Zionism Forums - Zionist and Israel discussion

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The accusation that the Jews (or Israel) started the Iraq war reared its head again at a mock committee meeting staged by US Democrats.

An artice about it is here:

http://www.zionismontheweb.org/iraqwarjews.htm

You are invited to comment in this forum topic.

[Evan Siegel]

This article is a crude manipulation of the charge of anti-Semitism.
The fact is that ex-spook analyst McGovern was telling the simple truth. There were different factions which brought in different reasons for the Iraq war. One of those factions were Israel's agents of influence in the US like JINSA. To say this is not to blame the war on "the Jews" or even "the Zionists."
But these Zionist activists should not camoflage their share of the responsibility for the war, which is not insignificant. To say that there are no Jews in the Bush administration is transparently besides the point. Everyone knows that the Pentagon's civilian leadership which played an absolutely vital role in laying the groundwork for the war--cooking data, cutting out the Pentagon's military leadership, etc.--was largely Jewish and had close ties to the Israeli Right. This is what our polemicist ought to have discussed.
That being said, Moran was wrong and his comments are indeed troubling. Our self-appointed gedolim (the AJCommittee, the AJCongress, Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations) played only an auxiliary role. But it is a fact that they which lined up behind the war effort, although with some grumbling in more liberal quarters, and elliding them with the mass of Jewish Americans in an effort to "discredit" Moran is more transparent dishonesty.
There is such a thing as anti-Semitism (very often disguised as anti-Zionism)--the lunatic fringe of the Black Nationalist movement, David Duke, parts of the Islamist and Christian Right, etc. It is a disservice to the fight against this scum to manipulate and politicize the charge of anti-Semitism in this way.
I have long been deeply concerned that when the American people turn against this war in large numbers--and this is beginning to happen--it will evade its own responsibility for supporting the war by scapegoating the Jews. Thanks to the prominent role of reckless maniacs like the Wurmsers and the Ledeens, this will be an irresistable temptation. The struggle against this kind of disorientation is not made any easier by the smearing the movement against the war as anti-Semitic in season and out.
http://geocities.com/evan_j_siegel[/list]

[Guest]

The USA did the world, the Middle East, the Iraqis and yes, the Israelis, a service by getting rid of Saddam Hussein.
He was the local bully who took over Kuwait, massacred the Kurds and the Shias, picked a fight with Iran, and threatened world peace.
In the past he lobbed missiles into Saudia and Israel and financed terrorism.
Am I to understand that some parts of the Democratic Party now pine for him?
I hope not.

David Zohar
Jerusalem
Israel

[Dvar Dea]

It’s hard for me as an Israeli to comment on this in international forums (with the exception of pro Israeli ones, such as this), since I am the accused, been an Israeli, buy the very rising of the subject. This was supposed to have been done for me.
I will make a few points clear instead:

It is no secret that Saddam Hussein wasn’t popular among us, and few people shad tears when he fell.

However, at the time of the invasion of Iraq he was not high on Israel’s threats list. Iran, Syria, Hizzbulla, Hamas, Islamic Jihad, even Al Qaeada, where and are greater threats to Israel and its civilians then Saddam Hussein in his last years.

Even those who sees Israeli agents in every major Jewish organization, haven’t brought evidence that our government or officials where ever consultant. What would have been Israel’s position if we where consultant? Hard to tell, removal of Saddam Hussein would have been a plus for us, but a theocratic Shia Iraq, unifying Syria and Iran is a major minus.

And one more thing, and the most important of them all, the whole idea of Israel and Zionism is that we do our own fights, our own dieing, which we have been doing since WW1. We never welcomed war, but when it came, we never shrunk from it.

[Oboler]

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Evan Siegel wrote:

[Guest]

[Evan]

It's probably not terribly useful to post a response in a forum which seems to have been dead for about a half a year. But I guess I'm obliged to answer some of this nonsense on your disucssion list.

Ami notices a parallel between my complaining about a crude attempt to manipulate the charge of anti-Semitism and a posting on al-Jazeera which was later picked up by Holocaust denier website. Yes or no, Ami, are you saying that anyone who complains about any crude manipulation of anti-Semitism is getting his ideas from al-Jazeera or Holocaust denial websites? If so, are you claiming that it is impossibly to crudely manipulate charges of anti-Semitism? If not, are you claiming that when such charges are crudely manipulated, only people who read al-Jazeera or Holocaust denial websites are allowed to respond?

I mention that it is well-known that the Jewish right has played a crucial role in driving the machinery of war forward. I guess it would be useless to mention the names Wolfowitz, David Wurmser, Eric Edelman, Douglas Feith, Michael Ledeen, Scooter Libby, Elliot Abrams, and Donald Kagan, or lesser lights like Don Zakheim, Kenneth Adelman, Steve Goldsmith, Edward Luttwak, Robert Satloff, David Frum, and Marc Grossman.

Again, I am told only I know this because of racist attacks on the Jewish people. Well, no, I know it because I read the newspapers. To claim, as Ami does, that they are simply individuals who speak for no one but themselves is disingenuous. They are part of a political movement. They are regularly addressed as such in the American press. The above-mentioned figures are not an atomized mass of people any more than the Christian Right is an atomized group of people who "speak only for themselves." It is not McCarthyism, Ami, to talk about the baneful influence of the Christian Right on the administration. The Falwells and the Robertsons are part of a movement, just as the Wurmsers and the Ledeens are.

The Roosevelt administration had almost no Jewish figures anywhere near it. Jewish politicians, Zionist, assimilationist, religious, or otherwise, were in no position to influence the direction of American foreign policy. The Americans entered World War II for entirely American purposes. The idea that Jewish influence had anything to do with the US getting into that war is therefore a phantasmagorum. But thanks for the cute Nazi analogy, Ami. I'll put that trophy next to the one about my getting my ideas from Holocaust denial websites on my mantle piece. Boy, no McCarthyism there! No guilt by association, nosirree! It pains me to see you stoop so low, Ami, it really does.

"The data were cooked at someone's behest." I never said that the data was cooked at the order of anyone else but the Bush administration as a whole, which is, of course, entirely Christian. I did say that the Bush administration was ably assisted in this by the Jewish Right. Ami is falling into the trap of believing his own distortions of my position and then attacking them.

I was not accusing you of being a liar, Ami. One can, l'havdel, cherry-pick quotations from the holy Talmud which offend modern sensibilities, as anti-Semites have been doing for centuries. They can do this by being intellectually dishonest and not liars, although, as we know, many of them supplement their quotations with outright fabrications.

And one can want to believe something so badly that it distorts ones judgement. Critics of the Jewish Right become followers of Holocaust denial or parroters of Nazism. All sorts of chimeras form before the eye in the demimonde inhabited by the True Believer.

I said,

[Dvar Dea]

I’ll restrict most my comment to Evan’s response to my words.

First, there is a huge difference between getting the weapons to fight and doing the actual fighting. Bleeding is doing the actual fighting.

So :

[Merlin]

I don't know what is scarrier, big time democrats being completely anti-semitic, or ordinary people like the poster in this thread being an anti-semite.

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[Dvar Dea]

Is Even Siegel anti-Semite?

No!

He’s just very very anti Bush. As his web site shows.

But the anti-Semite logic, as Ami puts it, of his arguments is evident and transparent: Suggesting that the idea of Jewish self-defense is utopian, suggests Jews are incapable of self-defense. Jews are as capable of self-defense as any other nationality, nearly 100 years since the formation of ‘Ha’Shomer’ had proven that over and over again. No capability is absolute, what ours is a fact of history.
Are the people he calls “Jewish right” are Jews first or American first?
Is it possible that they have made their choice, their views on American policies, based on what they think is good for their country, the USA,?
(Whether they are right or wrong is another debate.)

And then there is this:

[Oboler]

Well put
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