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25 December 2009 By James Petras Introduction The discussion of Zionist Power Configuration (ZPC)
in the US political system revolves around several
essential issues, including: 1. The claims by the ZPC that it represents
Jewish opinion and values as well as its authority to
speak for the interests of the American people. Method: Public Records, Ethnic Neutral
Sources and Citations The case against the Zionist Power Configuration is
based on the open record of publications,
speeches, articles, interviews and sources available
to the general public (and any interested reader).
Many facts and data are drawn from Zionist and Israeli
sources as well as mainstream publications and
writings by critical journalists and analysts.1
We do not privilege the statements by Jews,
whether they are critics or supporters of the State of
Israel, as most “progressive” writers do. The pursuit
of truth is not an “ethnic science”, an approach that
smacks of Nazi and Zionist racial theories. Indeed,
nothing reveals the extreme Zionist power or cultural
hegemony over the debate on Israel and American
Zionism so much as the constant reliance, reference
and citation of the “Jewish” authorship of critical
articles, even when publications by non-Jews are
better documented, of earlier publication, and better
argued. The ethnic (Jewish) label attached to writings and
intellectual and political activity is selectively
applied: the ethnic labels are applied to ‘positive
outcomes’ as part of a general campaign exalting the
“superiority” of the “race”; and disregarded in the
face of ‘negative outcomes’ and activities (e.g.,
financial swindles, Russian oligarchs, espionage
agents). In fact the “double standard” is buttressed
by savage attacks by the ZPC on those who, following
the ethnic labeling tradition, actually mention the
Jewish background of mediocrities and war criminals as
well as peace and justice advocates. We will begin by questioning and challenging the
representativeness of the ZPC in the United
States today. Zionists and the Jewish Communities in
America The 51 Presidents of the Major American Jewish
Organization (PMAJO) claim to speak for all Jews in
the US.2 A major study in the north Boston region
found that less than 25% of Jews belong to a
synagogue, fewer (10%) contribute to the Jewish
Federation and over 50% do not accept rabbinical
Zionist precepts against inter-marriage with
non-Jews.3) According to the Jewish Telegraph Agency
(12/4/2009) conservative synagogues have declined by
almost 25% from 800 to 650 over the past decade. Even
most striking many prominent individuals who may be of
Jewish parentage, no longer consider themselves “Jews”
despite frequent claims by Zionists that their
achievements are a product or a result of their being
“Jewish”. Near majorities of young people of Jewish
ancestry do not identify with Judaism and are critical
or indifferent to Zionist appeals for Israel. They
have no involvement in Jewish centered civic
activities.4 A small, but vocal, group of Jews are
organized and active critics of the entire Zionist
apparatus, rejecting the idea of Israel as an
exclusive ethno-religious state and supporting a
secular democratic republic in Palestine.5 In addition
several Orthodox Jewish sects view the ‘state of
Israel’ as a form of blasphemy and call for its
destruction.6 The “51” misrepresent their actual numbers and
claim to speak for 6 million US Jews. At best they may
speak for less than half of the imputed population and
even then their support waxes and wanes according to
the issue, the timing and the place and varies in
intensity. The power of the “51” is not a
result of its representativeness of the Jewish
community at large, but the location of its
followers in the power structure and the intensity and
quasi-religious fervor of their activists. Their
political power resides in their singular forces in
pursuit of the interests of the State of Israel and
the control and influence in media; their nationwide
networks and the wealth and financial power of
contributors. Their capacity to browbeat apathetic
Jews into making contributions and lending support
adds organizational muscle. Their willing use of
force, money and media slander intimidates any and all
critics, including dissident politicians, media,
journalists and professors.7 At most there are probably no more than 500,000
Jews who actively back the “51” – but what a half
million! Given the low level of political
participation of the US population in general, the
relative low salience of Middle East issues to most
Americans and the one-sided pro-Israel mass media
propaganda, which misinforms the public, the Zionist
zealots have little competition. They have a free hand
in penetrating and influencing political, social and
cultural institutions in line with the policies
dictated by their Israeli influenced leaders among the
“51.” The issue of the limited representativeness
of the Zionist organization must be separated from the
exercise of power. By leveraging non-Zionist,
non-Jewish civic organizations, political
institutions, pension funds, trade unions etc. the ZPC
magnifies its power beyond its numbers.8 The limited representativeness of the “51” is
compensated by the silence and apathy of the majority
of Jews and non-Jewish/Jews, who either are not
willing to challenge ZPC claims or are immersed in
private concerns, careers or other unrelated civic
issues. The ‘51’s hundreds of thousands of activists are
strategically placed in institutions, as well as
geographically, with a centralized command capable of
mobilizing money, media attention and political
leverage in any priority, political, cultural or
social arena.9 The ‘51’ organizations are not merely a
“lobby” in the sense of having paid officials
operating to influence congressional votes.10 They
include religious, civic, charitable, ideological,
cultural and social organizations unified and
unconditionally committed to following the zigzags of
Israeli political directives.11 The actual structure
resembles a ‘power configuration’ that reaches from
small chapters in municipalities to statewide
confederations, as well as national organizations,
each with its own budget, its own ideological
watchdogs and appropriate levels of power. The power for Israel is exercised by elected and
appointed Zionist officials, especially those in
positions that have any relevance to Israeli
interests. These “interests” include direct aid to
Israel, sanctions and wars against Israel’s Middle
East and Asian adversaries, American pension fund
investments in Israel, boycotts of companies trading
with Israeli-designated adversary countries and many
other strategic concerns. The key to the power of the Zionist Power
Configuration is that it is a mass grassroots
organization, bolstered by the financial support by
scores of millionaires and dozens of billionaires and
a complicit mass media. These political resources
translate into tremendous leverage over the far more
numerous non-Zionist electorates, the mass media
spectators and the upwardly mobile politicians. The ZPC illustrates clearly how “numbers” in the
abstract do not count,12 especially in a permeable
electoral system like the US, where money,
organization, discipline and ethno-religious
fanaticism define the boundaries, issues and
acceptable policies. The ZPC as Foreign Agents of the Israeli
State The recent decision of the US Congress to repudiate
(HR 867) the findings of Israeli war crimes in the
official Final Report of the United Nations’ Fact
Finding Mission on the 2009 Gaza Conflict by a vote of
344-36 is a measure of the power of the ZPC.13 The
report, also known as the “Goldstone Report”, after
its principle author Justice Richard Goldstone, was
released on September 15, 2009, amid a carefully
orchestrated campaign to discredit its findings and
its authors. What is even more important than the US
Congressional vote of condemnation is the fact that
the campaign was publically ordered from Israel,
directed by the Presidents of the ‘51’ and obediently
and enthusiastically carried out by several hundred
thousand Zionist activists, throughout the country.
The ‘51’ and the mass of Zionist zealots were openly
defending Israeli state terror and crimes against
humanity. Their defense of war crimes never evoked a
second thought. What mattered was their ability to
pressure, threaten, cajole and promise future funds to
Congressional representatives in order to secure their
vote against Justice Goldstone. Blind obedience to
Israeli dictates was evident in the fact that many
Congresspersons proudly confessed to never having even
read the Goldstone Report and that none dared question
the egregious fabrications, which its two uber-Zionist
Congressional sponsors, (Representatives H.L. Berman,
D-California and G.L. Ackermann, D-New York), of the
House Resolution 867, concocted.14 The US Congress, in
fact, almost unanimously rejected the eminent Justice
Goldstone’s request to present his findings in person. The United States, under the tutelage of the ZPC,
remains as the center of Israeli power and the sole
reliable backer of Israeli war aims in the Middle
East, especially with regard to Iran. The power of
Israel over Washington’s Middle East policy is in
direct relation to the strategic influence of the ZPC.
The denial of the power of the ZPC by seemingly
“progressive” and “leftist” writers and journalists
has been one of the principal obstacles undermining
efforts to effectively counter US government support
for Israeli war crimes, the expansion of colonial
settlements in the West Bank and the
military/sanctions policies toward Iran.19 Israeli Power over US Middle Policy: The
Centrality of the ZPC The manifestations of Israeli power over the US are
public, visible, outrageous and unprecedented in the
annals of US foreign relations.20 Israeli power is
wielded directly through its subordinated political
arm, the ZPC, which in turn facilitates the direct
intervention of the Israeli state in the internal
politics of the US. Let us examine several crucial
empirical indicators of Israeli power in the US. Top Zionist leaders in the Bush and Obama
administration have a long history of work for and
with Israel, including in some cases activity, which
has caused them to lose security clearances and/or to
come under investigation.36 Two top Pentagon officials
in the Bush administration, Former Undersecretary of
Defense Paul Wolfowitz and Assistant Secretary of
Defense, Douglas Feith are cases in point. Obama’s
chief of staff, Rahm Emmanuel spent time in the
Israeli armed forces and has long been suspected of
ties to Mossad.37 Stuart Levey, a top US Treasury
Department official involving in enforcing sanctions
against Iran, has spent nearly a decade in close
collaboration with MOSSAD, a point he brags about.38
During the Bush (Jr.) Presidency, non-Zionist
officials in the Pentagon and CIA complained of being
sidelined by top Zionist officials, who set up their
own intelligence offices run by their own fellow
Zionist policymakers. Wolfowitz and Feith set up the
Pentagon’s Office of Special Plans run by Abram
Shulsky. Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski, an official in the
Pentagon at the time, complained of being marginalized
and supplanted by Israeli officers who had unfettered
access to the highest Pentagon officials.39 The
November 2007 United States National Intelligence
Estimate Report (NIE) on the Iranian nuclear program
was savaged by all the major Jewish American
organizations, their cohorts in Congress, and the
Executive branch because the report concluded that
Iran had suspended its nuclear weapons development
since 2003.40 The major Zionist organizations and
their supporters in the US government favored Israeli
intelligence disinformation claiming an active nuclear
weapons program that threatened US security. In short
order the NIE report, prepared by 16 major US
Government intelligence agencies, was pushed aside and
US policy followed the lead of the Zionist-backed
Israeli claims of a “secret” Iranian weapons program
despite the absence of any hard data. Leveraging Power The key to Zionist power in shaping US policy
toward the Mid-East, Arab-Muslim relations and toward
“third parties” affecting Israeli policy is the
combined influence of Zionists in executive offices
(Treasury, State, National Security, Pentagon, etc.)
and Congress, especially leading committees relevant
to Israeli interests, and as well as the mass
organizations in civil society (the ‘51’ major
American Jewish organizations) and Zionist control
over the mass media.41 Zionist power and control in
these crucial areas spreads out into influencing
academic activity, including the repression of Israeli
critics, the censoring of publications, manipulation
of professional societies, trade unions and state and
union pension funds, whose members are overwhelmingly
neither Jewish nor Zionist. The Interlocking Directorate: Establishing
Zionist Hegemony Several critical analysts have identified some of
the key issues and institutions under Zionist
influence.43 Some have identified AIPAC as an
influential pro-Israel lobby. Others have noted the
pro-Israel bias of the mass media.44 A very few have
even identified Zionist predominance in media
ownership.45 Ethno-sizing Truth One of the extreme manifestations of Zionist-Jewish
hegemony is found in the fear and trepidation with
which critics of Israeli policy approach the issue.
Most seek to “Judaize” any criticism, instead of
seeking and citing truth, facts or analyses on their
own merits. They support their statements by citing
Israeli sources and Jewish writers, even if earlier
non-Jewish, non-Israeli writers and analysts have
raised the same issues and may have provided a more
systematic and consequential critique.48 This “tactic”
of seeking to play off critical Jews against the ZPC
and Israel is debatable if not counter-productive,
regressive and serves to re-enforce the pervasive fear
of the ZPC. The proponents of this approach, assuming
they are not ignorant of non-Jewish critics, argue
that by citing the Jewish background of the critics of
Israel, they disarm the ZPC charge of “anti-Semitism.”
They further argue that by putting an ethnic ‘spin’ or
‘ethnicizing’ the critique they are responding to
“Jewish sensibilities” and are more likely to get a
hearing from Jews and their sympathizers.49 Demystifying a Racial Doctrine The big challenge for opponents of Judeo-Zionist
hegemony is demystifying its ideological bases.
Zionists and their media camp followers always
highlight “Jewishness” and the disproportionate number
of notable, successful scientists and public figures
with whom the Zionists self-identify (even if the said
individual have no identification with anything
remotely “Jewish” beyond some distant ancestry). In
contrast, to highlight the “Jewishness” (and
Israel-centricity) of notorious swindlers, spies,
warmongers, gangsters, drug or arms traffickers is be
labeled anti-Semitic. Selective ethnic identity is
crucial to maintaining and perpetuating the racist
myth of Jewish superiority and the corollary of power
and prestige, based on special meritorious qualities.
One of the key components of Zionist-Jewish ideology
and Israeli power is precisely the racist myth of the
Jewish moral and intellectual superiority – not the
guns, money and backing of Washington and the ZPC’s
central location within the US elite social structure. There are two options for those interested in
demystifying Zionist-Jewish hegemony: One could
eliminate all ethnic labels or one could insist that
labels be applied to all individuals including the
most nefarious, grotesque and embarrassing. Despite cracks in the Zionist monolith and the
emergence of public critics within and without the
Jewish community,50 especially among young former
Jews, who prefer to assimilate with their
fellow-citizens (the passive majority), still up to a
third of US Jews remain hard-core backers of the ZPC
with Israel as their most enduring political loyalty.
While not discounting the psychological
gratifications, which accompany beliefs in a mythical
biblical past, there are real material benefits to
joining the Israel First Power Configuration. While it
is true Zionists contribute money and time to
promoting the Israeli agenda, there are also powerful
material incentives, especially the benefits accruing
from exclusive identification and membership in a
cohesive configuration, which empowers its members,
finances electoral campaigns and is well-connected
among political leaders, as well as financial, real
estate and insurance moguls. The spinoffs and payoffs
for upwardly mobile Zionist activists can be lucrative
and career-enhancing. Ambitious politicians, who
measure up and toe the line, are likely to tap into
substantial funding and favorable media coverage.
Networks, which work for Israel, enhance
Jewish-Zionist prestige while providing emotional
gratification and vicarious pleasure in sharing the
thrill of Israel’s bloody military victories and its
forceful expansion of the “fatherland.” Not a few
careers have advanced through the “contacts” made at
the national and regional Zionist meetings. This is
especially the case for many, otherwise mediocre,
political candidates facing competitive elections.
Active membership in a powerful Zionist organization
may protect the careers of lackluster, or even
incompetent, performers in some academic or
professional settings where the threat of a lawsuit
charging anti-Semitism can ensure contract renewal. Zionist racist ideology, with its implicit and
explicit emphasis on Jews as “special people” ordained
by God, as well as the media’s bias toward presenting
a selectively positive ethno-religious identity,
provides symbolic gratification to lower middle class
Jews, who sell Israel bonds, write letters to
politicians, heckle critics of the Jewish state and
march under the flag of Israel. They are likely to
play a role at the grassroots level in bullying family
members, neighbors and colleagues to join the cause or
refrain from voicing criticism of Israel. Recently,
more than a few Seders have led to family bust-ups
over issues like the massacre of Palestinian civilians
in Gaza, the Goldstone Report and the Ben-ami Kadish
spy episode. The success of the ZPC in projecting power and
shaping US policy depends, in large part, on the
financial clout of its millionaire financiers, its
penetration of the state apparatus and the interlock
of the corporate-political directorate. However,
equally important is the grassroots work of hundreds
of thousands of middle and lower middle class
activists. The effective exercise of power by the
Zionist elites is based on the vertical ties between
the leaders and followers, especially in mobilizing
for Israel’s high priority campaigns promoting dubious
causes – like Israeli repudiation of moderate US
policies toward Jewish colonial settler expansion or
calls for more restraint from killing civilians in
Palestine and elsewhere. It is highly unlikely that
any changes can be induced among the Zionist elite;
but there are reasons to believe that some sections of
the rank and file can be influenced by anti-Zionist
Jews and non-Jews. This is especially true at a time
when Israeli political leaders have embraced such
openly ultra-rightist postures. Zionist Hegemony is Vulnerable Several developments encourage the hope that these
vertical links can be weakened. Over the past five
years, numerous articles, books and videos critical of
Israel have broken through Zionist censorship. Equally
important, the emergence of new activist Jewish
anti-Zionist organizations and the vast increase in
member organizations supporting a boycott and
divestment campaign against Israeli products,
companies and cultural institutions have broken the
ZPC stranglehold on public opinion.51 Faced with
growing opposition in civil society the ZPC has
escalated its repressive efforts to ban publication of
critical authors, fire academics and savage
journalists and politicians.52 Simultaneously a
concerted effort has been made to encourage its
ideological ‘attack dogs’ in academia suppress any
critical discussion of the issues that most discredit
the Israeli state, namely the recent Israeli massacres
in Gaza, the brutal expansion of settlements in the
West Bank, the Goldstone Report on Israeli war crimes
and Israel’s well-orchestrated push for war against
Iran.53 Zionist Intellectuals: In Defense of Terror The ZPC has long established a near stranglehold on
the major media outlets for opinion and analysis on
the Middle East and especially on issues, which
Israel’s foreign office has given high priority. As a
result Israel First academics and pundits monopolize
the editorial and opinion pages of the Washington
Post, the Murdoch chain, the Wall Street Journal, the
New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago
Tribune, Newsweek, and other print outlets.54 The
spread of Zionist extremism is evident in two recent
feature articles published by Newsweek (December 21,
2009), glorifying the neo-fascist head of the Israeli
secret police, Mossad, Meir Dagan for his success in
assassinating political adversaries in violation of
national boundaries and his close ties with US
Treasury official and Zionist zealot Stuart Levey, who
is in charge of blackmailing Iran’s trade and
investment partners, in order to strangle the Iranian
economy and impoverish seventy million of its people.
The Newsweek authors of these articles are rightwing
Israel and US Zionists. Notorious Zionist news
anchors, like Ted Koppel and Wolf Blitzer, parrot the
Israeli-ZPC line in the major media (Fox News, CBS,
NBC, ABC, CNN, BBC) as well as secondary outlets
(National “Public” Radio).55 The result is self-styled
“experts” of dubious loyalty to the America, but with
strong ties to Israel and Zionist propaganda
institutes, grind out opinion pieces which defend the
Israeli regime’s most atrocious war crimes and land
grabs.56 Numerous professors from the most prestigious
universities hack out op-ed pieces defending Israel’s
assault on Gaza, fabricating judicial precedents, and
citing “Just War” theory.57 Israeli Prime Minister
Benyamin Netanyahu, when confronted by near universal
support for the Goldstone Report, ordered the ZPC to
denigrate Justice Goldstone, the basis and legality of
the Report and falsify its contents. When the extreme
militarists, like Netanyahu, passed the word to
Israel’s mouthpieces in North America, they unleashed
the ZPC’s entire stable of academics, journalists and
propagandists. Over one hundred op-ed pieces in the
major media savaged the Report, slandered Goldstone
and defended Israeli terror attacks, which destroyed
the entire human infrastructure of the Gaza.58 No
Israeli crime was too great to cause any Harvard,
Yale, Princeton or John Hopkins Zionist academic to
rethink their bind subordination to the Jewish state.
They parroted Netanyahu’s line that the massacre over
one thousand civilians and the brutalization of
hundreds of thousands was an exercise of “Israel’s
right to self-defense.” Few of the Jewish and
non-Jewish academics, who dared to criticize Israel’s
terrorist policy, cited the weakest section of the
Goldstone Report – its amalgamating Israel’s all-out
terror bombing of Palestinian neighborhoods, schools,
hospitals, mosques and farms, with Hamas’ futile and
ineffective retaliatory rockets falling mostly on
empty Israeli fields. Few if any raised their voices
against the domestic propaganda arm of Israeli war
crimes – the Presidents of the 51 Major Jewish
American Organizations. Needless to say, with few
domestic critics willing to even identify their
opponents, the ZPC secured over 90% of the US Congress
in favor of Israel’s repudiations of the Goldstone
Report, which they had never even read.59 What is striking about the vast majority of Zionist
academic apologists of terrorism is their shoddy
scholarship, their tendentious and illogical arguments
and de-contextualized analogies. Their
‘persuasiveness’ is based on the fact that their
‘line’ is reinforced by the mass media and enforced by
the ZPC’s political thuggery and character
assassination of potential critics. Their repeated
presence in the media gives the appearance of
legitimacy in defending violations of international
law. Their prestigious positions provide a veneer of
expertise or knowledge even as their research in the
region is based on flawed premises, including
disproven religious legends and colonial mythology.60
As Zionist academics become more deeply involved in
justifying the expansionist Zionist claims, Israeli
conquests and brutal militarism there is an
accompanying marked deterioration of intellectual
standards. Over time prestigious positions become
linked with mediocrity. Academic degrees, awards and
badges of merit are harnessed to hack writing and
political hatchet jobs. Noted critics, who exempt
Israeli war crimes and terror, are still published by
prestigious publishers, despite their shabby
intellectual output. Promotions and academic chairs
are secured by eminently distinguished apologists of
dubious morality. Their blind support and defense of
the practices of a terror state puts the lie to their
claims to high ethical and scholarly standards. The Globalization of Zionist Power From the Israeli fatherland to the nerve centers of
Zionist power in the US, using the experiences and
drawing on the support of the ZPC, pro-Israel
influence has spread to important political
institutions in England, Canada, France, Netherlands,
Russia and more recently South America. In England,
leaders and deputies from both the Conservative and
Labor party accept millions in campaign funds from
billionaire Zionists, paid junkets to Israel and other
payoffs in exchange for supporting Israel’s most
egregious acts of violence in Lebanon, Gaza and the
West Bank.62 Zionist front groups like the
“Conservative Friends (flunkeys) of Israel” and “Labor
Friends (flunkeys) of Israel” ensure that the
incumbent regimes and the opposition put Israeli trade
and militarist interests at the center of British
Middle East Policy.63 In Russia, eight of the top nine billionaire
oligarchs have claimed dual Israeli citizenship. They
illegally and violently seized hundreds of billions of
dollars worth of formerly state-owned mines, factories
and banks, and then transferred part of their illicit
fortunes to overseas banks in Israel, the US, London
and the money-laundering offshore island states and
tax-havens. Zionist power peaked during the debauched
Presidency of Yeltsin in the 1990’s, but residual
influence is evident in the Putin-Mevedev regime. This
is particularly apparent in the US-Russian accords to
increase sanctions on Iran, a policy that jeopardizes
billions of dollars in Russian investments and trade
with Iran. Russia has resolutely refused to pressure
Israel over its colonial settlement expansion. In a
similar manner, Israel retains a decisive influence
over Holland and Germany’s Middle East policy, via the
exploitation of the Holocaust Memory, the Ann Frank
legacy and the pressure of pro-Israel economic
sectors. The newest example of the “globalization” of
Zionist power and the drive for new Israeli spheres of
influence is found in Latin America. Major US Zionist
organizations have contributed substantial financial
resources to building, advising and orienting their
counterparts, especially in Argentina, Brazil and
Peru, while engaging in a systematic effort to curry
favor with the US by demonizing President Chavez for
his forthright defense of Palestinian rights and
condemnation of Israel’s crimes against humanity
during its blitz of Gaza.66 For these acts of courage
the 51 US Jewish organizations branded Chavez an
“anti-Semitic”, even going so far as to accuse him of
fomenting an assault on a Jewish community center in
Caracas. When the arsonists were arrested, the assault
was revealed to have been carried out by center
employees hired by the local Jewish notables.66 Global Zionism has targeted Argentina and Brazil.
Argentinean Jews have a history of ambiguous feelings
toward the state of Israel and Zionism. Early
twentieth century Jews established farming and cattle
ranches — the legendary “Jewish Gauchos” — while urban
artisans and working class Jews were active in
socialist, anarchist, communist and left-wing Yiddish
organizations. The mid-century generation (1940-60) of
professionals, businesspeople, academics and bankers
divided between leftist anti-Zionists and Zionists.
Both suffered attacks from the pro-fascist sectors of
the dominant mass-based populist Peronist regime. The
1960’s to 1970’s saw a profound generational split –
characteristic of all Argentinean society – especially
under the military dictatorships of (1966-1973) and
(1976-82). A significant contingent of
university-based students and professors,
psychologists and professionals of Jewish ancestry
joined urban guerrillas and radical mass movements and
suffered “disproportionate” number of deaths by
torture and ‘disappearances.’ During the worst years
of terror, the Israeli government retained relations
with the bloodiest of the military regimes (Videla,
1976), overlooking its anti-Semitic proclivities in
order to trade in arms and military technologies. At
the same time, Israel promoted Jewish immigration to
Israel, securing passage of Zionist and non-Zionist
Jews to Israel. The decimation of the generation of young
non-Zionist Argentine revolutionaries of Jewish
ancestry and the subsequent post-dictatorial
neo-liberal electoral regimes, saw the rise of new
groups of wealthy Argentine Zionist Jews who grew to
dominate local community organizations. They deepened
ties with Israel and more recently established
extensive links with the US ZPC. Once again, however,
under the pro-Israel Menem regime (1980-90)
anti-Semitic terrorists bombed a major Jewish civic
center killing and maiming scores of Jews in downtown
Buenos Aires. Investigations of police complicity were
aborted by the Menem regime. Israel ‘overlooked’
Menem’s “negligence” and instead exploited Jewish fear
to offer extremely favorable terms for Argentine Jews
to immigrate (including paid travel, subsidized
housing in the occupied territories – education, jobs
etc.).67 The decline of left-wing activity during
the1980’s and 1990’s was accompanied by the
de-radicalization of secular Jewish offspring,
especially in the professional classes. With
de-industrialization, Jews, who had formed the
backbone of the previous progressive national
bourgeoisie, turned to emigration, finance, real
estate and Zionism.68 The severe depression and
financial crash of 2001-2002 led to the mass
impoverishment of all Argentines (poverty levels hit
50% in December 2001-2002) including otherwise
prosperous middle class Jews.69 They joined the
popular mass neighborhood assemblies calling for the
return of their savings, the end of neo-liberal
policies and politicians and the restoration of their
jobs. Faced with the leftist regimes in Venezuela,
Bolivia and Ecuador opposed to US and Israeli colonial
wars and with Brazil and Argentina’s public opposing
Israel’s crimes in Gaza, Israel launched its US and
Latin American agents on a propaganda blitz to counter
the overwhelming public rejection of Israeli policies.
President Shimon Peres followed a disastrous failed
tour by thuggish Zio-fascist Foreign Minister
Lieberman, gaining trade and investment concessions in
Brazil and Argentina.72 Peres’s visit benefited
especially through the contacts and leverage of local
millionaire and billionaire Zionist business leaders.
Nevertheless, Brazil, which has major trade and
investment ties especially in gas and oil with Iran,
has no intention of pandering to Israel.73 In
Argentina, the Zionist connection continues to limit
any major openings to the Arab-Iranian investments.
Jewish-Zionist Cultural-Political Hegemony
in the US Jewish Zionist hegemony over the political
narrative in the US has grown in recent years,
evidenced by the support or, at most, tepid criticism,
found in the major literary and political journals and
magazines.76 In the beginning the ZPC imposed their
view that Israeli conquest and wars against the native
people of Palestine and its Muslim neighbors was a war
of “national liberation” or “independence”. This first
phase culminated with Jewish-Zionist success in
convincing President Johnson to cover up Israel’s
bombing of the USS Liberty during the Seven Day War.77
From 1970-90, Zionist-Jewish hegemony extended from
its traditional bastion in the film, TV and radio mass
media to a whole series of former left-of-center and
conservative weekly and monthly publications and the
establishment of new publications on the far right.78
The formerly liberal New Republic became a pulpit for
virulent attacks on any critics of Israel.79
Commentary, formerly a liberal cultural journal,
became a mouthpiece for neo-conservative apologists of
Israeli wars … and war crimes. The conservative
National Review moved firmly into the ‘Israel First’
camp, purging any critical dissent on Israel and its
unconditional supporters in the US. As Zionist
hegemony in intellectual and popular cultural print
and mass media was established, committed
Israel-Firsters gained influential positions in US
State Department and foreign policy apparatus.80
“Think Tanks”, thinly veiled propaganda mills,
produced pro-Israel position papers.81 Their staff
elbowed their way into the mass media as “experts” and
into foreign policy advisory positions serving various
politicians and Administrations. They rose to the
highest levels of government in the Clinton
Administration and expanded further during the
Bush-Obama regimes.82 Zionist entry into key positions
of structural political power mirrored their long
march through the cultural institutions. Their
influence was reinforced by billionaire
Jewish-Zionists’ contributions to established think
tanks, like the Brookings Institute, and to both
political parties. Contributions influenced the
nominations and candidates for office from local
mayors to the Presidency of the United States. Even today, at the end of the first year of the
Obama regime, the Zionist presence in strategic
positions in foreign policy making has been ignored by
leftist and liberal critics of US Middle East policy.
Few, if any critics, look at the structural
determinants of that policy. One is more likely to
find “data” in the business press. For example, an
article in the Financial Times, criticizing President
Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s
“inconsistent” position on Israeli settlements in
Palestine’s West Bank, points to the “…problems with
the administrations message – including its
inconsistent policy on Israel-Palestine – can be
traced back to the White House, where Chief of Staff
Rahm Emanuel (dual Israeli-US citizen) keeps a firm
grip on foreign policy. Some ex-diplomats say they
have never seen power so centralized … Mrs. Clinton’s
own deputy, Jim Steinberg, is widely perceived as a
White House enforcer, who polices even relatively
minor policy statements that often leaves State
Department spokesmen (sic) mouthing near meaningless
talking points.”86 Emanuel has been active in the
Israeli military and is suspected of ties to its spy
agency (MOSSAD). Steinberg is just a high powered
“native born” Israel Firster, marginalizing the State
Department from any alternative policies to pandering
to Israel and its US Fifth Column. The point is that not even the Israeli-Jewish
majority’s embrace of a totalitarian final solution
shakes Zionist hegemony in the US. The embrace of
inconvenient positions, such as genocide approval, is
not publicized in the Zionist mass media. Instead we
continue to hear the chattering classes mouthing the
clichés of a “dialogue” and “negotiated solution”
between the expropriators and the dispossessed. The question of Zionist cultural and political
hegemony, where it is even been acknowledged by
non-Jews and Jews, revolves around several mistaken
partially distorted conceptions. One key idea held by
anti-Semites and Zionists alike is that Jews possess
special qualities (“blood” or “genetic”). Many cite
the importance of a Jewish historical tradition, which
emphasizes education and learning. Others still, claim
success and power comes from knowledge, merit and
achievement. Recent studies refute the idea of a
special, unique Jewish “gene pool” – as most
contemporary Ashkenazi Jews are descendants of Central
Asian Khazari converts to Judaism in the 8th Century
A.D., who subsequently were pushed into Eastern Europe
and beyond by the Mongols.88 Israelis are not
descendants of the ancient Jews of Israel, many of
whom converted to Christianity and later Islam and
whose descendants are most certainly the modern-day
Palestinians (as conceded by early Zionists
myth-makers, like David Ben-Gurion). Equally questionable is the notion that the rise of
Jewish-Zionist hegemony is a product of “merit” or
“achievement.” But here we must distinguish between
the mass of Jews who occupy middle or lower
middle-class positions in society and those few
individuals who have made major contributions.
Moreover, it is important to not confuse the rise of
individuals to economic power through the exploitation
of labor, the extraction of rent from tenants and
speculation and achievement through “merit,” namely,
skills applied to advancing knowledge for the greater
good of working people. Zionists’ “superior race”
theorists lump successful Wall Street speculators with
innovative scholars as examples of “Jewish
superiority” justifying or “explaining” hegemony.
Zionist race theories, which claim a homogeneous
‘Jewish’ people bound by common history and horizontal
and vertical ties, is more an ideological manifesto
ignoring profound class and even ideological divisions
(at least in the past and perhaps emerging today). Jewish-Zionist hegemony in the US is the result of
a supra or meta-historical mythology with mystical
religious foundations in the Old Testament. The rise
of American Zionism is tied to a virulent exclusivist
tribal religious loyalty to Israel as the “mother
state.” The driving force of US Zionism is the
subordination of US civil society organizations and
the instrumentalization of the US military and
economic resources to service Israeli colonial
expansion and projections of power in the Middle East. What needs to be understood is that the present
subjection of our Middle East policy to the Zionist
Power Configuration is a result of the latter’s
accumulation of power and political-cultural
conditions within the US, which weakened the
articulation of alternative values and policies and a
defense of American working class interests embodied
in a democratic foreign policy. The Decline of US National Identity and
Working Class Politics The rise of Zionism, as a virulent form of
tribal-religious identity linked to a foreign state
and its successful exercise of hegemony within US
society, has been facilitated by the abdication by the
US ruling class ‘establishment’ of any ‘national’
identity and its interlocking economic ties with
Zionist power brokers in strategic economic sectors. The “globalization” of US capitalism, the process
of world wide empire building, has shifted the focus
of the US ruling class toward international issues, as
the center of its concerns, even as it intervenes in
domestic economic policies to secure state protection,
subsidies and bailouts, none which trespass on Zionist
priorities. Going “global” and the emergence of
“global consciousness” has worked against challenging
the Zionist pursuit of the colonial agenda of the
state of Israel. The ZPC has filled a ‘power vacuum’
left by the ‘globalized elite’ and has been able to
instill and impose a Zionist conception of US
“national interest” relatively uncontested. The rise of the Zionist business elites into the
top echelon of investment banking, financial
institutions, real estate and insurance led to the
inter-mixing of Zionist and non-Zionist members of the
ruling class, in which one side had a deep and abiding
political commitment to Israel, while the other sector
gave exclusive primacy to the accumulation of wealth
and guaranteeing that state economic policy ensured
profits, a deregulated financial sector and bank
bailouts, policies which they shared with their
Zionist partners. Given the low salience of Israeli
politics, the non-Zionist sectors of the ruling class
were not willing or able to engage in a fight with
their Zionist financial colleagues.91 The political class, party leaders, executive and
congress people, have also eschewed pro-American
working class economic policies, endogenous growth and
the avoidance of foreign entanglements
(interventionism). The political class – particularly
its dominant sector – favors military driven empire
building – undermining any popular democratic
definition of ‘national interest’. Moreover, the
military nature of empire building resonates with the
Zionist-Israeli projection of regional military power
and hegemony. Military-driven imperialism weakens any
effort to develop alternative US overseas economic
interests and policies, especially with Moslem and
Middle East oil countries, to counter Israeli-Zionist
policies designed to privilege Israeli military
expansion and colonial interests. If the majority of the US ruling class has
surrendered to the Zionist definitions of US Middle
East policy, and facilitated the rise of Zionist
hegemony, the decline of the values embedded in
working class solidarity and defense of republican
virtues and interests has opened the door for the
minority of Zionist cadres to influence mass culture
and civil society organizations and divert American
trade union pension funds to Israeli investments with
no opposition. For decades, predominantly
Afro-American and Hispanic female workers in garments,
textiles and related activities have been members of
trade unions run by Zionist functionaries, who
channeled hundreds of millions of member pension funds
and dues into purchasing Israel bonds, rather than
building co-operative housing as was done previously
when the union workers were mostly Jews. Many current
(minority) leaders of trade unions and Afro-Hispanic
ethnic organizations have been co-opted by the ZPC
though junkets to Israel and subject to propaganda
campaigns promoting Israeli interests. In
universities, municipal politics, professional
associations, Israel Firsters operate to stifle any
debate, let alone criticism, of Israeli war crimes.
Zionists in America are the most pernicious force
eliminating debate on American democratic foreign
policy options in the Middle East and favoring
unconditional submission to Israel. Millions of
individuals, who may question the “Israel First”
option, are frightened, intimidated and/or unwilling
to face the onslaught of organized, zealous
Zionist-Jewish notables, who can and will influence
their employers and jeopardize their jobs and
promotions. Conclusion: Alternatives to Zionist
Hegemony In other countries, especially where independent
class conscious trade unions, autonomous and organized
anti-Zionist professional and academic groups exist,
Zionist power in civil society is contested,
challenged and its heinous blackballing of critics is
weakened. Where internationalist movements are strong,
as in support for Palestinian resistance to Israeli
colonialism, the local ZPC has not been able to use
their economic power and media ownership to impose
their hegemony over civil society. This is especially
true in those locales where the international
solidarity movement is active in impacting society. While there are pockets of international solidarity
among some universities and trade unions in the US,
especially the dock and warehouse workers in San
Francisco, the major potential counterweight to
Zionist Israel First hegemony in the US would be in a
revival of patriotic working class consciousness.
America’s “special relation” with Israel has been at
an enormous cost to the working class, amounting to
over $1.5 trillion dollars in foreign aid, loan
guarantees, hijacked technological innovations, lost
overseas investment opportunities, not to mention the
wars on Israel’s behalf and the lost lives in fighting
Israel’s war in Iraq. There is a ‘material base’ for a
mass patriotic working people’s revolt against the
crass submission of the entire political class to the
ZPC and its patrons in Tel-Aviv. But today, tens of
millions of Americans are disillusioned with
“patriotic” appeals, whose purpose is to promote
imperial wars (including ironically wars for Israel)
at the expense of their living standards. Right wing
pro-capitalist politicians use patriotic rhetoric to
deflect attention from the domestic failures of
capitalism and the massive transfers of wealth to
Goldman-Sachs and other Wall Street speculators. The
devaluation of “patriotism” is evident in the right
wing’s perverse manipulation of ‘nationalism’ to turn
native born workers against immigrant workers, instead
of against the ZPC’s costly pro-Israel agenda. This,
in turn, hinders the growth of a national popular
movement against the Wall Street speculators at home
and the wars for Israel and Empire abroad. What is striking about the lack of mass based
movements against Wall Street is the fact that
literally less than 5% of the population even trusts
the financial sector. A vast outpouring of letters and
protests denounced Obama’s initial bank bailout plan,
forcing a temporary postponement. Unorganized mass
resentment persists and is smoldering, waiting for
effective popular organization. Likewise, family and relatives of the Zionist power
configuration, in and out of the government, who
promote US wars for Israel in the Middle East, are
rarely to be found in the Armed Forces, least of all
at the frontlines (or for that matter in any war
zone). If we exclude non-Zionist Jews – mostly
immigrants from the former Eastern Bloc and USSR – the
figure would be one-thirtieth of one percent. It is a
biting irony that more American Zionists are more
eager to join the Israeli ‘Defense’ Forces than to put
on an American uniform. Yet Zionists in public office,
in the Pentagon, executive branch and the White House,
who design and promote war policies and
military-driven sanctions, are in the forefront of
shedding American working class lives, especially now
when jobless American workers, including many
minorities, are forced to seek employment in the
military. A soldier’s anti-war movement could be
organized and energized under the banner: “A Zionist
war is a not the American workers’ fight” if the left
and pacifists were not so beholden to their Jewish
colleagues ‘sensibilities.” The anti-war leaders have
been reluctant to raise the issue of the Zionist/
Israeli influence in promoting US war policies. Genuine patriotic solidarity is weak at the top and
bottom, lacking any meaningful recall of our
anti-colonial, anti-slavery, anti-imperialist and
anti-fascist identity. In contrast, the Zionist
fifth column is driven by a powerful
mythological-tribal race-driven identity, which in
some cases is religious driven and in others embedded
in a deep-rooted secular sense of racial superiority. Israeli hegemony, embedded in a Zion-centric
cultural universe, has not been challenged by
Anglo-America’s flaccid intellectuals. Their
intellectual cowardice is covered by a thin veneer of
“cosmopolitan” impotence. Their pusillanimous silence
and even complicity is intended to ‘protect the
sensitivities’ of their Zionist colleagues regarding
any forthright critique of Zionist power in America.
Only a revived working class movement, which recovers
its historical memory of class solidarity and inspires
the popular imagination with an independent American
republic free from foreign dictates, will be able to
displace Zionist hegemony and Wall Street pillage.94
Our study raises several central questions that
need to be addressed by Americans concerned about
Zionist power and hegemony over public debate
regarding US wars for Israel in the Middle East. Can we oppose Israeli war crimes and expansion and
US government support of Israel by confronting the
ZPC? Can we open a debate on US, Middle East policy by
fighting Zionist authoritarianism, witch hunts and
hate crimes? Can we discuss and propose a democratic foreign
policy, which opposes military intervention, sanctions
and economic blockades, by tackling American
militarists and Israel’s foreign agents? If we answer in the affirmative, what can be done? What practical measures can be pursued and
supported? We can educate the American public about the Obama
regime’s charade – of talking peace to the American
people while supporting the Israeli war machine; of
talking about an evenhanded Middle East policy while
appointing committed Zionists to top policy positions.
We can demand the Justice Department enforce the
Foreign Agents Registration Act toward the ‘51
Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations’ and
especially AIPAC. We should oppose all dual citizens’ appointments to
key policy-making posts. We should demand that Undersecretary of Treasury
and Israel Firster Stuart Levey be investigated and
prosecuted for gross malfeasance of office for his
refusal to investigate the illegal billion-dollar
money laundering operations by US Zionists in the
funding of illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank
and for his promotion of economic sanctions against
trade with Iran, which have cost US workers thousands
of jobs and the crippled US economy billions of
dollars in lost trade. We should oppose military and economic aid to
Israel, especially when the average per capita income
of Israeli’s exceeds that of 40% of Americans. We should demand the end of trade privileges for
Israel in light of the US’ multi-billion dollars trade
deficit with Israel, which has destroyed tens of
thousands of American jobs in industry and services. We should combat widespread Zionist hate
propaganda, organized and publicized by the ZPC,
against Muslin Americans and Arab American, their
cultural foundations and charities. We should demystify Zionist claims that the Jews’
ancestral homeland is Israel, rather then North Africa
and Central Asia, and that there is no historic basis
for the Right of Return. We should support the class and popular struggle
against finance, real estate and insurance
billionaires (Wall Street) for their pillage of the
American economy and exploitation of American workers
and for their corruption of American politicians to
serve their interests and US and Israeli war
aims. |
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