The argument has been urged, but no persuasive evidence put in support.
Heh, you really are impervious to facts, aren’t you?
I just quoted the same cite stating that the decision to use the oil weapon was made before the '73 war was launched! 
Only “not persuasive” to people who have predetermined that the reason must be insanity, racism, conspiracy, etc.
In short, those who hand-wave away inconvenient evidence.
Are you claiming the Oslo Accords led to a precipitous drop in the Palestinian economy? More than the 36.1% I could ascertain, which would hardly lift the Palestinian line above SA’s, never mind “vastly” so. Because otherwise this doesn’t help your case.
Who controls the borders and ports into the OPT?
I’ve said no such thing.
I’ve “considered” that it’s not the be-all and end-all of quality of life.
Only with all else being equal
And I pointed out why that was a rubbish argument.
Which is why I didn’t point to just GDP, but to* GDP trends over time*, which speak a much more comprehensive language.
But like I said, there’s GNI there, various other numbers. Find the ones that make Palestinians “vastly” better-off than South African Blacks, go on.
Well, the Palestinian one is something like 50% foreign aid (which kind of gives the lie to their overwhelming success as an economic powerhouse, but whatever) so I can see how you can make that argument. But* I* wasn’t the one who started making the comparison, was I?
And you wouldn’t catch me within 100 miles of the Territories, even for a visit.
No, go back and re-read. The original post said: “Palestinians in the West Bank have vastly higher standards of living than Black South Africans do** even today** much less under Apartheid.” My bolding. No morphing of timeline.
I did stretch the subsequent discussion over to conditions in Gaza as well, because hey, they’re all one country (or would like to be) and yet they’re being compared to all Black South Africans, not just the ones in Sandton, so that’s fairer.
So are South African Blacks. With a much lower unemployment rate.
And do you have some mistaken idea that a lot of poor South Africans are literally starving Somalia-style?
Actually, it’s looking like we’re heading out of that one, our incidence rates are dropping.
I’ll pick the one that’s a functioning country, not dependent on foreign aid for its very existence, that isn’t regularly hit by airstrikes because some of its inhabitants like lobbing rockets and shooting small arms at its better-armed neighbour, thanks.
And there’s no place in my country where poor people have to live packed in at densities of 120 000/km[sup]2[/sup], like in the West Bank.
Errm, I don’t know what you’re referring to? You mean recent political protests, our rapidly-dropping murder rate, or something else?
Wait, so it’s better to suck at the international aid-teat than to be a recipient of your own country’s welfare system, now?.
The senior partner is, of course, inertia.
Yes, I’m sure all Israelis regularly get arrested for living in their own homes.
Seeing as a recurring theme here is that the opposition Arabs have to Israel is because they’re anti-semites to start with, that’s rich.
Just to put it out there: An Israeli scientist was just awared the Nobel Prize in chemistry today. He works at a fairly prestigious Israeli technical university.
That’s just the latest in the history of brilliant scientists that have come out of Israel, some of which I’ve had the pleasure of working with personally.
I’d rather they contiue to be working on our side.
Splendid example of the extreme zealotry with which some individuals will go in their attempts to defend “all things Israel.”
I mean, seriously, a whole family’s life is made a living hell for the sole reason of being non-Jews – being called “illegal aliens” in the very place he/they were born and raised in, flat-out threats to steal (“seize”) their property under utterly bigoted laws grounds, denial of education rights, made to wear a Scarlet Letter in the form of Palestinian plates should he wish to have a car, restricted movement, etc. – and the best you can come up with is “try getting a license in Israel”? :rolleyes:
I’m not sure that even rises to the standards necessary to qualify as a tu quoque.
So, some unnamed people on this board once (allegedly) claimed Arab opposition to Israel was based on anti-Semitism. Who cares? Why does that allowother folks to essentially close their minds on the entirely different issue of why the US has adopted a policy of providing military subsidies to Israel, and adopt magic-conspiracy type thinking instead?
There is no license to be stupid, just because your perceived opponents have also, allegedly, at one point been stupid.
Whose side would the discoverer of quasicrystals be working for? He doesn’t work for anyone but his own intellectual curiosity as it is. We don’t have to have our congress clapping at every one of Netanyahu’s farts to be the beneficiary of scientific advances out of Israel. You’re addressing the question that nobody is asking.
Where’s the conspiracy in several disparate groups having similar political aims and an absence of any real opposition? That is what has been suggested throughout the thread. So why not just stop casting it as something else?
The “conspiracy thinking” lies in stating that a discrete US foreign policy point by which the US subsidizes several other countries to the tune of many billions of dollars is undertaken, not for the ostensible purposes (to promote stability and peace in the region) that the government claims, but for nefarious and underhanded, not to mention sometimes irrational and silly, purposes advocated by cabals of apocalyptic fundies, neocons and Jews.
Call it something else if it makes you feel better about it. To my mind it is absurd to assume that these folks have in effect captured both US political parties over a matter of decades, without any evidence and in contradiction to the evidence presented, and absurd is what I’ll call it.
The whole point of this OP, it seems to me, was not the spirit of rational enquiry as to the question, but rhetorical: in effect, to claim that there existed no sensible reason for US subsidies, and thus, by default, to state that only the non-sensical reasons (that is, cabals of fundies, neocons and Jews) remain.
Fundies, Neocons & Jews are the ostensible purpose.
The reason I’ve always heard from most people here in America is that they believe that Israel needs to stay Jewish because they are the chosen people, and they will one day all accept Jesus Christ as their personal savior, and then the rapture will happen … or something like that.
Basically, America supports Israel because we want Jesus to come down.
Sorry if I botched the details or reasons, but this honestly is what I thought the real reason was.
The OP’s question is a legitimate question of how to formulate our rhetoric and foreign policy given the changing conditions of the Middle East. Is the policy still relevant? Why does toning down our support for Israel on the world stage necessarily mean we stop subsidizing their military? Are the current advantages of our attitude toward Israel getting us anything strategically or economically that outweighs the disadvantages? It’s a straightforward question and one that should be asked of all our relationships with other countries, not just Israel.
In this country, the most vocal supporters of Israel are the groups listed by BrainGlutton. One of the local Christian channels here seems to have the Israeli flag on it pretty much every morning when I flip on by it. He thinks there is inertia from the Cold War period, vocal support for Israel from sufficiently-sized parts of the population, and no real political opposition to our support for Israel. Pointing out those things, those things that were pointed our without reference to conspiracy, helps make it a bit clearer for me.
It’s not conspiracy thinking, it’s trying to get a handle on our attitude toward Israel via our politics. The rhetoric our government uses in support of Israel is on the same level that we show the UK or Canada if the situation comes up. I can easily point to X, Y and Z of why we might stick our neck out for the UK or Canada, but what did Israel do for us to get this level of support? We all saw how quickly Obama changed the Middle Eastern tune in regard to Israel- what’s the explanation?
You’re going too far with re-characterizing the OP. Rational inquiry is there to be had among all the monkeys throwing feces. Implied by the question of the OP is I think the question as to what extent can we be less supportive of Israel and still get what we get out of them (whatever recent benefits there may be).
This is so totally untrue. American Gentiles support Israel because it’s the only country in the region, as far as they can see, that seems to have a society similar to America’s or another Western country. Whether or not this perception is indeed true is another issue, but I think that’s the main reason. They read/hear about Arab Muslim countries and the picture they get is stoning, honor killing, religious theocracy, lots of angry mobs chanting and burning things, etc. Then they look at Israel and they see tech upstarts, friendly-looking people, men and women mingling, attractive female soldiers smiling in photos…it’s a no-brainer as to why they would come down on the side of Israel. It’s got nothing to do with Jesus and rapture theology, except in some groups of fringe fundementalist Christians (who do not comprise the majority of American gentiles.)
I agree this is a legitimate question and indeed I’ve said as much in this thread, more than once.
However, this was the question:
When I explained the strategic background - the purpose behind the subsidy not only of Israel, but of Egypt - I was met with incredulity. Read the thread yourself.
Now you are moving the goalposts. The question is ‘what does the US strategically get out of the subsidy of Israel’. It is not ‘why does the guy on my Christian TV channel support Israel’. Simply put, to substitute the latter for the former without any evidence is “conspiracy-type thinking” of the crudest sort.
That isn’t what was asked. The OP combined the statement “But I cannot think of any particular instance or manner in which our alliance with/patronage of Israel has been of any strategic or economic advantage to the U.S.” with the no doubt rhetorical question “Can you?”.
I can, and I have - the provision of stability in the region has been of inestimable strategic and ecomomic value to the US.
Now, a further and IMHO sensible question may well be “can this subsidy now be reduced or eliminated because of changing conditions in the ME and not endanger the benefits of the strategy - peace and stability in the region?” A perfectly fair question that reasonable people could discuss.
Note that cabals of fundies, neocons and Jews don’t play any role in that discussion. Just as they play none in legitimate analysis of consistent US ME strategy over the past few decades.
If there were no Israel, then NOBODY would be benefiting from the scientific advances out of Israel. Hence, one of the things the U.S. gets out out its alliance with Israel – which helps to keep Israel in existence – are those advances. Of course, the whole world benefits, too.
There’s no need to substitute. There are going to be several facets to the question of why we support Israel. Some of it might be that we get a continued strategic advantage benefit from it, but politicians do attempt to reflect their constituencies. It would be foolish for a politician to be negative toward Israel because a vast majority of the voting public ranges from being fanatical about Israel to slightly more positive than ambivalent. There is no voice in the opposite direction. There are lots of causes in Congress and policies of the government that reflect this kind of dynamic.
Also Argent Towers raises some good points about the ease of including Israel as us against them, yet that explanation does not need to replace Brainglutton’s or yours.