The announcement last week by the United
States of the largest military aid
package in its history – to Israel – was
a win for both sides.
Israeli prime
minister Benjamin Netanyahu could boast
that his lobbying had boosted aid from
$3.1 billion a year to $3.8bn – a 22 per
cent increase – for a decade starting in
2019.
Mr Netanyahu has presented this as a
rebuff to those who accuse him of
jeopardising Israeli security interests
with his government’s repeated affronts
to the White House.
In the past weeks alone, defence
minister Avigdor Lieberman has compared
last year’s nuclear deal between
Washington and Iran with the 1938 Munich
pact, which bolstered Hitler; and Mr
Netanyahu has implied that US opposition
to settlement expansion is the same as
support for the “ethnic cleansing” of
Jews.
American president Barack Obama,
meanwhile, hopes to stifle his own
critics who insinuate that he is
anti-Israel. The deal should serve as a
fillip too for Hillary Clinton, the
Democratic party’s candidate to succeed
Mr Obama in November’s election.
In reality, however, the Obama
administration has quietly punished Mr
Netanyahu for his misbehaviour. Israeli
expectations of a $4.5bn-a-year deal
were whittled down after Mr Netanyahu
stalled negotiations last year as he
sought to recruit Congress to his battle
against the Iran deal.
In fact, Israel already receives
roughly $3.8bn – if Congress’s
assistance on developing missile defence
programmes is factored in. Notably,
Israel has been forced to promise not to
approach Congress for extra funds.
The deal takes into account neither
inflation nor the dollar’s depreciation
against the shekel.
A bigger blow still is the White
House’s demand to phase out a special
exemption that allowed Israel to spend
nearly 40 per cent of aid locally on
weapon and fuel purchases. Israel will
soon have to buy all its armaments from
the US, ending what amounted to a
subsidy to its own arms industry.
Nonetheless, Washington’s renewed
military largesse – in the face of
almost continual insults – inevitably
fuels claims that the Israeli tail is
wagging the US dog. Even The New York
Times has described the aid package as
“too big”.
Since the 1973 war, Israel has
received at least $100bn in military
aid, with more assistance hidden from
view. Back in the 1970s, Washington paid
half of Israel’s military budget. Today
it still foots a fifth of the bill,
despite Israel’s economic success.
But the US expects a return on its
massive investment. As the late Israeli
politician-general Ariel Sharon once
observed, Israel has been a US
“aircraft carrier” in the Middle East,
acting as the regional bully and
carrying out operations that benefit
Washington.
Almost no one blames the US for
Israeli attacks that wiped out Iraq’s
and Syria’s nuclear programmes. A
nuclear-armed Iraq or Syria would have
deterred later US-backed moves at regime
overthrow, as well as countering the
strategic advantage Israel derives from
its own nuclear arsenal.
In addition, Israel’s US-sponsored
military prowess is a triple boon to the
US weapons industry, the country’s most
powerful lobby. Public funds are
siphoned off to let Israel buy goodies
from American arms makers. That, in
turn, serves as a shop window for other
customers and spurs an endless and
lucrative game of catch-up in the rest
of the Middle East.
The first F-35 fighter jets to arrive
in Israel in December – their various
components produced in 46 US states –
will increase the clamour for the
cutting-edge warplane.
Israel is also a “front-line
laboratory”, as former Israeli army
negotiator Eival Gilady admitted at the
weekend, that develops and field-tests
new technology Washington can later use
itself.
The US is planning to buy back the
missile interception system Iron Dome –
which neutralises battlefield threats of
retaliation – it largely paid for.
Israel works closely too with the US in
developing cyberwarfare, such as the
Stuxnet worm that damaged Iran’s
civilian nuclear programme.
But the clearest message from
Israel’s new aid package is one
delivered to the Palestinians:
Washington sees no pressing strategic
interest in ending the occupation. It
stood up to Mr Netanyahu over the Iran
deal but will not risk a damaging clash
over Palestinian statehood.
Some believe that Mr Obama signed the
aid package to win the credibility
necessary to overcome his domestic
Israel lobby and pull a rabbit from the
hat: an initiative, unveiled shortly
before he leaves office, that corners Mr
Netanyahu into making peace.
Hopes have been raised by an expected
meeting at the United Nations in New
York on Wednesday. But their first talks
in 10 months are planned only to
demonstrate unity to confound critics of
the aid deal.
If Mr Obama really wanted to pressure
Mr Netanyahu, he would have used the aid
agreement as leverage. Now Mr Netanyahu
need not fear US financial retaliation,
even as he intensifies effective
annexation of the West Bank.
Mr Netanyahu has drawn the right
lesson from the aid deal – he can act
against the Palestinians with continuing
US impunity.
- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/2016-09-19/palestinians-lose-in-us-military-aid-deal-with-israel/#sthash.fL4Eq28N.dpuf
How the US Manipulates Humanitarianism
for Imperialism #Aleppo
By
Steven Chovanec
October 12, 2016 "Information
Clearing House"
-
"Underground
Reports"
-
The United States is manipulating
humanitarian concern in an effort to
protect its proxy militias and its
imperial regime-change project in
Syria. The media and intellectual
classes are dutifully falling in line,
promoting a narrative of military
aggression under the cover of
“protecting civilians.” These same
“responsibility to protect” arguments
led to the invasions of Iraq and Libya,
exponentially increasing the massacres,
chaos, and proliferation of violent
extremism within those countries. They
are hypocritical, designed to further
interests of conquest and domination,
and will lead to more death and
destruction in Syria as well.
The United States has no stake in the
wellbeing of Syrian civilians, despite
their condemnations of Russia’s
offensive in Aleppo. This is clearly
shown in the fact that the people they
are supporting are guilty of the same
crimes they accuse Russia and Syria of:
indiscriminate attacks,
targeting of civilians, destruction
of
schools,
hospitals, etc. Furthermore, the
offensive in Aleppo is really no
different from what the US did in Manbij,
where they are said to have incorporated
a “scorched
earth policy” while they liberated
the city from ISIS, whereby the civilian
population was treated “as if they were
terrorists or ISIS supporters.”
Arguably their conduct was even worse,
as they there earned the distinction of
launching
the deadliest single airstrike on
civilians out of the entire 5-year
conflict, massacring at least 73
where no ISIS fighters were present.
The Manbij operation elicited no moral
outcry from the media and punditry,
understandably since these were “unworthy
victims” given that they were our
victims and not those of our
enemies. The same can be said about the
US operations in Kobani and Fallujah,
whereby the entire towns were
essentially reduced to rubble without
any uproar.
Saudi Arabia as well has no concern for
Syrian civilians, as they have been
ruthlessly besieging and bombing Yemen,
with the support and help of the United
States, for two years without any
concern for civilian lives. Their
assault has led to a humanitarian
situation even more dire than in Syria,
leaving
at least 19 million in need of
humanitarian assistance; in Syria it is
estimated that a total of
18 million are in need of aid.
Turkey as well is not concerned, as is
evidenced by their conduct towards their
Kurdish population, yet the recent quiet
by Erdogan over the fate of Aleppo is
indicative of
an understanding reached between him
with President Putin, whereby Turkey
establishes a presence in northern Syria
and blocks the advance of the Kurds, and
in return limits its support to the
rebels and the insurgents in Aleppo.
The real reason the US is decrying the
Russian operation is the fact that they
are staring aghast at the near-term
possibility that their proxy insurgency
in Aleppo will be defeated. Not only
will this mark the decisive turning
point in the war, the rebels all-but
being fully overcome with the Syrian
government in control of all the
populated city centers except Idlib, but
others
have argued that it could as well
mark the end of US hegemony over the
entire Middle Eastern region in
general. In other words, the US is
trying to turn global public opinion
against the Russian effort in an attempt
to halt the advance and protect their
rebel proxies trapped in Aleppo.
So, who are these rebels?
Expert analysis concurs, as
Fabrice Balanche of the Washington
Institute details how these rebel
alliances indicate “that the al-Nusra
Front dominates more different rebel
factions, including those considered
‘moderate.’” He explains that
al-Qaeda’s “grip on East Aleppo has only
increased since the spring of 2016.”
It
is these fighters, al-Qaeda and their
affiliates, that the US is trying to
protect from the Russians, and as well
other US intelligence operatives that
are likely embedded with them. The
narrative that Russia is committing a
humanitarian catastrophe is intended to
hide this fact, as well as to shift the
blame for the suffering in Aleppo off of
the US’ shoulders. Yet it was the US
support to the rebels that is primarily
responsible for the suffering.
To
illustrate this, the people of eastern
Aleppo
never supported the rebels nor
welcomed them. The rebels nonetheless “brought
the revolution to them” and
conquered the people against their will
all the same. Of the few reporters who
actually went to the city, they describe
how Aleppo has been
overrun by violent militants through
a wave of repression, and that the
people only “saw glimmers of hope” as
the Syrian army was driving them from
the area. The people decried this “malicious
revolution” and characterized the
rebel’s rule as a “scourge of
terrorism.” This, of course, was of no
concern to the US at the time, who now
proclaims to be the “protectors” of the
civilians in Aleppo.
Around
200-600,000 of the original
population fled and relocated in the
government-held western part of the
city. Of the civilians who remain, they
are
primarily the families of the fighters,
who themselves are paid to stay and
fight. The official numbers for those
remaining are 200,000, yet the actual
number is likely much lower,
around 40-50,000.
Nonetheless, the remaining civilians who
were trapped within this warzone were
prevented from leaving.
During the first ceasefire, humanitarian
corridors were opened and the civilians
were encouraged by the Syrian army to
leave, yet
the rebels stopped them, with
reports saying they went as far as
to shoot at those who tried. The
attempt to evacuate the civilians
was condemned by the US, who argued
that the innocent people “should be able
to stay in their homes.” The radical
groups were using the civilian
population as human shields in order to
protect themselves, and the US was
supporting it. Further corroborating
this is the special UN envoy Steffan de
Mistura, who quotes reports indicating
that the rebels have been utilizing “intentional
placement of firing positions close to
social infrastructure, aside and inside
civilian quarters.” This is because
it has always been the policy of the
Syrian government to separate civilians
from insurgents, as it is simply much
more militarily effective to fight
against an enemy that is not ensconced
within a civilian population. Likewise,
it has always been US and rebel policy
to prevent this separation.
According to a knowledgeable individual
with contacts with high level Syrian
officials, the US and EU
always rejected the Syrian governments
proposals to separate civilians from
the fighters, as they explained, “because
doing so will be helping you win.”
This makes sense, given that if all of
the civilians from eastern Aleppo were
evacuated there would then be nothing
stopping the Syrian army from crushing
the remaining fighters, and there as
well would be no international outcry
over them doing so. The source
explains: “Syria’s war is an urban
war theater. [The] only way for
insurgents to compete is to use
residential areas to hide and operate
out of. This is in direct contrast to
[the] Syrian army who would like to
fight a theater totally void of
civilians.”
Those claiming to be protecting Aleppo’s
civilians from the Russian and Syrian
onslaught are in actuality using them as
a means to protect their success on the
battlefield.
Given this, the strategy of the Syrian
government has been
to bomb sporadically in order to
scare the civilians and force them to
flee from areas controlled by the
militants. This is also why the Syrian
army just recently
halted their advance in order to
allow civilians to evacuate; they wanted
the civilians out of the picture so they
could militarily defeat the rebels more
quickly and easily.
If
one actually were concerned about saving
the civilians in eastern Aleppo it is
pretty straight forward that one would
try to evacuate the civilians from the
area, and that the backers of the rebel
groups would put pressure on them to
allow this to happen. From there it
would follow that all sides abide by the
UN Security Council resolutions of which
they agreed to, which call for
the suppression of financing, fighters,
and support to al-Qaeda, for the
suppression of al-Qaeda “and
all other entities associated” with
them, and “to eradicate the safe haven
they have established over significant
parts of Syria,” of which Aleppo is one
of the largest.
Unfortunately, it is only Syria and
Russia who are following through on
these commitments, while the US and its
allies are consciously blocking them.
The media and intellectual opinion are
as well falling in line,
obscuring from the narrative all of
these inconvenient truths that do not
support the interests of the policy
planners in Washington. In this way,
the media are shown to be completely
subservient to state power, drumming up
support for another aggressive war based
on falsities and half-truths in the
exact same way that led to the
continuing catastrophes in Libya and
Iraq. When the US was driving ISIS from
Manbij, just as Syria is now driving
al-Qaeda from Aleppo, killing hundreds
of civilians at a time, there was not so
much as a debate about it, much less an
international outcry.
Yet now there are countless calling to
“save” Syrians by bombing them and
flooding the warzone with more weapons
and fighters, ironically using
“humanitarian” concern to call for
policies that will lead to even more
death and misery. The rebels are
dominated by jihadi extremists, and
any further support to them will further
strengthen the radicals engaged in a
project of ethnic cleansing, conquest,
and reactionary theocratic governance.
Bombing would only help to further
descend Syria into chaos and death, just
as it did in Iraq and Libya.
This is an international proxy war and
humanitarian concerns are being
manipulated unscrupulously in
support of interests having nothing to
do with concern for innocent lives.
Don’t fall for this faux humanitarianism
from which more war, imperialism, and
thus more death and destruction will
result.
Steven Chovanec is a freelance
journalist and independent geopolitical
analyst based in Chicago. Bachelors in
International Relations with a minor in
Sociology at Roosevelt University.
Independent, open-source research & analysis
into geopolitics and social policy. Follow
on Twitter @stevechovanec - Facebook
facebook.com/stevechovanec - Tsu http://www.tsu.co/stevechovanec
- e-mail:
schovanec@mail.roosevelt.edu -
http://undergroundreports.blogspot.com
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