The Power of Israel in the United States
by James Petras
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Book Summary Information
Author: James PetrasEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2006-09-26
ISBN: 0932863515
Number of pages: 191
Publisher: Clarity Press, Inc.
Book Reviews of The Power of Israel in the United States
Book Review: Brilliant study of the Israel lobby in the USA
Summary: 5 Stars
James Petras, Professor of Sociology at Binghamton University, New York, has written a fine study of the pro-Israel lobby in the USA, joining John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt's excellent book, The Israel lobby and U.S. foreign policy. The tide is turning on this matter: 59% of Europeans think that Israel is the biggest threat to Middle East, and world, peace.
Part 1 looks at the power of the pro-Israel lobby, and how it promoted the war against Iraq. Petras notes that the US-British policy of breaking Iraq into statelets follows the British precedent in setting up the Gulf States at the end of the 19th century and the EU-US scheme of destroying Yugoslavia at the end of the 20th century.
Part 2 looks at the Israeli record of torture and assassination against the Palestinians, the invasions of Gaza and Lebanon, the threat to Iran, and Israel's efforts to polarise Christians against Muslims.
Part 3 examines the role of so-called `terror experts' like Harvard's Professor Jessica Stern, who claims to `explain how violent Islamic nihilism continues to spread'. Part 4 shows the importance of the lobby, rather then Big Oil or finance capital, in shaping the USA's imperial policy. The US undercuts the interests of the oil companies, which want peace so that they can maximise their profits, in favour of Israel's interests, which wants war to increase its power in the Middle East. Petras also shows how Noam Chomsky underplays the lobby's role.
Petras concludes, "One will hear from Zionists the `relativist' argument: `Israel's crimes are no worse than many countries in the world'. However, few countries (except the US) are engaged in colonizing a neighbor, bombing adversaries with impunity (and killing massive numbers of innocent bystanders), storing nuclear warheads with an offensive doctrine, securing the largest proportion of US foreign aid including its most advanced technology, controlling US congressional voting on Mideast issues, shaping the Mideast political agenda for both Presidential candidates, routinely torturing thousands of political prisoners (and sending advisers throughout the world to teach how to do likewise), and practising the totalitarian law of collective punishment for popular resistance."
We could do with a similar study of the pro-Israel lobby in Britain, of Blair and Brown's fanatical Zionism, and of the lobby's fascistic attacks on the University and College Union in Britain.
Summary of The Power of Israel in the United States
This book is a chapter-by-chapter analysis and documentation of the power of Israel via the Israeli, Jewish or Pro-Zionist Lobby on US Middle East policy. It raises serious questions as to the primary beneficiary of US policy, and its destructive results for the United States. The extraordinary extent of US political, economic, military and diplomatic support for the state of Israel is explored, along with the means whereby such support is generated and consolidated. Contending that Zionist power in America ensured unconditional US backing for Israeli colonization of Palestine and its massive uprooting of Palestinians, it views the interests of Israel rather than those of Big Oil as the primary cause of the disastrous US wars against Iraq and threats of war against Iran and Syria. It demonstrates and condemns US imitation of Israeli practice as it relates to conduct of the war on terrorism and torture. It sheds light on the AIPAC spying scandal and other Israeli espionage against America; the fraudulent and complicit role of America's academic "terrorist experts" in furthering criminal government policies, and the orchestration of the Danish cartoons to foment antipathy between Muslims and the West. It questions the inability in America to sustain or even formulate a discourse related to the subject of Israeli influence on the United States. It calls for a review of American Mideast policy with a view to reclaiming US independence of action based upon enlightened self-interest and progressive principles.General Books
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