palestinian' Positions — Say They'll Starve Labour Party of Funding

These very same tactics are used to terrify and bribe American politicians into supporting Israel's war crimes.—Ronald David Jackson

Ed Miliband: Labour Party leader. (Photo by net_efekt)

By Oliver Wright
The Labour party is facing desertion by Jewish donors and supporters because of Ed Miliband's "toxic" anti-Israeli stance over Gaza and Palestine. In a fresh headache for the Labour leader, it is understood that Mr Miliband has been warned that Jewish backers are deserting the party in droves over what community leaders perceive to be a new, aggressive pro-Palestine policy at the expense of Israeli interests.

One prominent Jewish financial backer, a lifelong Labour supporter, said he no longer wanted to "see Mr Miliband in Downing Street or Douglas Alexander as Foreign Secretary".

A senior Labour MP warned that Mr Miliband now had a "huge if not insurmountable challenge" to maintain support from parts of the Jewish community that had both backed and helped fund Tony Blair and Gordon Brown's election campaigns.

At the same time, a former cabinet minister privately admitted that Labour's fundraising efforts were in disarray. The former minister said the party would struggle to raise anywhere near the £19m a party is entitled to spend under electoral law in the run-up to next May's poll. "We will have to pass the begging bowl round to the unions," they said. "That would send a bad signal. In return, they [the unions] would demand to call the shots on policy."

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'US Gives Too Much to Israel': That's What 6 in 10 American Citizens Think — Says Google Survey

By Robert Barsocchini
Surveying Americans about U.S. aid to Israel requires putting it into proper perspective. Given Israel’s position as the leading single U.S. foreign aid recipient (by a wide margin), as in 1989 asking the foreign aid question requires embedding relevant data to obtain a bona fide response.  When such data is included, the majority of Americans (60.7 percent) believe U.S. aid to Israel is excessive.  The major response, that aid to Israel is “Much too much” is 33.9 percent of Americans.  Some 26.8 percent believe it is “too much” while 25.9 percent believe it is “about right.” Only 13.4 percent of Americans believe U.S. aid to Israel is not enough.

The policy and political implications of this finding are stark.  Elected officials passing ever larger aid packages and supplemental spending for Israel simply cannot claim they are representing the majority interests of their constituents.  American presidents proclaiming the U.S.‐Israel bond is “unbreakable” cannot claim such a bond is willingly underwritten by U.S. taxpayers.  The finding also shines yet more light on Israel lobby organizations as the major factor coming between most constituents and their representatives and quietly working to ensure that Israel’s majority share of the U.S. foreign aid budget continues.

The survey also finds that, in particular, younger US citizens are strongly opposed to the amount of US aid that goes to Israel, and, crucially, finds that “Only the Wealthiest Americans believe U.S. aid is ‘about right’”:

The only category of Americans (47.6 percent) who believed U.S. aid for Israel is “about right” is the segment earning $150,000 or more (although even 42.9 percent in that category thought aid was too high).  The next lower income category, $100,000‐149,000 is the most vehemently opposed to aid, with 79.5 percent believing it is too high (42.9 percent responding “much too much” and 36.6 percent “too much.”)

While the Google report says the findings are “stark”, they are precisely consistent with the findings of the recent study out of Cornell and Northwestern universities, the largest study of its kind to date, which looked at nearly 1,800 individual US policy issues and found that the average US citizen has zero impact on those policies, while the wealthiest citizens essentially get exactly what they want, meaning they dictate US policy (and they largely comprise the US government).

This Google survey simply singles out one of the policy issues, which together illustrate that the USA is not a democracy, but a society in which people are allowed to choose which of two corporate-backed figureheads they want as the face of an oligarchy that dictates government policy in its own interest.

It is also worth noting here that 1) the top ten recipients of US aid (with Israel as #1) all, like the US itself, have torture regimes, 2) US law “prohibit[s] U.S. foreign aid to nuclear weapons states such as Israel that are not signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty”, and 3) Obama, while repeatedly insisting the US is a “nation of laws”, requested more military aid for Israel than any president ever (among many other blatantly illegal acts).

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Robert Barsocchini is a researcher focusing on global force dynamics.  He also writes professionally for the film industry.  Here is his blog.  Also see his free e-book, Whatever it Takes – Hillary Clinton’s Record of Support for War and other Depravities.  Click here to follow Robert and his UK-based colleague, Dean Robinson, on Twitter.

Reprinted with permission from Center for Research in Globalization.

Israel's 'Hasbara': An Exercise in the Impossible — Israel's Social Media Propaganda Army Won't Change Many Minds About Israel's Atrocities

Israel has constructed a systematic policy of propaganda, 'hasbara', that depends on its citizens - the extension and 'mouthpiece' of the state - to act as its voice. But this rationalization of Israeli policy rests on shaky foundations.

Screen capture from YouTube's Hasbara Channel.

By Tanzil Chowdhury
“The explanation” is a calculated translation of the Hebrew term ‘hasbara’, that describes the systematic policy of propaganda that bleeds throughout Israeli society. To rationalize its every action and inaction, even its citizens, when traveling abroad, are encouraged to act as mouthpieces of the state.

The hasbara machine is most dynamic in the crescendos of the illegal occupation and blockade such as we have seen unraveling before us over the last month. But it moves beyond mere silencing tactics, equating criticism of it’s government with anti-Semitism or exceptionalising suffering. It is not enough however, to say that Hasbara manipulates the truth to manufacture consent. A recent article in the Independent, ‘The Secret report that helps Israel hides facts’, is both revealing and indicting. Whilst it still remains that Israeli spokespersons have not been taken to task on this document, the following statements, by no means exhaustive but familiar to many, canonise and characterise the reasoning of statesmen, military personnel and impassioned advocates.

“Israel has a right to defend itself”

Derived from its democratic mandate that the government has (and by extension the army) an obligation to defend its citizens, this is perhaps the most regurgitated of the hasbara mantra. It’s undoing, however, is that the very same argument can be extended to the democratically elected Hamas government in Gaza. Failure to accept this argument is a failure to accept the virtue of democracy. What is perhaps most startling about this claim is not only that it undermines the right, recognized under international law, for occupied peoples to resist, but for Israeli PR, it toys with people’s ignorance, advocating the idea of ‘self-defense’ and an association with being the weaker party.

Do American Politicians Think They Were Elected by Israel?: Take Trips To Mideast to Support Israel — Ignore Palestinian, Arab American Opinion

American politicians pretend they care about Israel, but all they really care about is getting the cash of (and not angering) pro-Israel lobbyists.

Photo by shira gal.

By Thomas Kaplan and Jason Horowitz
It is high season for travel to the Holy Land.

The previous New York City mayor, Michael R. Bloomberg, squeezed onto an El Al commercial flight in an everyman’s show of support. Members of Congress, eager to report back to their constituents, are carving time out of their schedules.

And on Wednesday, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York, who has resolutely avoided anything resembling the résumé-burnishing travel of a presidential hopeful, arrived here for a state visit that included a stop at the Western Wall. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, eager to showcase the support of prominent American leaders, set aside time for a meeting and remarks from side-by-side lecterns.

Summertime trips to Israel are nothing new for American officials, but amid the fighting in Gaza, more and more of them are seizing on their annual sojourns or booking last-minute excursions to make a political statement. Representative Steve Israel, a Democrat from Long Island, just got back; Representative Peter T. King, a Republican from Long Island, will depart this month.

On Wednesday, The Boston Globe reported that Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts — considered by many the most serious threat to Hillary Rodham Clinton in a Democratic presidential primary — is planning to join a congressional trip to Israel after the fall midterm elections.

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The Israeli Government: Five Facts It Would Prefer You Did Not Know

Photo by Middle East Children's Alliance.

By Anthony Bellchambers
1. Binyamin Netanyahu claims to speak for the majority of world Jewry although, in fact, he represents only a minority of Jewish Israelis and Americans – those who support his right-wing, Likud Party. To many others, particularly in Europe, he is considered a US-financed, Zionist rabble-rouser with an extremist political agenda that rejects any Palestinian state and requires the ‘transfer’ of all indigenous Arabs out of former Palestine.

2. Israeli policies such as the illegal settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem (to prevent the establishment of a Palestinian state); the 8 year blockade of essential supplies into Gaza; the mis-labelling of exported fruit and vegetables to Europe and the horrific killing of hundreds of defenceless women and children in Gaza – all have the effect of exacerbating antisemitism around the world. The agenda of the Israeli government against the indigenous Arab population being the primary driver of anti-Jewish feeling both in Europe and globally.

RELATED STORY: Human Shields, A-Bombs and the Origins of Gaza, Hamas and the Current Conflict: Big Media is Lying by Omission

3. Netanyahu is well aware of this link and the detrimental effect of his policies on the security of Jewish communities worldwide, and on public opinion, but he also knows that the greater the increase in antisemitism the more French, British and other Jewish nationals will be forced to sell their homes and reluctantly leave the countries of their birth to seek sanctuary in Israel. This is a key principle of the Netanyahu government agenda that all American, European and diaspora Jews should be ‘persuaded’ to emigrate to the Israeli state – together with their assets.

4. However, this agenda is also partly supported by millions of evangelist, Christian Zionists in America, who believe in the literal word of the bible and whose goal is for all 14 million Jews in the world to be relocated to the Israeli state where they can be baptised and converted, en masse, into the Christian church! The Israeli government ministers smile knowingly behind their hands as they accept this support – without which their economy would collapse.

5. The Israel lobby in America comprises over a dozen organisations including AIPAC, the primary Zionist political pressure group with links into the White House that heavily influences US foreign policy around the world.

However, for many integrated European Jewish communities, Mr Netanyahu’s alleged war crimes in Gaza plus his violent, expansionist agenda with its consequent rise in antisemitism, are very bad news indeed.

The head of UNICEF said yesterday, that 392 children had been killed in the conflict between Israel and Hamas, and that about 370,000 children had been traumatised.

A boycott of academic and trading links with the state of Israel now seems to be inevitable consequence of the atrocities carried out in Gaza.

Reprinted with permission from Center for Research in Globalization.

Israel Wants Its Paid Agents Within the US Congress To Help It Fend Off War Crimes Charges

Palestinians are planning to join the International Criminal Court and accuse Israel of crimes against humanity.

Photo by Alkan Boudewijn de Beaumont Chaglar.

By Haaretz
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has asked United States legislators to assist Israel in fending off charges that Israel committed war crimes during its month-long operation in Gaza, the New York Post reported on Wednesday.

“The prime minister asked us to work together to ensure that this strategy of going to the International Criminal Court does not succeed,” Democratic congressman Steve Israel told the Post by phone from Tel Aviv.

Israel was one of a group of American lawmakers who met with Netanyahu in Israel on Wednesday.

Palestinian leaders met with ICC officials in The Hague this week, preparatory to making a formal application to join the international tribunal.

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Even Left-Wing Politicians Like Bernie Sanders Can’t Quit Israel

'Progressive' politicians like congressman Keith Ellison (right) and senator Bernie Sanders will stand up
to almost anyone - but not Israel. (Left Photo from Keith Ellison; Right Photo from Senate Democrats)

By Tim Mak
Despite grassroots outrage at Operation Protective Edge, left-wing members of the House and Senate won’t criticize Israel’s ongoing incursion into Gaza.

Much of the American left is critical of Israel, particularly since its incursion into Gaza. But in the halls of Congress, even progressive Democrats beloved by grassroots activists are loath to criticize the Jewish State’s ongoing military offensive.

A Pew Research Center poll released Monday showed that a plurality of Democrats across the country, 35 percent, and liberals, 44 percent, said that Israel had “gone too far” in its response to its conflict with Hamas. Meanwhile 47 percent of Democrats told Gallup that Israel’s actions during the current conflict were “unjustified,” compared to just 31 percent who thought the opposite.

But these opinions are nearly impossible to find in Congress. Democrats, when asked a question about Israeli operations in Gaza, had two standard responses: irritation, or else a statement of their broad support of Israel, without going into specifics. It was as if the very mention of Israel turned the question into a hostile interview.

“Look, man, I’m a politician, with multiple constituencies. Why should I alienate one just so that you can write a story?” Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison angrily told The Daily Beast. Ellison, a stalwart progressive, was the first Muslim-American elected to Congress.

Ellison cited a Tuesday op-ed he had written that was critical of the Gaza blockade, but became noticeably agitated when asked to expand on his views. In particular, he did not want to address whether Israel had gone too far during its current operations in the Gaza Strip.


Sen. Bernie Sanders, a darling of the left who identifies as a democratic socialist, was curt. His tone changed suddenly when the topic shifted from the Veterans Administration bill that he had been shepherding through Congress to Israel’s operation in Gaza.

“That’s not where my mind is right now,” he told the Beast.

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