Has America Been a Good Ally of Is? PART 1

Has America been a good ally of Israel?

Nearly 100% of American Jews would answer that question with a strong – YES.  A majority of Israelis would give the same answer.  They would be wrong!

All one would have to do would be to look at the historical record.  In 1948 after Israel had declared its independence several Arab countries attacked.

The Arabs were loaded with sophisticated weaponry including airplanes.  Israel had next to nothing.  The United States refused to provide Israel with any weapons whatsoever. To the contrary, America imposed an arms embargo on Israel.  For a time Czechoslovakia, a communist country, provided weapons to Israel including airplanes. Stalin reversed that policy.

Zero weapons from America even though the Secretary General of the Arab League had said –

“IT WILL BE A WAR OF ANNIHILATION”.

The American government was willing to risk that.  General George Marshall was the principal leader of the Allied Forces during World War II.  President Truman appointed him first as Secretary of State and later as his Secretary of Defense.  His Marshall Plan after World War II was responsible for rebuilding most of Europe including Nazi Germany. He favored the arms embargo and was strongly against Israel declaring independence.

In July, 1956 Nasser of Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal and closed the Straights of Tiran.  Even Britain and France regarded those totally unprovoked measures as constituting acts of war.  They joined Israel in attacking Egypt.

The United States sponsored a resolution at the United Nations calling on Israel to halt its advance.  That has always been a consistent American position, the objective being to prevent an overwhelming Israeli victory.  Israel conquered the Sinai and Gaza.  They accomplished this without receiving any weapons from the United States.  The United States sponsored another resolution in the United Nations condemning Israel, Britain and France.  The United Nations has specialized for decades in passing anti-Israel denunciations and resolutions.

The United States pressured Israel to withdraw from those territories which it had conquered.  President Eisenhower was unhappy that Israel wasn’t withdrawing fast enough. He went on national television on February 20, 1957 to blast Israel, threatening sanctions.

Prime Minister Ben-Gurion did something unprecedented in responding to Eisenhower.  He actually criticized America, saying that it had applied different standards of justice for dictatorial Egypt and democratic Israel.  Ben-Gurion wanted guarantees for Israel’s freedom of navigation.  Nasser had prohibited Israeli ships from entering both the Suez Canal and the Straits of Tiran.  Ben-Gurion accused the United States of not lifting a finger regarding the Straits.  He pointed out that – “for eight years the United States has permitted acts of blockade and murder by the Egyptian government against Israel.”

Eisenhower’s pressure was successful, Ben-Gurion folded.  Israel returned both the Sinai and Gaza to Egypt.  Nasser thanked Eisenhower profusely.

THE SIX DAY 1967 WAR

Nasser did not learn anything from his military defeat in 1956.  In 1967 he was threatening Israel again.

“OUR BASIC OBJECTIVE WILL BE TO DESTROY ISRAEL.”

Egypt had 100,000 troops and 900 tanks in the Sinai.  Nasser had again closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli shipping.

Israel took the threats seriously and decided on a preemptive strike on June 5, 1967.  Israel took out over 400 Egyptian, Syrian and Jordanian aircraft that were exposed and grounded.  They all figured Israel would not risk incurring the wrath of the United States by attacking first.  Syria, Iraq and Jordan all had bought into Nasser’s lunacy.

The fruits of Israel’s overwhelming victory – they got the Sinai and Gaza back from Egypt, the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, the Golan Heights from Syria.

Israel probably would have returned nearly everything in exchange for meaningful peace treaties and an end to terror.  Instead they got the three NOS from the Arab League on September 1, 1967 – NO PEACE, NO NEGOTIATIONS, AND NO RECOGNITION.

THE 1973 YOM KIPPUR WAR

The victories of 1967 made the Israelis cocky, even arrogant.  They became careless.  Many could not believe that there would be another Arab attack a mere six years later.

There were 100,000 Egyptians massed on their side of the Suez Canal.  Sadat said they were there simply for training maneuvers.  Training for what?  No Arab country was a threat to Egypt and certainly not Israel.  The military heroes of the past Moshe Dayan, and Yitzhak Rabin told Prime Minister Golda Meir that there would be no attack.  Military intelligence did not expect one either.

Could it be that no one figured that Yom Kippur would be a perfect day to attack and particularly so because Yom Kippur in 1973 fell on the Sabbath.  Yom Kippur is a 24-hour fast day.  The country is basically shut down, nearly everyone is in synagogue for the entire day.

The Egyptians did cross the canal and attack.  They destroyed many Israeli planes, tanks, and a ton of other weaponry and defenses.  Some 2,600 Israeli soldiers were killed in the prime of their lives – never to marry, never to have children.  The negligence of military and political leadership was astounding.  How could it be a surprise attack with thousands of well-armed Egyptian troops visible to all?  Tragically similar omissions were duplicated on October 7, 2023.

So hard to understand considering the brilliant accomplishments of so many Israelis.  The brilliant accomplishments of the military and political leadership on so many other occasions.  There is a terrible price to pay when such lapses occur in a country surrounded by blood-thirsty enemies.

There were many who thought that 1973 could mark the end of Israel as a vibrant, sovereign, independent, democratic nation.  So much of their weaponry and aircraft had been destroyed.  Guess who came to Israel’s rescue.  President Nixon – a figure despised by thousands of liberal American Jews.

Nixon provided a massive airlift of planes, tanks, etc. in C-5 cargo galaxies over and over again.  Re-equipped, Israel regained its confidence and its military genius.  Ariel Sharon’s troops crossed the canal and were ready to crush its attackers.  Nixon cared enough to do this while he was embroiled in the Watergate mess resulting in his resignation on August 9, 1974.

So many liberal American Jews regard Nixon as an ant-semite which is absurd.  He made a Jew, Henry Kissinger, his closest confidant, making him the second most powerful person in America.  During the months that Nixon was preoccupied with the threat of impeachment, Kissinger was probably the most powerful political person in the country.

PRIME MINISTER MENACHEM BEGIN BLASTS THE UNITED STATES

Hard to believe that the United States was critical of Israel’s success in destroying Iraq’s nuclear facility on June 7, 1981.  The United States voted in favor of a resolution condemning Israel in the Security Council of the United Nations.  Vice-President Bush (under President Reagan) was particularly vocal about the need to punish Israel.

By December 1981, Prime Minister Begin had become so fed up with American threats that he did something unprecedented – he summoned the United States Ambassador to Israel to his office where he dared to be straightforward.  He said –

“Three times during the past 6 months, the United States government has punished Israel.  On June 7, we destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor, this reactor was going to produce atomic bombs.  We had no doubt about that, therefore, our action was an act of salvation, an act of national self-defense.  Nonetheless, you announced that you were punishing us, and left unfulfilled a signed and sealed contract that included specific dates for the supply of war planes.”

“You have imposed upon us financial punishments, and, have thereby violated the word of the President.  A week ago the Knesset passed on all three readings, by an overwhelming majority of two-thirds, the Golan Heights law.  Now, you once again declare that you are punishing Israel.  What kind of expression is this – “punishing Israel”?  Are we a vassal state of yours?  Let me tell you who this government is composed of.  It is composed of people, whose lives were spent in resistance, in fighting, and in suffering.  You will not frighten us with punishments”.

Israel had captured the Syrian Golan Heights during the 1967 war; Syria was not successful in getting it back during the 1973 war.  For years, Israeli communities had been bombarded by Syrian artillery and guns from the strategic position of the Heights.  Israel was now going to apply its laws and jurisdiction to that territory.

“As regards the future, please be kind enough to inform the secretary of state, that the Golan Heights law will remain valid.  There is no force on earth that can bring about its rescission”.

The United States had suspended a joint strategic cooperation agreement after Israel annexed the Golan.

The United States never sold weapons to Israel until the administration of President Kennedy.  That’s right – the Arms Embargo remained in effect from 1948 until 1962.  Finally, in 1962, Israel received its first major weapons system from the United States – Hawk anti-aircraft missiles.  The State Department, which has been consistently anti-Israel from day one, opposed the sale. They opposed it knowing that the Arab states had received massive amounts of aircraft and weaponry from the Soviet Union.

President Bush (the father) suspended ten billion dollars in loan guarantees that were needed to absorb the influx of Jews from the breakup of the Soviet Union.  The purpose of the suspension was to force Israel to agree to a construction freeze in the West Bank.

The arrogance is stunning – how is that America’s business?  America would not dare tell any other sovereign, independent democracy, where it can build or where its citizens could live.

Obama did not object to a United Nations resolution in 2016, that condemned settlements as a flagrant violation of international law.  When Prime Minister Ben Gurion came to America numerous times as prime minister, he was never officially invited to the White House.  Clinton invited Arafat to the White House more times than any other foreign leader. This salesman in chief thought he could convert the mass murderer into a peacenik. Clinton ignored Arafat’s speech to the United Nations calling for the destruction of Israel.

Jimmy Carter’s national security advisor, Brzezinski, actually said, that if Israel attempted to bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities, that United States planes should confront Israeli planes, and if necessary, shoot them down. Carter uttered not a word of rebuke. Why would he? He wrote a book calling Israel an apartheid nation.

The Israeli haters say that American politicians are in the pocket of the Israeli lobby-AIPAC.  What a joke!  AIPAC has never been able to get any president to say anything like the following –

You cannot fire rockets and missiles into Israel.  No sovereign country can tolerate that.  If rockets were being fired into New York or Miami or Los Angeles, the United States would destroy the perpetrators.  If you persist in this irrational behavior, American policy will be to back Israel’s response, and we will never criticize that response for being excessive.

AIPAC has never been able to get any American president to say what any real ally would say to the Palestinians –

Suicide bombers must cease, terror must cease.  The murdering of unarmed civilian families must cease.  Americans consider such actions to be cowardly – not heroic!

When President Obama speaks to an AIPAC convention, and says that Israel has the right to exist, and the right to defend itself, the applause is thunderous.

What?  Tell Canada that it has the right to exist, tell Great Britain that it has the right to defend itself.  That’s like telling a person that they have the right to breathe!

TO BE CONTINUED ….