XPost: uk.legal, soc.culture.jewish, alt.politics.democrats   
   XPost: alt.atheism, alt.bible.propecy   
   From: void@invalid.noy   
      
   BY MELVIN GOODMAN   
      
   “The State of Israel will be judged not by its wealth, nor by its   
   army, nor by its technology, but by its moral character and its human   
   values.”   
      
   – Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, 1955, Israel’s first prime minister   
   and defense minister.   
      
   Fifty-seven years ago during the Six-Day War (June 8, 1967), Israeli   
   Defense Forces (IDF) brutally attacked a U.S. naval intelligence ship   
   that was seconded to the National Security Agency (NSA) for   
   intercepting communications in the Middle East.  Thirty-four American   
   sailors were killed in the attack, and 171 were wounded by unmarked   
   Mirage fighter aircraft using cannons and rockets.  Israeli boats   
   fired machine guns at close range at those helping the wounded,   
   including a Soviet naval vessel that was trying to rescue U.S.   
   sailors; they also machine-gunned life rafts that survivors had   
   dropped in hopes of abandoning the ship.  The Israelis immediately   
   called the disaster a “random accident.” It wasn’t “random” and it   
   wasn’t an “accident,” but the NSA investigation of the assault remains   
   classified to this day.   
      
   Israeli duplicity in their relations with the United States was   
   displayed as early as 1955, when Israeli intelligence operatives   
   bombed a U.S. library in Alexandria, Egypt, and the Israeli government   
   placed the blame on Egyptian operatives.  This covert action was   
   designed to stop the United States from funding the Aswan Dam in   
   Egypt.  Several decades later, Israeli intelligence recruited a U.S.   
   naval intelligence officer, Jonathan Pollard, to provide sensitive   
   U.S. intelligence, despite the reams of intelligence that the Central   
   Intelligence Agency (CIA) was sharing with Israel.   
      
   Pollard sold numerous state secrets, including the NSA’s ten-volume   
   manual on how the U.S. gathers its signals intelligence as well as the   
   names of thousands of people who had cooperated and were cooperating   
   with U.S. intelligence agencies.  Some of Pollard’s documents ended up   
   with the Soviet Union’s KGB, and the loss of sensitive signals   
   intelligence contributed to several successful Palestinian terrorist   
   attacks against Israel. The Israelis maintained for years that the   
   Pollard operation was an unauthorized rogue affair.  More lies.   
      
   Israeli deceit in their relations with the United States continues to   
   this day.  U.S. weapons have been used illegally in Israeli wars,   
   including the current genocidal attacks in Gaza.  U.S. weapons   
   technology and the weapons themselves have been provided to third   
   countries in violation of Israeli agreements with the United States.   
   The United States has never challenged the obnoxious personal attacks   
   on its leaders by Israeli leaders, particularly Prime Minister   
   Benjamin Netanyahu.   
      
   The current war in Gaza is replete with examples of Israeli denials   
   and explanations that defy reality.  Israel has denied placing limits   
   on humanitarian aid entering Gaza, which couldn’t be more   
   counter-intuitive or counter-factual.  After all, there are famine   
   conditions in the north and south of Gaza as well as ample evidence of   
   Israels preventing aid trucks from entering Gaza.  There is no serious   
   evidence that the Israelis are willing to investigate the brutal   
   attacks that have taken place.  Israeli spokesmen describe the current   
   Rafah operation as a “limited incursion,” which is belied by satellite   
   photography that shows Israeli forces moving closer to the center of   
   the city as well as the collapsed buildings and debris in the eastern   
   parts of the city.   
      
   “The pattern of attacks” on aid workers, according to the Secretary   
   General of Doctors Without Borders, Christopher Lockyear, “is either   
   intentional or indicative of reckless incompetence.”  Israel’s 16-year   
   blockade of Gaza at least permitted a stable food situation in the   
   territory, but now Israeli Defense Forces ignore Israeli right-wing   
   activists who destroy food headed for Gaza’s refugees.   
      
   The Israeli military states that it would “never deliberately target   
   aid convoys and workers,” but this too is a bald-faced lie.  Hundreds   
   of Palestinian aid workers have been killed, but it was not until   
   non-Arab workers were killed in a malicious attack that the   
   international community expressed outrage.  This has not stopped   
   Netanyahu from proclaiming that Palestinians “sanctify death while we   
   sanctify life.  They sanctify cruelty while we sanctify compassion.”   
      
   Last week’s disgraceful attack on a tent camp in Rafah was the latest   
   example of Israel’s lack of moral compunction in the killing of   
   innocent civilians, even children.   The many Israeli wars against the   
   Palestinians have demonstrated Israel’s ease in destroying homes and   
   olive groves, but the increased killing of children reveals the   
   absence of a moral compass  among Israeli civilian and military   
   leaders.   
      
   The anniversary of the Liberty attack is a reminder that there are no   
   limits to Israeli perfidy.  In June 1967, I was a junior analyst at   
   the CIA working on the Six-Day War.  Our task force knew that the   
   Israeli attack took place after six hours of intense, low-level   
   reconnaissance.  The attack itself was conducted over a two-hour   
   period by unmarked fighter aircraft.  According to Israeli archives,   
   at least one of the pilots instructed to attack the Liberty   
   communicated “But Sir, It’s an American Ship.”  He was told “Never   
   Mind, Hit Her!”   
      
   Even today, Michael Oren, a former Israeli ambassador to the United   
   States, maintains that the operation was an accident: “There was a lot   
   of chaos. It was a classic screw-up.”  Another former ambassador to   
   the United States, Ron Dermer, one of Netanyahu’s closest colleagues,   
   once remarked that Israeli Defense Forces should be given a Nobel   
   Peace Prize for its use of “knock on the roof” warning shots before   
   they destroy homes that often house numerous members of extended   
   families that are seeking shelter.  No warning was given to the   
   Palestinian refugees in the Rafah encampment. Both Oren and Dermer   
   would born in the United States and educated at Ivy League   
   institutions.   
      
   Meanwhile, U.S. officials at the highest levels continue to maintain   
   that the Israelis have crossed no “red lines” in their genocidal   
   attacks in Rafah.  John Kirby, the spokesman for national security   
   adviser Jake Sullivan, even maintained that Israeli use of precision   
   guided weapons in Rafah “indicates a desire to be more deliberate and   
   more precise in their targeting.”  When pressed, Kirby blithely   
   maintained that he needed “more granularity” to explain the civilian   
   losses.  The Palestinian in Rafah who held a girl’s brain in one hand   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)