Don't ask, don't tell Israeli style
 

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


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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?

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Interesting.

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...

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.

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

https://qpesxw.bay.livefilestore.com...umb%5B6%5D.gif

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

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?

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.

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....

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.

-- 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.

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.

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, read the op"


- Which?

op = original post

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?

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.

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."

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?

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?

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

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

-- 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.

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.

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 :)

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.

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.

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.

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.

meanwhile, back in the reality of apartheid:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/28/wo...ef=global-home

disconnected?
i don't think so.


=====
edit:

polar--i don't really have an iron in that fire.
i really don't.

So the best way to handle the discussion is to...change the subject?

I assumed the veiled threat would be self evident.
There are no "best sources" on this, because anyone speaking on the record about plans by Israel to attack Iran with nuclear weapons would be guilty of espionage. I don't understand why, in your mind, anonymous is comparable to "unreliable".
I'm glad that in your opinion your opinions are concrete, but not everyone has the same lack of skepticism for your arguments. You name the Downing Street Memos? I'll raise you Deep Throat. He was anonymous until the age of 91, but he managed to blow the lid off one of the largest political scandals of the decade.

Anyway, the journalist is responsible for vetting the claims of an anonymous source, and it's trust in that journalist, not the anonymous source, that earns a claim veracity.

Still, all of this journalism 101 aside, you need to look at this within a wider context. Israel secretly developed nuclear weapons either on their own or with the help of the US in order to defend itself from it's neighbors. Seems innocent enough, right? Well things aren't so clear. Israel has a history of preemptive and asymmetrical warfare.

Go back several months and we see Israel attack Gaza, breaking a 6 month cease-fire (a.k.a the 2008 Lull), on dubious intel that Hamas militants were running gunmen into Israel (this was November 5, 2008, iirc). Hamas of course retaliated with a few missiles. Israel proceeded to bomb Gaza, not just attacking government and military, but civilian buildings. Mosques, hospitals, homes, and schools were targeted. 1,166 to 1,417 Palestinians (officially) died, most of whom were civilian non-combatants. I believe 13 Israelis died.

Go back a year and some change and we see Israel attack Lebanon. Lebanese Hezbollah terrorists kidnapped 3 Israeli soldiers with the intent of trading them for Hezbollah prisoners, a common practice. Israel responded by launching huge bombing campaigns and invading Lebanon, killing over 1000 Lebanese, again targeting civilian infrastructure and again mostly killing civilian non-combatants.

I'm not saying Israel doesn't have a right to defend itself. It does. It doesn't have the right to launch asymmetrical attacks on civilian targets, especially in response to what are relatively small offenses. All they do is aid their enemies by providing them new, angry and heartbroken recruits. And they lose my trust.

uh..polar: if you remember, i was putting up information about the israeli settlements in the west bank almost from the outset in this thread. i explained why i was doing it, why i thought it important. it just happened that i saw the article i posted in the times after i posted what i expected to be my last in the sequence, which was the post above.


to be clear: willravel and i are separate people.
i don't find the same things interesting as he does.
in this case, my main contention is that the iran "threat" functions to frame israel as a potential victim---i see this as a bit of symbolic politicking. i also contend that the central issue concerning israel is the settlement program and by extension the treatment of palestine. i've already explained why this is the case.
this is the line i am pursuing here.
it just seems to have turned out that i was right in suspecting a linkage between the stories about iran and the politics surrounding the settlements--which follows given the far-right coalition that netanyahu has had to enter into in order to govern. he's paying the piper.

It's true. He has a beard while I am clean-shaven.
My main contention, on the other hand, is more about the general state of the Israeli government's asymmetrical offense-as-defense strategy and how that plays into Israel having nuclear weapons. While I'll be glad to talk your ear off about Palestine and Lebanon in order to frame that strategy, my contention is less about politics and more about military strategy. It's not that roach and I disagree on the issue, we're just coming at it from different angles.

You forget Willravel, Deep Throat provided hard copy documentation to Woodward and Bernstien. He wasn't just a voice. He was a voice with official documentation.


As far as them breaking the six-month cease-fire, you apparently feel that rocket attacks into Israeli civilian centers isn't breaking a cease fire. That has nothing to do with nukes, however.

As far as kidnapping soldiers (an act of war) being a common practice, that only shows that Israel has shown restraint. And you forget that at least one soldier was killed during the kidnapping process. Again, an act of war. Again, this has nothing to do with nukes.

As far as "asymetrical attacks on civilian targets" those targets were where Hamas was launching rockets. Using civilians as shields in contemptable.

Willravel, most of your post is propoganda, period. Kidnappings, suicide bombings and rocket launches into Israeli civilian centers are ignored by you.

Instead you focus on the response. Hamas worked and fired rockets out of schools, hospitals, apartment complexes, etc. Israel did indeed rightfully return fire to those sites. Hamas more responsible for civilian deaths than Israel is.

Roachboy, you did indeed put the west bank settlement information at the start of the thread. It just had nothing to do with the topic of the thread. That is my point.

polar--i don't think you get to dictate what is and is not the logic along which a thread develops. if you start your own thread, then you can control it as you like. in this case, there are perfectly reasonable explanations for going in the direction i have gone--if you want to debate them, fine--but otherwise it's just a stone that you'll have to carry around with you.

speaking of data that's empirically suspect cited without any sources: how about your ludicrous claim concerning relative deaths caused by israel and hamas? where'd that howler come from? from under your hat i expect.

Sometimes, but again this is about the verifiable evidence being provided to the journalist so that the journalist can test the validity of the source's claims. Once the journalist or journalists are satisfied with the veracity of the claims, they publish. We don't know who Uzi Mahnaimi spoke to in the Israeli military, only that the source spoke to the journalist and was able to pass the journalist's test. Ultimately it's not going to be about verifying the information by contacting the sources because they'd be charged with espionage. It's a question of whether or not you trust Uzi Mahnaimi and by extension the Sunday Times.
Your time line is wrong.
You're off base here. Hezbollah cannot commit an act of war because Hezbollah is not a government, it's a terrorist organization. Lebanon did not kidnap anyone and they immediately offered to help. Unfortunately, Israel was more than willing to attack an entire country over the acts of a few very foolish terrorists. I wonder where they learned that from.
You need to do homework before posting stuff like this, because it weakens your case. On January 15th, Israel launched white phosphorus (illegal) ammunition into the UN headquarters in Gaza, which has been confirmed to not have any Hamas militants. The facility did have Palestinian refugees, food, medicine, and UN workers.
UN headquarters in Gaza hit by Israeli 'white phosphorus' shells - Times Online
I find it deeply ironic that as you parrot Fox News talking points you accuse me of spreading propaganda. I look forward to you failing to refute the articles I posted.

US-Israel relations hit low after Jewish state rejects Obama demand | World news | guardian.co.uk

so the cross-chatter between these two stories continues to reveal itself by default--the floating of "news" concerning the iranian nuclear program and potential threats to israel this time is obvious linked to a deteriorating relation between the united states and israel over exactly the question of settlement and "outpost" expansion---which are fundamental to any hope of ending israeli occupation of the west bank, setting up a palestinian state.

since all this stuff floats around in the infotainment sphere of the net, bouncing around under the auspices of wire service subscriptions, context is routinely stripped away. in this case, the context i have in mind is the immediate context for the fashioning of certain stories, the timing of their release, the implications of that release and so forth. wire service stories simply show up--information is either inside or outside the streams they constitute--a degree of neutrality is assumed along with their presence within the stream, as if there is some vetting that accompanies admission.

perhaps the problem is not so much there as it is in the nature of infotainment gathering itself. perhaps the budget-constrained need for more continuous infotainment, preferably already packaged is an ongoing Problem.

we've seen the effects of again and again--witness the appalling "news" coverage in the early phases of the iraq war, which only appeared to end when information that compromised the institutions of infotainment relay themselves surfaced and the extent to which the media apparatus in the united states had allowed itself to become a simple relay for bush administration information/disinformation---we know about this, but somehow we want to trust infotainment so we forget about it, put it aside.

this criss-crossing of story lines looks an awful lot like disinformation--a type of disinformation--the creation of an interpretive fog as a result of putting into play mutually exclusive narratives, each of which activates an image of israel that precludes the other---israel threatened by iran, which has the advantage of being one of the principal bush administration bogeymen of choice--and israel the colonial occupier which refuses--as it has refused---to do ANYTHING to stop the ongoing annexation of palestinian land in the west bank. this annexation--and it's implications--are THE primary underlying causes of conflict in the region--above and beyond anything else.

but what are we who read this stuff supposed to make of it?

the information as to source, context etc. is simply absent from the stories. if this same stuff was broadcast on television, chances are you'd see footage of people in suits entering and leaving important-looking doorways bookending stock footage of iran, stock footage of israel-being-threatened and maybe a map or some such.

we really are being fed nothing but bullshit, if you think about it.

quite a democracy we have here, ain't it?

the nature of information streams determines the nature of debate which determines the ability and inability of the polity to make meaningful decisions. we have no such ability. we're just being managed.

Anonymous sources providing information to The Sunday Times about Israeli nuclear capability want to be anonymous because they don't want to become the next Mordechai Vanunu. It should also be noted that The Sunday Times is different from The Times and should probably be considered a trustworthy enough source. If they hadn't believed and published Vanunu's story back in 1986 we would be a lot less certain of Israel's capacity.