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Nine-eleven would not have occurred if the U.S. government
had refused to help Israel humiliate and destroy Palestinian society. Few
express this conclusion publicly, but many believe it is the truth. I believe
the catastrophe could have been prevented if any U.S. president during the
past 35 years had had the courage and wisdom to suspend all U.S. aid until
Israel withdrew from the Arab land seized in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war [as required by UN Resolution 242].
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The U.S. lobby for Israel is powerful and intimidating, but
any determined president - even President Bush this very day - could prevail
and win overwhelming public support for the suspension of aid by laying these
facts before the American people:
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Israel's present government, like its predecessors, is determined
to annex the West Bank - biblical Judea and Samaria - so Israel will become
Greater Israel. Ultra-Orthodox Jews, who maintain a powerful role in Israeli
politics, believe the Jewish Messiah will not come until Greater Israel is
a reality. Although a minority in Israel, they are committed, aggressive,
and influential. Because of deep religious conviction, they are determined
to prevent Palestinians from gaining statehood on any part of the West
Bank.
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In its violent assaults on Palestinians, Israel uses the pretext
of eradicating terrorism, but its forces are actually engaged advancing the
territorial expansion just cited. Under the guise of anti-terrorism, Israeli
forces treat Palestinians worse than cattle. With due process nowhere to
be found, hundreds are detained for long periods and most are tortured. Some
are assassinated. Homes, orchards, and business places are destroyed. Entire
cities are kept under intermittent curfew, some confinements lasting for
weeks. Injured or ill Palestinians needing emergency medical care are routinely
held at checkpoints for an hour or more. Many children are undernourished.
The West Bank and Gaza have become giant concentration camps. None of this
could have occurred without U.S. support. Perhaps Israeli officials believe
life will become so unbearable that most Palestinians will eventually leave
their ancestral homes.
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Once beloved worldwide, the U.S. government finds itself reviled
in most countries because it provides unconditional support of Israeli violations
of the United Nations Charter, international law, and the precepts of all
major religious faiths.
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How did the American people get into this fix?
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Nine-eleven had its principal origin 35 years ago when Israel's
U.S. lobby began its unbroken success in stifling debate about the proper
U.S. role in the Arab-Israeli conflict and effectively concealed from public
awareness the fact that the U.S. government gives massive uncritical support
to Israel.
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Thanks to the suffocating influence of Israel's U.S. lobby,
open discussion of the Arab-Israeli conflict has been non-existent in our
government all these years. I have firsthand knowledge, because I was a member
of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee in June 1967 when
Israeli military forces took control of the Golan Heights, a part of Syria,
as well as the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza. I continued as a member for
16 years and to this day maintain a close watch on Congress.
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For 35 years, not a word has been expressed in that committee
or in either chamber of Congress that deserves to be called debate on Middle
East policy. No restrictive or limiting amendments on aid to Israel have
been offered for 20 years, and none of the few offered in previous years
received more than a handful of votes. On Capitol Hill, criticism of Israel,
even in private conversation, is all but forbidden, treated as downright
unpatriotic, if not anti-Semitic. The continued absence of free speech was
assured when those few who spoke out-Senators Adlai Stevenson and Charles
Percy, and Reps. Paul "Pete" McCloskey, Cynthia McKinney, Earl Hilliard,
and myself-were defeated at the polls by candidates heavily financed by
pro-Israel forces.
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As a result, legislation dealing with the Middle East has been
heavily biased in favor of Israel and against Palestinians and other Arabs
year after year. Home constituencies, misled by news coverage equally lop-sided
in Israel's favor, remain largely unaware that Congress behaves as if it
were a subcommittee of the Israeli parliament.
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However, the bias is widely noted beyond America, where most
news media candidly cover Israel's conquest and generally excoriate America's
complicity and complacency. When President Bush welcomed Israeli Prime Minister
Ariel Sharon, sometimes called the Butcher of Beirut, as "my dear friend"
and "a man of peace" after Israeli forces, using U.S.-donated arms, completed
their devastation of the West Bank last spring, worldwide anger against American
policy reached the boiling point.
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The fury should surprise no one who reads foreign newspapers
or listens to BBC. In several televised statements long before 9/11,Osama
bin Laden, believed by U.S. authorities to have masterminded 9/11, cited
U.S. complicity in Israel's destruction of Palestinian society as a principal
complaint. Prominent foreigners, in and out of government, express their
opposition to U.S. policies with unprecedented frequency and severity, especially
since Bush announced his determination to make war against Iraq.
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The lobby's intimidation remains pervasive. It seems to reach
every government center and even houses of worship and revered institutions
of higher learning. It is highly effective in silencing the many U.S. Jews
who object to the lobby's tactics and Israel's brutality.
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Nothing can justify 9/11. Those guilty deserve maximum punishment,
but it makes sense for America to examine motivations promptly and as carefully
as possible. Terrorism almost always arises from deeply-felt grievances.
If they can be eradicated or eased, terrorist passions are certain to
subside.
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Today, a year after 9/11, President Bush has made no attempt
to redress grievances, or even to identify them. In fact, he has made the
scene far worse by supporting Israel's religious war against Palestinians,
an alliance that has intensified anti-American anger. He seems oblivious
to the fact that nearly two billion people worldwide regard the plight of
Palestinians as today's most important foreign-policy challenge. No one in
authority will admit a calamitous reality that is skillfully shielded from
the American people but clearly recognized by most of the world: America
suffered 9/11 and its aftermath and may soon be at war with Iraq, mainly
because U.S. policy in the Middle East is made in Israel, not in
Washington.
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Israel is a scofflaw nation and should be treated as such.
Instead of helping Sharon intensify Palestinian misery, our president should
suspend all aid until Israel ends its occupation of Arab land Israel seized
in 1967. The suspension would force Sharon's compliance or lead to his removal
from office, as the Israeli electorate will not tolerate a prime minister
who is at odds with the White House.
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If Bush needs an additional reason for doing the right thing,
he can justify the suspension as a matter of military necessity, an essential
step in winning international support for his war on terrorism. He can cite
a worthy precedent. When President Abraham Lincoln issued the proclamation
that freed only the slaves in states that were then in rebellion, he make
the restriction because of "military necessity."
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If Bush suspends U.S. aid, he will liberate all Americans from
long years of bondage to Israel's misdeeds.
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Mr. Paul Findley, who served as a Republican congressman from
Illinois for 22 years, is the author of 'They Dare to Speak Out' and a member
of the American Educational Trust's Foreign Relations Committee
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From
RePortersNoteBook.com
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