#Israel as NATO Member? - Clifford Kiracofe

  
       Cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder, Reagan’s ambassador to Austria who heads the World Jewish Congress, recently demanded that Israel be admitted to membership in NATO.  

        This proposal has been raised over the past decade in academic and in political circles but the rapidly changing situation in the Arab world, and in the Middle East, gives it a sense of urgency for Zionists around the world seeking protection for the “Jewish State”.

 

        The “Israel as NATO member” concept was promoted at the neoconish Hoover Institution in 2005.  Well established at Stanford University, Hoover received special attention in the George W. Bush administration owing to its close links to former Secretary of State George Shultz and to then Secretary of State Condi Rice.     

        In 2005, the concept was presented in a paper for Hoover’s publication, Policy Review.  Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Ronald D. Asmus and Bruce P. Jackson wrote the piece entitled “Does Israel Belong in the EU and in NATO?”  Jackson, who has close ties to the Bush family, was a leading advocate of the war against Iraq and worked closely with George Shultz to promote it behind the scenes.

        Asmus and Jackson concluded that:  “…we believe there is a compelling strategic argument why Israel should explore the option of building closer ties to the Euro-Atlantic community. As noted, we are living in a moment of strategic fluidity — both across the Atlantic and in the Middle East. The future contours of the Euro-Atlantic community are likely to settle in the years ahead. The question is whether they will come to an end on the northern edge of the wider Middle East and stop with Turkey and the Black Sea region — or whether they will reach down to embrace a democratic country like Israel as well. In the Middle East itself, we may be entering a new phase of strategic fluidity as well …”

        In February 2006, the concept was introduced at the prestigious and influential annual Munich Conference on security.  No less than neoconish Jose-Maria Aznar, Spanish Prime Minister (1996-2004), advocated it and featured it in a special report on NATO expansion prepared by his own foundation in Spain. Aznar has good relations with Shultz and others at the Hoover Institution and one would expect some coordination.

        Conveniently, a piece then appeared in the Washington Post on 21 February 2006 entitled “Israel as a NATO Member” by Ronald D. Asmus.

        For his part, Aznar breathlessly pushed the idea again in an op-ed for the Times (London) on 17 June 2010: 

        “Israel is our first line of defence in a turbulent region that is constantly at risk of descending into chaos; a region vital to our energy security owing to our overdependence on Middle Eastern oil; a region that forms the front line in the fight against extremism. If Israel goes down, we all go down.”

        Ronald Lauder this year, during the annual Herzliya Conference in Israel, pushed the concept again. For the Euros he wrote an op-ed for the major German newspaper Die Welt published 8 February.  According to the Jewish Telegraph Agency wire story promoting the piece globally:

        “Writing in an editorial published Tuesday in the major daily Die Welt, Lauder said current events in Egypt, Tunisia and other Muslim countries show both the forces of "freedom, democracy and economic participation" at work as well as "how unpredictable developments in the Middle East are. If NATO is to continue upholding "our basic principles and our Western way of life," then Israel, "the only democracy in the Middle East," deserves guarantees for its peace and security that membership in NATO would help provide, Lauder wrote.”

        Given the rapidly changing situation in the Arab world, and the overall situation in the Middle East, increased pressure by the global pro-Israel Lobby for closer NATO-Israel relations should come as no surprise.    

  

 

               

       

 

Comments

[J]

The State of Israel as it exists does NOT 'deserve' security, what it does 'deserve' is for it to be dismantled to its slab and left to the Divine Hand to create. Time to cast the Zionist State of Israel where it rightfully belongs, dismantled. As long as the Zionist State of Israel is allowed to continue to exist, it poses a grave threat to the whole of mankind as it is presumptuous before Heaven.

[J]

Does anybody in their right minds within NATO want a 'partner' like the Zionist State of Israel dragging them into war crimes and crimes against humanity which is what Zionist Israel is doing? I would hope that sane heads prevaled within NATO and Israel was told to go and bark up somebody else's tree.

Anthony Lawson: Gaza in Plain Language

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TxdaHM7rgag&feature=player_embedded

[William R. Cumming]

Is Israel condemned like a "Sparta" to living by a sword dying by a sword?

What options does it have NOW?

[Cal]

Israel has a proven track record of making sacrifices in war to prevent collateral damage more than any other nation that I am aware of. Can you document otherwise Sidney?]
Posted by: Theodore Lewis >>>>>>>

Huh? Are you talking about the same Israel the rest of us are talking about?
Sidney and everyone here could document "otherwise"..but the list would take up the whole site. Israel's main goal in all their aggression is to create as much collateral damage as possible....from bombing power plants, hospitals, police stations, UN schools to bulldozing homes and crops in Palestine to blowing up bridges and fuel terminals in Lebanon spilling millions of gallons of oil into the sea, not to mention dropping a million cluster bombs in Lebanon.
Israel = collateral damage, that's all they do.

[Clifford Kiracofe]

1. The Secretary General was a guest and speaker at the 11th annual Herzliya Conference I wrote about in another thread. Many participants were Israeli military, high ranking Israeli military, active and retired.

The desire for increased cooperation with NATO on the part of Israel cannot be denied or dismissed as a fantasy of Ronald Lauder and the World Jewish Congress or the Herzliya crowd.

2. The Washington Post reported:

"HERZLIYA, Israel -- The secretary general of NATO is offering peacekeeping services to Israelis and Palestinians if both request it in a peace deal.

"Anders Fogh Rasmussen told a security conference in Israel on Wednesday that NATO would intervene if a future peace treaty was broken or if the two sides needed assistance.

"A spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said he and Rasmussen discussed expanding cooperation between Israel and NATO."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/09/AR2011020903719.html

3. It seems to me the evidence plainly is that there are moves afoot to increase NATO-Israel cooperation. As I pointed out, this theme has been picked up on the official website of the Israeli Embassy in Washington.

4. As Sidney Smith points out, closer relations between NATO and Israel no doubt will have the effect of creating the impression in the Arab world and Middle East of a "clash of civilizations". This in turn increases security dilemmas for NATO members.

5. Turkey is a valued NATO member. One would think Turkey, however, would be cool to Israeli membership in NATO to say the least.

[Twit]

Israel in NATO?

Well, Israel is already in Eurovision, so why not NATO?! Then NATO can just also add Ukraine, Georgia, Morocco, and Russia and become about as meaningful an organization as Eurovision.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurovision_Song_Contest

More seriously, it seems to me that Israeli membership in NATO would be primarily a symbolic gesture (in 'support' of Israel / against those who 'threaten our way of life' / whatever). But since NATO is a very real mutual defense pact, symbolism-based membership seems extremely dangerous.

[Farmer Don]

Why does NATO even exist? WWII is long over. The cold war is long over.

[Matthew]

Theordore Lewis: You seem to think that you can guilt people into silence. You just don't get it. More and more people are rejecting hte Zionist narrative. Why? Because it isn't true.

Truth trumps guilt every time.

BTW, attempting to take over the thread by repeating Hasbara won't work in this forum. The Colonel's loyal readers know better. Do you need the web address for Pajamas Media? You'll have better luck there.

[William R. Cumming]

Farmer Don! NATO largely exists because Brussels and Germany are comfortable outposts in the cafe society called the EU. Few problems there than US for US forces. I believe the annual cost of NATO membership is estimated publically around $14 B but in reality closer to $30 B in my opinion. And of course when the US departs from a base permanently the costs of US improvements are not reimbursed completely ever.
The interesting thing to me is that weapons standardization continues to be a problem for the US and NATO generally. Conventional weaponary is about to undergo another almost complete replacement. By the way my courtesy rides in the FRB Leopard showed them quite superior in comfort to even the M-60! but hey both direct and indirect fire are useful when push comes to shove.

[Redhand]

“Israel is our first line of defence in a turbulent region that is constantly at risk of descending into chaos; a region vital to our energy security owing to our overdependence on Middle Eastern oil; a region that forms the front line in the fight against extremism. If Israel goes down, we all go down.”

Israel our "first line of defense"?

I can't think of a single instance in the entire history of the State of Israel that it served as "a first line of defense" for any NATO member, much less the United States.

"If Israel goes down, we all go down."

This is such a palpable nonsense that it's laughable to see it in print.

[Jake]

Mr. Cummings....

The only problem I have with your statement of " but hey both direct and indirect fire are useful when push comes to shove".

is.....

Tanks come in two forms: the dangerous, deadly kind and the "liberating" kind.... Robert Fisk

Let's hope we see more of the liberating kind.
`

[William R. Cumming]

I seem to remember flecette rounds for tanks and artillery direct fire being banned under some internation agreement. They saved several people in my OCS class when NVA cadre tried to overrun their battery.

[Patrick Lang]

WRC

There was a flechette round for the .57 recoiless. It was useful for breaking up assaults. p

[The Twisted Genius]

WRC and PL,

The 90mm recoiless also had one. We loved it... a man portable hell bringer.

[Patrick Lang]

TTG

Yes. The 57mm was just incredible. pl

[William R. Cumming]

Hoping we (US) did not provide flechette rounds to Libyans.

[Jake]

"It was useful for breaking up assaults."

No pun intend of course....

[DE Teodoru]

Assmus and Jackson forget that NATO is not Warsaw Pact so, whatever bought-off US politicans insist, European nations in NATO have long said "niet." Israel used to think of itself a Middle East nation. But somehow, now, the people who called Europe "Eurabia"-- claiming that Europe's "inherent" anti-Semitism is making it a slave to Arab conquest-- think they can dictate to Europe on NATO, once again using America as their mad dog on a leach with which they sought to intimidate Iraq, Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

NATO will die before Israel joins!

Someone there must be shown a sign in English, French, German...etc: "EUROPE, NOT FOR SALE as id US Congress!"

[shanks]

well, well, what a coincidence!

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/02/08/israel_data_protection_law_eu/

Israel has formally joined the list of seven countries whose data protection laws are considered strong enough for companies there to receive and process personal data from companies in the European Union.

The European Commission has formalised a decision taken last October to deem Israel's data protection laws 'adequate' for the purposes of the Data Protection Directive.

That Directive prevents personal data being sent out of the EU unless to a country whose laws give it the same protection as it would have in the EU. Israel now joins six other countries with that status.

What was that, NATO membership impossible? Things are inching along in that direction, innit?

You don't steal land or chase people out in one massive land grab and expulsions. You do it, street by street, village by village.

And that's how it will be for NATO membership. IF I were Israel, I'd conflate oil security for Europe with Isreal's security and try to sell that as a reason for NATO umbrella support.

You can't have these Ayrabs suddenly use their 'demos' and 'freedom' and all that bilge to start thinking for themselves and applying economic leverage on outside interests, can we?

[Anna-Marina]

The State of Israel is in principle the apartheid state, and there is no way to mitigate this inherent problem in the foreseeable future: http://www.middleeastmonitor.org.uk/articles/europe/2089-permanent-temporariness

[LeaNder]

What I would like to understand is why the animosity towards Israel.Is it connected to bad relations between principally CIA and Mossad going way way back??

TL, this is interesting, admittedly a random pick. Somehow this was on my mind lately, but it is reduced to vague traces of memory by now. Anyway I heard this before.

Can you give us a bit of data related to the CIA's basically antisemitic atmosphere, attitudes, sentiments?

I think it is interesting that this idea surfaces in connection to Phil Giraldi.

[William R. Cumming]

The Cia's real tradition stemming from William Donovan's OSS days--he was a prominent law street lawyer who had served with distinction in General Pershings forces in WWI [and a brand new bio of Donovan has just appeared and will interesting to see if it is as hagiographic as all the others--and its recruitmant was largely Wall Streeters and other with language facility from univeristies in teh NORTHEAST. The reason this is important is that even post-depression WALL STREET blantantly discriminated agains Jews as did many northeastern universities. Even HARVARD has a
quotae for JEWS after the early 20's [wondering if they do for Asians now] so that is the CIA lineage that was at least anti-semitic underneath and sometimes directly anti-semitic. Study the issue of the turn away of refugees that might have been save by the US from the HOLOCAUST in detail and you see the outlines of that discrimination throughout the Executive Branch despite many idealistic NEW DEAL stalwarts being Jewish. The so-called Palmer Raids in 1919 by AG PALMER and J. Edgar Hoover were largely anti-semitic efforts. See book "1919" published in 2007.
There clearly were and are many herocic and brave men and women who have been in the CIA and I have know a number of them. But PL article several years ago on a related subject describes in detail the cultural problems in the IC community. I also know many people who worked in the CIA who used their jobs to feather their own nests including Helms and Casey. Career military and civil servants if corrupt all know enought to retire rich. As PL can attest. I live on my annuities with an occasional NSF grant or stipend but I can guarantee to almost any disaster grantee or NFIP claimant (National Flood Insurance Program) or government contractor ways to manipulate the sytem for their financial benefit. I choose not to do so. Since I believe the people of the US paid me not to do OJT in how to manipulate or defraud the US govenment meaning the people of the US. I tried to be an agency IG but many worried I might just be the Junk-Yard Dog all the IG's claim to me. Perhaps as a second generation civil servant my strong antipathies against those who serve who feel they were or are owed is evident. Unfortunatley, many many in the CIA have the same problem. They are "chosen" ones in another sense. Hoping LeaNder this helps although probably inaccurate except as to revealing my bias. I always said sending an SES or Colonel to jail would be useful in tightening up the posture of both civil service and the military. To my knowledge that has yet to occur in US history despite some making fortunes while employed by the people. Although sometimes the payment was deferred to a post-employment activity.

[Patrick Lang]

WRC

"sending an SES or Colonel to jail would be useful." Hmm. I would qualify on both counts. pl

[William R. Cumming]

Nope P.L. you are exempt based on your blog posts and life of speaking truth to power. Still too honest and might prove a rabble rouser or jail house lawyer if imprisoned.
You might be like the Anthony Hopkins character in a movie called something like "CONTROL"! Never imprision the really dangerous ones.

[LeaNder]

Hoping LeaNder this helps although probably inaccurate except as to revealing my bias.

Thanks, WRC, I had more the post 1948 history in mind, there was no Mossad in the 20s. But I am aware of that history.

**************************

Theodore, what specific data or evidence from the time Mossad was founded in Dec. 1949 do you have for the animosity of CIA against Mossad? How do we know about these bad relations?

TL: What I would like to understand is why the animosity towards Israel. Is it connected to bad relations between principally CIA and Mossad going way way back??