Marble Composition

Newsflash: America is Not Israel

I just read this quote from John McCain over at Digby's joint:

"The greatest single threat that we are facing right now to our national security is Iran," he said. "If they get that weapon, and they have the capability to deliver it, put yourself in the position of the government of the state of Israel. This could be one of the most unsettling and difficult challenges that we have ever faced."

But we're not the state of Israel. And this isn't a challenge "we" face. The challenges the U.S. and Israel face are distinctly seperate. Have the two nations' security now become permanently coupled to one another? As if they're one in the same? Someone needs to start calling politicians and talking heads on this. Yes, we should support Israel in the many ways that we already do, but as the blogger Billmon coined it, that country really has become our 51st state. I would add that I don't think the fact that we supply them with an enormous amount of military goodies gets lost on the Arab world. Trust me, when Al-Jazeera shows American-made M1A1 Abrams tanks rolling into both Bahgdad and Lebanon, it doesn't get lost on their audience. They get it (nevermind the supply of Blackhawk and Apache helicopters, and nuclear weapons).

I was watching Meet the Press a couple of weeks ago, and Ken Mehlman, chairman of the Republican National Committee, had this to say (question included):

MR. GREGORY: It is very clear that this is going to be topic A in the midterm election. This is what another prominent Democrat, the vice chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Jay Rockefeller, had to say about the legacy of the Bush years, particularly the war in Iraq. He said the following: “I fear many of our policies over the past five years have done more to inflame extremism than to diminish it. I believe the war in Iraq has diverted resources and undercut the Bush Administration’s ability to protect our people against a terrorist attack.” A view echoed in terms of money spent in the Iraq war by the 9/11 Commission’s co-chairman.

MR. MEHLMAN: I would say, with all due respect to Mr. Rockefeller, tell that to the families of the 241 people who were killed in 1983 by Hezbollah, the people that were in the East African Embassies that were bombed in the 1990s. The fact is, for a generation terrorists have made war on America. From the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich to Mogadishu to Beirut to the East African bombings, to the USS Cole...

Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold it right there Kenny. Let's be clear here: no Americans were attacked at the Munich games in 1972. Not one. Yes, a Palestinian terrorist group did attack the Olympic compound, and they did kill athletes and take hostages. But they were Israelis, not Americans. I feel like I'm writing for a fifth grader here, and maybe Ken can get his ears around that, but Jeebus, this is common historic knowledge.

I keep hearing this more and more from prominent conservative figures, and not only is this faulty rhetoric, but it leads to bad policy. From the time Bush came into office, for decades America was seen as an honest broker in the Middle East. All to easily, the Bush administration, and conservatves in general, are throwing that notion out the window. If you listen to William Kristol enough, he'd have you believe America is Israel.

This is not good for American or Israeli security. There are many times when the interests of both nations converge, and where cooperation and support is necessary, but both countries need to draw a clear line when they don't. That line is quickly disappearing, and to the detriment of both nations. Here's the rub though; the Israelis have been paying the price for their national survival since their nation's birth, and as horrific as that's been, there's no reason to make it America's permanent problem. Dragging America into a seemingly intractable, endless, low-level war in the Middle East is a horrible drain on the U.S.'s long term security (Iraq being a different story, and a horrible one).

Given the Bush administration's reaction to the 33 day war, I'm not very hopeful. Maybe someday the neoconservatives will remember that Israel was the U.N.'s idea, and not solely born from some inkling of an endless tie to America.

[update: edited for spelling errors]

posted by FuzzFinger @ 8/24/2006 09:28:00 PM