Pols undermine U.S. by pandering to Israel

Home News Tribune Online 06/5/07

HASSAN
MAHMOUD

According to a recently published book, "Presidential Courage" by presidential historian Michael Beschloss, Harry Truman was an anti-Semitic bigot who called New York City a "Kike town" and said, "Those goddamned Jews are never satisfied. Jesus Christ couldn't please them when he was here on earth, so how could anyone expect that I would have any luck?" While staying in Independence to interview Truman in 1961, the talk-show host David Susskind asked him why he never invited him into his home. Truman replied, "You are a Jew, David, and no Jew has ever been in the house."

By the approach of the presidential election of 1948, Truman's approval rating was very low. At that time, the United Nations was debating the partition of Palestine between the indigenous Palestinians and the immigrant Jews from Europe. The White House counsel, Clark Clifford, strongly suggested that Truman recognize a Jewish State for which the Jewish donors would support his campaign. As per the book, John Kennedy, allegedly, later insisted that recognition of Israel was rushed through so fast because a Zionist bagman handed the president $2 million in cash in a suitcase. On the other side, Secretary of State George Marshall, whom Truman described as the "great one of the age" and the "architect of victory who won the war," told the president that if he followed Clifford's advice and if he were to vote in the election he would vote against him. He and Assistant Secretary of State Loy Henderson and Under Secretary Robert Lovett warned that the founding of a Jewish State in Palestine would be a strategic mistake as it would throw away many years of hard work with the Arabs, would jeopardize oil supplies, turn the whole Arab world into our enemy and make Israel a burden on the United States.

With the hypocritical personality of a U.S. president as such, one wonders how national vital decisions were made.

Since 1948, many upheavals occurred in the Middle East resulting in many wars and destruction and loss of hundreds of thousands of lives — including thousands of Americans — and periodic economic turmoil due to disruption of oil supply, plus the birth of international terrorism. All of these catastrophes could have been alleviated or minimized if we could have wisely managed the aftermath of the creation of Israel in the midst of a sea of Arab and Muslim nations by evenhandedly forcing the adherence of the antagonists to the United Nations resolutions of 1947, which demarcated the boundaries of two states — Palestine and Israel.

Unfortunately, our politicians never learned from the past. When President Bush is asked about the fallacy of the allegations upon which the ruinous Iraq war was waged, his recent answer during his news conference of May 24 was that a main reason for the war was Saddam's payment to the families of the killed Palestinians who attacked Israel. When he speaks of the dispute with Iran, he always invokes the danger of Iran to Israel. Can't our politicians stop holding our security and economic interest hostages to the whims of the extremist Israelis who are pursuing colonialist policies in the Middle East and always demand from us to back their follies even by scarifying the lives of our soldiers and our economic welfare?

Amazingly, at the time when a number of our soldiers are kidnapped in Iraq, some New Jersey politicians thought that the fate of our kidnapped soldiers is not worth as much as the fate of three Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah and Hamas. Assemblyman Eric Monoz and state Sen. Thomas H. Kean Jr., both R-Union, Somerset, Essex, Morris, sponsored resolutions that call on the United Nations to take action to help free the three Israeli soldiers. Munoz stated: "I want Israeli citizens here and abroad and the government of Israel to know that the United States — and in particular the State of New Jersey — stands united with them in their efforts to bring these young men home safely." One wishes that these comforting words and strong resolutions are spoken and made on behalf of the missing Americans and their families. Shame on those politicians. Their pandering to foreign interests blinded them to the interests of America.

"Be Counted" columnist Hassan Mahmoud is a resident of Westfield. "Be Counted" columnists are members of the public. Their opinions do not represent those of the Home News Tribune.