I wasnât debating Russia with you I just said her article on Russia was stupid and she appears to have a plank in her eye on Israel so overall she strikes me as a bit of a dope.
Which was the âstupidâ article about Russia?
Most of her pieces about Russia and the rise of authoritarian figures in eastern Europe are well worth reading.
I recall we discussed it before, I thought it was stupid anyway. Iâm sure if you search back here youâll find it, no need for a rerun.
I donât recall and anyway all Iâm looking for is a link.
TFK search function should do it.
This appears to be the article you took umbrage at - she was spot on to be fair.
Real life âFaudaâ stuff here from Israel.
https://www.rte.ie/news/world/2024/0130/1429344-israel-palestine/
At least she doesnât have crab apples in her mouth.
The shocking thing in many ways is the global power and influence that they have, the extent of it.
And a very large section that arenât.
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Global blackmail Iâd call it. They are the only country in the world that holds the whip hand in their relationship with the US, and boy do they use it.
The rest of the world is constantly treading on eggshells with them. For the sake of the world, this treading on eggshells, this paying undue respect to a shower of genocidal cannibals, it has to stop, but it never will. The global power centres are gutless. Israel is totally nuts and has total free rein to do what it wants.
What a world we live in.
There was also a âgood sectionâ of German society that was horrified by the carry on of the Nazis.
This appears to be a modern phenomenon. Since the 90s or so. Before then the US was prepared to and did apply pressure on Israel.
Thatâs not true, US has been a staunch backer of Israel since the 60s. In some respects it was easier then, as the whole Arab world attacking them was a bit more clear cut. It got even easier in the late 70s and early 80s when after the revolution in Iran and Iran started bombing US targets through proxies in Lebanon. The Iranian support for the PLO then made a more clear cut choice for many Americans as PLO was seen as anti-American and Israel as pro. Oversimplified and without nuance, no doubt, but thatâs how these things often fall.
There was a good article in the guardian recently and it ran through examples of how the US pressured Israel in the past to accept agreements it didnât want to. Still a staunch backer of Israel no doubt but some strong examples of applying proper pressure to Israel.
An absolute world away from the approach nowadays when Israel, to say the least, is far less in need of support and far far less deserving of it.
The second option is to make the fallback worse. This is what President Eisenhower did following the 1956 Suez crisis when he threatened economic sanctions to get Israel to withdraw from Sinai and Gaza. This is what President Ford did in 1975 when he reassessed US relations with Israel, refusing to provide it with new arms deals until it agreed to a second Sinai withdrawal. This is what President Carter did when he raised the spectre of terminating US military assistance if Israel did not immediately evacuate Lebanon in September 1977. And this is what Carter did when he made clear to both sides at Camp David that the United States would withhold aid and downgrade relations if they did not sign an agreement. This, likewise, is what the US secretary of state James Baker did in 1991, when he forced a reluctant Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir to attend negotiations in Madrid by withholding a $10bn loan guarantee that Israel needed to absorb the immigration of Soviet Jews. That was the last time the United States applied pressure of this sort.
How did the Jews get so much money in the first place?
They were always money lenders going back to the time when Christ was on this earth.
He scattered them one day in the temple and relations between Jews and Christians havenât been the same since.
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In fairness to Carter he did he did put some pressure on to pull off Camp David. Canât remember Reagan being anything but uncritical of Israel. The 1979 revolution in Iran had a large influence on how US supports Israel. People often forget than prior to that that Iran and Israel were actually allies. Iran going full on Great Satan and anti US and Israel meant Israel got more license from the US.
I name checked Reagan above in error, corrected it after looking up the para Iâd read, quoted above.
The shift in approach since those days is insane.