Apparently, We Cannot Trust Israel

Israeli Use Of US-Made Cluster Bombs May Have Violated Arms Export Laws: White House

The problem with trading in weapons, especially high-tech weapons like those that we have shared with the Saudis, the Israelis, as well as Saddam Hussein back in the day, the Shah of Iran before the Ayatollahs took over, General Noriega during his dictatorship over Panama, General Pinochet during his overthrow of the elected Chilean government and other places where we have used arms as an incentive to be "friends" with the United States, is that our "friends" all seem to turn out to be fascists with tastes for fascism, secret police forces known for murder (or abductions, torture, drug trafficking, or other crimes), heinous crimes against their own people and a poor record of adhering to the rules we set forth when we made the sale of weapons to these despotic regimes.

We have a poor record on these sorts of deals. In the Philippines, under the Marcos regime, a supposed democracy was run like a fascist dictatorship, which we supported because of our "need" to maintain military bases in the Far East. In South Korea there have been a number of regimes, most of the time elected to office, that have engaged not only in scandals, but also major violations of human rights... mostly against Korean students protesting the abuses of the government and the affiliation with the US gone wrong.

Once again Israel has proven itself to be fascist and an untrustworthy "friend," perhaps even a friend unworthy of our support and allegiance. By violating the conditions under which we sold them arms, by employing tactics that are essentially disproportionate and "overkill," and by justifying any and all means of attacking those that seek to do Israel harm, Israel becomes a despotic regime without a moral leg to stand upon in the face of the evils lined up against them.

I support Israel's right to exist. I support Israel's right to defend itself, including some preemptive strikes given the number of forces mounted against them and the history of dirty deeds used in the past. But I cannot support Israel's disregard for humanity, war crimes, invasions of sovereign nations, embargo and blockade tactics that harm innocent civilians as well as targeted combatants, or the use of indefinite incarceration and torture to arrive at their desired outcomes.

But Israel is not the only nation in the Middle East to disregard the conditions under which we have engaged in arms trading. Saudi Arabia has a consistent and persistent pattern of accepting our weapons under certain conditions, and then either ignoring those conditions or using political and economic pressure to get us to modify those conditions. At various times over the last 40 years we have traded arms with Egypt only to have those conditions ignored as well.

We need a distinctive and immediate change in regard to our foreign policy. We need to cut off all arms and military supply deals with any nation that does not comply with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We need to comply with that Universal Declaration ourselves. We need to export food, health care, education, technical support for water supply and sanitation, technical support for civil engineering, technical support for agriculture, and other forms of aid that will improve the conditions and standard of living in those nations that we embrace as "friends." We need to export compassion and principles that embrace humanity, rather than weapons and an entrenched ideology based on war and conflict.

In the meantime, we need to cut off Israel for a couple of months, or until we get a genuine commitment to the democratic ideals and principles under which we originally agreed to support the right of an Israeli state to exist. If Israel is unwilling to live by those principles, then perhaps we need to withdraw our support entirely. The same goes for the Palestinians, the Egyptians, the Saudis and everyone else that we deal with... and we need to change ourselves. We need to heed the words of Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Truman and Eisenhower, all of whom warned us about the manner in which we should deal with other nations.

The problem here gets ridiculous, though. The US State Department has launched an investigation based on the reports by Human Rights Watch, a reputable NGO that monitors human rights violations. However, even if the allegations against Israel prove to be true, the Bush administration will probably not impose any sanctions against Israel, even though our law provides for such sanctions, the breach of not only our law but international law screams for such sanctions, and human decency mandates some sort of action. So we must ask ourselves if we ever plan to stand on our principles and do the right thing?

The White House plans to tell Congress on Monday that Israel's use of US-made cluster munitions in southern Lebanon last year may have violated several decades-old agreements requiring that the weapons only be used against clearly defined military targets or the Arms Export Control Act, which authorizes use of the weapons only for self-defense, the New York Times reported Sunday. The US State Department opened an investigation into Israel's use of the weapons in August. US officials, however, say it is unlikely that US President George W. Bush will impose sanctions on Israel for such a violation. The State Department's Directorate of Defense Trade Controls began investigating Israel's use of cluster bombs in Southern Lebanon in August 2006.

In July 2006, Human Rights Watch accused Israel of using cluster grenades in an attack on a Hezbollah village in south Lebanon, allegations which Israeli officials have denied. Cluster munitions are considered by many to be inaccurate weapons designed to spread damage indiscriminately and could therefore be considered illegal [backgrounder] under multiple provisions of Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions (1977).