https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQJt8dwvs78
The US-Israel relationship explained | Start Here
Search in videoIntrolet's talk about the US's relationshipwith Israel we stand with Israel I loveIsrael I love Israel the bond betweenour two countries is unbreakable theEternal friendship relationship is veryimportant we are you and you are us it'sa relationship that's always been superclose but it's been getting moreattentionrecently after Hamas attacked Israel onOctober7th and Israel launched its war onGaza the US is moving a tremendous mousamount of Firepower and Manpower as ashow of support to Israel significantincrease in American Support basicallycomparable to a blank check no questionsasked not even a debate now there arelots of layers to the US Israelrelationship and it's tied up in atleast 75 years of pretty complicatedhistory but here are four things to knowthat'll help explain what's behind itwhat's kept it going and where it's at[Music]now the the first thing to know is thatUS support for Israelthe US has supported Israel from thevery beginning the Arab Israel Israeldeclared itself a state in 1948 on landthat had previously been Palestine underBritish control more than 700,000Palestinians fled or were forced fromtheir homes and the US was the firstcountry to recognize Israel PresidentTruman did it just 11 minutes after itscreation the idea of establishing anation for Jewish people had beengaining momentum for decades it was themain goal of a movement called Zionismwhich started in the late 1800s zionistsbelieved that a Jewish homeland was theonly way to ensure safety for Jews who'dsuffered persecution around the worldfor centuries the United States the toDay idea designist idea from the verybeginning it was almost natural that theUnited States would be the first torecognize the existence of the state ofIsrael there was great Sympathy for theZionist project throughout the 1930s and40s for exampleand of course after the Holocaust thatwas combined with enormous Sympathy forthe genocide that was uh carried outagainst the Jewish people in Europe andthat helped pave the way for Western andparticularly American support for theestablishment of a Jewish State theother thing was that President HarryTruman was facing an election and uh hedidn't want to sacrifice any possibleEdge that he could have over hisopponent now something both the US andShared valuesIsrael highlight a lot is the idea ofshared values it can be hard to pin downexactly what those values are but manyUS politicians talk about Israel as theonly democracy in the Middle East a lotof people might criticize this idea thatboth the US and Israel are beacons ofdemocracy but whatever you think aboutthat it's a narrative they both like toemphasize America is a nation ofimmigrants strengthened by diversityenriched by faith were fueled byentrepreneurship and in ation and we aredefined by a democratic discourse so inIsrael we see values that we share theyseem to feel they have an alignment ofvalues that perhaps the United Statesdoesn't feel it has with Muslim nationsin the Middle East and they feel thatIsrael's strategic desires and America'sstrategic desires dovetail umsignificantly and I think that'ssomething that draws them together sohere's the next point to know as well asStrategic Partnersthose shared values the US and Israelare strategic Partners what does thatmean well basically that they both getsomething concrete out of therelationship that serves their Nationalinterest and it really started with theCold War significant news from Russiathat's the period after the second worldwar until the late 1980s when the US andthe Communist Soviet Union werecompeting to be the dominant Globalpower and that rivalry played out in theMiddle East too especially in in EgyptIsrael's neighbor keep in mind that fiveArab countries including Egypt went towar with Israel right after it wascreated colel NASA holds a parade in1955 Egypt's leader Gamal Abdul Nasserbought weapons from the Soviet Union wehave to defend our country againstaggression that shifted the militarybalance in the region against Israel andmarked a new division in the Middle Eastwith that Naser separated himself fromthe west and the Middle East was dividedinto two camps Pro Soviet and proWestern now here's the thing Israel hadbeen asking the US for weapons since1950 it said it needed them to maintaina military Edge over hostile Arabneighbors and in 1962 the US underPresident Kennedy finally agreed Kennedylaid the foundation for what would laterbecome a a closer relationship and onethathad a strategic Dimension that increasedexponentially after the 1967 war whenIsrael not only fended off Arab statesin 6days but also managed to conquer landfrom Jordan Syria and Egypt and withtime Israel started to offer more andmore strategic gains and advantages tothe United States they've gotintelligence gathering abilities thatare pretty efficient and they're alsofunneling a lot of this information backto the United States so what does IsraelMilitary Aidget out of its relationship with the USwell among other things a lot of moneysince the second world war the UnitedStates has given more money to Israelthan any other country about $260billion in total that included economicaid until 2008 but now the us only givesmoney for military spending Israel gets3.8 billion a year as part of a dealsigned by President Obama these Americantaxpayer dollars have helped Israelbuild up one of the most powerfulmilitaries in theworld with the latest American fighterjets and an advanced missile defensesystem called IronDome but one important thing to knowabout the money given to Israel is thatalmost all of it has to be spent in theUS America provides essentially grantsto buy for Israel to buy uh AmericanMilitary Hardware so it's kind of aself-licking ice cream cone really Imean you you give all this money butit's actually spent uh on industriesthat are in Key congressional districtsanother thing about this military aid isthat the US really doesn't attach anyconditions to it either in terms of howthe weapons are used or as a way topressure Israel on any of its policieslike the way it treats Palestinians forexample Israel essentially is given ablank check uh with regard to themilitary hardware thetechnology uh the resources that theUnited States provides um there islittle or noscrutiny theoretically there are laws inplace for example the Ley laws that USmilitary hardware can only be used fordefensive purposes and can't be used uhin violation of of Human Rightsstandards um we've never seen thoseconditions or those Provisions appliedin in the Israeli case so how do weexplain this blank check approach whilePublic Opinionsome of it comes down to domestic uspolitics where generally beingpro-israel pays off politically and oneway to look at that is by looking atpublic opinion on the IsraeliPalestinian issue sympathy for Israelishas consistently pulled higher thansympathy for Palestinians although thegap's been narrowing a bit recentlysomething else to consider is that a bigvoting constituency in the US areEvangelical or born- again Christiansthey make up about about a quarter ofthe US population and they areoverwhelmingly pro Israel Israel is nota political issue it's a Bible issueIsrael is the only nation on earthcreated by a sovereign Act of God Jewishpeople are God's chosen people the Biblesays 55 times that that land shall beIsrael's land forever we are talkingabout a millions of millions of peoplewho believe that what is written in theBible is a pure truth so if God promisedto Abraham that land of Israel would behis and of his descendants then this iswhat should happen another element in USpolitical support for Israel is theinfluence of pro-israel Lobby groupslike APAC now there are differentschools of thought on just how muchinfluence Lobby groups like APACactually have in practice are theyreally shaping policy or are they justpromoting policies already popular withpoliticians and the public whatever thecase us leaders certainly pay attentionwell hello apack what a remarkableremarkable crowd it is wonderful to behere and see so many friends APAC haslong been able to direct funds tocandidates for office on the basis of uhthatcandidate's um attitudes towards Israelespecially in the House ofRepresentatives where you know they'reyou know running for office every 5minutes they need a constant flow ofmoney what the Jewish Israel Lobby do isnot forcing policy on the United Statesas many academics and pundits arearguing they present a policy that theyargue would be preferable to Israel ifthese interests are aligned with theAmerican interest then the United Stateswould go for you so you've got all ofthese elements that feed into the US'srelationship with Israel there's thehistory those shared values strategicinterests religion and Broad public andpolitical support all of this hasCriticismsustained the relationship to the pointwhere some people say it goes prettymuch unchallenged and that's where a lotof the criticism also comes inespecially in the context of Israel'soccupation of Palestinian territory anda system that human rights groups havedescribed as a parid one view of the USIsrael relationship is that it basicallyenables this to the detriment of bothPalestinians and Israelis cuz crucial tothis relationship is that America is theguarantorof Israeli impunity we could not bewhere we are today if America had notgot us to a place where there are nocosts and consequencesinternationally legally in terms ofsanctions at the UN etc for the wayIsrael treats the Palestinians day inday out for generations and I wonder howmuch America is waking up to that so isthe alliance under pressure well it'shard to say but events following theHamas attack on October 7th have put iton full display let there be no doubtthe United States has Israel's backplenty of people are questioning itperhaps more than before Biden You Can'tHide bid Biden you can't hide the UnitedStates of America provides $3.8 billionevery year to Israel we have a right tosay sorry you need a new militarystrategy but whether that will translateinto any tangible change is somethingelse Congress is still overwhelmingly inline with the traditional uh pro-israelstance uh that is largely uncritical andin many cases hostile towardPalestinians a lot will depend on howthe Gaza War plays out what Israel doesnext and how the US governmentresponds we do all kinds of explainerson news events and current affairs on
No comments:
Post a Comment