Why America (REALLY) Supports Israel

0:01 hey everyone I'm not a team of people I'm just one person if you want to support the work I do there's three things you can do number one please subscribe for more videos like this number two join the patreon you can access the amazing Discord server there and there's all kinds of exclusive content that's not on YouTube number three you can donate whatever you can afford and I just want to thank everyone that has already subscribed become a patron and donated love you all thank you in the spring of 1948 a group of eight men sat together to discuss a move that would massively impact the future of the Middle East forever ostensibly a debate of sorts the

0:48 question hanging in the air with time running out to decide was whether to recognize a new Jewish state in Palestine on the opposing ends were the state department LED at that time by the Towering figure of General George C Marshall the other end being represented by the White House President Harry S Truman had asked a domestic adviser Clark Clifford to deliver the case for recognition as Clifford would later write in his Memoir of all the meetings I ever had with presidents this one Remains the most Vivid not only did it pit me against a legendary war hero whom President Truman revered but it did so over an issue of fundamental and enduring National Security importance

1:35 Israel and the mid East the president regarded his secretary of state George C Marshall as the greatest living American yet the two men were on a collision course over mid East policy which if not resolved threatened to split and wreck the administration Marshall firmly opposed American recognition of the new Jewish State I did not Marshall's opposition was shared by almost every every member of the brilliant and now legendary group of men later referred to as the wise men it included the respected under Secretary of State Robert lit his predecessor Dean aeson the brilliant chief of the policy planning staff George F Kennan the dynamic and driven Secretary of Defense James forestal and a man with whom I would disagree again

2:21 20 years later when we served together in the cabinet Dean Rusk then the director of the office of United Nations Affairs though Shuman had tapped Clifford to be the messenger of his opinion Clifford saw the president changing his mind and he worked steadfastly to keep the administration on its course my fears about the state department had crystallized after a bitter incident in March when without informing the president it had permitted the American delegation to the UN to reverse its support for partition partition as in the November 1947 partition plan which immediately preceded the 1948 war and ethnic cleansing of of Palestine Truman was outraged by the state Department's move writing in his calendar the state department pulled the

3:07 rug from under me today there are people on the third and fourth level of the state department who have always wanted to cut my throat they succeeded in doing it Clifford continues in his Memoir that despite his annoyance though the president did not order the state department to reor partition lest he create a crisis with Marshall and as Clifford prepared for his fateful meeting he noticed that the president may very well have cided with Marshall Marshall and love it had prepared a position paper for the president's consideration reading it before the meeting I saw it amounted to a clever way to avoid recognizing the new nation and I feared that the president's respect for Marshall might Prevail and then came the spirited debate which would go down as

3:52 legendary at 400 p.m. on Wednesday May 12th a cloudless sweltering day we assembled in the Oval Office Mr President I said I strongly urge you to give prompt recognition to the Jewish State immediately after the termination of the British mandate on May 14th this would have the distinct value of restoring the president's firm position in support of the partition of Palestine such a move should be taken quickly before the Soviet Union or any other Nation recognizes the Jewish State I knew my comment would displease Marshall and love it I had noticed Marshall's face reing with impressed anger as I talked when I finished he exploded Mr President I thought this meeting was called to consider an important and complicated problem in

4:39 foreign policy I don't even know why Clifford is here he is a domestic adviser and this is a foreign policy matter I fear the only reason Clifford is here is that he is pressing a political consideration with regard to this issue I don't think politics should play any part in this the situation became ugly when Clifford writes Marshall again he was still Furious speaking with barely contained rage and more than a hint of self-righteousness he made the most remarkable threat I have ever heard anyone make directly to a president if you follow Clifford's advice and if I were to vote in the election I would vote against you everyone in the room was stunned here was the indispensable symbol of continuity whom President Truman revered

5:24 and needed making a threat that if it became public could virtually seal the dissolution of the Truman Administration Marshall must have taken the president's decision deeply personally as Clifford wrote not only did he never speak to me again after that meeting but according to His official biographer he never again mentioned my name then at the end of that day still steaming he did something quite unusual although the president and I were unaware of it at the time certain that history would prove him right he wanted his personal comments included in the official state dep Department record of the meeting those comments are immortalized in the Foreign Relations of the United States history series a top secret memorandum of conversation by the secretary of state from the day of the

6:11 quarrel provides George C Marshall's side of the story the president said that he had called the meeting because he was seriously concerned as to what might happen in Palestine after May 15th the president then invited Mr Clark Clifford to make a statement Mr Clifford's point was strongly to urge the president to give prompt recognition to the Jewish state after the termination of the Mandate on May 15th I remarked to the president that speaking objectively I could not help but think that the suggestions made by Mr Clifford were wrong I thought that to adopt these suggestions would have precisely the opposite effect from that intended by Mr Clifford the transparent Dodge to in a few votes would not in fact achieve this purpose the great Dignity of the Office of the President would be seriously

6:56 diminished the council offered by Mr Clifford was based on domestic political considerations while the problem which confronted us was International I said bluntly that if the president were to follow Mr Clifford's advice and if in the elections I were to vote I would vote against the president why was Marshall so fervently against recognition answers May lie in the fact that Marshall represented not only the state department position but also the leadership of the US military careful attention was given to their position by the late Mark Perry who was a senior Analyst at the Quincy Institute for responsible statecraft Perry would write for foreign affairs in 2010 that in the period between the end of World War II and

7:42 Marshall's meeting with Truman The Joint Chiefs of Staff had issued no less than 16 papers on the Palestine issue the most important of these was issued on March 31st 1948 and entitled Force requirements for Palestine in that paper the JCS predicted that the Zionist strategy will seek to involve the United States in a continuously widening and deepening series of operations intended to secure maximum Jewish objectives the JCS speculated that these objectives included initial Jewish sovereignty over a portion of Palestine acceptance by the great powers of the right to unlimited immigration the extension of Jewish sovereignty over all of Palestine and the expansion of verett Israel into

8:27 trans Jordan and into portions of Lebanon and Syria one paragraph of Clark Clifford's account perhaps more than any other aptly summarizes the rift that would grow between the state department and its foes in the White House and Beyond read carefully it contains a powerful Narrative of the influence of the side that prevailed I was also in close contact directly and through David Niles with eliyahu Epstein the Jewish agency representative in Washington through Epstein I had been able to learn much about the situation in the mid East in particular the position of the Jewish Agency information that went beyond what the state department with its pro-arab bias allowed to filter across the street

9:13 to the White House Through official channels years of shrewd political maneuvering preceded the momentous decision by the White House to recognize the Jewish State Walter L Hixon in his extremely detailed Israel's armor the Israel Lobby and the first generation of the Palestine conflict documents the earliest beginnings of the men who had Clark Clifford's ear the pivotal moment crystallizing the American special relationship with Zionism came in May 1942 with the historic meeting at the builtmore hotel in New York City attended by 586 American zionists the meeting culminated with passage of a resolution known as the builtmore program that centered on the pledge that Palestine be constituted as

10:01 a Jewish Commonwealth and also called for unrestricted Jewish immigration though somewhat obscure in the history of the Israeli Palestinian conflict its significance cannot be overstated as in hixon's words the builtmore meeting marked the birth of the Israel Lobby I've described the legacy of Isaiah Sai Kenan in another video of mine though his name being synonymous with the earliest years of the Israel Lobby is beyond dispute dispute and as early as 1944 their strangle hold on Congress was already evident as described by Hixon the signature strategy of the Israel Lobby lining up support for the Zionist state in the US Congress first materialized in the 1944 electoral campaign Kenan kept diligent

10:48 records of his political actions writing in February of that year the unprecedented flood of telegrams telephone calls and letters profoundly impressed the capital evoking many assurances of support from congressmen this was early enough that the principal Lobby group at the time was the American Zionist emergency Council and the a had achieved an endorsement from both the Republican and Democratic parties more important for them was the platform endorsed by Franklin D Roosevelt's Democratic party which read we favor the opening of Palestine to unrestricted Jewish immigration and colonization August 1945 President Harry Truman told the Press we want to let as many Jews into Palestine as is

11:33 possible Truman's sympathies with the Jews was described by his close adviser Clark Clifford he was of course horrified by the Holocaust and he denounced it vehemently as in the aftermath of the war its full Dimensions became clear also he believed that the balur Declaration committed Great Britain and by implication the United States to the creation of the Jewish state in Palestine and finally he was a student and believer in the Bible from his reading of the Old Testament he felt the Jews derived a legitimate historical right to Palestine and he sometimes cited such biblical lines as Deuteronomy 1:8 behind the scenes however clear references were made to another factor in the president's decision-making from a memorandum by under Secretary of State Will Clayton in

12:20 September of 1946 zionists are urging that you should issue at once a statement in favor of partition in Palestine upon consideration of this matter we do not feel that it would be advisable for you to issue such a statement at this time for the following reasons including if we yield to the pressure of Highly organized Zionist groups just now and make statements calculated to give support to their policies of the moment we shall merely be encouraging them to make fresh demands and to apply pressure in the future whenever they conceive it to be in their interest any statement by this government approving partition would mean that we had gone contrary to the recommendations both of the anglo-american committee of inquiry and of the experts who drew up the Morrison Grady scheme this would undoubtedly give

13:06 rise to the impression that we are adopting a policy on an important matter in order to satisfy a particular Zionist group and finally the attitude of the Arab world toward the United States has become progressively hostile in the last few months our Joint Chiefs of Staff who feel that the United States has a vital security interest in the Middle East have urged that we take take no action with regard to Palestine which might Orient the peoples of the entire area away from the Western Powers a 1968 oral history interview with Truman White House appointment secretary Matthew J Connelly also blows the lid open on these political pressures the interviewer asked him on the subject of the recognition of Israel how instrumental was Clark Clifford in

13:52 your opinion in formulating the events of that time in convincing Mr Truman that the state of Israel should be recognized as quick as it was Connelly responds well the decision had already been made with the assistance of David K Niles who handled the minority problems and myself we were the fundamental movers the interviewer asked subsequently why did you take the position that you did Connelly responds for two reasons one it was humanitarian and two it was good politics and I raised the question with Mr Truman how many Arab votes are there in the United States where does the Democratic Party get its financing from and the answer was apparent the name David Niles is ubiquitous in this early history and

14:38 when asked about him specifically Connelly declares David Niles was a very bright political analyst he was quiet he was receptive he was never out in front during the Roosevelt administration they used to call him the backstairs boy at the White House with regard to the 1948 election the interviewer asked the golden question how important in your opinion was the recognition of the state of Israel early in 1948 to the Democratic Victory the following November Connelly admits there's no question about it he had practically a solid Jewish vote he also had Financial contributions to the campaign in 1948 that he never would have had without Jewish support it was a matter of more or less just pure politics to

15:24 me perhaps Truman truly sympathized with the plight of the Jews who just years earlier had suffered at the hands of the Nazis and perhaps his fundamentalist upbringing helped shape his thinking with regard to Middle East policy however it would not be telling the whole story to omit the other considerations that he wrote about for example in his Memoirs the facts were that not only were their pressure movements around the United Nations unlike anything that had been seen before but that the White House too was subjected to a constant barrage I do not think I ever had as much pressure and propaganda aimed at the White House as I had in this instance the Persistence of a few of the extreme zist leaders actuated by political motives and engaging in

16:10 political threats Disturbed and annoyed me some were even suggesting that we pressure Sovereign Nations into favorable votes in the general assembly the 1948 war in Palestine had created an incalculable human tragedy the Zion's forces Plan D or doot in Hebrew implemented by the spring of 1948 had systematically condemned hundreds of villages in the end more than 500 for Destruction as Israeli historian Benny Morris would describe in his the birth of the Palestine Refugee problem the essence of the plan was the clearing of hostile and potentially hostile forces however the hag regarded almost all the villages as actively or potentially

16:57 hostile history tells us that the zionists had long schemed to use any partition plan to their advantage beginning a takeover of the entire land of Palestine David beneran made as much known in a statement regarding the 1937 peel commission plan under this proposed partition the Jews would receive some 20% of the land absent 200,000 Palestinians who were to be removed from it the rest becoming not a Palestinian state but simply an extension of Jordan the ultimate goal would be achieved most quickly by accepting the peel proposals Ben gurian told the 20th Zionist Congress erect a Jewish State at once even if it is not in the whole of the land the rest will come in the course of time it must come the

17:43 boundaries of Zionist aspirations are the concern of the Jewish people and no external Factor will be able to limit them by way of plot some 750,000 Palestinians were made homeless forced to March toward Jordan Lebanon Syria Gaza mines would be laid in their old neighborhoods to kill those wishing to return otherwise they'd simply be shot on site indeed Israel authorized a free fire policy in which again referencing Benny Morris soldiers policemen and security guards especially at night fired at anything that moved the evidence suggests that the vast majority of those killed were unarmed the overwhelming majority had infiltrated for economic or social reasons the Zionist overwhelmed all the

18:29 armies of the surrounding Arab states and formed a secret pact with Jordan to avoid fighting their formidable Arab Legion by the time of the Armistice talks of 1949 the new state of Israel had found itself in a comfortable position at the negotiating table as described by Mark F Ethridge chairman of the United Nations conciliation commission for Palestine the Arabs are shocked and stupified by their defeat and have great bitterness toward the UN and the United States the Arabs have made what the commission considers very great concessions the Jews have made none so far it was this Zionist in transigence that would provide the basis for the first animosities between the White House and the Jewish State indeed the history of the so-called special relationship has been fraught from the

19:17 beginning Michael Hoffman followed the talks in lcon Switzerland for the New York Times on April 28th 1949 he reported following the initial talks Mark Ethridge United States chair chairman of the commission said he was confident a peace settlement could be reached at a press conference Mr Ethridge indicated that in the commission's view settlement of the Arab Refugee problem was the key to the whole Palestine solution the only problem with that being Hoffman reported the following day unless Israel modifies her attitude on the refugees she is due for some sharp setbacks in her struggle for stability and World recognition it seems to some observers that for the first time Israel is on the wrong side of almost every point at issue in the eyes of world opinion as expressed through

20:03 the United Nations resolutions on Palestine these observers reason as follows Israel is occupying territory that has been repeatedly assigned to the Arabs in various partition plans Israel is acting as if Jerusalem were to be incorporated fully into the new state Israel is encouraging further immigration of Jewish settlers while rejecting responsibility for the reestablishment of 600,000 to 1 million Palestinian Arabs displaced from their former homes these are the factors cited in commission circles as reasons why Israel's position has weakened of these factors the refugee problem is by far the most important as Walter L Hixon has observed Israel responded to us diplomatic pressure by openly declaring its intention to deploy the Israel Lobby to

20:50 go over the heads of the Truman Administration we are fortunate to be able to review state department memoranda from this period and of of particular importance is a summary of a telegram from Mr Mark Ethridge dated May 27th its content is quite valuable and revealing Israel has now put forth its full territorial demands upon the Arab states while Israel makes no demands upon Lebanon at present it would later like a portion of Southeastern Lebanon Israel desires to acquire from Egypt the Egyptian occupied Gaza Strip allotted to the Arabs under the partition resolution Israel will make further demands upon trans Jordan for territory Israel will retain occupied areas such as Western Galilee and Jaffa L and ramla allotted

21:38 to the Arabs under the partition plan Israel will relinquish none of the ngev eth follows the Israeli demands with the United States position this government has consistently supported the position that Israel should offer territorial compensation for any territorial acquisition which it expects to obtain beyond the boundaries allotted to Israel in the resolu ution of November 29th 1947 additionally this government has recently made representations to the Israeli government urging its agreement to repatriation of a substantial number of refugees our representations on these two questions have thus far met with no success with the Israeli government Israeli officials have in fact informed our representatives in Palestine that they intend to bring about a change in the position of the United States

22:23 government on the above points through means available to them in the United States there are also indications that the Israelis are prepared to use the implied threat of force to obtain the additional territory that they desire in Palestine with respect to refugees the commission has succeeded in persuading the Arabs to give up their previous insistence upon repatriation as a prerequisite to negotiations the commission has failed to obtain any concessions from the Israelis on a territorial settlement or the refugee question it is now the considered opinion of Mr Ethridge that there will exist no possibility of Peace On Any basis heret for envisioned by the United States government unless Israel modifies its demands Mr Ethridge believes that such modification is unlikely failure of

23:09 the Israelis to modify their present demands will inevitably aggravate Arab distrust of Israel and bring about renewed Arab charges that the United States remains passive no matter how unreasonable the demands of Israel under recommendations the department believes that the time has come to make a basic decision concerning our attitude toward Israel the United States has given generous support to the foundation of the Jewish State we are convinced that there is no reason why the Jews and the Arabs cannot live together in peace in the near East the department considers that it is now essential to inform the Israeli government forcefully that if it continues to reject the friendly advice which this government has offered solely in the interest of a genuine peace in the near East this government will be forced with regret to revise its

23:56 attitude toward Israel which may include withholding approval of the $49 million as yet unallocated of the $100 million earmarked by the export import bank for loan to Israel there is also of course mention of the challenges with holding the Israelis accountable the proposed course of action would arouse strong opposition in American Jewish circles the significance of this document I'm sure is not lost on you this was a top secret memo obviously not to be seen by the public public containing a plain stating of us interests which included a solution to the refugee problem it also States Israel far from being satisfied with their 77% of Palestine and contrary to

24:41 any pretense of concessions of any land wanted to expand further Truman if it can be believed took the state Department's advice with regard to suspending the $49 million of the export import loan Walter L Hixon notes that this only amounted to posturing as a result of stepped up pressure from the lobby Truman's anger proved short-lived bowing to telephone calls telegrams and public criticism the president restored the funding and the administration gave up on attempting to force the Israelis into making a settlement or accommodating return of Palestinian refugees Truman's fundamentalist Christian upbringing and his sympathies

25:27 regarding the person persecution of Jews were reportedly sincere motivations for his Middle East policy these factors duly considered it appears that Truman struggled to maintain a balance of us interests and Israeli interests far from one and the same I've covered the emergence of the American Zionist Council in a previous video the ACC would replace the American Zionist emergency Council in 1949 the new organization informed Isaiah Sai kenon on February 12th 1951 that they'd agreed to retain you as its public relations Council to assume the general direction of all its activities in connection with securing US economic assistance for the state of Israel in an address to the ACC

26:14 successor in April of 1975 ABA abben the prolific Israeli Statesman recalled in 1951 I asked Sai Kennan to come to Washington to ensure a permanent atmosphere of sympathy for Israel in the Congress and the Press Truman's successor general of the army Dwight Eisenhower would provide the first serious obstacle to the lobby achieving their demands Eisenhower was of course a Monumental figure of the military establishment which gave careful consideration to the Middle East especially due to their proximity to the Soviet Union and their oil perhaps no document is more characteristic of the split between the Zionist and the Eisenhower Administration than the 1953 National Intelligence

27:01 estimate with Decades of hindsight and how much the situation has degraded in that time this now reads as an extraordinarily honest assessment from a sitting US president and his administration in a section titled obstacles to US influence in the Middle East US association with Israel is a continuing irritant in US Arab relations and the major obstacle to the acceptance of US influence in the Middle East the Arab world is united in its belief that the US is primarily responsible for the establishment of Israel which it interprets as an act of Ruthless anti-arab imperialism moreover many Arabs believe that us partiality in the Arab Israeli dispute is further demonstrated by us

27:48 failure to press more vigorously for enforcement of un decisions on Arab refugees on delimination of the borders of Israel and on the internationalization of Jerusalem M the US faces The Dilemma that Israel cannot survive without foreign aid and that USA to Israel deepens Arab resentment against the US the National Intelligence estimate also concludes the Arab Israeli dispute has seriously damaged the US security position in the Middle East in a Frank discussion on Zionism Israel has an importance out of proportion to its size population and resources because a it is one of the key factors in the current instability in the Arab states and B it has the

28:33 political and financial support of the Zionist movement and of many influential groups and persons in the western Nations particularly the US the National Intelligence estimate was further concerned with the renewal of hostilities between the Waring parties to the 1948 War the Israeli free fire policy mentioned earlier was caused for concern in this regard while some 200 Zionist settlers dieded from attacks by Arab infiltrators between 1949 and 1956 in that same period Zion's forces killed as many as 5,000 Arabs one incident the massacre at Kia exemplifies the indiscriminate murders of the period using an attack which killed an Israeli

29:18 mother and her two children as a pretext Colonel Ariel chiron's Commando Unit 101 Rampage through kibba blowing up house by house and killing 69 people most of them women and children a telegram from Char Affairs at US Embassy Amad talili explains Jordan's outrage the Israelis began by shelling village with mortar and artillery fire for between 3 and 4 hours demolition parties then entered Village blew up 39 houses looted shops an Israeli attack of this magnitude could have come at no worse time it occurs just prior to arrival of important Us Mission to area and caps three other recent unprovoked unilateral Israeli moves if there existed before

30:04 remote hope of persuading Jordan to sit down with Israel to discuss Mutual water development problems and internationalization of Jerusalem such a hope has been dashed to Smither at least for the foreseeable future a blow to us interests since Jordan according to the CIA had been a key strategic Ally in the region indeed commenting on the assassination of King Abdullah CIA wrote the death of Abdullah removes a Resolute anti-communist pro-western ruler in fact so detrimental to US foreign policy was Zionism that the CIA illegally organized and funded an anti-zionist Lobby in order to counter the Israel Lobby an operation overseen

30:50 by CIA director Alan dullas the American Friends of the Middle East was launched in 1951 the afme being a Stateside outfit made it explicitly illegal for the CIA to fund it under the National Security Act of 1947 as explained by Walter L Hixon Israeli aggressiveness heightened popular resentment across the Middle East destabilizing the region thus prompting the covert support for afme and other groups the failure of warnings and efforts from the military Department of State CIA and FBI lends Credence to the effectiveness of of fostering friendly relations with members of Congress David Ben guan's brief Hiatus as prime minister saw his seat filled by

31:37 his right hand mosha sheret sharett's insubordinate defense minister was none other than pinhas leavon a failed operation named Susanna an affair now notorious and bearing his name saw Zionist operatives plant bombs in various Western targets including British and American Cinemas libraries civilian targets as part of a false flag operation to be blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood to destabilize the NASA regime the operation was exposed and 13 operatives were arrested two were executed beneran returned to government in February of 1955 initially as Minister of Defense just days later or one week to be exact the Israeli Army launched operation Black Arrow a deadly

32:24 crossborder raid into Egyptian held Gaza killing some 40 of their soldiers again occurring at an inopportune moment since the month earlier the state Department's Bureau of near Eastern South Asian and African Affairs had prepared a memo containing suggested main points of approach toward Israel Arab settlement which read while the basic obstacles to Israel Arab peace still exist there are a number of reasons for believing that special efforts to induce the parties to take steps toward a settlement of their major differences might bear fruit these include an improvement during the past two years in the attitude of important segments of the Arab world toward the west and particularly toward the United States and the promises of the Egyptian government to take steps toward a

33:09 settlement with Israel asham The Black Arrow operation would commence since they themselves acknowledged that Egypt was willing to it's worth repeating take steps toward a settlement with Israel as fate would have it it was this raid into Gaza that Nasser cited specific Al as the driving force behind his signing an arms deal with Soviet Alli Czechoslovakia in September of 1955 exactly what the Department of State had wanted to avoid now Egypt would receive Mig fighter jets tanks and armored personnel carriers from the Soviet block Nasser taking further steps towards sovereignty and independence from British control nationalized the Suz Canal company in July of the following year in what would become a legendary move as was his right under

33:57 International law considering the compensation Nasser pledged to pay Britain sought War along with France who would offer weapons to the Israelis for their assistance as well as building them a nuclear reactor a war was starkly against us interests as they responded to the escalation by halting a shipment of helicopters half tracks and machine guns to Israel deploying their signature strategy the American Zionist Council produced a letter to be dispersed to members of Congress asking for arms to Israel and for releasing the weapons for every member of Congress who signed the letter the ACC advised local chapters to send congratulatory messages and for those that didn't please wire or write him by August Sai Kennan was elated that

34:43 the 8-week campaign involving Congressional and Community leaders all over the country produced 151 signatures to the letter that same month Secretary of State John Foster Dulles cave to the pressure giving Israel their weapons to do with as they pleased despite all that was on the line the ensuing sus crisis as it's now known in which Israel captured Gaza and the entire Sinai Peninsula up to the Suz canal with the assistance of France and Britain enraged Eisenhower the prospect of the Soviet Union sending troops to Aid its Newfound Ally was an unwelcome one indeed nothing justifies double crossing us said the president flexing his position as the world superpower by long shot Eisenhower

35:29 came down on Britain and France to accept a ceasefire typical of the Israelis they proved unwilling to relinquish their spoils however Eisenhower forced Israel to withdraw via threats of cutting off Aid and diplomatic support the president apparently can pick up the phone and stop them if they want John Foster dullas told his Israeli counterpart gold deayer the United States had hoped that common long-term policies could be work worked out with Israel so that we could align ourselves effectively we had not found them Israel needed good relations with the Arabs to assure its future what Israel had done in Egypt had deferred this possibility for perhaps a generation the secretary could not see where Israel's present

36:14 course could bring about any solution to Israel's problems the security situation in the Middle East was far from satisfactory to the military establishment who made us much known in a memorandum dated December 4th 195 7 to the Secretary of Defense listen carefully The Joint Chiefs of Staff are greatly concerned by the unsatisfactory political military situation in the Middle East which they consider stems basically from the unresolved Arab Israeli problem and which poses a serious threat to the security of the United States and the Free World all three basic elements of the overall problem must be resolved the present boundaries of Israel must be fixed and agreed upon there must be a Western guarantee that Israel will not

36:59 thereafter expand territorially and the refugee problem must be settled the United States should take this action now the threat to US security inherent in failing to take the initiative in solving this problem is so great as to transcend the interests of any minority group within the United States if there was one decade in particular that saw the Israel Lobby grow to its full potential from which it remain remains largely unchanged to this day it was the decade of the 1960s much of this happening during and indeed as a consequence of the presidency of John F Kennedy much like David Niles worked behind the scenes in the Rosevelt and Truman administrations the backstairs

37:46 boy as he was called inside Kennedy's White House lurked another highly competently leaon as Walter L Hixon describes Mike Feldman a deputy special Council to the president Feldman functioned essentially as a member of the Israel Lobby inside the White House his influence on US policy is made known in a May 1963 Memo from Deputy assistant Secretary of State for near Eastern and South Asian Affairs James Grant to Secretary of State Dean Rusk in recent weeks as you are aware it has become increasingly clear that the White House is under steadily mounting domestic political pressure to adopt a foreign policy in the near East more consonant with Israeli desires Mike

38:31 Feldman increasingly is the primary White House staff influence on United States policy with respect to Israel and Arab Israeli issues all outgoing cables and actions dealing with Israel and Arab Israeli matters must now be cleared with the White House Feldman assumed the difficult role of fashioning US policies in compliance with Israeli interests in light of their opposing interests one example being Israel's aggression toward Syria in the words of Israeli historian aish schlim in his indispensable the Iron Wall Israel's strategy of escalation on the Syrian front was the single most important factor in dragging the Middle East to war in June 1967 amazingly the United States voted

39:16 with the Soviet Union in a resolution that deplored the Hostile exchanges between Syria and Israel starting on March 8th 1962 and determined that the Israel attack on March 16th and 17th 1962 constituted a flagrant violation of the general Armistice agreement the resolution called upon Israel scrupulously to refrain from such action in the future in oral history interview with Robert comr from the JFK Presidential Library Begins by describing him as a senior staff member of the National Security Council from 1961 through 1965 in this interview com discusses working with MC George Bundy and the inner circle of the Bundy State

40:02 Department you'll doubtless find his Frank discussion of the Israel Lobby to be enlightening it's certainly something to be studied closely and pondered the interviewer asks one hears the charge that the state department that near Eastern Affairs is pro-arab is there justification for that comr responds yes state is naturally cast in the role as a deliberate understandable counter to the great domestic pressures from the Israeli constituency on the White House the secretary of state is by definition it's in his tacet job description the spokesman for the even-handed policy against all that political advice that is going to the White House on how to be pro-israeli second American Business in so far as it has any influence the oil

40:49 companies Etc tends to be pro-arab third in terms of strategic geography Israel is a millstone around our and known as such to all and sunry if it weren't that Israel were inhabited by Israelis our policy would be totally different you can make a very good case that it has been our commitments to Israel that has given the Russians great opportunities in the Middle East naturally the state and defense departments at the professional level were arabist our strategic and economic interests were emphatically with the Arabs only our political interest was with the Israelis and our political interest was being argued by somebody else so I regarded it as 1,000% legitimate that state and defense the

41:34 professionals tend to be pro-arab comr describes tussling with the lobby quite naturally the Bundy State Department middle easterner is cast in the role of being the debater with Mike Feldman or Larry O'Brien why he's got to keep Jack javitz and a whole series of other guys Happy on the hill and rightly so Kennedy would soon learn in his brief tenure what it meant to be at odds with the lobby a number of fateful policies he pursued measures intended to appease the Israelis and to make them receptive to us demands proved a spectacular gamble that failed Kennedy would forever alter the relationship between Israel and the United States by Breaking the Barrier on Direct Advanced weapons

42:19 shipments to Israel sending them Hawk missiles was a two-pronged strategy Kennedy hoped to settle the refugee question namely by getting Israel to agree to take in even a small number of refugees additionally by providing Conventional Weapons to the Jewish State Kennedy hoped that Israel would not pursue nuclear weapons the US position was unequivocal no nuclear pler in the Middle East as you all know the Israelis defied Kennedy on both from his thank you note to the president David beneran dated August 20th 1962 wrote I would like to take the opportunity to express to you my profound appreciation for your decision to issue instructions that the hawk missiles be supplied to

43:05 Israel regarding the settlement of the refugee crisis in exchange however those steps will prove ineffectual and will result only in complicating matters even more for us without any advantage uring to the refugees themselves after all says Ben Gan these Arab refugees left their former place of domicile at the call of the Arab Arab leaders a reference to the foundational Israeli myth disproven by CIA records as early as the late 1950s that Arab broadcasts instructed the Palestinians to leave their homes before the Arab Army's invasion in reality even the Unearthed Israeli records prove otherwise as has been documented by historians including Benny Morris that the hag intelligence

43:52 service was reporting every Arab leaving the country is regarded as a traitor and would be put on trial in Syria everyone wishing to leave the country had to obtain permission from the Arab National Committee in hia driving the point home further on September 17th David beneran instructed his Ambassador in Washington I find it necessary to write to you so that you can pass on a translation of this letter to our friends we will not receive any additional Arab refugees obviously this plan will not be implemented if necessary we shall fight against it to the last man with regard to the Israeli nuclear program well in December 1962 in Palm Beach Florida the president met

44:38 with foreign minister golden Mayer Kennedy told her from the memorandum of conversation we are opposed to nuclear proliferation Mrs Mayer reassured the president that there would not be any difficulty between us on the Israeli nuclear reactor in deona interestingly she also said Israel is perfectly prepared to live within its present borders it doesn't want more land despite her assurances Israel developed an arsenal of nuclear weapons that by the time Meer herself became prime minister became a small arsenal of over a dozen devices to create their first nuclear weapons Israel stole hundreds of pounds of Highly enriched uranium in a yearslong Espionage operation orchestrated by Lam the

45:25 israeli's secret scientific in Ence agency the source of the uranium was a facility owned by the numc corporation in Apollo Pennsylvania not only did the Israelis lie about developing a nuclear reactor and about developing weapons they further stole uranium to be used for nuclear weapons that they've never disclosed Israel had proven itself to be a rogue State characterized by political in transigence and routine aggression against its neighbors to make matters worse their pursuit of nuclear weapons threatened to further destabilize the region to the point of no return and still does by the way this being in stark contrast to its Western neighbor who had even after the wars of attrition and the Israeli invasion of the Sinai

46:10 Peninsula sought peace with Israel a memo authored by esteemed Statesman John J McCloy features his account of a meeting with Kamal Abdul Nasser in Cairo in June 1963 along with American ambassador John B I met with Nasser at 7 p.m. Thursday and spent 2 hours with him he suggested that perhaps it could be arranged that in response to a written inquiry by the president regarding his intentions he could give a written reply number one he had no intention whatsoever of engaging in nuclear weapons and number two he had no intention of attacking Israel he narrated a full history of Israeli attacks beginning in 1952 through 1956 his request for weapons the refusal of

46:56 Britain France and the us to give him weapons after these attacks and his final appeal to the Russians he repeated several times that I could report to the president that he had no intent or desire to manufacture nuclear material and he had no intention of attacking Israel having devoted attention to the Truman Administration it would appear that Lynden Baines Johnson has a lot in common with his Democratic forbear Johnson also being a fundamentalist his aunt Jesse Hatcher remained throughout his life a source of influence on his beliefs Lyndon always remember this she reportedly told him don't ever go against Israel because Israel was given to them by God the Jews are God's people

47:41 and they are always going to be that's their land and nobody is going to take it away from them as with Truman however this infatuation with the Bible and its perceived impact on Real Middle East policy only went so far and as with Truman Johnson struggled quite powerfully with the opposing interests of the United States and Israel far from one and the same Johnson of course immediately inherited Kennedy's cabinet following his death in a meeting with his Israeli counterpart prime minister Levi eshkol in June of 1964 the president said that as long as he remained in the White House Mr Feldman would continue to serve as his prime minister on the question of Israel

48:26 Johnson practically gave in completely at certain points during his presidency to the lobby Walter L Hixon notes the extremes to which this amounted showing both fear of the Lobby's political clout as well as frustration with its tactics Johnson made the extraordinary statement that he would simply leave up to the Israelis and the lobby the decision on us arm sales to Jordan my judgment is and it's it's rusk's judgment that uh this little King has some value to us and that we ought to keep him as far away from the Soviet and NASA as we can the Israelis though don't think so well if they don't we'll just pull out we won't sell him a damn thing but we want

49:12 it to be clear it's their decision and we want to be clear that we're doing it so we can satisfy the Jews and not irritate them our people that the Jews in our country say that we ought not to under any circumstances sell Jordan anything now that we've spent 600 million on this course of action under Kennedy and all through the years uh only reason I'm helping Jordan is on account of Israel now if Israel doesn't if Israel considers them their enemy and not of help then we just wasted 600 million but I'm not prepared to take on New York Times and Mike Felman and everybody else and I'm I'm going to let them make the decision the lobb's pressure despite Johnson's extraordinary friendliness with the Israelis reached Such Great Heights that he told now

49:59 foreign minister ABA Aben in February 1966 we always seem to have a problem with well-meaning friends of Israel who attempted to help our relations along he asked aen to tell them to stop coming in the back door or writing or sending telegrams or talking to the newspapers as sympathetic as Johnson was to the Israelis and as much as his Bible thumping contributed to this worldview he still had to consider us positions and interests which were starkly opposed to Israeli interests while Kennedy selling Hawk missiles was one thing those were defensive weapons but directly sending offensive weapons was something the US government wanted to avoid since basically they were worried about what the Israelis would do with them from a conversation with Dean Rusk

50:46 I think there's Somey about uh about our making a flat commitment on the numbers of Tanks when we're on notice that so far as we can tell now that they're going to take preemptive action on that Jordan Water Business President John F Kennedy's Department of Justice led by Brother Bobby Kennedy ordered the American Zionist Council in December of 1962 to register as a foreign agent their receiving funds from the American section of the Jewish Agency for Israel constituted the council an agent of a foreign principal and the council's registration was requested in January of the New Year Sai Kennan incorporates the American Israel public affairs Committee in a clever maneuver to avoid registering as a foreign agent

51:32 themselves the lobbying arm of the ACCC broke off into its own outfit despite receiving the same funding and pursuing the same goals to this day APAC now led the effort to obtain these offensive weapons while Johnson was in the White House in what would become their standard procedure they deployed a letter to Secretary of State Dean Rusk securing signatures from 76 House members by July of 1965 the United States and Israel signed a deal providing 210 M48 patent tanks they further demanded planes so much so that wrote comr to President Johnson I got aan down here on the 12th and mcnamer dusted him off in 20 noons minutes our

52:18 tactic of sicking mcnamer on the Israeli seems to have worked will sell Israel 48 A4 e about $50 million and they will undertake in return to number one quietly support our sale of 36 secondhand f104s to Jordan and number two reaffirm their promises not to go nuclear of course by this time Regulators for the atomic energy commission had discovered hundreds of pounds of Highly enriched uranium missing from the newc plant at Apollo as reported by Howard con and Barbara Newman for Rolling Stone in December 1977 the total missing and unaccounted for was 194 lb larger by far than any previous known discrepancy at other US nuclear facilities approximately 22

53:06 pounds of enriched uranium are needed to make the smallest functional bomb the number grew substantially by early 1967 the atomic energy commission had reinventoretv Carl E Ducket briefed members of the US nuclear Regulatory Commission Victor kolinsky was one of them what Ducket confirmed to everyone's astonishment was that the CIA believed that the nuclear explosives in Israel's first several bombs about 100 kg of bomb grade uranium in all came from material that was missing at a US Naval nuclear fuel plant operated by the nuclear materials and

53:52 Equipment Corporation in Apollo Pennsylvania it was reasonable for Dean Rusk to assume that Israel intends to make its decisions on whether to produce nuclear weapons without consulting Us by contrast Dean Rusk was thrilled with Egypt for not pursuing nuclear weapons since the United States was utterly opposed to the introduction of nuclear weapons in the Middle East Rusk would have a tense confrontation with the Israeli Ambassador Gideon Raphael would Israel agree to International atomic energy agency safeguards he asked Ambassador Raphael said Israel was not giving any thought to it Rusk insisted that if Israel went nuclear you will lose us support if on the other hand you

54:37 accepted a Nuclear Ban your neighbors would follow you and that would be a first step toward reduction of tensions this consideration is fundamental to the US position either this card is in your deck or it is not if it's not then get it out of the way by accepting safeguards Rusk again noted that if Israel is holding open the nuclear option it should forget us support we would not be with you on the road to the 1967 war a telegram from US Embassy Tel Aviv back to US state expresses strong disapproval over the Israeli attack on Syrian tractors on May 13th if such actions lead to Security Council considerations the US will not be able to support

55:24 Israel years later in 1976 mosha Dian would tell reporter Ramy tall how at least 80% of the clashes there started while he was defense minister speaking of the Syrian front in my opinion more than 80% we would send a tractor to plow someplace in the demilitarized area and knew in advance that the syrians would start to shoot if they didn't shoot we would tell the tractor to advance farther until in the end the syrians would get annoyed and shoot and then we would use artillery and later the Air Force the Americans were perplexed with why if the Israelis were militarily Superior to all the Arab states did they bother attacking them this way in a July 1965 telegram from the Department of

56:10 State to the Embassy in Israel we would have expected during recent months as high tide of Arab Summit solidarity receded and as Arab realists recognized once again Israel's basic military preeminence the government of Israel's actions would be characterized more consistently by calm confidence and restraint expected of a nation whose security is essentially if not absolutely assured the government of Israel's actions pointed to above also have disadvantages in our view of detracting from Israel's image as a country sincerely devoted to peace with its neighbors and of making US Government efforts to help Israel more difficult and reducing their chances of success their perplexity turned to outrage as news emerged of an isra

56:56 Israeli raid on Samu in the West Bank on November 13th 1966 in response to the deaths of three Israeli soldiers from landmines the Israelis sent in a large Invasion Force including tanks and followed by aircraft in an act of collective punishment the IDF forced everyone into the Town Square to watch as they demolished their houses some 125 in all the CIA offered a sobering assessment of the damage the raid caused King Hussein had made a sustained effort to avoid provocations to Israel this has involved such steps as preventing Arab sabots from Crossing from Jordan into Israel and keeping his armored forces east of

57:41 the Jordan River these measures have been politically unpopular at home and have subjected him to criticism from other Arab states the recent raid involved an infantry Brigade supported by armor aircraft and artillery it resulted in about 50 deaths half of them Jordanian soldiers and in the destruction of about 150 buildings he is aware that retaliation carries the risk of an expanded conflict which could involve the bulk of his army a process in which the latter would almost certainly be defeated the Israeli raid seems illogical and miscalculated to us Walt rostow National Security adviser as well opined retaliation is not the point in this case this three th000 man raid

58:27 with tanks and planes was out of all proportion to the provocation and was aimed at the wrong Target in hitting Jordan so hard the Israelis have done a great deal of damage to our interests and to their own they've wrecked a good system of tacid cooperation between Hussein and the Israelis continuing this kind of cooperation will be all but impossible now which stung for the US even more when considering we've spent $500 million to Short him up we might begin putting out the line with our Jewish friends here that the US can't go on supporting Israel's interests in the Middle East unless the Israelis themselves show some intent over the long run to reach an accommodation with the Arabs Washington responded to the Samu

59:13 incident by speeding up delivery of f104 aircraft to Jordan rostow acknowledged that no matter what we do the Israelis and their friends will object but we're just cleaning up the mess that Israel's rate created and we taken Israel's military concerns into account by contrast the Joint Chiefs of Staff in a February 1967 memorandum to defense secretary Robert mcnamer made their feelings known with regard to arming Israel The Joint Chiefs of Staff do not consider that military aid to Israel is justified by the internal or external threat Israel's present military forces are capable of Defending successfully against any individual or Collective Arab attack how however the previously bitter rostow changed his tune telling

59:59 Johnson their December rate on Samu precipitated our emergency military assistance to Jordan costing us about $9 million while we made no commitment to match exactly for Israel what their action at Samu forced us to in Jordan ambassador to the United Nations Arthur Goldberg under continuing pressure in New York feels strongly we should do nearly that pressure from New York a euphemism for the lobby you may also find it interesting that the Israelis considered Goldberg an asset and even referred to him by a code name Minasha in April of 1967 the Israelis again launched a provocative assault on Syria sending tractors as was routine

1:00:46 and following Syrian shelling the Israelis launched an assault deep into Syrian territory shooting down six migf fighter aircraft including two in Damascus judging from briefing notes for CIA director Richard Helms this left Nasser little Choice the Egyptians embarrassed because they had not helped the syrians in April then made a big show of marching into siai partly to show good faith partly in hopes of deterring the Israelis Nasser followed this with a move which would seal the fate of the Middle East forever closing the straight of Tran eager to avoid a repeat of Eisenhower's strong disapproval of the Suez invasion of 1956 the lobby utilized all means at their disposal the Israeli

1:01:33 foreign Ministry orchestrated a campaign to quote create a public atmosphere that will constitute pressure on the administration in the direction of obtaining our desired goals without it being explicitly clear that we are behind this public campaign on May 26th 1967 foreign minister ABA Aben met secretly with president Johnson to lay out a fake apocalyptic scenario in which we are sitting on a time bomb saying they faced imminent attack in January 1969 the state Department's historical studies division produced a report at the time top secret on United States policy and diplomacy in the Middle East crisis from May 15th to June 10th

1:02:19 1967 it contains the US government's position on the threat of an Egyptian attack on Israel since aan had wondered why the United States did not accept Israeli intelligence reports of a possible imminent United Arab Republic attack on Israel secretary mcnamer explained to aen in some detail that three separate intelligence groups had looked carefully into the matter and that it was the US conclusion that the Egyptian deployments were defensive all estimates were unanimous President Johnson added that if the United Arab Republic attacked Israel would quote whip the hell out of them Johnson additionally sent a telegram to prime minister Levi eshkol the Soviets tell me

1:03:04 that they have information that you are preparing to take military action against your Arab neighbors and provoke a conflict which would be fraught with great consequences they tell us that they know the Arabs do not wish a military conflict Israel just must not take any preemptive military action and thereby make itself responsible for the init iation of hostilities unilateral action on the part of Israel would be irresponsible and catastrophic Israeli ambassador to the US Abraham Harmon told Dean Rusk in a conversation just days before the War Began that Israel is threatened not with aggression but with genocide Dean Rusk responded just days after Harmon's boss was told the Same by

1:03:50 President Johnson that we have been told categorically that Egypt will not attack they had good reason to believe this since to read from a state department telegram from May 27th on behalf of all Arab ambassadors Lebanese Kuwaiti and Libyan ambassadors called on the secretary May 27th on instructions that their governments Express concern of Arab countries about present Arab Israeli crisis ambassadors emphasized that no Arab State wanted to start war and no one wanted unfriendly relations with the US I've covered the the Israeli admissions that Nasser did not want a war prior to June 5th 1967 but just to review no less an Israeli figure than Yak Rabin then Chief of Staff of the IDF

1:04:37 said in 1968 that the two divisions that Nasser sent to siai on May 14th would not have been enough to unleash an offensive against Israel he knew it and we knew it his Deputy Ezra whitesman further said there was never a danger of extermination years later in 198 2 Israeli Prime Minister mahim beIN declared we must be honest with ourselves we decided to attack him aware of the unfortunate position and Israeli attack on Egypt would put the United States the Israelis decided to lie about it Harry mcferson then White House councel provides an amusing account of Israeli lying following their preemptive attack on Egypt the first day of the war June 5th mcferson made his

1:05:24 way over to the Israeli defense min history and met with ABA Aben something quickly struck him as odd they were saying that they were hit by the Egyptians were attacked by the Egyptians and they had counterattacked it didn't seem right to me and I kept asking about this I kept saying well where did they hit you and he said oh there were big movements down in the sin in the ngev I said into Israel and he said it was imminent it was coming I said but did but did they cross over it's vital for the president to know is he going to be talking on behalf of a country that was literally attacked or a country that launched a preventive attack and he said they were right there at that time the air rate siren went off again and he kept talking and he didn't make a move

1:06:11 nobody made a move to go underground finally one of them said shouldn't we go underground and general yariv looked at his watch and thought for a minute and said no that won't be necessary and suddenly the whole thing just broke open of course it wasn't necessary AR there weren't any damned Arab airplanes left it was easy enough to tell by the first day as was noted by the CIA an analysis of presently available information suggests that Israel fired the first shots today Walt rosow remembering a cabinet meeting from that day with Dean Rusk Robert mcnamer McGeorge Bundy Clark Clifford and Dean Atcheson the former Secretary of State under Harry Truman wrote there was an interesting moment as I remember remember it Mr aeson looked back on the

1:06:58 whole history of Israeli Independence and in effect said that it was a mistake to ever create the state of Israel in a 1983 oral history interview with the aformentioned UN Ambassador

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