Tully Mars

Don't ask, don't tell Israeli style-


Story

Does anyone believe Israel does not have nukes?

Maybe they're pulling a Saddam and acting like they have them when they really don't?

Personally I think they have them and they likely got the technology from the US.

Without them, or at least the threat of them, would they have a harder time surviving in the hostile environment they exist?

Anyone think Obama's going to have better luck with middle east peace then any of his predecessors?

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loquitur

1. I'm pretty sure the Israelis have a nuke arsenal.

2. They are simultaneously pulling a Saddam, or trying to, by refusing to say one way or the other publicly.

3. I remember reading (I forget where) that Israel somehow pirated fissile material from the US and then presented the US with a fait accompli in some secret talks. I wish I could remember the details.

4. They have a hard enough time surviving as it is now, and it would be worse if they didn't have nukes. The one comfort Israel's neighbors have is that Israel is very unlikely to use them unless the country was at immediate threat of extinction (as distinct from, say, al-Qaeda or some of teh "rejectionist" states that would use them in a heartbeat if they had them).

5. Obama will fail just like everyone else. The problem isn't solvable now and won't be for at least another 10-20 years. He's an ambitious guy, and since this is the world's most intractable conflict, it seems irresistible to him to try to solve it. He won't succeed. The conflict will end when we have a source of endlessly renewable clean energy, thereby rendering the Middle East much less interesting and removing the Arab states' leverage over everyone else. When that happens, the Palestinians will be about as interesting to the rest of the world as the Tamils in Sri Lanka were.

Willravel

Does anyone believe Israel does not have nukes?
I doubt it.
Maybe they're pulling a Saddam and acting like they have them when they really don't?
Only Saddam wasn't our only and best regional ally. No, we either gave them nuclear weapons or were complicit in some way in their construction.
Without them, or at least the threat of them, would they have a harder time surviving in the hostile environment they exist?
The Israeli war machine is perfectly capable of fighting a simultaneous war with any 5 Arab nations.
Anyone think Obama's going to have better luck with middle east peace then any of his predecessors?
I'd love to see Obama take a crack at Oslo Accord 2: The Reckoning, but he's got his hands full. You know what would be cool? Send Hillary, give her a chance to earn her liberal chops back after bitching out on healthcare.

guy44

A) I don't even know what that means
B) I'm not usually the word police, but that seems like a really skeezy use of the word "bitch"

As for the OP, yes, Obama is going to fail. US-Israeli relations are at their lowest point since...I dunno, a very long time. Probably since the Suez Canal made the headlines every day. My guess is that Bibi and the Likudniks will have to crash and burn before the relationship improves substantially. Luckily, this is Israeli politics we're talking about, so that could happen any day now.

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roachboy

israel has nuclear weapons.

israel is in no danger from it's neighbors.

as for whether obama's administration is able to make headway in stopping the settlements, taking down those that exist, ending the system of checkpoints that impede the movement of palestinians, ending the ban on circulation into and out of jerusalem---it's possible, but it would require playing hardball with the israelis, who are in a weak position after the gaza atrocity. this despite the likud/extreme right coalition that is for the moment in power. but i do think progress is possible, so long as the administration is willing to break with the rubber-stamp relationship that the united states has had to anything and everything israel does, particularly over the past 8 years.

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Willravel

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/12/ny.../12donate.html
"Bitch out" means to not do something out of fear. It's a more vulgar version of "chicken out". I wasn't calling Hillary Clinton a bitch, just like Barack Obama wasn't called Sarah Palin a pig. It's a turn of phrase.

ObieX

I couldn't say either way if they have them or not. If they do have them they stole them (plans and/or the refined nuclear material) from the US or some other nation and did not build them entirely themselves.

As for Obama being able to make peace between Israel and Palestine, it won't happen. You can't make peace between two parties that don't want peace. I think its pretty obvious at this point that neither side does. They want war and that's what they've been getting.

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roachboy

actually, i changed my mind.

i just found this essay which outlines the numbers and locations of palestinian refugees--which in this context is obviously not a neutral category.

http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-111657-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html

i figure it might be useful to build information on these matters...so that's what i'll do.
the informational hole that surrounds the actual conditions under which palestinians live is pretty deep.

http://www.idrc.ca/en/ev-111711-201-1-DO_TOPIC.html


all kinds of strange opinions can grow in spaces which are this information-free.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

dippin

One of the key reasons the US cannot admit that Israel has nukes is because anyone who acquires nukes outside of the non-proliferation treaty is barred from receiving foreign aid from the US because of the Foreign Assistance Act. In that case, foreign aid to Israel would require some sort of special authorization and would have some restrictions, as is the case in Pakistan.

Tully Mars

Interesting.

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ASU2003

jimmy carter israel nuclear weapons - Yahoo! Search Results

I'm not saying you should believe him or not, but I think it sounds about right.

Now, I'm pretty sure this has something to do with the fact that Israel hasn't been attacked by it's neighbors offensively in 35 years...

Polar

Of course Israel has nukes.


But to their credit they have never threatened to use them against a neighbor as a first strike or as a lever for a political agenda.


Israel has also been attacked by people whose sole purpose was to wipe them off the map and they didn't use them to defend themselves.


They have proven to be a responsible member of the Nuclear Brotherhood.


Meanwhile we have countries that are striking to get nukes (do you really think Iran wants nuclear power just to power their homes?) who are threatening Israel's existance.

roachboy

gee, why would a country want to provide power for homes?


here's a map from last year showing israeli settlements in the west bank and something of the infrastructure surrounding them



there are more detailed maps, but they're too big to post directly.
this for example:

http://mappery.com/maps/Jewish-Settl...t-Bank-Map.jpg

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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

Gosh Roachboy, what a swell map.

What exactly does it have to do with Israel having nukes?





"gee, why would a country want to provide power for homes?"


- Are you talking about that country with one of the largest oil reserves in the Middle East?
Do you REALLY believe that Iran wants nuclear power solely for generating electricity to its citizens?

Willravel

Economics 101: if you have something that's worth a shitload of money and you want to sell it, use as little of it as you can in order to maximize profits.

Baraka_Guru

For starters, Iran exports twice as much oil as it consumes, and nearly all of its power is generated by fossil fuels. Of what little hydro generation they have, they export nearly as much as they import. Natural gas? They export nearly on par to imports.

And who isn't going nuclear for energy these days? Look at China...France....

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roachboy

polar...

the map of settlements on the west bank is interesting.
the bigger one is even more swell.

in order for the obama administration to make headway, it needs to acknowledge the realities of life under occupation, the realities of what israel has been doing (with american support, tacit and explicit) in the west bank, in gaza---and jerusalem (even as this raises even more questions than does the settlement programs)...doing that means that israel is no longer viewed as some imperiled little state, but instead as a regional military superpower that presides over an illegal and brutal colonialism, that presides over a de facto apartheid system..

the iran bogeyman is self-evidently part of the way of framing israel as other than it really is.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

-- You are absolutely correct BG. But China and France both have had Nukes for decades and have never threatened to use them on their on their neighbors.

Perhaps Iran wouldn't run into the resisitance it is seeing if they weren't promising the certain demise of Israel.




Roachboy, with all due respect, your argument will only have a point if/when Israel threatens to use nukes on the Palestinians.

If you want to change this thread to the non-nuclear policies of Israel, fine, but you are changing the topic of the thread none the less.

If you are going to argue that Israel shouldn't have nukes because of the Palestinians, then you are going to have to make the same arguement for China due to Tibet and the treatment of it's own people, Russia due to Georgia, Chechnya and others, and even the US due to its invasion and occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Otherwise it is selective outrage.

roachboy

polar: read the op.



edit

to make my position a bit more clear than maybe it is: i don't see this thread as geared around questions of realities on the ground--information about that dimension of israeli politics is surprisingly difficult to come by---which explains the tack i decided to take here. instead, i see this as being about how israel is framed in the press. that's why it is apparent to me that the linkages between iran as potential nuclear threat and israel as potential victim are in significant measure politically motivated.

so the idea is to tamper with the framing.
things follow in a pretty straight line from that.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Willravel

Israel doesn't need to nuke Palestine, the current strategy to expel them from the area is working just fine.

Anyway, Israel has threatened to use nuclear weapons against Iran, as a response to Iran's alleged nuclear program.
Israel Threaten Iran With Nukes Pak Alert Press

Polar

"polar, read the op"


- Which?

Derwood

op = original post

Polar

Willravel, you need to re-read the article you posted.


Perez calls for others to nuke Iran and only IF Iran used nukes first. He does NOT call for nuking Iran as a first strike. Never even implied it.


Now tell me, which nuclear power on earth HASN'T said it would respond to nukes with nukes?

---------- Post added at 02:00 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:57 PM ----------

Roach, I re-read the original post.


Discusses Israel and the fact they likely have nukes.


........and?

roachboy

Anyone think Obama's going to have better luck with middle east peace then any of his predecessors?

depends how you stack things up logically, i suppose. if you think that numerical order is the same as logical order, then i can see the confusion. it's like thinking that alphabetical order is more than a convention though. but whatever. back to the thread.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Willravel

The article is perfectly clear assuming you understand that Israel has nuclear weapons. Because Perez can't just come out and say, "OH, btw, we're nuclear", he has to mince his words ever so slightly.

And they're not saying they will "respond to nukes with nukes", they're saying, "You even developing nuclear weapons warrants a nuclear attack."

roachboy

the point i'm trying to make here is that there are any number of ways to frame israel as a political matter. you'd think that after the gaza atrocities the focus would be more on moving forward with creating a viable palestine--which would require the dismantling of the settlements in the west bank and their attending military/colonial infrastructure. but placing the emphasis on this situation makes israel into a colonial power. which it is.

placing emphasis on a perceived threat to israel from iran keeps israel in the role of potential victim, which is consistent with the fantasy-image of israel that's been used repeatedly to rationalized unconditional support from the american state for anything that israel does. it also enables a continual looking-the-other-way on problems that related to palestine--which aren't going away---and which constitute the single most important underlying threat to the region--because much of the hostility directed at israel follows from it's treatment of palestinians. theres no way around this, politically or logically.

if you separate this manipulation of the meaning of israel (how it functions as a signifier, which is altered by the contexts that are layed over it) and think about iran...

i support the obama administration's approach to iran. i am hoping--as i suppose most folk are---that ahmadinejad looses in the coming elections and is replaced with someone who doesn't play the same game. the paradox of the dick-waving approach to iran used by the bush people and manipulated by the israeli right for it's own purposes is that it simultaneously decries ahmadinejad's administration while providing it EXACTLY the conditions it requires to stay in power.

so it seems to me that if anyone is seriously concerned with what the iranians may or may not be doing with their nuclear program, they would support an approach that doesn't play straight into maintaining the political conditions that make of it a real or imaginary Problem.


of course, the other hilarious, counter-intuitive aspect of this game is that israel is a nuclear power...but iran is the problem. so the israeli nuclear arsenal is not understood as destabilizing...how does that work?

o i know i know: they haven't said much about it--but they can't (see dippin's post above)...what does that change?

nuclear weapons are in themselves a bad bad idea. it'd be better if every last one of them was taken apart, instructions for building them erased.

and if you're worried about the consequences of nuclear proliferation, why bother dwelling on imaginary scenarios with iran when you can fret about quite real scenarios involving pakistan?

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

Willravel, here is your entire article:



"Israeli President Shimon Peres says the best way to deter Iran from continuing its nuclear program is to threaten it with a ‘nuclear response’.He accused Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons, saying that a conventional military attack could not halt Tehran’s nuclear program.

“Simply attacking the nuclear facilities is not the be-all and end-all,” Peres told Israel’s Channel Ten on Wednesday.

“There are other options for the West, or the coalition that arises. The first thing is to tell the Iranians … ‘If you use a nuclear weapon — no matter against whom — you’ll get a nuclear response,” Reuters quoted Peres as saying.

“You can destroy the (uranium enrichment) centrifuges but you cannot destroy the knowledge about building centrifuges,” he said.

Israel, which is believed to be the only possessor of nuclear weapons in the Middle East, has repeatedly accused Iran of trying to develop nuclear weapons.

Iran, however, says its nuclear program is for civilian purposes."





-- Kindly point out where exactly it says, in your words, ""You even developing nuclear weapons warrants a nuclear attack."


The first line of the article is misleading at best and does not quote Perez.


Later on in the article, the ACTUAL Perez quote negates the implication of the first line:


“There are other options for the West, or the coalition that arises. The first thing is to tell the Iranians … ‘If you use a nuclear weapon — no matter against whom — you’ll get a nuclear response,” Reuters quoted Peres as saying."


The first line is either poor journalism or intentional misinformation.
In either case, there is NOTHING in the rest of the article which supports your 'interpretation' of what it is saying. No-thing.


Once you read the entire article you realize the first line is actually saying that Perez is calling for the threat of a nulcear response if Iran uses nukes because a conventional bombing (either before it comes to fruition or after Iran used nukes) would not stop their program.


Do you often feel you know everything in an article simply by reading the first line?

Willravel

""Israeli President Shimon Peres says the best way to deter Iran from continuing its nuclear program is to threaten it with a ‘nuclear response’."

Polar

It's good to see that you don't let a little thing like facts get in the way of your position.

Willravel

Israel can't just come out and make threats because that would confirm that they have nuclear weapons and they'd lose their aid from the US. Still, Israel has made it clear that it has drawn up secret plans to destroy Iran’s uranium enrichment facilities with tactical nuclear weapons, a fact that they intentionally leaked to the Sunday Times. Why would they blatantly release such information? As a threat. The same intentionally unsubtle threats can be seen in the article I linked.

Instead of snarky remarks that get us nowhere, let's try and make this constructive.

Tully Mars

Who are you speaking to here? You seemed to have a chip on your shoulder. Any reason for this? I'm trying to follow your reasoning and I think you're making a few valid points here and there. But then your posts just appear to go sideways.

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Polar

You say you don't want 'snarky' comments but all you do is give the first line of the article you provided. A line that is refuted later in the very same article. An article I commented on in length pointing out specifically where you are in error.

The only assumption can be that you could not refute what I said so you chose to simply post the first line of the article again. That is hardly being 'constructive.'

The article given in your blog link is from the UK and provides no source for the 'information' included. "The plans, disclosed to The Sunday Times last week..." Provided by whom? You aren't the least bit concerned about the honesty/veracity of the source? It could even be Israel planting disinformation to further dissuade Iran BECAUSE they have no intention of nuking them first. This is the standard of proof you use?

Tell me, why would this be given to a news outlet in the UK, but not the US? Why haven't any of the US news outlets picked up on it and presented it as fact?

Your article provides no proof, no source, no outside corroboration....no validity.

Willravel

It does. See the green passage, "engage in a preemptive nuclear strike"? That's a link to the source:
Revealed: Israel plans nuclear strike on Iran - Times Online
In journalism, you sometimes finding yourself having to quote anonymous sources to protect their identities. This is one of those cases.
I know the Sunday Times to be reliable.
The same reason many stories break on BBC News before they reach MSNBC, CNN and Fox News. They've got plenty of good journalists over there.

Polar

-- A journalist quoting an 'anonymous source' does not automatically give that anonymous source validity. You have no idea if it is someone out to burn someone else or who has an ax to grind.

I remember the "Downing St. Memos" that were "copies of the original that had been destroyed" (how convenient) brought forth by an 'anonymous source.' That died a quick death.

And the 'anonymous source' who allegedly brought forth actual 1960's documentation from Bush's time in the service. CBS News ran with it, only to find out that the documents were not from the 60s but were typed up in Microsoft Word. That 'anonymous source' vanished and has never been heard from again.

That is why when you are tried you cannot be convicted by an 'anonymous source.' You get to face your accuser.

YOU believe it because you WANT to believe it. You have no proof other than an unvetted, unverified, 'anonymous source.' Good luck with that.

roachboy

and you don't believe it because you don't want to, polar. given the constraints of information flows, how they work, among which is the fact that you have no independent access to the sources that you're demanding from will either....

it seems that you're pursuing a line of argument every point of which applies to your own position as well.

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spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

Roachboy, I would believe it if more than just the Times reported it as fact using an 'anonymous source.'

Do you have any other news outlet pushing this as fact that isn't referencing the Times?

BBC isn't reporting it. Nor is Sky News. Neither is UPI or AP. Or CNN. Or Aljazeera. Or....well, you get my point.

Call them old fashioned. They appear to be waiting for provable facts or a verifiable source.

I have given two of the many examples of 'anonymous sources' ending up being full of crap. And what have you given?......exactly.

Neither you nor Willravel have provided ANYTHING to show this 'anonymous source' is valid or accurate.



I just got an email from a Nigerian government official asking for help getting his money out of Nigeria. Sounds like I should forward it to you

roachboy

actually, polar, you may or may not have noticed that i wasn't taking part in the exchange between you two. i only added something after your last post.

it is strange to see arbitrary standards being set up as arguments against arbitrary standards. and surely you know about wire services and the complication they present for your claim that a degree of "validity" can be imputed to a particular article or factoid via repetition.

the funny thing is that much of your Problem here centers on a paraphrase of the opening line of the article will posted. the paraphrase is not much more than that. anyone who read the article would encounter the qualification that follows a paragraph or two below it.

so i honestly don't know what you're on about here.

it seems a pseudo-problem: maybe that's why your argument ends up going as far as it does, as if by jacking up the rhetoric in your critique you can make your point seem less slight.

it's not working.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

So what you are saying is that both your position and my position carry about the same weight


What you are saying contradicts what Willravel says about the article, though. Perhaps you should be speaking with him.

roachboy

what i'm saying is that the argument about how to interpret the statements in the article isn't going to be resolved by heading down the path you're taking, i don't think. i'm also saying that the problems you point to apply to your own position.

in a classroom, the approach might work: but you'd have to provide other information--not so much the "anonymous source" but contextual information that'd function to make the political lines of the article/interpretation clear. it might work because you'd be building a shared informational pool and could assume that folk in the room were at least talking about the same thing using the same material basis (plus what they bring to it of course)....but the shared pool of information would provide a density of common referencepoints. here, we're trafficking in factoids.

really, we're running into one of the limitations of the messageboard form. articles are presented in more or less isolated form; you can't assume that the people reading either the articles or interpretations have anything like a shared information pool to draw from; you can't really build one because folk don't use these forums in ways that allow for it (you have to modulate how much information you bring into play else folk will shut down...it happens all the time). so things tend to devolve into point/counterpoint tv debate.

if you can figure a way around this, by all means go for it.
i haven't quite worked it out.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Polar

I hear what you are saying, roachboy, but the 'heading down this path' should not necessarily be saved just for me.

On 5/25/ at 10:48am I gave a detailed factual message to Willravel explaining why his assumption of what the article says is incorrect.
His response was to post the first sentence of the article. Nothing more.

Then later, an article basing his entire claim on a single anonymous source. I give two concrete examples as to why anonymous sources should not be considered the best sources. The result is a response from you.

I give concrete reasons why the 'anonymous' source should be doubted. You, like Willravel provide none to assume he should be taken seriously.

Your standard should be applied evenly when calling for a specific type of give and take.