XPost: uk.legal, soc.culture.jewish, alt.news-media   
   XPost: alt.politics.democrats, alt.atheism   
   From: void@invalid.noy   
      
   BY MELVIN GOODMAN   
      
   Question: How do you know when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is   
   lying?   
      
   Answer: He moves his lips.   
      
   Israel’s history over the past 76 years is replete with examples of   
   deceit.  This was true from the start, when the Israelis denied their   
   role in expelling hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from their   
   homes during Israel’s War of Independence.  The Arab world refers to   
   the expulsion as the “nakba” (the catastrophe), which is largely   
   denied in Israel.  The Israeli legacy of denying the “nakba” is no   
   different from those who deny the Holocaust.   
      
   The mainstream media bends over backwards to defend Israel’s case, and   
   over the years it has said very little about the history of Israel’s   
   deceit and deception.  As recently as last week, for example, the   
   Washington Post carried a bizarre headline that read “Israel is on its   
   honor to comply with U.S. intelligence limits.” The accompanying story   
   was a significant one, detailing the importance of the U.S.   
   intelligence provided to Israel to conduct the rescue of four Israeli   
   hostages, an operation that took the lives of nearly three hundred   
   Palestinians, mostly women and children.  By any definition of the   
   requirement for proportionality in wartime, this was indeed a war   
   crime.   
      
   The Post article went on to cite National Security Adviser Jake   
   Sullivan, an apologist for Israel since the start of the war on   
   October 7th, who explained that the United States has “provided an   
   intense range of assets and capabilities and expertise to Israel,” and   
   that the provision of intelligence  is “not tied or conditioned on   
   anything else.  It is not limited.  We are not holding anything back.   
   We are providing every asset, every tool, every capability.”  These   
   remarks are dispositive of our complicity in Israel’s brutal and   
   unconscionable assault against Palestinian civilians.   
      
   At the same time, U.S. officials disingenuously claim that Israeli is   
   prohibited from using U.S. intelligence for targeting in Gaza in any   
   military operations, including airstrikes.”  They argue that there are   
   “long-standing formal arrangements that are scrutinized by lawyers in   
   the U.S. intelligence community, as well as directives from the White   
   House following the October 7th attacks.”  This is particularly   
   disingenuous because of the long record of deceit and deception from   
   both the U.S. intelligence community regarding U.S. wars in Vietnam,   
   Iraq, and Afghanistan, and the Israeli lies over the years regarding   
   their wars in 1956, 1967, 1973, and 1982.  I’ve written extensively   
   about U.S. and Israeli lies in my articles for CounterPunch and my   
   various books and articles.  And I will return to this deceit in   
   future articles.   
      
   The idea that Israel is “on its honor” not to use U.S. intelligence   
   for proscribed purposes, which is described by current U.S.   
   intelligence officers, is laughable.  The Israelis have regularly   
   broken agreements with the United States regarding the use of certain   
   weaponry as well as the supply of U.S. weapons technology to third   
   countries.  There is legislation on the books that requires the   
   Director of National Intelligence to notify Congress if U.S.   
   intelligence to  any third country leads to civilian casualties, but   
   this law is observed only in the breach.  U.S. oversight regarding   
   Israel is virtually nonexistent.   
      
   The Israeli pattern of deceit is particularly important because Prime   
   Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is currently engaged in a new round of   
   false accusations in order to embarrass the Biden administration and   
   divide the American public on the Gaza war as well as the U.S.   
   election.  At least, the Biden administration has responded to   
   Netanyahu’s outrageous charge by canceling an important meeting of the   
   U.S.-Israeli Strategic Consultative Group regarding policy toward Iran   
   in return for Netanyahu’s  “stunt.”   
      
   Nevertheless, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan did not cancel   
   or postpone his meeting with his Israeli counterpart, Tzachi Hanegbi,   
   and the U.S. Ambassador to Israel, Jack Lew, went overboard in   
   stressing to Netanyahu there there haven’t been any delays in   
   providing weaponry.  Also, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who   
   arrived in Israel early in the war and announced that “I’m come before   
   you not only as the U.S. secretary of state, but as a Jew,” assured   
   Netanyahu that U.S. weapons were “moving as it normally would move.”   
   The only exception has been the hold on 2,000-pound bombs, which have   
   killed thousands of women and children and should never have been   
   provided to Israel in the first place.   
      
   These mixed signals over Netanyahu’s remarks were reminiscent of the   
   so-called “red line” that Biden proclaimed to lighten an Israeli   
   assault in Rafah, where more than a million refugees were threatened.   
   Israeli Defense Forces stormed Rafah on May 6, and Biden threatened to   
   withhold weapons on May 8.  But there was no interruption of U.S.   
   weapons deliveries, and the consequences in Rafah over the past six   
   weeks have been devastating.  The assault is still ongoing, but   
   national security adviser Sullivan announced that the “red line” had   
   not been broken.   
      
   The fact that the U.S. Congress is rolling out the red carpet for   
   Netanyahu in July is particularly ludicrous in view of his history of   
   manipulating American public and congressional opinion.  Have we   
   forgotten his address to the Congress in 2015, designed to embarrass   
   the Obama administration and stop the completion of the Iran nuclear   
   accord?  On this occasion, the congressional invitation is shameful   
   because Netanyahu is a war criminal whose policies are killing and   
   starving innocent civilians.   
      
   Netanyahu has spoken privately about his ability to manipulate   
   Democratic administrations because he has the power of the Jewish   
   lobby behind him, and Democratic presidents are fearful of   
   antagonizing the Jewish vote and Jewish fund raising on behalf of   
   Democrats.  He has insulted American presidents, vice presidents, and   
   secretaries of state over the years, and has never missed an   
   opportunity to demonstrate that he has the upper hand in negotiations   
   with the United States.  Netanyahu has always played hard ball with   
   the United States.  Now, it’s time for the United States to do the   
   same.   
      
   Melvin A. Goodman is a senior fellow at the Center for International   
   Policy and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University.  A   
   former CIA analyst, Goodman is the author of Failure of Intelligence:   
   The Decline and Fall of the CIA and National Insecurity: The Cost of   
      
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