Recently declassified files obtained from the National Archives provide a rare look at just how Israel not only buys influence in the US media, but actually shapes the agenda of that media. These documents are from a sealed Senate investigation into the predecessors of AIPAC, (America-Israel Public Affairs Committee), and its mouthpiece WINEP, (Washington Institute for Near-East Policy).
I understand that Israel pours a lot of money into PR Campaigns in America, and that the majority of Americans are willling and eager to believe that PR, but what's to stop Islamic countries or organizations from at least attempting the same thing? Do they try but nobody listens, or are they not even trying?
ReplyDeleteGood question, Kem.
ReplyDeleteFirst, no foreign government should be allowed to interfere in the internal politics of any sovereign nation in this manner. Yes, the USA does it to other nations, but it's still wrong, wrong, wrong.
Second, Israel has a diaspora population with wealth and political influence far out of proportion to its numbers. Remember, please, that of 15M Jews in the world, 6M live in Israel and 6M live in the USA.
Third, Israel has the Holocaust Sympathy card, with a seemingly-unlimited line of credit, which has played with ruthless abandon for the last 65 years.
Fourth, Israel has the cry of "Anti-Semitism", to which they resort whenever anyone dares to criticize their actions. And, in both Europe and the US, that accusation is enough to ruin the career of any politician or other public figure, enough to silence any critic, enough to stifle any accusation of wrongdoing.
As an example, in 1967 the Israelis sank the USS Liberty, killing 34 of her crew and wounding 172. Some the Liberty's crew were literally machine-gunned in their lifeboats. And U.S. military rescue aircraft were recalled, not once, but twice, through direct intervention by the Johnson administration.
As outrageous as this action was, as certain as drastic US retribution would have been against any other nation in the world, Israel had enough influence in Washington DC to whitewash the whole affair not just at the time, but again in 2004.