Bill Keller’s op-ed in The New York Times describes the conspiracy theory like this:
“A cadre of pro-Zionist zealots within the Bush administration and among its media chorus (the “amen corner,” as the isolationist Pat Buchanan crudely called them last time we threatened Iraq) has long schemed to make the Middle East safer for Israel by uprooting the hostile regime of Saddam Hussein. They have finally succeeded, the theory goes, in pushing their agenda up to the desk of a gullible president.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/08/opinion/08KELL.html
At the basis of the theory is a 1996 memo by some American conservatives, written for Binyamin Netanyahu, spelling out ideas for Israeli diplomatic-economic-security policy. One of the items called for the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. (Read the document at: http://www.israeleconomy.org/strat1.htm)
The Washington Post describes how “these ‘neocons’ then insinuated themselves into the Bush administration and seized on 9/11 as the pretext to put their plan into motion. Mr. Bush and his top foreign-policy team — Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, national security adviser Condoleezza Rice and CIA Director George J. Tenet — are presumably too weak and gullible to evade the manipulations of these Jews.”
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A13012-2003Mar11.html
* * *
So who is spreading this conspiracy theory? Here’s a short list:
JIM MORAN (U.S. Congressman)– “If it were not for the strong support of the Jewish community for this war with Iraq, we would not be doing this. The leaders of the Jewish community are influential enough that they could change the direction of where this is going, and I think they should.”
EDWARD SAID (Columbia professor and Palestinian apologist) — “Wherever you look in the Congress there are the tell-tale signs either of the Zionist lobby, the right-wing Christians, or the military-industrial complex, three inordinately influential minority groups who share hostility to the Arab world, unbridled support for extremist Zionism, and an insensate conviction that they are on the side of the angels.”
http://www.counterpunch.org/said03082003.html
DAVID DUKE (former KKK leader) — “By any standard, this Iraq war is of no benefit to the United States of America, nor is it of any benefit to the commercial oil industry. So, for whose benefit does America wage this war? The answer is Israel, Israel, Israel! Radical Jewish supremacists in Israel launched this drive for war. Their agents all over the world, both in government and media, have been the real power behind this war.” http://www.balochistanpost.com/item.asp?ID=3436
* * *
One might expect such comments from the political fringe. But what is shocking is that this conspiracy theory is getting ink in some “mainstream” publications.
Consider this op-ed published by the Chicago Tribune, written by University of Chicago professor Fred Donner. Donner writes of a Likud-U.S. conspiracy to remove Saddam Hussein that will give Israel “an opportunity implement its long-cherished dream of expelling all Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza” and the U.S. will allow this “ethnic cleansing.”
We expect better from an ostensibly respectable paper like the Tribune.
Read the article at:
(If the URL does not fit onto one line of this e-mail, paste the parts into your browser, and remove any spaces that appear in the URL address field.)
Comments to:
[email protected]
Fax: (312) 222-2598
* * *
Of course, this conspiracy theory has as much credibility as the popular belief in Muslim countries that the Israeli Mossad orchestrated the Sept. 11 attacks. Yet for the anti-Israel media and politicians, the Iraqi showdown is just another opportunity to foment anti-Israel sentiment.
As Keller writes in The New York Times:
“The fact that our interests coincide with Israel’s does not mean that a Zionist fifth column has hijacked the president’s brain… Making the world safer for us — defusing terrorism and beginning to reform a region that is a source of toxic hostility to what we stand for — happens to make the world safer for Israel as well. But the idea that Israel’s interests are driving one of the most momentous shifts in America’s foreign policy is simple-minded and offensive.”
History, it seems, is repeating itself. As The Economist observes: “In the 1930s, when anti-Semitism was both pervasive and respectable in America, Charles Lindbergh and his America-Firsters blamed Jewish interests for trying to drag America into a pointless war with Germany.”
http://economist.com/world/na/displayStory.cfm?story_id=1632966
HonestReporting encourages members to monitor your local media to see how they are reporting the Jewish-Israeli influence on President Bush’s war plans.
This communique is sponsored by Daniel Gazzar of Switzerland — “To my children, Nathaniel & Ben, so they will live in a better world.”
