The Obama "To Make Important Middle East Speech" MEGATHREAD

[dps]

Hell, a lot of US support for Isreal is just because of moral disgust with the Holocaust.  But Viking is right, a lot of it was also Nassar accepting Soviet aid.

[Razgovory]

I think a major factor is that lots of Israeli citizens have American Citizenship.

[Razgovory]

What made the US pick socialist Israel was Nassers trying to play the superpowers against each other and eventually going for Soviet funding of the Aswan dam.

Thing is, the US was the first country to recognized Israel.  So it goes back further then that.

[HisMajestyBOB]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

I think it's a combination of right time/place. We were going to support anyone during the Cold War that we could, much of the Middle East was "in play" as to who they would side with. Both us and the Soviets pumped a lot of money into countries in that region. Egypt sort of went back and forth, Iraq sort of went back and forth. Iraq notably had a lot of support from us but also a lot of Soviet military hardware that we tore up in Gulf War I.

Israel was a lot more amenable to being on "our" side than the side of the Soviets, they were one we could move into the "firm" column in supporting the side of the West against the savage, unwashed Russian monsters. The large Jewish population in America also tightened this up significantly. Sometime in the past 30 years fundamentalist American Protestants also became massive supporters of Israel because they intrinsically think it is "right" for the people of David to control the Holy Land (contrary to popular belief only a very small number of the most extreme fundamentalist Protestants believe that Israel has to rebuild the temple for the rapture to happen.)

I'm with you though, ROI on the shit hole that is the Middle East is absolutely terrible. I look more to our relationship with Saudi Arabia than our relationship with most other European countries as an example of how to get decent ROI. Unfortunately we made the mistake of stationing some troops in Saudi Arabia which enraged some hard liners.

IIRC there were some fears that Israel would swing over to the Soviet camp, at least prior to '67. After all, a lot of Jews came from Eastern Europe and the USSR, and they were seen as leaning socialist (see kibbutzes).

[Siege]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

There is an unwillingness in the US to let an allied country get eaten up by it's aggressive neighbors.  I understand this is a foreign concept in Europe.

But how this alliance came to be and is sustained exactly is the question. We know there is an alliance between the US and Israel, but the US does not get a lot out of this alliance, and Israel has been consistently a piss-poor ally (getting into trouble, selling secrets to the Chinese and the Russians etc.).

Israel have never sold anything without american consent.
Not even israeli developed tech.
This is in fact one of the issues in israeli domestic politics.
We see ourselves as far too complacent to american desires.
Not that it is an issue for me.
I do support israeli complete alingment with the US.

[Neil]

What made the US pick socialist Israel was Nassers trying to play the superpowers against each other and eventually going for Soviet funding of the Aswan dam.

Thing is, the US was the first country to recognized Israel.  So it goes back further then that.

Yeah.  The US was trying to strongarm the UK into giving Palestine to the Jews during the war.

[Siege]

What made the US pick socialist Israel was Nassers trying to play the superpowers against each other and eventually going for Soviet funding of the Aswan dam.

Thing is, the US was the first country to recognized Israel.  So it goes back further then that.

Not to mention familiar relationship.
You can't throw a rock without hitting somebody with a relative in the US, whether it is israelis migrating to the US (yeah, I'm guilty) to american jews migrating to Eretz.

[Neil]

And a lot of the money that funded the terrorists that were involved in founding Israel came from the US.

[Siege]

Can an Amerikkkan enlighten as to why the US and Israel have such close ties? US jewish voting population? Cold War history between the two?

I don't see what the US gets out of this special relationship.

I think it's a combination of right time/place. We were going to support anyone during the Cold War that we could, much of the Middle East was "in play" as to who they would side with. Both us and the Soviets pumped a lot of money into countries in that region. Egypt sort of went back and forth, Iraq sort of went back and forth. Iraq notably had a lot of support from us but also a lot of Soviet military hardware that we tore up in Gulf War I.

Israel was a lot more amenable to being on "our" side than the side of the Soviets, they were one we could move into the "firm" column in supporting the side of the West against the savage, unwashed Russian monsters. The large Jewish population in America also tightened this up significantly. Sometime in the past 30 years fundamentalist American Protestants also became massive supporters of Israel because they intrinsically think it is "right" for the people of David to control the Holy Land (contrary to popular belief only a very small number of the most extreme fundamentalist Protestants believe that Israel has to rebuild the temple for the rapture to happen.)

I'm with you though, ROI on the shit hole that is the Middle East is absolutely terrible. I look more to our relationship with Saudi Arabia than our relationship with most other European countries as an example of how to get decent ROI. Unfortunately we made the mistake of stationing some troops in Saudi Arabia which enraged some hard liners.

IIRC there were some fears that Israel would swing over to the Soviet camp, at least prior to '67. After all, a lot of Jews came from Eastern Europe and the USSR, and they were seen as leaning socialist (see kibbutzes).

You definitively do not understand israeli mentality.
The kibbutzim are an expression of israeli democracy.
In Eretz, if you want to be a pinky or reddish, you do not need to go and create a violent communist revolution.
You just need to join a Kibbutz.
Israel is probably the only country in the world in which you can live according to whatever crazy ideology you subscribe to.
From hard core capitalism to hard core communism, with no money and communal kitchens, not kidding you.

However these days most kibbutzim are just another form of capitalism, with more than half their workforce being non-kibbutzniks, working hands paid in hard cash.

[Pat]

International law is a standing international arrangement, stemming from the principle of pacta sunt servanda, indeed no different from two businessmen entering into contract, or those contracts arising from concludent action (i.e. from acting as though there is a contract, not sure it's the correct term in English).

Except in a business relationship you can always go to court or to arbitration in case you disagree on something or in case one of the parties fail to meet its side of the agreement. That is not possible in international relations.

Yes it is, there are courts for that.

If there is some part of the international law you don't like, you can always object to that part, and you won't be considered bound by it, as long as you are a persistant objector.

Oh really? What about Iran and the non-proliferation-treaty? If I understand things correctly, there are some parts of "international law" that all states are bound to, no matter if they want to or not. That is what Nurnberg taught us.
[/quote]


Right, you're not wrong about that last part. For every rule there's an exception. You're talking about the ius cogens, a core of Intl. law that you actually can not opt-out of, which is a recent inclusion from Nurnberg onwards and something I should've mentioned (especially as it contains territorial aggrandizement). It's universally accepted even though it can be a bit hard to defend from the classical perspective of sovereignty.

BTW your point about the NPT was void because Iran actually had signed it, but it could've been valid if you had chosen some other example. Let's say there's a treaty regulating maritime traffic or something, then you'll most likely be considered bound by it even if you haven't signed it, unless you protest. I.e. the written intl. law can spill over into the unwritten intl. law.

And a lot of the money that funded the terrorists that were involved in founding Israel came from the US.

RIP Folke Bernadotte

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

[jimmy olsen]

Lol, I just read the title as The Obama "To Make Important Middle Earth Speech"

[Ed Anger]

We should've had battlewagons forward deployed to the UK in 1939.

Ewww, I don't know about that. Let the Europeans bash themselves for a while before we get involved.

Fuck that.  Any time is good Nazi killing time.

Let 'em overrun the frogs first. They deserve it.

Why do they deserve it?

I was attempting a troll. I set out some hamburger with glass in it for the Euros.

[Caliga]

Lol, I just read the title as The Obama "To Make Important Middle Earth Speech"

"...at my direction, hobbit bowmen of the Shire have located and killed Grima Wormtongue..."

[KRonn]

Lol, I just read the title as The Obama "To Make Important Middle Earth Speech"

"...at my direction, hobbit bowmen of the Shire have located and killed Grima Wormtongue..."

[The Minsky Moment]

International law is a standing international arrangement, stemming from the principle of pacta sunt servanda, indeed no different from two businessmen entering into contract, or those contracts arising from concludent action (i.e. from acting as though there is a contract, not sure it's the correct term in English).

It's a poor model for analyzing international law from both a descriptive and prescriptive point of view.  Descriptively, it doesn't at all capture how international law arises, who the actors are, and how it operates in practice.  Prescriptively, it doesn't do the work that proponents of a more vigorous international law regime would want it to do, but at the same time does more than what opponents would want it to do.