The Blue and White Scare

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The "Blue-and-White Scare"

U.S. Security Agencies are insecure. The Defense Department is on the defensive.
Internal CIA memos warn of the sinister threat to American interests
posed by a certain well-defined ethnic group.

The Chinese Communists? The Iranians? No.
The American Jews who love Israel.

A report and commentary by Hannah Newman
last revised 13/mar/02

Chapters in this Report:
        The Ciralsky Caper
        Tenenbaum's Trauma
        The Tale of Two Jews, Or More
        The Shadow of Jonathan Pollard
        The "Jewish Fundamentalist" Bogeyman
        Israel, America's "Ally"
        CIA - Agents of Middle East Peace?
        Joe Lieberman, The Exception That Proves the Rule
        Daniel Kurtzer, The Exception that Promotes the Rule
        Marc Rich, The Exception That Bends the Rule
        What Needs Protection from Jews Who Love Israel? (Four Theories)

The CBS show "60 Minutes" (Feb.6, 00) featured a short on-line summary of the lawsuit by Adam Ciralsky against his former employer for ethnic discrimination. What made this case so newsworthy were two things: his employer happened to be the CIA, and Ciralsky happens to be an orthodox Jew.
Skeptics abound, especially in the American Jewish community. Are we to believe that open practice of the Jewish religion is enough to put an American under suspicion at the world's most sophisticated intelligence agency? (The operative word here is "intelligence".) After all, what about the well-publicized orthodoxy of Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman (who came within a whisker of winning the Vice Presidency), or the current Ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer? On the other hand, why did former Nazi-hunter for the U.S. Justice Department, Neal Sher, feel it was his duty to represent Ciralsky? In a Aug. 98 letter to National Security Advisor Sandy Berger, Sher wrote of receiving "redacted copies" of Ciralsky's files a month earlier from the CIA: "To say that I was appalled by documents contained in these files would be an understatement." And Sher's legal discoveries unearthed CIA treatment of other religious Jews that "stood my hair on end". (National Public Radio, "Morning Edition", Apr.9, 99)
Sher found that Ciralsky is not the only religious American Jew to be red-flagged merely on grounds of identity, and he is neither the first nor the last. But as we will see, the red flags aren't going up so much for orthodox Jewish identity as for the staunch Zionism which such an identity tends to nurture. Ciralsky and Sher ran into the "Blue-and-White Scare".
This is my own handy term for an enduring U.S.paranoia about Jews for whom religion or community identity includes love of Israel. The security establishment expresses this paranoia by presuming such people have dual loyalty, whether they show it or not, and are ready to betray the Red-White-and-Blue for Israeli interests. In terms of security profiling, as Sher discovered, orthodox Jews are the prime "suspects", but not the only ones.
Naturally, the same establishment guilty of this discrimination will hotly defend freedom of religious practice in America, including Judaism. There lies the catch, and the irony. The catch is that the Jewish religion is rooted in ancient Israel, making it inevitable that devout Jews will feel personally connected to modern Israel. The irony is that this connection should logically not be a "catch" at all. Firm support of this proven American ally would presumably promote U.S. interests, or at least not harm them any more than other ethnic ties in the great American Melting Pot. Nevertheless, this particular "ethnic tie" appears to be the only one that automatically puts Americans under the kind of suspicion that gave the old anti-Communist "Red Scare" a place in U.S. history. While not as widely known as the Red Scare, the Blue-and-White Scare is equally scary in its manifestations. The term should have been coined long ago, because the phenomenon predates even Jonathan Pollard. But let's start with Adam Ciralsky.
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The Ciralsky Caper
I had already been digging at the Ciralsky story when "60 Minutes" interviewed him (Feb.6, 00), since his lawsuit against the CIA first broke in the Israeli press a month.earlier. Although most of the news items found on-line were dated Apr. 99, shortly after National Public Radio first broke the story in the U.S., the case really went all the way back to Aug. 97. Why this scandal took nearly two years to surface, and then almost another year to become newsworthy for American TV and the Israeli media, is an intriguing question in itself. As of this writing, the lawsuit is still in process, but Ciralsky's story has returned to media obscurity. Here is a summary:
Attorney Adam Ciralsky, a rising star and recipient of a privileged spot in a CIA honors program, was hired by the Agency in Dec. 96 as a legal advisor. He was noticed immediately and was awarded a cash prize for professional excellence. But he attracted notice for other reasons as well.
Technically, it was during his very first week of work that he came under CIA suspicion, and his file was sent to Counterintelligence with the coded warning of "strong ethnic ties". [See below for a likely source of this phobia.] The Agency had received a "warning", so the official story goes, from another (unidentified) agency, to beware of Ciralsky's relationships with Israelis. This source was later discredited, and was considered unreliable from the first by the FBI and Justice Department. (In fact, Ciralsky disclosed in his "60 Minutes" interview that the source was under investigation at the time for stealing classified information from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories.) Yet the "hot tip", which accused Adam of trying to transfer classified material to Israelis, remains in his CIA file to this day.
But all of this fuss was unknown to Ciralsky - the stuff hit the fan only nine months later, in Aug. 97, when he came up on the rotation schedule to work at the National Security Council at the year's end, on assignment with NSC terrorism expert Richard Clark. Suddenly, Ciralsky's "strong ethnic ties", which were never a secret, became an insurmountable problem. On Aug.19 he was subjected to a polygraph, which became a nightmarish seven-hour interrogation accusing him of being a spy and "a terrorist" (an absurdity Ciralsky mentioned to "60 Minutes" - but one that would also be used on Israeli Jews in the aftermath of 9/11). In September, Ciralsky was interrogated again, this time by the CIA Chief of the Middle East Section. On Oct.20, 97, he was finally placed on "indefinite administrative leave" due to "legitimate" security concerns. (_Washington Jewish Week_, Apr.16, 99)
The character assassination had begun long before his polygraph, with an internal office memo expressing misgivings about Ciralsky's affinity for Israel. Per the memo, the security risk was evidenced by his family contributing to the United Jewish Appeal, buying Israel Bonds and supporting Israel's politically right-wing Likud Party. There was particular concern mentioned about "right-wing politicians like Prime Minister Netanyahu". The memo's writer (whose name was not released) noted: "I fully expect Adam's wealthy Daddy" to be a Likud supporter, based on "my experience with rich Jewish friends in college." The memo noted that Ciralsky never claimed to be a Likud supporter, but he was "withholding on this issue" only because "he wishes to avoid" being considered an "extreme supporter of Israel's hardliners in the Likud." The Ciralsky family has publicly denied any involvement with the Likud Party, or any Israeli politics. But supposing it had been true, they expressed "true fear" to see that support of a democratic Israeli party can blacken the reputation of an American Jew. (Israel Wire, Apr.13, 99)
This memo was later traced, not to some agency paper-pusher, but to the Head of Middle East Counterintelligence, sent from her immediate superior. The memo writer also specified as one of Ciralsky's "big problems" his pride and firm support of Israel, which made him "biased", and recommended that Ciralsky "must be made to admit" this. The memo's recipient was then put in charge of Ciralsky's September interrogation. [There is a conflicting version: In a "60 Minutes" transcript published Feb.18, 00 by the _Jewish Press_, attorney Sher implicates the Middle East Chief as the author of the memo, while the recipient is unidentified except as Ciralsky's interrogator.]
Other revelations turned up on internal CIA memo stationery, including evidence that Ciralsky's bosses had predetermined that he would fail a security polygraph which focused on his connections to Israel. One memo, written two weeks before the polygraph, says that this order came down from none other than CIA Director George Tenet himself, who Sher says was kept personally informed of proceedings by special memos. [This is the Tenet of "you dare pardon Pollard and I'm outta here" fame, whose private news leak and public ultimatum caused President Clinton to break faith with Israel at the Wye peace talks. The same Tenet who more recently found a new calling as a Middle East peace diplomat.] This particular memo reads: "Tenet says this guy is outta here because of lack of candor.... Subject is scheduled for a poly. Once that's over, it looks like we'll be waving goodbye to our friend." (_Washington Post_, Feb.6, 00) [Readers in shock should read comments about the real purpose of polygraphs, below.]
During the seven-hour interrogation following his "failed" polygraph, conducted by the recipient of the "wealthy daddy" memo, Ciralsky was duly accused of "lack of candor": hiding sinister Israeli contacts such as the Hebrew teacher he had in high school, the tour chaperone for a trip he took at age 15, and a "dual national" (CIA term for American with Israeli citizenship) whom he tried to help with business contacts. He was accused of not listing among his "close and continuing" contacts Israel's first President, Chaim Weizmann (a first cousin of his great-grandfather who died two decades before Adam was born). The last item is not only silly, but his relationship to Weizmann was unknown to Ciralsky until the interrogator tried to wring the "confession" out of him.
As a reality check, not one question touched on Ciralsky's summer stint in Communist China and any resulting relationships, in spite of current U.S. problems with Chinese spies. His personnel file contained details about his Hebrew skills but nothing about his equally good Spanish, and his Judaic Studies minor in college was listed but not his major, International Affairs. Interrogators pressed him on whether Israelis had recruited him for spying in his teen years - a time when, as Ciralsky pointed out in the "60 Minutes" interview, "I didn't even have a driver's license, much less access to classified information." When Ciralsky challenged the purpose of the interrogation and asked for the involvement of a Polygraph Supervisor (the right of every CIA employee), he was refused.
It seems the NPR expose and its follow-up in the Jewish press is what finally goaded the CIA in Apr. 99 to set up a five-person committee, including "prominent American Jews" (per "60 Minutes"), to investigate Ciralsky's two-year-old charges. The committee included attorneys Nicole Seligman, Ely Jacobs, Henry Rosovsky; retired Admiral William Crowe; and former CIA Director William Webster. The story gets quite muddled from here on:
1. The official CIA statement was that the independent review committee found "no antisemitism", backed by an internal memo from DCI Tenet emphasizing that "nothing whatsoever" was found. This was followed by the admission of William Harlowe, CIA Director of Public Affairs, that the committee had experienced "heartburn with some of the language" in the memos referring to Ciralsky. Harlowe was followed in turn by Tenet's public apology for "insensitive, unprofessional and highly inappropriate" remarks made to and about the Jewish attorney. Said remarks were apparently blatant enough, antisemitic enough, and high-ranking enough to prompt the Director to sign up his entire senior management for a "sensitivity training" course with the Anti-Defamation League. Upon hearing of that, Ciralsky's attorney retorted that they didn't need the "window dressing" of sensitivity training; "They need to learn to follow the law." (_Jewish Voice & Opinion_, Jun. 99) Meanwhile, ADL head Abe Foxman defended his CIA pupils: "I think there have been some problems in this [Ciralsky's] case... but we found no evidence that [Jewish] profiling exists." (_Boston Phoenix_, Sep.1, 00).
2. Tenet came out in support of the decision to fire Ciralsky, based on the "evidence" of misconduct predating his CIA job (as mentioned, from a discredited source). Yet other CIA managers testified to attorney Sher that Ciralsky did nothing to warrant being fired. Stranger still, eight months after being "fired", Ciralsky was still receiving his salary. By Apr. 99, he was classified as "on leave without pay", but banned from so much as setting foot in his office. He was never charged, nor was he ever "cleared" of suspicion. All this in spite of a conversation with Jewish community leader Malcolm Hoenlein in which Tenet "expressed concern about the young man and not wanting to hurt his career." (_The Forward_, Apr.16, 99)
3. And it gets weirder. Ciralsky's attorney Neal Sher says the CIA began negotiating an out-of-court settlement deal in Aug. 98, in which they confirmed that Ciralsky was innocent and agreed to "expunge" the damning information from their records (that is, the discredited source). But one of their conditions was that Ciralsky submit to an independent polygraph to clear his name. The fact was that he already had done so, shortly after the "failed" CIA test, and had passed cleanly, so Ciralsky refused. The CIA then withdrew their offer, and now they deny ever proposing this deal, which Sher has in writing and about which he informed the White House National Security Council (where Ciralsky had been slated to work).
4. On the subject of Ciralsky's polygraphs, someone should take one to determine the truth about them. [For some interesting facts about polygraphs in general, see below.] The _Washington Post_ reported (Feb.6, 00) that Ciralsky failed two polygraphs which were given to him in Jun. 98, while _Salon_ reported - back in Jun. 98 - that he had passed both of them. The NPR scoop mentions an independent polygraph given sometime between Aug. 97 and Apr. 99 (_Washington Jewish Week_ dates it in late 1998) by a former chief of the FBI polygraph lab who was also a CIA polygraph instructor, which Ciralsky passed. Regarding the focus of all these tests, _Salon_ reports that the Israeli connections mentioned as suspicious in the "wealthy daddy" memo had already been examined in a 1993 Defense Intelligence Agency security check and were determined to be innocuous.
Sher wrote on Aug.4, 98 to White House National Security Advisor Sandy Berger, and on Mar.22, 99 to Attorney General Janet Reno, requesting an investigation into these Agency irregularities, as well as a protest to Vice President Al Gore. When he did not receive a reply from any of them, the decision was made to go through with the court battle, and later to go public on "60 Minutes" in Feb. 00. According to reports in the _Boston Phoenix_ (Sep.1, 00) and _Jewish Press_ (Sep.8), Ciralsky also appealed to Senator Joseph Lieberman, and received no answer from him either.
In advance of that "60 Minutes" interview, Tenet warned his staff through inter-office memo about the plans of the CBS news show to dig up "old allegations of antisemitism at the agency" which he said were groundless. The CIA Chief must have realized that the term "old allegation" was a bit misleading for a court case which had opened less than a year before and was then in progress. But his colleagues soon saw that he was bluffing - excluding four former CIA directors (James Woolsey, William Webster, John Deutch and Robert Gates) who all backed Tenet's claim of Agency innocence. Sympathetic CIA sources provided Ciralsky's attorney with several internal memos circulated by staff in response to Tenet's denial, in which they wondered out loud how to break it to the Director(s) that antisemitism does indeed run free in the Agency.
As a confidential source told NPR Legal Affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg, "The security folks are out of control, and the higher-ups are unwilling to take them on." Michael Sirfrino, a senior intelligence officer and counsel at the Pentagon who had recommended his underling Ciralsky for the CIA job, told Totenberg he will never again send a good employee there, commenting that the CIA has "an internal problem. I think it's a cultural problem." [The implications of "a cultural problem" become even more serious in light of CIA influence in the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.]
Besides ethnic and religious discrimination, Ciralsky is charging the CIA with illegal electronic surveillance, and falsification of his polygraph in order to disqualify him for serving in the NSC. Updates on his case are hard to come by, but the complaint brief of the lawsuit against the CIA and FBI, which opened Apr. 00, can be accessed on line. In the summary, we find more startling assertions: that the CIA considers the reliance of American Jews on the First Amendment as nothing more than "pro-Israeli baggage"; that conversations and activities of Jewish employees are regularly monitored; that Director Tenet was in the center of rigging Ciralsky's dismissal; and that the CIA threatened to have Adam disbarred from legal practice (for reasons unknown) if he went through with the lawsuit.
That last item may be irrelevant. Ciralsky apparently impressed his interviewers at "60 Minutes" so favorably that they offered him a job. He is currently working for CBS News.
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Tenenbaum's Trauma
Slightly predating the Ciralsky case is the story of David Tenenbaum, a study in media assassination which took three years to arrive in court.
This engineer, who worked with a security clearance since 1984 for the Defense Deparment (Army Tank Automatic and Armament Command, or TACOM) in Michigan, was the focus of multiple news articles appearing across the country simultaneously on Feb.19-20, 97. These variously reported that Tenenbaum had admitted to leaking classified documents to the Israelis which compromised American defense, that incriminating evidence was found when FBI agents searched his home, that he lied on a polygraph test, and that he was arrested - all of which proved to be false.
I found copies of the story on-line in the _Detroit News_, _Washington Post_, _Detroit Free Press_, and several others, and there are indications that it was covered elsewhere, including TV. Like Ciralsky, Tenenbaum is an orthodox Jew with a strong affinity for Israel, and as with Ciralsky's story, the "facts" get more muddled the more one reads. For example:
1. Tenenbaum was not charged with espionage or any other wrongdoing, yet he was suddenly the focus of an intense interrogation which confronted him abruptly in Jan. 97 but in reality started much earlier. Even then, it was presented to him in the disguise of "an interview" to upgrade his security classification. With dizzying speed, he was accused of espionage and suspended from his post, his employee ID was confiscated, his personal papers were seized, and his house and family were put under constant surveillance for the next four months. A spokesman for the National Security Council, Eric Rubin, told the _Detroit News_ (Feb.20, 97) that the NSC viewed it as a "criminal investigation" and had no comment. Yet the day before, the same newspaper was told by the FBI that Tenenbaum hadn't been charged.
2. The media reports listed various damaging documents marked "Secret" which were carted away, supplied by their FBI sources. Yet the official in-house FBI report specifies "no classified documents were found". And as Tenenbaum's lawyer later informed him, U.S. regulations require any documents which are truly damaging to security to be sealed and kept from public view. Even more troubling, some of the technology which the sources said Tenenbaum had passed to Israel had in reality been developed by Israel, such as "reactive armor" and upgrades to Patriot missile technology.
3. Coverage in the Jewish press was heroic but largely ignored by other media. The Jewish Telegraph Agency dutifully reported the FBI statements, along with reactions from Jewish security personnel who were already worrying about the antisemitic fallout, which they considered inevitable "whether this guy [Tenenbaum] did it or did not do it". ("Jews in U.S. Defense Nervous Over New Spy Charges", Feb.28, 97) Then the JTA balanced these with refuting facts from Tenenbaum and his attorney - a side conspicuously missing from nearly all non-Jewish media reports at the time. The _Detroit News_ had claimed they could not reach Tenenbaum or his lawyer for comments.
4. Within one week, the Israeli government publicly pledged "full cooperation" should the U.S. need help in exposing Tenenbaum. (JTA) But the ensuing American investigation showed this to be a gesture as suspicious as it was unnecessary. The strange Israeli eagerness to add fuel to Tenenbaum's fire lacks an explanation to this day, and the strange behavior is magnified by a _Jerusalem Post_ report that even before his legal traumas began (1990-96), Israel had rejected three separate requests from David Tenenbaum for permission to immigrate to Israel under the Law of Return , giving no reasons (cited by JTA).
5. The U.S. Justice and Defense Departments concluded, after a 14-month inquiry costing $2 million, that there was no evidence at all against Tenenbaum. But after three years, U.S. Army spokesmen announced that they were still conducting their own unspecified investigation, which to date has not been declared officially finished.
6. In spite of that open Army investigation, it was only 1-1/2 years after the public media lynch that Tenenbaum was tersely pronounced "cleared of all charges" [sic - he hadn't been charged]. I located a five-line notice in the _National Counterintelligence Center News_, Sep. 98, quoting a July 5 press statement from the FBI, neither of which appeared in the non-Jewish press. The _Detroit Jewish News_ was the first to report it. But when contacted for confirmation by a Washington DC paper, FBI spokesperson Dawn Moritz refused to say "cleared", but only: "The case is closed. No criminal charges have been filed." The FBI refusal to clearly pronounce him innocent elicited the reporter's conclusion that Tenenbaum (identified in the opening line as the "American Jewish engineer") remains under suspicion, further confirmed by Tenenbaum's refusal to be interviewed by this pro-Palestinian paper. ( _Washington Report on Middle East Affairs_, Aug.98, with the erroneous title: "American Engineer Who Admitted Giving Classified Information to Israel is Back at Work")
Only later it came to light that FBI special agent James Gugino had already investigated Tenenbaum for the same suspicions in 1996 - twice - and had found nothing of concern.
7. Tenenbaum officially went back to work in his old office in Mar. 98 [this according to the court brief - most media versions say Apr. 98]. Officially he had been "suspended with full pay" for the year. But he was not allowed to touch any work in the office and was forbidden to so much as speak to an Israeli. His colleagues of 15 years avoided him. He didn't even have a computer at his desk, and all the projects he had once worked with were now off-limits. To my knowledge, this is his situation today. He spends his office time reading and sketching, and fretting about the waste of taxpayers' money in paying him to do nothing. "They're in effect pressuring me to quit." (_Jewish Voice & Opinion_, Jun. 99) At the same time, and as recently as Jul. 00, Tenenbaum was listed on the Army Internet site as "a spy". (_Detroit Jewish News_, May 18, 01)
Media coverage after Tenenbaum's return to work becomes muted in contrast to the initial free-for-all. Three Jewish papers mentioned Tenenbaum's complete (sort of) exoneration, two of which were belatedly reminded of his case by Ciralsky's lawsuit. There was a bare-bones reference to him in _Salon_ (Jun. 98), again as a footnote to Ciralsky and with the basic facts wrong. And of course, all articles pro and con brought up associations with Jonathan Pollard, regardless of the fact that Tenenbaum was never charged with espionage. Relatively recent coverage in the _Investigator_, an "Intel Bulletin Newsletter" from the Spy Tech Agency (Oct.13, 00), continues to repeat the 1997 media error that "Tenenbaum had admitted to inadvertently giving classified information" to Israel "for more than 10 years", but now claiming that the government had submitted a sworn statement to that effect "in court records", which present a mystery since there were never any legal proceedings against him.
This is only the surface of a whole saga behind the Tenenbaum Trauma. Rabbi Abe Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, thinks that this saga ought to "put a chill down the spine of any hyphenated American." (_Investigator_)
Tenenbaum's Story: It's the Internal Memos (Again)
David Tenenbaum's troubles began much like those of Ciralsky. He was first convinced to take a polygraph test in Jan. 97, under the impression that his security clearance was about to be upgraded. As Tenenbaum's attorneys were to discover, this was the only way his supervisors could subject him to a polygraph and interrogation without informing him that he was under investigation. One of the questions, at that time seemingly routine, was about inadvertently releasing classified information to unauthorized parties, to which he replied in the negative, adding that he rarely dealt with classified information. During a short meal break, one of the investigators said, "Mr. Tenenbaum, it's hard for me to believe you haven't passed secret information to Israel."
Why was it so hard for the gentleman to believe? According to the sworn legal statement by TACOM supervisors which attorneys obtained for his lawsuit, "Tenenbaum's religious and ethnic background fit 'a classic profile' warranting security concerns." They were acting on a Defense Department advisory memo, sent out in Oct. 95 [or Dec., per _NY Times_] to 250 military contractors regarding potential spies. After noting "military friends" such as France, Japan and Germany, the memo singled out Israel as a "non-traditional adversary" which "aggressively" uses its "ethnic allies present in the U.S." Predictably, it cited Jonathan Pollard as a prime example. The confidential memo was exposed by _Moment_ in 1996, and then picked up by the JTA, _Washington Post_ and _NY Times_. In response to a subsequent protest from the ADL, the advisory was disowned by Assistant Defense Secretary Emmett Paige Jr. Its author was dismissed as "a low-ranking individual" in the New York branch of the Defense Investigative Service who, according to Pentagon spokesman Kenneth Bacon, based the warning on "his views, his own worries". However, Tenenbaum's former attorney, Martin Crandell, says the DoD has never replaced it with revised directives. And Paige's assertion that "this document does not reflect the official position" of his Department contradicts both TACOM testimony and an earlier study funded by the Defense Department itself, which demonizes not only Israel's "ethnic allies" but Israel's entire political process.
Other phrases in the DoD memo referred to "a ready-made spy network" in the U.S. among religious Jews, Hebrew-speaking Jews and those who travel regularly to Israel. (_Jewish Press_ editorial, May 14, 99) In these terms, Tenenbaum was a threefold offender. But the irony is that these same attributes were exploited as part of his job, and he was even sent by the U.S. government on a six-week mission to Israel to glean knowledge from their ally. Tenenbaum saw no evidence of this secret profiling until 1996, when he was progressively refused clearance to travel to Israel or to interact with Israelis as he had in the past. But he still had no idea he was under suspicion for espionage until his "interviewers" expressed their doubts at the above-mentioned meal break.
The investigators (named in the court brief as DIS agents Mark Yourchock and Robert M. Riley) then shocked Tenenbaum by accusing him of being a spy and offering him the choice of resigning, taking a second polygraph test, or going to jail (since refusal to take the polygraph would be considered an admission of guilt). He was also pressured to sign a written notice advising him that he was under investigation for espionage - again told that failure to sign would be an admission of guilt He naturally opted for the polygraph (scheduled for Feb.13) and signed the notice.
When he arrived for the test, the examiner (identified in the legal brief as DIS polygraph operator Albert Snyder) announced that he knew Tenenbaum was a spy just by looking at his eyes; that he had "done other Jews before", including Jonathan Pollard; and that he would get a confession out of Tenenbaum, no matter how long it took. Tenenbaum asked to record the session and was denied; Snyder ordered him to write out a confession and he refused. He was never allowed to see the results of the polygraph test. (_Jewish Voice & Opinion_, Jun. 99) He only later discovered that TACOM Counterintelligence Director, Lt. Col. John Simonini, had submitted a sworn statement to the Defense Dept. Security Service - dated Jan. 22, weeks before the second polygraph - claiming that Tenenbaum had already confessed to giving the Israelis classified information. (_Detroit Jewish News_, May 18, 01)
Simonini is a story in himself. As early as Oct.21, 96, he had written in a memo that the chance of Tenenbaum being a spy was 65%, since the "subject's behavior, actions and statements fit a classic profile... [He is] at best - an unwilling accomplice. At worst - he may be knowingly assisting a foreign government which is known to exploit nationalistic and religious tendencies." (_Investigator_, Oct.13, 00) Why did the intelligence chief consider this fact "known"? From the Defense Department's memo and study which branded Israel as extremely exploitative, especially under a Likud government. And what was this "classic profile" he relied on? Apparently the same profile applied to Ciralsky and others mentioned in this article. Simonini went so far as to remove Tenenbaum from an engineer exchange program for which a higher-ranking official had chosen him, simply because he "didn't trust Tenenbaum, or the Israelis". And by the end of 1996, he had banned Tenenbaum from all trips to Israel. (legal complaint to District Court, Apr.29, 99) All of this took place before David was ever questioned about his activities.
Following the second polygraph, Snyder reported that Tenenbaum had admitted passing "non-releasable classified information", just as they all suspected, "to every Israeli Liaison Officer assigned to TACOM over the last 10 years". His very detailed report on the damaging leak turned out to be filled with fabrication from several angles, providing 21 points in Tenenbaum's legal complaint. Perhaps this is how Agent Snyder has "done other Jews before".
FBI Agent Gugino, who had seen allegations against Tenenbaum come to nothing before, was obligated nevertheless to open a third investigation based on Snyder's report. To his credit, Gugino tried to postpone the requested house search, with a view to cross-checking what appeared to be suspicious polygraph results. But another investigator obtained the warrant and scheduled the search for that Saturday (which everyone knew would disrupt the Tenenbaums' custom of keeping the Sabbath). Gugino would later testify in a deposition for Tenenbaum's lawsuit that he had sensed the Jewish engineer was caught in the middle of "a far bigger, very wide-ranging intelligence scheme".
All of this was being arranged without Tenenbaum's knowledge. For him the boom fell on Feb. 14, the day after the second polygraph. When he returned to his office that day, a dozen investigators surrounded him (with the entire staff watching), seized his computer and demanded to search his home. A warrant had been obtained based on Snyder's report. On his way out, a guard stripped Tenenbaum of his ID badge and parking sticker (but failed to search his briefcase for sensitive documents). It was at this point, Tenenbaum said, that he realized he would need an attorney. But he had no idea of the ordeal to follow: a house search which traumatized his young daughter, four months of 24-hour surveillance which drove his wife into clinical depression, enduring up to six cars (two agents each) tailing him everywhere he or his wife went (in one case nearly running him over), and hoards of journalists who camped outside the Tenenbaum house after receiving FBI tips. The scrutiny which began that February day did not subside until 17 months later, and it even extended to the neighbors who drew attention to themselves by complaining to local authorities about the unreasonable harrassment of Tenenbaum.
On Feb.3, 98, about one year later, U.S. Assistant Attorney Michael Liebson notified the FBI that there was no evidence with which to indict Tenenbaum: "This investigation was exceptionally thorough.... There is no question that if evidence existed which would prove this case, then these agents would have found it." David was ordered back to work within the month. But the intrepid investigators persisted in harrassing the Tenenbaum family for an additional six months, until July 10, 98. Most interestingly, government records show that Tenenbaum's security clearance was not revoked until Nov.17, 98... one month after he filed his lawsuit. (Ciralsky's lawsuit notes that his security clearance was likewise untouched until he registered a complaint of discrimination with the U.S. Attorney General.)
David Tenenbaum is convinced that although he was originally hired for his fluency in Hebrew and his Israel connections, his orthodox Jewish/Israeli combination was the reason for all this harassment, the seeds of which can be traced back to 1992. His lawyers, headed by Juan Mateo, cite testimony of "key Army officials... [who] have admitted that Tenenbaum's being an Orthodox Jew was a driving factor in accusing him of espionage." TACOM's Director of Research, Richard E. McClelland, testified flatly that Tenenbaum would not have come under investigation if he had not been a religious Jew. Most telling, McClelland's government attorney repeatedly objected to the questions put to his client about the so-called "classic profile" of a Jewish spy - not on the grounds that no such thing exists, but that such information is "classified" and therefore could not be entered into the court record.
Tenenbaum's lawsuit, which opened Oct. 98, is (I presume) still making its tortuous way through the courts. Here are the known details of the case itself:
Tenenbaum's legal complaint names as defendants Simonini, Snyder, the two investigators and other Defense officials, as well as the American government. It mentions conspiracy to violate his civil rights, slander and libel in the press, religious discrimination reminiscent of Nazi policy, professional incompetence and unjustified suspension of his security clearance. According to one report, Tenenbaum is also suing the _Detroit News_ and its parent company Gannet Newspapers for libel. The search of his house for evidence, which took place on Feb. 15 (the day after he was ejected from his office), adds weight to the religious discrimination charge: fully aware that the Tenenbaums observe the Sabbath according to orthodox tradition, the FBI insisted on conducting a search on that day only, at which time seven investigators interrupted a meal with guests present and "turned the house upside down" for four hours, even opening mattresses and confiscating their child's drawings. Regarding the libel charges, the rash of error-laden news reports on Feb.19-20, 97 (only four days after the house search) are unanimous in identifying the FBI as their source. Tenenbaum is also asking the court to force the FBI to show him the results of his polygraphs, which were used as justification for his entire ordeal. [One version of the legal complaint, as presented to Eastern Michigan U.S. District Court in Apr. 99, is available on line - and as with Ciralsky's complaint, the obliging host is not a Jewish group but an anti-polygraph lobby.]
Updates on the Tenenbaum case are hard to come by. The _Detroit Jewish News_ published a detailed summary up until last year ("Targeted?" May 18, 01). We are told by the _ Jewish Voice & Opinion_ that the government moved to have the case thrown out of court, and was overruled in May 99. Tenenbaum's charge of religious discrimination under Michigan civil rights law was dismissed in Apr. 99, on the grounds that it was a federal affair. It was refiled in District Court, and again the government requested that at least this part of the suit be dropped. (_Forward_, Oct.13, 00) This time (writes the Detroit paper) the court ruled in favor of the government, on the grounds that too much time had expired since the incident. With a third try in Jan. 01, Tenenbaum's lawyers appealed that ruling, pointing out that the discrimination continues. The outcome has not been reported. The charge that David's security clearance was unfairly revoked was duly referred to a federal panel, with a verdict expected sometime in 2001 (but I found no update). The outcome of the disinformation and libel charges have not been reported either. In summary, other than the lone _Detroit Jewish News_ article of last year, there appears to be scant media interest in Tenenbaum's landmark case.
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The Tale of Two Jews, Or More
There are enlightening parallels between Adam Ciralsky and David Tenenbaum. As with Ciralsky, Tenenbaum was accused of hiding sinister information about his Israeli connections, all of which proved to be innocuous: To whom were all those Hebrew calls made on David's office phone? (to his bilingual children) Why did he "entertain" Israeli military personnel at his home on such-and-such a date? (they were paying him a condolence call while he sat shivah for his deceased father) Why did he violate regulations by traveling to Israel on El Al, a non-U.S. airline? (he had written permission from his supervisor to do so) And why did he stay in different Israeli hotels apart from his American colleagues? (his religious observance limited his choice of accommodations) Like Ciralsky, the questioning focused on his involvement with Israelis, even though Tenenbaum had regular contact with other countries dealing with military equipment. Nevertheless, DoD officials consistently deny Jewish profiling had anything to do with either case. A letter protesting the religious targeting of Tenenbaum and Ciralsky, written (Aug.31, 00) by David Zweibel, a leader in the orthodox organization Agudath Israel of America, was answered (Nov.20, 00) by Assistant Defense Secretary Arthur Money, who proclaimed that U.S. security issues "do not allow investigation based on race, religious affiliation or political views or activities." ("Targeted?")
Also like Ciralsky, all suspicion of Tenenbaum began with a source later discredited, who insinuated rather than proved his charges. And like Ciralsky, the accusation had been voiced and dismissed long beforehand, a fact that came to light only under legal discovery for the lawsuits. Both Jews lost their security clearances, not when they came under investigation as would be expected, but only after they made trouble for their employers. Not least, the Jewish identity of both was discussed by their colleagues in the most unflattering terms: Whereas Ciralsky suffered snide remarks due to his wealthy Jewish philanthropist father, Tenenbaum was referred to by TACOM associates, as far back as 1992, as "our little Jewish spy" who would tell anything he knew to the Israelis. (_Forward_, Oct.13, 00)
It came to light later that Adam Ciralsky's personal file, unknown to him, was red-flagged at the same time that Tenenbaum's investigation, unknown to him, was also reaching its climax (Dec 96/Jan 97). The flagging resulted in a summary of their backgrounds that concentrated on their "Jewish" involvements and ignored their secular activities. The timing, along with parallels in their religious-Zionist backgrounds and how they were treated, indicate not only a common target but a common time period, as well as a predetermined method for dealing with these "ethnic allies".
The Truth About Polygraphs
Last but not least, the conclusive evidence against these two men consisted of "failed" polygraph tests. Controversy has continued to rage within the FBI over its handling of both Tenenbaum and Ciralsky through the use of polygraphs. In a testimony before the Department of Energy, FBI supervisory agent Dr. Drew Richardson expressed open criticism concerning "falsely accused victims stemming from polygraph examinations". He pinpointed the problem as less mechanical than "improper treatment and conduct on the part of examining polygraphers... rang[ing] from improper language and unprofessional manner to outright civil rights abuse." To illustrate his point, Richardson names Mark Mallah, "previously" with the FBI (context unknown); Adam Ciralsky, "presently employed [sic] by the CIA"; and David Tenenbaum, "presently employed [sic] by the Department of Defense." ("Prepared Statement" for Energy Dept.: "Polygraph Examination Regulation", Sep.22, 99).
This under-publicized furor over polygraph abuse is made more intelligible by the personal testimony from another source who is in a position to know. Convicted CIA-head turned spy Aldrich Ames commented on the issue in Nov. 00 from his prison cell at Allenwood Federal Penitentiary, writing to Steven Aftergood at the Federation of American Scientists and drawing on his firsthand experience in 30 years at the CIA. Comparing it to a "junk science" like astrology, Ames says that reliance on the polygraph for lie detection "has done little more than create confusion, ambiguity and mistakes." Regarding their reliability, he notes that he himself had passed two polygraphs while spying for the USSR. He then explains that polygraphs are known to be unreliable on a scientific basis, but their use continues because of their value as a psychological "coercive aid" to obtain confessions. For this reason, Ames says, the practice of "false representation to the subject of the polygraph results" is both common and justified in intelligence work. And lest anyone think that the old spy may have subversive motives or outdated information, a U.S. Senate Committee of Judiciary took testimony last year from Mark S. Zaid, Esq., which included the following comment: "[I]n 1997-98, CIA polygraphers reported to the Department of Justice's Public Integrity Section that they were instructed by CIA management to 'fail' certain employees.... There is no evidence that either the CIA or Department of Justice ever conducted an investigation." Zaid cited Ciralsky as a prime example, and we note that the time period he mentioned also included Tenenbaum. ("Issues Surrounding the Use of Polygraphs," Apr. 25, 01)
This means that for both Ciralsky and Tenenbaum, the FBI and the CIA had used the "failed" polygraph ploy in the hopes of forcing a confession out of these "ethnic allies" of Israel, based on presumed misdeeds. As it turned out, there was nothing for these individuals to confess, but prevailing attitudes about Israel in the intelligence community will interpret this as an accident of circumstance. There are sure to be future abuses, driven by the Blue-and-White Scare and perpetrated on other religious Jews who deal with sensitive information.
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The Shadow of Jonathan Pollard
As Tenenbaum's case surfaced in the media (with the implication of likely guilt), some Jews working in American security and defense were already bracing themselves for an anti-Jewish backlash of dual-loyalty suspicion, regardless of whether he was found guilty or not. There were those who had already been touched by the Scare, while others were about to be. These are experienced people with promising careers who suddenly found themselves under unique dual-loyalty suspicions, apparently for one of two reasons: active Jewish religious practice and/or tangible support of Israel. NPR reporter Totenberg was told by unidentified sources, "You have no idea what it was like in the wake of the Jonathan Pollard spy case. Every Jew was looked at with suspicion, and still is."
_Salon_ refers to Ciralsky's affidavit which tallies as many as 10 Jews who got the ax, due to panicky rumors in Mar. 98 about an Israeli "Mega" spy at large. The _Jewish Voice & Opinion_ and _Forward_ (Apr.23, 99) both report that as of 1999, six such claims were filed against the CIA alone. [Clearly someone has yet to brief the poor CIA spokesman who told the _Washington Post_ that no CIA employee had filed a complaint of antisemitism in the past five years, and that "If there are such complaints, we want to hear about them."] Mentioned in the National Public Radio report are also a State Dept. employee (like Ciralsky, blocked from serving on the National Security Council by "failed" polygraph questions which focused on Israel); and a FBI counterintelligence agent, who was fired after vacationing in Israel (with permission from her superiors), and who won a hefty settlement and lifetime annuity - but not the right to return to her job. In this last case, Jonathan Pollard was explicitly named as the reason for ousting her. In the others, Pollard's shadow looms over the landscape.
A recent addition to the list is Major Shawn Pine, a reserve Army intelligence commander whose top-security clearance was suddenly revoked in mid-2001 after 11 years of exemplary service. During his last routine update, he agreed to "the unusual step" of a polygraph relating to his Israel connections. It was then that his dual U.S.-Israeli citizenship, which he has held since the late 1970s, suddenly became a security problem. In commenting on the incident (JTA, Nov.2, 01), the Army simply replied that it was implementing "new rules" - rules which Pine says have a lot to do with Pollard. But this disregards the fact that Pollard did not have dual citizenship while spying for Israel. Pine's "security problem" may have more to do with his open participation in strong Zionist think-tanks like the Ariel Center for Policy Research and the Freeman Center, as a regular contributor to their publications. The final straw may have been his 1998 article in the Freeman's _Maccabean On Line_ which assesses the newly minted Wye Agreement, and which warns Israelis that the CIA would prove unreliable as the monitor of Palestinian compliance: "For the last two decades the U.S. military and intelligence apparatus has become increasingly politicized.... Even should the agents in the field maintain their professional integrity, their official reports will be modified by political bureaucrats within the organization." ("A Refreshing Change", Nov. 98) Regardless that his assessment has proved right on target, the very fact that Pine - like Pollard - candidly advised Israel for her own good, rather than supporting his American superiors in anti-Zionist subterfuge, was likely interpreted as inappropriate loyalty to Israel.
Jonathan Pollard's shadow fell on his own wife, Anne, who was arrested shortly after him on charges of spying for Communist China. There was never any evidence forthcoming, and the charges were dropped within three months. Yet Anne was held for a year in a Washington DC jail, while suffering from debilitating health problems. She was told that if she did not plead guilty to being an accessory to Jonathan's deeds, he would receive a life sentence. She complied, but as we all know he received life anyway. (See "Pollard is Still Seeking Justice", by Roberta Dzubow, _Jewish Exponent_; also "Presidential Agenda: Pollard" by Uri Dan and Dennis Eisenberg, _Jerusalem Post_, reprinted in _Maccabean On Line_, Oct.97) [More about Pollard in my article dedicated exclusively to him.]
Was Pollard a Cause of American Jew-Phobia, or a Victim?
One of the few journalists to ask this probing question was David Twersky of the _MetroWest Jewish News_ (editorial, Apr.15, 99). American Jews who have experienced or witnessed the U.S. witchhunt for Jewish spies are sharply divided on the weight of the Pollard factor. One might agree with several Jewish security people (who predictably want to remain nameless) that it is only since Pollard's arrest that a paranoia has set in at U.S. security agencies regarding religious and/or Zionist American Jews having questionable loyalty to America. Without a doubt, Pollard is an example of dual American-Israeli loyalty. But why should dual loyalty to two staunch allies with so many common interests be looked upon as a national security disaster? It is now known that Pollard's activity rated as a misdemeanor as far as real espionage goes, and it cannot begin to account for the American defense paranoia toward all Jews who love Israel.
My research indicates that the Blue-and-White Scare extends back - way back - before Jonathan Pollard, and that the obsession is not dependent on any real threat from American-Jewish dual loyalty, even where dual loyalty does exist.
Moreover, the CIA folks are not alone in their Scare. Ciralsky's attorney Neal Sher says he himself felt the "sting of the charge of dual loyalty", while working in the U.S. Justice Department. (_Boston Phoenix_, Sep.1, 00) The _Wall Street Journal_ broke a story in 1992 about a project named "Scope", in which the FBI kept lists of Jewish employees with security clearance (admitted by the FBI, who claimed to have discontinued it). Researchers Loftus and Aarons claim (_The Secret War Against the Jews_, 1994) that a tradition of paranoia, or worse, toward American Jews is concentrated in the judenrein "Jew Room" at the National Security Agency, the largest, best-financed and least-known Sigint (signals intelligence) agency in the world. (An NSA employee says that this is actually an entire suite of rooms, plus offices at the FBI as well.) The authors of _Secret War_ report that wholesale "surveillance of American Jews had already reached staggering proportions long before Pollard." (p.194, citing former FBI and NSA agents)
Retired NSA agent Bob Brill confirmed both the existence of the "Jew Room" and the climate of paranoia in his day (which spanned the early 1970s). Foremost, he says, is the unparalleled NSA security clearance "heirarchy" that "begins at the Top Secret level and goes on from there." He speaks matter-of-factly about the "traditional antagonism of the U.S. State Department toward Israel" which was shared at his agency, but notes that this was not common knowledge in NSA ranks. Brill then writes with wry cynicism that his task included working with "Arabic and 'Special Arabic' linguists", the latter being an NSA code to hide the presence of Hebrew experts: "The Hebrew language was the only one used at the Agency for overt spying." The reason for Brill's revelation is apparently his memory of the Yom Kippur War - a memory which he says has haunted him every Yom Kippur thereafter. Brill himself had received word of Arab intentions "41 hours before the attack began," and he insists that upper levels at the NSA knew "hours, if not days" beforehand, but allowed Israel to believe that there would be no attack. At some point "quite by accident", Brill discovered the NSA areas that were off-limits to all Jews, regardless of security clearance. "Clearly," he comments, "efforts towards Israel's demise are made here... totally immune from any monitoring." ("Revelations of a Former NSA Insider", _Jewish Press_, Dec.25, 92)
NSA spying on Israel was briefly exposed in the controversial story of the Liberty, a spy ship which stood off the Israeli coast during the Six-Day War in 1967 and fed data on Israeli movements to Arab forces. It was bombed by Israel and became a scandal clouded by conflicting accounts. A recent book on the NSA by journalist James Bamford, _Body of Secrets_, is considered a landmark and received high marks in a _NY Times_ review (Apr.29, 01) except for its analysis of the Liberty incident, where Bamford's remarkable documentation suddenly gives way to unsupported accusations that Israel bombed the ship in order to cover up a massacre of 400 Egyptian POWs at El Arish: "Perhaps Bamford's analysis has been skewed by his palpable distaste for the Israeli state." On the other hand, given the nature of the NSA, we may assume that the selective revelations provided by Bamford's sources were edited and approved at the highest NSA levels, and this includes their version of the Liberty bombing and also the choice of Bamford as their mouthpiece. [For a very different version of the Liberty incident, see an informative article in _Azure_, published by the Shalem Center in Israel.]
The pre-existing Blue-and-White paranoia in the intelligence community was witnessed by Pollard himself, when his interrogators in the mid-80s produced copious lists of American Jews and ordered him to show which ones had helped him spy for Israel. (Twersky) Upon Pollard's incarceration, the CIA became convinced that his crimes also included contact with a supposed Israeli mole high in U.S. security. Pollard reported to _Jerusalem Post_ reporters that he was subjected to no less than 52 polygraph tests, each one naming a different senior U.S. official and all of them failing to prove the existence of such an agent. Then in May 97, former Secretary of State Warren Christopher hinted in a letter to Yasser Arafat [sic!] that another Israeli mole was suspected, and a short time later the _Washington Post_ broke the story of the rumored mole with the code-name "Mega". ("Sacrifice of a Spy", Jun.5, 97)
In fact, the dual-loyalty paranoia seems to have been embedded for decades not only in the U.S. security establishment, but in the American mentality at large. The American Jewish Committee, in their study, "Anti-Semitism in Contemporary America", documents polls over the last 30 years which consistently show that about one third of the American public believe American Jews are more loyal to Israel than to the U.S., and another 20% do not know where the loyalties of American Jews lie. (JTA, Feb.28, 97) There is no similar public uncertainty about the loyalties of Chinese Americans.
But not all American Jews are considered equally worrisome. This is demonstrated by the apparent distinction made by one foreign policy analyst reacting during this time to Madeleine Albright's plans to fill senior State Department jobs with nearly all Jews: "What's there to worry about? After all, they're all Reform anyway." ("Jewish Numbers Grow at the State Department", _Salon_, Feb.13, 97) Is he implying that a Jew practicing something more committed than "Reform" is something to worry about? On what would he base such an assumption? Quite possibly the authoritative government/CFR study which is our next topic.
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The "Jewish Fundamentalist" Bogeyman
Not long after Pollard's arrest, the U.S. Defense Department went on the offensive to "prove" that American Zionists like him, who share unauthorized information with Israel, are in reality aiding a weak, unstable nation which overnight could become a new threat to American interests. To this end, the Department of Defense Academic Research Support Program funded a paper assessing the political future of Israel, written by Dartmouth Associate Professor Ian Lustick and published in 1988 by the New York Council on Foreign Relations. Lustick's title, "For the Land and the Lord", is the first clue to his agenda, which was to focus on religious-Zionist ideologues as representative of Israeli society, quite eclipsing the vibrant liberal-secular Israeli elite of the 1980s which enjoyed strong media and academic support. The distortions which arose from this myopic analysis are many, but we'll look at just a few.
In Lustick's Conclusion, we find the entire Israeli right-wing neatly reduced to one fanatic stereotype: The Likud, one of Israel's largest political parties and a major player in the democratic process, is "irredentist" [an obscure academic term meaning "greedy for territory not belonging to them"] and exploits disenfranchized Sephardic Jews, giving rise to "a redemptionist Jewish fundamentalist movement" controlled by the Gush Emunim (Bloc of the Faithful) settlers. Yet somehow Lustick, who has so much to say about these settlers, fails to mention that early Gush supporters ranged from Likud's Ariel Sharon to Labor's archdove Shimon Peres. (Among other sources, see Dr. Israel Shahak, _Middle East Policy Council_, 1992.) For those who are not spooked by "redemptionist" ideology, Lustick seeks to enhance the power of Gush Emunim by quoting Israeli Doron Rosenblum's view that they are capable of "transforming the criminal to the... consensus view." Regardless of whether it's fair to characterize them as "criminal", the hypnotic influence attributed to this group is absurd, given that in 1987 the entire settler population comprised 1% of the Jews in Israel (53,300 souls), of which Gush was only one modest faction.
Lustick then pits this mighty settler subgroup against Israel's democratic strength: Although he grants us that "Israel is not Iran", he can't resist adding an implicit "not yet". For Lustick, the 40-year-old Israeli government "has such a short and essentially untested tradition of constitutional democracy" that it cannot be considered stable enough to withstand these few proponents of "Jewish fundamentalism" (a term he uses continually throughout the Conclusion). They could join forces with "unscrupulous right-wing politicians" and "ambitious military commanders" to create "an Israel decoupled from the United States, opposed in principle to a negotiated peace, unfettered by the norms of liberal democracy, animated by redemptionist imperatives, and disposing of a large and sophisticated nuclear arsenal, [which] would pose challenges to American foreign policy and security interests at least as profound as those resulting from the Islamic Revolution in Iran."   [This equation with Iran is amazing but did not originate with Lustick or the CFR. Six years earlier, another globally influential group analyzed the threat of "religious fundamentalism" in the world, and chose from the many trouble-spots "three prominent examples": Iran, Israel and... the United States. See _World Goodwill Newsletter_, Jul-Sep. 82, published by Lucis Trust, a Roster Consultant to the UN and publisher of all Alice Bailey writings.]
As a measure of Lustick's predictive reliability, his 1988 Conclusion, subtitled "Assessing Jewish Fundamentalism's Long Term Potential", foretells that "the extremist proclivities of Gush Emunim settlers" will never permit the Israeli government to implement even a "minimally satisfactory" land-for-peace arrangement with the Palestinians. Thus the Dartmouth professor missed all signs of the impending Madrid Conference, to which the Likud's Yitzhak Shamir led the way. Not only that, but Lustick's prime candidate (Conclusion, note 10) for the "unscrupulous right-wing politician" who would take advantage of chaos to pre-empt the democratic process, and seize power with settler support, is none other than Israel's current Prime Minister, who was openly elected by the largest majority in Israeli history. Within a decade of its publication, the phrase "For the Land and the Lord" was less descriptive of Israeli settlers than the endless line of Palestinian shahid (martyr) terrorists; meanwhile Israel's credo had become "For Life and Limb", a rallying cry for survival. Yet Ian Lustick and his report still enjoy a place of honor in today's academia (the Conclusion is available on line, along with the entire tome), backed by Defense and CFR endorsement. This has ensured that the public and the media would continue to accept and replicate Lustick's image of Israeli settlers as fanatic quasi-terrorists who secretly rule the country, and the Likud Party as "hardliners" who pose a danger to the region.
The fact that the Defense Department and the CFR would even allow Lustick's grade-B fantasy to see the light of day shows a predisposition - shall we say, an irrational eagerness - to accept this sinister image of Israel, even if Pollard were not in the picture. But here is all the justification needed to throw the book at Pollard: he was aiding a country that can mutate overnight from a democracy to a religious dictatorship, stifling the 80% secular population and imposing an apocalyptic agenda on the region. It's a laughable scenario to anyone who is familiar with the Israeli political landscape. But for the uninformed and the willfully paranoid, any loyalty among American Jews toward Israel now assumes alarming dimensions. In essence, Pollard dared to reinforce a nation with the potential to be worse than the Islamic ayatollah-sponsored nightmare - with nuclear weapons into the bargain!
In his Conclusion, Lustick goes beyond analysis to strategizing. He urges the U.S. government to "shape circumstances" in Israel to "undermine" this dangerous element called "Jewish fundamentalism", and to come up with "effective ways to support those inside Israel who are struggling against the fundamentalists and their allies." At last we find a likely source for the paranoia in the DoD and CIA about "ethnic allies present in the U.S." who might be sinister secret "supporters of Israel's hardliners in the Likud". We also find a rationale for injecting the CIA into Israeli affairs, drawing on their long track record of "undermining" dangerous foreign elements abroad.
Lustick also assumed there would need to be "vigorous American and Soviet pressure" on Israel, which is quite curious, since in 1988 the two superpowers were supposed to be ideological adversaries on opposite sides of the Middle East conflict. This slip of the pen adds weight to _Ma'ariv_ journalist Carmel's suggestion of "bizarre cooperation" between the KGB and CIA, as well as reporter Phillip Knightley's view that the entire Cold War was a clash between two covert agencies which "often had more in common with each other than with the governments that employed them." ("The KGB vs. The CIA: The Secret Struggle", PBS Red Files, 1999)
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Israel, America's "Ally".
Jonathan's wife, Esther Pollard, observed in a 1994 interview that Pollard's sentence, and the subsequent comments made by U.S. officials, implicitly changed Israel's relationship with America. When an agent working for a U.S. ally receives a jail term "consistent with one given to a hostile agent", the logic must follow that there has been a "de facto legal redefinition of Israel" as an enemy. (_Canadian Jewish News_, Sep.14, 94) At least one former intelligence agent goes even farther, implying that the Pollard redefinition was a mere formality: "In public, Israel is our ally. What the public doesn't know is that all Western nations have covert policies to side with the Arabs.... Screwing Jews is what I did for a living." (_Secret War_, p.510) In fact, John L. Martin, a former Justice Department official who helped prosecute Pollard, attempted to justify that redefinition publicly: "Espionage statutes make no distinction between allies and adversaries. The courts recognize that today's friends might become tomorrow's adversaries." (Israeli paper _Yated Neeman_, Dec.18, 98) In other words, a double standard can be applied to U.S. allies whenever desired, based solely on what "might" happen "tomorrow". Such a flexing standard can become downright convoluted, as when U.S. State justifies protecting today's "Axis of Evil" in the hopes of improved relations tomorrow. (See _Jerusalem Post_, Feb.15, 02, "Just Rewards", reporting on U.S. government explanations for plans to pay American victims of Iranian terror with American taxpayers' money rather than with frozen Iranian assets.)
From both the context of Martin's statement and the easy sentences given to spies of others of "today's friends", this discretionary right of betrayal must refer to Israel only, whose dark "tomorrow" was so vividly portrayed by Lustik and others. But is there any clue as to when and why Israel lost her status as real ally? Angelo Codevilla, staff member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence who was privy to all details of the Pollard case, drops a clue in an interview with the _Forward_. He commented that Pollard had been "illegally" forwarding to Israel the kind of intelligence mandated by U.S. treaties with the Jewish State, the kind of intelligence officially shared as agreed... until "the U.S. government's anger over Israel's bombing of Iraq's Osirak reactor. I know what Israel was denied, because the then-Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, Admiral Inman, explained it to me in detail." ("Pollard Was No Pelton", Dec.8, 00) Codevilla had an unimpeachable source here; according to the _NY Times_ (Dec.23, 93), it was Bobby Inman (then Deputy CIA Director, later Director of the Jew-phobic NSA) who had personally ordered a halt to sharing Arab armament intelligence with Israel and therefore knew what was held back. Although in violation of several Presidential and Congressional resolutions, Inman's decision was later upheld by Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger, who personally ensured that Pollard would receive the harshest sentence imaginable for the "harm to national security" he caused by defying Inman's embargo.
Allowing these statements to speak for themselves, it would appear that for reasons unexplained, American security interests required keeping Iraq's Osirak reactor intact, and also hiding intelligence which showed its purpose as a lethal weapons producer (weapons most likely with Israel's name on them). Israel's status as U.S. ally was (secretly) revoked the minute she disregarded these interests in favor of her own, and Pollard's attempt to give Israel the intelligence by which to do so caused the U.S. to view itself as the injured party in his case - a charge never brought against him, but specified in the Victim Impact Statement which was submitted to the court (unseen by Pollard until 1997). Part of the "damage" mentioned was diminishing America's ability to use withheld intelligence to pressure Israel (_Middle East Quarterly_, Jun.13, 97), and making the Jewish State "too strong" (_WorldNetDaily_, Sep.26, 01).
We can now reasonably speculate that Israeli PM Menachem Begin's decision in 1981 to value Israeli security over American protection of Saddam Hussein triggered the CIA's redefinition of Israel which is later reflected in Pollard's stiff punishment. It's also possible that U.S. Defense's dire fabrications a few years later about Begin's Likud Party had a vindictive agenda which dates back to this moment of Israeli defiance. Then again, the whole Osirak affair may have only served to drag the real status of Israel to the surface. Which came first, John Martin's hint about allies viewed as adversaries, the Defense Dept. definition of Israel as a "non-traditional adversary", or the CIA policy of "screwing" Israel?
A relevant sidenote regarding another Iraqi weapons effort: in June 97, Pollard related to _Jerusalem Post_ correspondents that what prompted him to spy for Israel was another of those "insensitive" comments which the CIA denies. Pollard: "When I saw a photo of the world's largest poison gas factory being built in northern Iraq, I asked permission to transmit it to Israel - as the U.S. was obliged to do by prior agreement. My [CIA] chief said no, adding, 'We all know how sensitive Jews are to gas....' That's when I became a spy for Israel." The sadistic humor of Pollard's boss was all the more gruesome for the fact that the gas factory in question was literally using the same formula perfected by the Nazis on the Jews at Auschwitz. (_Secret War_, p.293)
My own guess is that if Pollard were free to write a book about everything he knows (drawing on decades-old information), he would reveal yet more details of U.S. betrayal of an ostensible ally. The main danger of this would be to undermine the American image of "honest broker" in the ongoing Israel-Palestinian peace talks. It would impact any future Syrian talks as well, undermining the public U.S. rehabilitation of an unrepentant Syria which decades ago humiliated and exploited Vice President George Bush (Sr.) in his ill-advised hostage negotiations (_Secret War_, p.484-487). Pollard's knowledge, which focused on Iraqi weapons intelligence, might also shed light on past U.S. deals with Saddam Hussein, and perhaps more details about National Security Directive 26, in which President Bush (Sr.) forwarded to Hussein new weapons technology and billions of dollars with full knowledge of Iraq's chemical and atomic weapons plants (p.491). Bush transferred some $5 billion from U.S. Agriculture for that deal, an illegal act for which Attorney General Janet Reno prompted pardoned him. (Emanuel A. Winston, _Maccabean Online_, Aug.96) Relating to the issue at hand, Directive 26 was enacted and forgiven in 1989, eight years after Israel destroyed the Osirak reactor. But it was in 1981 that Bush himself (then serving as VP) became the first world leader to call for Israel to be "punished" for its action. (_Secret War_, p.356) Said punishment was dealt out by withholding promised delivery of vital aircraft, by joining in UN condemnations, and by the CIA's illegal cancellation of its government's agreement to share further intelligence on Israel's sworn enemies. Later the punishment was augmented by locking up Jonathan Pollard and throwing away the key.
As the 1980s gave way to the 90s, the punishment of Israel not only continued but intensified. According to Loftus' sources, the U.S. sweetened the deal for the Palestinians' Arab sponsors in the Camp David talks, by betraying Israeli secrets and making covert deals with the PLO to remove rivals (_Secret War_ , p.476-477. On these pages we also find a helpful explanation for the U.S. favoring the PLO, coming from a former CIA agent: "Abu Nidal was a terrorist because he killed Americans. Arafat was a freedom fighter 'cause he only killed Jews." [More on this curious distinction below.] ) Then there were the CIA meetings with the PLO out of Israeli earshot, to synchronize America's political moves with delegates such as Hanan Ashrawi and Saeb Erakat, who still represent the PA "peace" camp. (p.194, 476.) Ashrawi has the added distinction of serving on the International Advisory Board of the New York Council on Foreign Relations (CFR, _Calendar & Chronicle_, Nov. 00, p.9). This CFR branch is the publisher of that definitive guide to "the dangerous Jewish fundamentalism" embedded in Israel's democratic society, which is relied on by the U.S. Defense Department.
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CIA - Agents of Middle East Peace?
The 1998 Wye agreement, which officially integrated the CIA into the peace talks, gave them a clear task: to "oversee" Palestinian compliance, including the "arrest of Palestinian terrorist suspects and the confiscation of [illegal] weapons in areas under Palestinian Authority control." (Associated Press, Oct.24, 98) They were also to oversee the reduction of the bloated PA police force "from more than 40,000 to the 30,000 called for in earlier accords," as well as to make sure that Palestinian terrorists arrested by the PA would not be secretly released. This means that ultimately, Israeli decisions to continue handing land over to the Palestinians would be governed by CIA assessment, in their role of "observer" (National Security Advisor Sandy Berger) and "honest broker" (Secretary of State Madeleine Albright), concerning whether the PA was keeping its side of the Wye agreements. (_NY Times_, Oct.26, 98) They were also to monitor Israeli fulfillment of their agreement to a freeze on new settlements. Last but not least, the CIA was to strengthen PA security forces - training sniper units and intelligence officers, conducting training exercises for the PA "police", providing sophisticated surveillance and satellite equipment for PA use, construction of a miniature "pentagon" in Bitunia (Ramallah), and hosting PA trainees at CIA headquarters in the U.S.
Actually, CIA involvement was already a fact, whether or not the parties at Wye agreed to it, as Berger pointed out, seconded by Albright on the CBS news show "Face the Nation". CIA relations with Arafat and the PLO date all the way back to CIA Lebanon station chief Bob Ames in the 1970s. Tenet himself had been involved with the Israeli-Palestinian talks since before Netanyahu's election in 1996, including personal meetings with Arafat. Albright noted that CIA offices were long established in Hebron, Ramallah, Nablus and the Gaza Strip. The Israeli paper _Yediot Ahronot_ (Dec.19, 97) describes CIA "monitoring" of PA's arrested terrorists as a process already in place nearly a year before Wye, whereby the PA must receive approval from the CIA for terrorists they want to release, after which the CIA notifies Israel - who may protest but cannot change the decision. In Nov. 97, again long before Wye, Tenet reassured the Conference of Jewish Organizations that U.S. efforts had already "caused the Palestinians to fulfill their obligations." Yet at the same time he gave these assurances, Tenet had already spent months at meetings hammering out plans to take on the mandate to help the Palestinians begin to try to keep these thrice-promised obligations. We can consider his address to these Jewish leaders a sample of the honesty that can be expected from this "honest broker". It is doubtful whether George Tenet will ever again have the trust of American Jews - in the Middle East peace process or any other Jewish issue - given the more recent publicity over his inability to recognize (let alone correct) unfair treatment of Jews in his own agency, not to mention a lawsuit charging him personally with antisemitic behavior.
Others had misgivings about Tenet's peace role for other reasons. Immediately after the Wye announcement, the doubts rose in a chorus across the U.S. political landscape. Newt Gingrich (_NYT_, Oct.26) warned that allowing the "traditional CIA" to supervise security between Israel and the PA "would be a very major mistake". A former CIA Middle East station chief called the venture "such an unlikely prospect that I don't see this as anything but trouble." (_Washington Post_, Oct.26)   Professor Melvin Goodman, an international security expert with high contacts in U.S. security circles, objected on the grounds that the peace talks were "a matter for statesmen and not for secret services," noting that Tenet in particular is not qualified. (Israeli paper _Kol Ha-Iyr_, Nov.24, 00, posted in translation by "Israel Resource Review", Dec.7, 00) Major Shawn Pine, as I noted above, repeated the Gingrich warning less than a month after him, a timely word of wisdom which may have earned this American Jew a place on the "dual loyalty" blacklist. The strongest objection came from Senator Richard Shelby, Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, who called it "troubling to me, troubling to a lot of people that have overseen and worked with the CIA", also saying rather bluntly that it "will put people in danger." Shelby vowed to hold hearings with Tenet. (_NYT_) [This is the cooperative senator who followed Tenet's prompting to denounce clemency for Jonathan Pollard. See my article, under the Pollard chronology heading, "Wye deal".]
DCI Tenet responded promptly to the criticism in a public statement (_NY Times_, Oct.27), first asserting that CIA involvement in the Israeli- Palestinian conflict was nothing new. He then countered: "Some have said the CIA is exceeding the limits of its charter. But fighting terrorism is our charter.... We would be derelict in our duties if we did not do all in our power to fight for peace." Other sources (_Washington Post_, Oct.27) clarified the CIA role as "merely" an observer whose task was to "monitor the security provisions of the Wye Agreement", specifically PA compliance in fighting terrorism, and to serve as a "go-between" for the two sides. Critics of this claim responded that they were hard-pressed to fit sniper training into the innocuous "monitor" role, while a _NY Times_ editorial observed: "The CIA has long mixed action and analysis, often with disastrous results," expressing a hope that the Agency would be "careful about avoiding past mistakes." The only comment from Israel's PM Netanyahu was that Israel didn't need CIA intelligence information so much as CIA honesty in evaluating PA compliance, "because lives are at stake." (_NYT_) In time, however, all the challenges faded and pundits turned elsewhere, while the CIA settled into this controversial assignment which made no provision for either performance evaluations or a termination date.
And now, nearly four years later (or six, if we count from Tenet's first involvement in 1996), the CIA is still on their mission "to fight for peace", and the news coverage of the conflict has shown that they have failed miserably in all the mandates that require honest monitoring. The PA shelters terrorists with impunity instead of arresting them. Illegal weapons and explosives plants have multiplied, and the only efforts to locate them which are bearing fruit are credited to Israeli security agents. The PA "police" force has grown in size and strength rather than being cut, and they have now openly joined in terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians. The infamous PA "revolving door" that secretly releases terrorists continues to spin, providing moments of grim humor when the PA protested Israeli assassinations of several terrorists on the streets who were officially sitting in their jails. In only one mandate has the CIA shown their customary professionalism: training PA security forces in sniping and snooping (the sniping is showing its deadly accuracy on Israeli civilians, and the snooping has been neutralizing Israeli intelligence assets). The wide-ranging failures of Tenet's Agency may be due to the pressing issue which the CIA chose for priority attention immediately after Wye: painstaking "censuses of mobile homes" in the Israeli settlements, described by Prime Minister Netanyahu's staff as "the central focus of interest by the CIA people" in 1998. (_NYT_) [This was a reflection of increasingly zealous application of the Wye "new-settlement freeze" by the CIA observers, to include expansion of existing settlements, and then new construction within settlement borders, and finally even temporary mobile structures brought in to relieve overcrowding.]
But despite their clear inadequacy in fulfilling their original mandate, CIA activity in Israel was further expanded in Oct. 00, after the Palestinians made good on their August threats to unleash new levels of violence on Israel. Enter CIA Director Tenet himself as the author of a new plan to "save the diplomatic process", and adding yet another failure to the CIA track record here. An unnamed "senior Israeli political figure" commented wryly on Peacemaker George, suggesting that it would be "preferable for Tenet and his buddies, and the can of worms that accompanies them, to direct their calming efforts to other places." (_Kol Ha-Iyr_)
As those familiar with PA Chairman Arafat could have predicted, the so-called "Tenet Plan" has joined the dozens of other stillborn peace plans which the Palestinian leader has accepted and promptly disregarded. Personal efforts by Tenet and his Tel Aviv station chief John O'Connor to intervene in Palestinian atrocities that October fared no better. They tried and failed to rescue trapped and dying (Arab) Israeli soldier Yusef Madhat from the PA-besieged Joseph's Tomb in Nablus. They tried and failed to secure the surrender of the blood-smeared lynchers of two hapless Israelis who took a wrong turn into Ramallah. However, someone from the CIA succeeded in establishing rapport with the Palestinians during those months of violence: a man from the U.S. Consulate identifying himself as a CIA special agent accompanied PA officials to the Temple Mount and at their direction diligently took videos of clashes between Israelis and Palestinians. (_Jerusalem Post_, Dec.19, 00)
Probably the single biggest show of CIA incompetence as monitors of Palestinian compliance to Wye was their total ignorance of the Karin-A weapons ship, which Israeli commandos caught sailing through the Red Sea on Jan.6, 02. Not only did Tenet's Agency (along with the entire U.S. intelligence community) miss all the evidence that must have piled up while the Palestinians purchased 50 tons of sophisticated offensive weapons, crammed them into a purchased ship and embarked on a voyage of over 1000 kilometers through the Middle East. They also failed, to a man, to find any evidence after the ship was captured, resulting in several days of U.S. denial that the destination of the weapons could be confirmed, and finally necessitating a personal visit and briefing from Israeli intelligence personnel armed with the documentation.
Currently (mid-Mar. 02), the failure of the CIA in overseeing Palestinian compliance is being implicitly acknowledged by U.S. plans to send yet more "monitors". According to the White House spokesman, "One of [U.S. envoy] Zinni's first tasks is to secure agreement on the size and shape of a U.S. monitoring team that could help evaluate Israeli and Palestinian compliance with commitments outlined in the Tenet security work plan." (_Jerusalem Post_, Mar.13, 02) Curiously, the Tenet Plan is now referred to as "the" peace initiative, rather than an effort to implement all the "security plans" predating it. Moreover, nothing is being said about this new team (expected to number "several dozens", once again drawn from the CIA and State Dept.) replacing Tenet's failed team - it's as though no monitors had been here for the last four years, although Tenet's entire intelligence apparatus will apparently be left in place. It's only fair to wonder if a swelled CIA "monitor" force will help PA compliance any better than the original "monitors" have. As for George Tenet's botched mission, the absence of any rebuke or announcement of termination provokes a question of whether his real assignment was ever the "monitor" job after all.
Tenet's track record and reason for being in Israel become even more important when set into the big picture we are examining. The CIA, acting on its own understanding, may well believe they received a mandate during the Wye negotiations to set up shop in Israel and manage (not monitor) the current violent exchanges, not between the Jewish State and the Palestinians, but between a mistrusted "non-traditional adversary" and a protected group of "freedom fighters". We may also assume that the CIA, along with the U.S. State and Defense Departments and the Council for Foreign Relations, are involved in "shaping circumstances" in Israel, as recommended in the special study sponsored by Defense and published by the CFR in 1988. What kind of future do they have in mind for the nation which they all agree is problematic? How much of their perception is based on the very similar assessment of Israel by the patron saint of the United Nations, Alice A. Bailey? And for how long are they going to silence Israeli objections to their "shaping" by dragging out the living skeleton of Jonathan Pollard, and using it as "the killer issue"? (this last term coined by foreign policy strategist Gerald Steinberg, _Jerusalem Post_, Jun.5, 97)
We can hope that continuing to use Pollard as the "killer issue" may have the opposite effect in due time, causing the American people to realize that the cosmic proportions assigned to this small-time spy, which were proven baseless years ago, are symptomatic of deep antisemitic bias. Some might think to link this to the fact that years of "monitoring" the Israeli scene by the same parties have contributed nothing whatsoever to shutting down Palestinian terrorism, but they instead have stood by while terrorists increase their deadly effectiveness and Israeli casualties mount. Someone might even get the bright idea to focus media attention on the connection between Pollard's treatment and Israel's treatment.
CIA - Agents of Middle East Chaos
To date, the U.S. government has not publicly called the CIA to account for their failures, which Israel's Chief of Staff Shaul Mofaz said has cost Israel some 11,000 injuries and deaths over the last 16 months alone (as of Feb.12, 02, a figure already behind by several hundred). Despite Senator Shelby's vow to question Tenet, either the Senate hearing never took place or was totally off the record: a subsequent "Special Report of the Select Committee on Intelligence" (Jan.6, 99 to Dec.15, 00) does not contain a single reference to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, let alone a CIA account of its involvement during those violent two years. However, Tenet's own voluntary briefing to this same Senate Committee, given on Feb.7, 01, is available and does bring up Israeli-PA relations (by then in a shambles), but in a context which speaks loudly of CIA priorities and attitudes. (See "The Worldwide Threat 2001: National Security in a Changing World")
First, Tenet nimbly avoids any questions about his agency's response to the horrific increase in PA terrorism, by completely omitting any reference to his vaunted mission to "fight terrorism". Briefly mentioning the security breakdown that testifies of his failure, he passes over it as old news unworthy of his time, and hurries on: "We are all aware of the violence between the Israelis and the Palestinians, and the uncertainty it has cast on the prospects for a near-term peace agreement. So let me take this time to look at the less obvious trends...."   Then in a masterful spin that could not fail to appeal to the democratic mindset of his audience, he presents "the recent popular demonstrations in several Arab countries" [the street celebrations following successful Palestinian suicide attacks] as "activism of the Arab street" [bold in the original] initiated by "average citizens" - the equivalent of a healthy exercise of free expression among independent Americans.
It's bad enough that the CIA chief promotes congressional naivete by giving the impression that in "Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Jordan" demonstrations are possible without explicit government approval; he insists on describing it as "action without any identifiable leadership or organizational structure", reminiscent of anti-war demonstrations on an American college campus. But he also fails to mention what all Israeli TV viewers could plainly see: the Arab demonstrators were openly burning American flags with the Israeli flags, in their utter hatred for Tenet's country. Worst of all, the DCI goes on to imply that the current bloody rampage by the Palestinians - a testimony to his personal failure and that of his agency - is actually desirable for its effect on the "Arab street": "Recent events show that the right catalyst - such as the outbreak of Israeli-Palestinian violence [sic] - can move people to act." Perhaps the CIA considers this "catalyst" to be so "right" for stimulating grassroots initiative among Arab populations that it seems a shame to end it. Perhaps it's because the "catalyst" is so compatible with the real CIA mission that they decided to help it along by teaching the PA "catalyzers" more professional sniping techniques. Perhaps the CIA is deaf to the broadcasts in which their PA "catalyst" is regularly inciting hatred of "America, the leader of world terror.... There is no place for a weak nation [like America] among the nations of this world." (sermon at Al Aqsa Mosque by Mohammed Hassin, Dec.7, 01, broadcasted on Palestine Radio, translated by Palestinian Media Watch)
On the point of Arab expression, it's curious that in his Senate briefing Tenet applauds the Internet for nurturing Arab independent thinking. He must be unaware that Arab websites present more bitter criticism of CIA involvement in the Middle East than anything to be found in Israeli sources. One of the more sophisticated Muslim websites, called "khilafah.com" (origin unknown, apparently Sunni), brands the CIA as a "tool of American colonialism", and states (Jun.30, 01): "The Palestinians... have pressed for the CIA's role to be revived after it had been put on hold by the new Bush administration. It seems ironic that Arab leaders today call for the involvement of the CIA in their affairs. In years gone by, the CIA was the scourge of Middle-East governments that dared to hold anti-American policies." The author, Athar Jamil, then offers a well-researched analysis of CIA involvement with Arafat, as well as the Agency's 50-year track record of toppling various regimes and replacing them with "loyal agents" who cater to American interests and divert anti-American hostility in their own countries. The payback for those loyalists, Jamil says, is American help to establish their own despotic rule, sometimes overruling the wishes of their people. [Understandably, he fails to comment on the Arab habit of syphoning off the grassroots resentment against America and their own leadership for this collusion, accomplished by redirecting it at the uninvolved nation of Israel.]
"Khilafah" is decidedly anti-Israel, and some comments seem to align U.S. and Israeli interests in wicked agreement. However, Jamil shows a depth of insight into the CIA role in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that Zionists would do well to note: "Indeed, it was America that hatched this entire process, kick-starting it in the Madrid Conference in 1993 [sic], as a means of permanently securing its presence and interests in the region and curtailing the growing ability of Israel to undermine those interests." The Muslim writer echoes the evidence found in the Victim Impact Statement at Pollard's trial which charges him with undermining U.S. "bargaining leverage" on Israel, in Lustick's call on U.S. defense to "undermine" Israeli factions which resist such leverage, and in the heavy CIA presence in Israel which is not accountable to any public body for its performance.
I doubt if Jamil is aware of the American intelligence evaluation of Israel as a "challenge to American foreign policy and security interests at least as profound as those resulting from the Islamic Revolution in Iran." Yet he identifies the conflict of Israeli and U.S. interests, and in effect warns the Jewish State not to trust the CIA's motives: "The CIA is providing technical assistance to both Israelis and Palestinians with regards to security, and this may seem innocent enough. But in reality the CIA's involvement in the peace process is based upon U.S. foreign policy objectives for this region.... We should not welcome it or the Americans as friendly forces." This last bit is not necessarily good advice for Israel, because a large segment of the American people and their elected representatives have remained proven friends. But the unelected and largely autonomous intelligence and security apparatus in America is another story. In the same vein, a Lebanese "Khilafah" contributor with nothing good to say at all about Israel nevertheless warns that when the Americans "find that the Jewish state has changed from being a tool of profit and benefit... they will abandon it." How strange that hostile Muslims should be better than the Israelis at spotting threats to our security.
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Joe Lieberman, The Exception That Proves the Rule
The main argument against the existence of a Blue-and-White Scare, which is probably on every reader's mind, is Senator Joseph Lieberman, whose nomination and campaign for Vice President in the last elections triggered euphoria among secular and orthodox Jews alike. Hailed as the "conscience of the Senate" and a proud keeper of Jewish law, his near-ascension to the halls of the White House would seem to undermine the basic premise of this entire article. The _Boston Phoenix_ (Sep.1, 00) raised several close parallels between Ciralsky's background and that of Lieberman, yet the Senator never met with the persecution suffered by the CIA lawyer. Ciralsky's lawyer Neal Sher, noting the difference, hopefully cited Lieberman's nomination as the end of negative Jewish profiling. Actually, it only confirms my assertion which appears at the beginning: The Blue-and-White Scare is not really about orthodox Jewish practice, but about active Zionism.
Much of the commentary on Lieberman, both enthusiastic and less so, discusses his unapologetic Sabbath observance as a sign that Jewish tradition is now respected in America. The American Jewish Congress rejoiced over this "sign of the culmination of a growing acceptance of American Jews in a wide array of high offices."   Some Jewish admirers expressed slight misgivings, but only where Lieberman appeared to switch sides over certain issues which divide liberals and conservatives. Some orthodox Jews became increasingly upset with "the gap between Senator Lieberman's private faith and public positions" (Toward Tradition, Aug.9, 00), a displeasure which culminated in an announcement of "excommunication" by a beit din (rabbinical court) in New York. But most religious objections made no reference to his platform on Zionism. Many assumed that he would be good for Israel, citing his past initiatives such as lobbying to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem. But remembering that the strong tie with Israel is what got Ciralsky, Tenenbaum and other observant Jews in trouble, let's look at Joe Lieberman's Zionist initiatives of late.
Few Jewish sources seemed to investigate Lieberman's track record on Israel around the time of his VP nomination. The Jerusalem Post Radio (Aug.7, 00) was one that did think to ask whether he would be good for Israel. Their guest, former senatorial aid Mordechai Tal, replied that for Israel there was "clearly no reason to celebrate", pointing out that Lieberman's non-support "in the past has been used as a cover" by U.S. officials to justify criticism of Israel. Yet even Tal mildly defended Lieberman, saying that his track record "is not anti-Israel" but just part of his effort "to be more American than the Americans". Significantly, neither the reporter nor his guest challenged the idea that being "more American" will require a Jew to be less Zionist, in contrast to the Christians who are not considered "less American" for being Zionist.
But Lieberman's "more American" distance from Israeli interests did not begin with the 2000 elections. After 1998, he abruptly left his previous unabashed Zionism, which had included bold support for Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Over the last three-plus years, Lieberman has sponsored only one safe piece of legislation per year: a bill calling for the return of Israel's MIAs from the 1982 war in Lebanon (Mar.22, 99); another calling for the Red Cross to recognize Israel's counterpart, Magen David Adom (May 2, 00); and a third affirming Israel's right to fight terrorism (Dec.5, 01). More telling is a long list of bills he did not support, most notably his own former call to relocate the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, which he declined on the grounds that the Camp David talks would "bring an agreement [on Jerusalem] home before the end of the year". (_Jerusalem Post_, Aug.10, 00) As we all know, within two months those talks brought something quite different home to Jerusalem, and Lieberman admitted that it "truly pained" him, carefully homogenizing the PA-ordered bloodshed into "the unrest and death occurring between the Israelis and the Palestinians." (Vice Presidential debate, Oct.5, 00) But months after his rationale was shown to be groundless, he still refused to sign yet another bill (Feb.13, 01) calling on President Bush to move the Embassy to Jerusalem, as U.S. law requires and as Bush had promised in his campaign .
In 2001 alone, besides the Jerusalem Embassy bill, Lieberman declined to sponsor these as well: congressional solidarity with the falsely convicted Iranian Jews (Feb.13), condemnation of Syria's Israel-bashing (May 15), advocating justice for American victims of Palestinian terror (Aug.3), a call to impose sanctions on the PA if they were found to be breaking their agreements with Israel (Sep.6), a declaration of Israel's right to self-defense (Sep.10), an endorsement of the Mitchell Commission which specified seven days of non-violence before obligating Israel to continue peace talks (Oct.25), and a condemnation of "vicious" terror attacks over one 48-hour period in December (Dec.4). He also refused to participate in an open letter of support for Israel shortly after all hell broke loose in the "al Aqsa" riots, which was signed by 95 other senators, but wide public criticism persuaded the moral heavyweight to sign it in the end. (_NY Post_, Oct.20, 00)
Yet even this abstinence was not enough to keep the Blue-and-White Scare from haunting Lieberman. As news of his VP nomination spread through the Muslim communities, they agreed that Lieberman's Jewishness was not a problem - but his "Zionist loyalty" was. When the accusation of dual loyalty (and a mistaken presumption of dual citizenship) came repeatedly from Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, many Muslim (and some Afro-American) leaders accepted it as a "legitimate" concern, and there were calls for Lieberman to meet with Muslims "to arrest those fears". (_LA Times_, Aug.12, 00) Others joined in the complaint that Lieberman was too Zionist, among them the white supremacist David Duke. And as if on cue, the Editor of the Jewish Renewal magazine _Tikkun_, Rabbi Michael Lerner, expressed the fear that Lieberman would actually lend credence to antisemitic images: "The typical anti-Semitic attack on Jews portrays us as having disproportionate power and influence in the world. This is a lie about Jews in general, but it's true about the sector of Jews who Lieberman represents." What sector does Lieberman represent for Lerner? The sector that supports "hawkish Israeli governments" [read that "Likud hardliners"] at the expense of "Palestinian rights", that sees value in "building a militarily strong Israel". Right-wing Zionists justify the antisemites' caricature of the world-gobbling Jew. ("Bad for the Jews, Bad for the Country," Aug.10, 00)
Lieberman hurried to ward off the Scare by declaring his undivided loyalty to the Red-White-and-Blue, and adding for good measure, "I admire what Farrakhan is doing." (_NY Post_, Sep.30) He might have realized that he had already earned the respect of Muslim leaders, having been awarded the American Muslim Council's top award in 1998 (after years of vocal support for Israel). But when Farrakhan's doings extended to linking Lieberman with the Jewish "master-slave" attitude toward black people on Meet the Press (Oct.14, 00), Lieberman responded by expressing the desire to meet with him.
Since then, Joe Lieberman has looked for yet newer and better ways to prove his U.S. loyalty as only an American Jew would do. While his colleagues lined up to support Israel's struggle against escalating Muslim terror in recent months, Lieberman led a nine-member delegation through six Muslim countries in order to fight Muslim terrorism... against other Muslims. His website is heavily publicizing his involvement in spearheading a congressional plan to prevent the descent of a "Theological Curtain in the Muslim world", and he vows that the U.S. will protect Muslims and "will take risks to support their freedom." (Georgetown University speech, Jan.14, 02) The Palestinian Authority areas were not on his tour, however, and it is doubtful that the Jewish zealot will press his country to take any "risks" in supporting the freedom of Muslims terrorized by Yasser Arafat, with whom Lieberman claims a close relationship.
Above all else, Lieberman has religiously kept his distance from the plight of Jonathan Pollard, who illegally tried to repair an illegal blackout of vital intelligence promised to Israel, and is now suffering in one of the worst cases of injustice in American legal history. When approached for help by his father, Dr. Morris Pollard, the "dual loyalty" issue was the reason Lieberman gave for bowing out. (_Jewish Press_, Apr.7, 00; also the activist group "Justice for Pollard", Aug.8, 00) We may assume that this was also his reason for ignoring Adam Ciralsky's appeal for support, despite the fact that Ciralsky was totally innocent of any wrongdoing. But even the fear of dual loyalty falls short of explaining Lieberman's eagerness to lead a Senate lobby against Pollard's release. [For more about Lieberman and Pollard, see my companion article on the Pollard Affair.]
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Daniel Kurtzer, The Exception that Promotes the Rule
Another anomaly in our survey of the Scare is Daniel Kurtzer, an orthodox Jew whose 25 years of service in the U.S. State Department has been not only illustrious but seemingly Scare-free, culminating in his May 01 appointment as the first-ever orthodox Jew to serve as Ambassador to Israel. Yet far from being thrilled, supporters of Israel in the U.S. thronged to protest Kurtzer's appointment, ranging from former AIPAC leader Morris Amitay to pro-Israel Arab columnist Joseph Farah, who called Kurtzer "a disaster for Israel". The organization "Americans for a Safe Israel" sent an objection to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee prior to his confirmation. Full-page ads of protest were launched by ZOA, the Jewish War Veterans of USA, the American Sephardi Federation, the National Council of Young Israel, and the Center for Security Policy. Zionist Christians joined with their 40-million-member National Unity Coalition for Israel. Israeli opposition came from the Jerusalem Institute for Western Defense, as well as former Prime Ministers Shamir and Netanyahu.
Why the furor? Because for many Zionists, Daniel Kurtzer (his orthodoxy notwithstanding) personifies the terminal effect of the Blue-and-White Scare: the transformed post-Zionist Jew on a mission to transform others. In contrast to Lieberman, who is running from the Scare, the breed of Jew that Kurtzer represents is running with the Scare. This is one who has accepted the validity of the Scare, either from political expediency or perverted moral principle, and makes a conscious decision to defect from the ranks of the hunted to those of the hunters. He first works at purging from himself the last traces of affection for his own "ethnic ties", and then he dedicates himself to weakening Israel and her "ethnic allies". Meanwhile his tribal kinship (and even better where applicable, his religious observance) serves to deflect suspicion among Israel's supporters. He can also wield the influence of the Scare on fellow-Jews as a commissioned "change agent" for the transformation of others. Such a Jew would be both rare and immensely valuable to the orchestrators of the Blue-and-White Scare, who would rightly view him as a trojan horse. Therefore, we are sure to find him in the thick of any action that impacts the State of Israel. [Sidenote: The individual's motives may not necessarily be malicious; he is more likely convinced that his destructive efforts will eventually benefit the world - even the Jewish world. Such is the sincere perception of the "benevolent and enlightened" disciple of The Plan for the New Humanity. But Jewish disciples may not be aware that at some stage, the New Humanity will expect them to sacrifice more than just their ancestral homeland - Jewish religion, Jewish identity and ultimately the physical life of the Jew must also be offered up "for the good of the whole".]
But clearly, a Jewish defector from the Blue-and-White ranks would have to prove himself most thoroughly before being entrusted with such a position of influence. Kurtzer's qualifications in this respect are an exemplary Arabist record acknowledged by supporters and critics alike, together with a proven talent for undermining Israel's interests. The Zionist Organization of America has been particularly thorough in documenting Kurtzer's successful decades in sabotaging the Jewish State. Beginning with his PdD dissertation in 1976, Kurtzer promoted the view that Palestinian "guerrillas", who had recently massacred Israeli Olympic athletes and Ma'alot schoolchildren, were being driven to such violence by Israeli (Labor) government policies. In 1988, as the PLO stepped up its violence in the first "Intifada", Kurtzer reported to his government that the PLO under Arafat "was moving in a moderate direction." (_NY Times_, Jan.13, 89) His recommendation resulted in U.S. recognition of the PLO in Dec. 88 - and Kurtzer's promotion in 1989 to the post of Deputy Assistant Secretary for Near Eastern Affairs. His assessment proved so ill-advised that within 18 months, the U.S. once more broke off contact with Arafat. Yet Kurtzer is cited by the State Department (_Dispatch_, Feb.28, 94) as playing a key role in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks since 1991 in Madrid, and in 1994 he was again promoted, this time to Assistant Secretary for Intelligence and Research.
As an example of his key role in regional developments, while he was working for Secretary of State James Baker, Daniel Kurtzer is widely credited with creating the concept of "land for peace" - a trading of tangibles for (the promise of) intangibles, which later evolved into trading more tangibles for (reiterated promises of) the same intangibles as yet undelivered. [As a negotiating tactic, we should note that this principle has proven grossly unfair to the side surrendering the tangible assets, and powerless to guarantee delivery of the elusive intangibles. No nation has been pressured to abide by it other than Israel. Yet its introduction to the Arab-Israeli conflict is still hailed as a major breakthrough, with kudos going to Kurtzer.] Moreover, throughout the years of these "land for peace" negotiations, Kurtzer became personally involved in applying pressure to facilitate his concept, to the point of verbally attacking cautious Israeli negotiators and calling Israel the "main obstacle to peace" for not accepting the PLO's recycled promises of peace as legal tender for new land transactions. Former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, whose administration sat at the Madrid talks, recalled Kurtzer's insistence that Israel continue making unilateral concessions to the PLO in the face of escalating terror attacks, "constantly" blaming Israel for the lack of progress. For his part, Kurtzer expected to be heeded since he was "family" - a manipulative tactic which upset the Israelis even further (_Washington Jewish Week_, Dec.17, 92).
Compare those Israeli testimonies with Ambassador Kurtzer's own recent accounts of the Madrid and pre-Oslo years. In a speech to the BESA Center at Bar Ilan University (Dec.6, 01), he casts himself in the role of helping Israel "to exclude the PLO from the Peace Process", and solemnly says of Oslo: "If we had thought at the time that the Oslo Process was seen by Palestinians as retaining not only a political direction, but also a military option, I'm not sure we would have given even tactic agreement to the pursuit of the process." Yet he makes no apology for this misjudgment, which has proved so deadly to Israelis and which was largely based on his own 1988 report of PLO "moderation" and repeated pressure on Israel to give up more land in spite of PLO violence. On the contrary, when Kurtzer enumerates the reasons for Oslo's current "difficulties", Arafat's ongoing use of that "military option" shares half the blame, with the other half being assigned to Israel's settlement policy. In the same speech given four days later to the Israeli Council on Foreign Relations, Kurtzer hastens to deny any moral equivalence between these two "unilateral actions"; he simply mentions them together (at every opportunity) as "the two starkest examples" of how "each one does activities that in their own way change the subject matter [sic] to be negotiated", thereby spoiling the negotiating atmosphere. Based on these "examples", Kurtzer must either see innocent   Israelis killed by the dozens in premeditated murder as "subject matter" for give-and-take at the negotiating table, or he has passed over Arafat's "unilateral action" in order to denounce Israel's settlement policy as the real spoiler of negotiations.
To further confuse his position on Oslo, in a later speech (Jan.2, 02) at the Orthodox General Assembly, against the background of near-daily terror attacks, Kurtzer applauded 1993 as the year when PLO "attitudes changed" and granted Israel "recognition", ending the time "when the very existence of Israel was in doubt [and] Jews were denied access to holy places," and therefore ending the time when Israeli control of territory was necessary to ensure these rights. He urged religious Jews to be part of the "informal diplomacy that takes place [sic] between Israelis and Palestinians."   In such statements, Kurtzer exhibits an extreme callousness toward Israel's situation, and a total disregard of current Palestinian activities and attitudes in barring Jews from various holy places and calling for their blood. This single speech amply justifies the widespread misgivings about his suitability as U.S. ambassador here.
Former Executive Director of AIPAC Morris Amitay, upon hearing of Kurtzer's potential appointment to Tel Aviv, warned that he would be sure to "use his Jewishness as a protective cover for his anti-Israel views." (JTA, Mar. 29, 01) Kurtzer's "protective cover" of religious Jewish practice can indeed have the effect of placing him above antisemitic motives in the eyes of fellow-Jews, no matter how deeply he is connected to anti-Israel activities. It's an effect which plays off the Scare from both ends, and the lesson must not be missed: The willingness to turn a blind eye to an orthodox Jew bent on Israel's destruction is in direct proportion to the unwillingness to recognize just how deep the Blue-and-White Scare can reach into the Jewish community. For those Jews who would prefer to see Kurtzer as a Jewish victory over the Scare, rather than the Scare's victory over a Jew, it is a simple matter to collude in maintaining his protective cover for him. This role was accepted by _Jerusalem Post_ writer Daniel Bloc, who accused the ZOA of "antisemitism" for opposing Kurtzer's appointment.
According to the _Jerusalem Post_ (Mar.15, 98), the State Department had been trying to install Kurtzer in Israel long before 2001 - as far back as 1996, when many Middle East analysts expected the dovish Shimon Peres to become Prime Minister. But with the election victory of Likud's Netanyahu, Israel "signaled to Washington that his [Kurtzer's] appointment would be unwelcome." The reason? A concern that "overinvolvement" by Kurtzer in the peace process (considered inevitable from his track record) would increase pressures on Israel. At that point, Kurtzer was instead sent to Cairo, another player in the regional peace process. While there, he endured a measure of antisemitic comment and caricature in the Egyptian press for his religious practice. But he appeared to have governmental respect, and he refused to grant any interviews to Israeli reporters during his entire stint there, "out of understanding for Egyptian sensitivities." (_Ha'aretz_, Apr.6, 01)
As of May 01, however, the choice of Kurtzer was finally accepted by Israel. And it's no surprise that his new role has only given him a higher platform from which to blame the still-escalating Palestinian violence on Israeli policies. Within four months of taking office, Kurtzer lodged an official protest over Israel's attempt to eliminate Abu Ali Mustafa, head of the Palestinian PFLP, on the grounds that American Arabs in the vicinity had been exposed to danger (none were injured). Jewish protests over Kurtzer's statement came from the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, as well as from the family of an American Israeli seriously hurt in a terrorist attack a few weeks earlier. All focused on Kurtzer's refusal to acknowledge that Mustafa was responsible for multiple Israeli murders (including 14 Americans), as well as Kurtzer's silence concerning an American Jew wounded by terrorists just hours after his protest on behalf of Arab Americans. The protest from ZOA included a comment on Kurtzer's behavior: We told you so.
Soon warming up to his "change agent" role, the Ambassador (by now on the job for barely eight months) spoke to Israeli students at the Jewish-Arab Center for Peace about applying pressure to change the present government of Sharon, using the example: "My generation used to take over offices of college deans." After hurrying to deny that he was advocating such action, he added, "It was a kind of political action that let the power structure know we wanted a change... and it worked, over time." (_Jerusalem Post_, Jan.24, 02) A "senior diplomatic official" (apparently Israeli) called Kurtzer's comments "way out of line" and "blatant inference" in Israel's domestic politics, also theorizing hopefully that the Ambassador was not speaking for the American government. But the U.S. Embassy insisted that Kurtzer's remarks were acceptable, and that his job required that he "speak about the American experience". [Curiously, while Knesset members complained that Kurtzer never called on Palestinian students to pressure their government for change, the same story in Reuters (Jan.23) claims that Kurtzer "appealed to ordinary Israelis and Palestinians to mobilize for peace [and] put pressure on their governments." This important contradiction required an explanation, so I hunted down the JACP website. The page advertising its joint programs with Palestinians has all its links and photos removed, hinting that the projects are suspended indefinitely, as would be expected in the current situation. But the school identifies its Israeli-Arab constituency as "Palestinian citizens of Israel", accounting for the "Palestinians" in Kurtzer's audience. Reuters' use of the plural in "their governments" needs to be interpreted in that light.]
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Marc Rich, The Exception That Bends the Rule
When American Jewish billionnaire Marc Rich, already a fugitive since 1983 from charges of mega-tax evasion, was discovered to be spying for Israel, observers immediately began making comparisons with the Pollard case, with the expectation that Rich would be extradited and end up as Jonathan's symbolic cellmate. The shock was profound when he was suddenly and inexplicably pardoned by President Clinton on the last day of his White House tenure, without even having to stand trial. Clinton's move, which circumvented all normal procedures for presidential pardons, was the subject of hot debate and a Congressional hearing, and even provided grist for the antisemitic mills about "the rich Jewish criminals" who can manipulate the American justice system for their benefit.
Relevant to the issue at hand, we might well wonder what happened to turn the Blue-and-White Scare on its head for this particular American Jew. A few background facts make the question even more urgent, the most glaring of which was the energetic public lobbying by Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Mossad chief Shabtai Shavit, who cited Rich's contributions to the Jewish State. A close second to that was the ease with which Clinton found a way to grant the requested pardon without so much as consulting U.S. government prosecutors - a move which he never seemed able to make for Jonathan Pollard. Adding insult to injury, the comment of White House spokesman Jake Siewert was offensive in its matter-of-factness: "The government of Israel considered Rich a critical ally, and the President took that seriously when he considered the pardon request." ( _NY Post_, Feb.5, 01). The double standard displayed by both the Israeli and American governments toward these two spies who contributed to Israeli security cries for an answer.
A look at Rich's personal assets may explain the riddle. A clear factor, duly noted by most commentators, is the man's financial influence. Rich reportedly gave huge donations to political causes and charities dear to the American and Israeli leaders, including Clinton's Democratic Party (via Rich's wife). An equally attractive asset is Rich's "mammoth information-gathering operation", which ranges through Europe and the Middle East (_NY Post_) and which he reportedly offered to make available to the CIA. From the standpoint of amoral pragmatism, we could speculate that such financial and intelligence assets were judged too good to waste in a U.S. federal prison. We might imagine that had Pollard been able to offer this kind of ransom, he might have been freed long ago. And it's not so hard to accept a scenario implied by _NY Times_ journalist William Safire, that a quiet deal was worked out in which Israel agreed to forego any future government pressure for Pollard's release if only Marc Rich could walk free.("Isn't It Rich?" Feb.1, 01) Personally, I considered Safire's accusation pure assumption, until I came across the interview of Pollard's former prosecutor Joseph diGenova, who told his host on Meet the Press less than two weeks later (Feb.11) that Israeli PM Barak had indeed been given the choice between Pollard and Marc Rich. The inescapable conclusion is that this choice was made in the name of the Jewish State. It can only be refuted by energetic lobbying from the Sharon government for Pollard's release. [More details about Jonathan Pollard in the article dedicated to him.]
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What Needs Protection from Jews Who Love Israel?
The "Red Scare", that era of Commie-phobia against Soviet sympathizers, was nothing compared to the Blue-and-White Scare, either in scope or in longevity. The Zion-phobia is real and sweeping. It flies in the face of Israel's track record, political realities in the Middle East, basic moral standards and common sense. Are the super-informed U.S. security people really unaware of all the public documentation I have presented here? Are they mentally incompetent, driven by a hallucination that Zionist Jews are in league with the devil? On the contrary, these are some of America's finest minds, chosen for their abilities and groomed for crucial decision-making.
We have to assume some hidden but compelling reason why this caliber of leadership would fear a strong Israel, and therefore fear American "ethnic allies" who are in a position to foster a strong Israel. Yet the very idea that loyalty to a 54-year-old beleagured U.S. ally no larger than New Jersey could somehow threaten the security of the undisputed world leader doesn't compute - in fact, "reasons of state" would dictate an even greater investment in the viability of the region's only democracy. Apparently U.S. policymakers have their eyes on someone or something that, at least in their own minds, requires "protection" from the tiny Jewish nation - something so vital that it takes priority over American commitments, American values and even American lives. We need to narrow down the possibilities to something plausible, that fits what we know.
Theory One: Protecting "Arab Interests."
Is the conventional wisdom valid, that the West is so desperate to buy Arab oil these days that the U.S. cannot risk upsetting their anti-Zionist suppliers? Perhaps that was true up until 20 years ago. Movements in the world oil market since then, including Russia's emergence as a strong exporter, has forced the Arab oil cartel to repeatedly lower prices to meet the competition, indicating that the Arabs are more desperate to sell than the West is to buy. Other energy sources available for years are gradually being made more viable, and environmental concerns have caused developed countries to invest in fuel efficiency, which has further cut demand for oil. And in keeping with the changing profit picture, many U.S. oil companies now have wide-ranging investments in other areas besides Saudi oil fields, making them far less vulnerable to fluctuating oil revenues than they were in the 1970s. I propose that U.S.-Middle East relations are no longer rooted in heavy dependence on oil.
Is the "Scare factor" perhaps only a pretext for a calculated sacrifice of America's Jewish ally for more lucrative Arab trade partners? If true, the entire relationship would be driven by the bottom line of net gain. The Arabs are big buyers of expensive weapons, which might be considered enough incentive to downgrade Israeli interests somewhat for reasons of pure greed. But greed does not explain the systematic sabotage being practiced independently on the diplomatic and intelligence levels against Israel, whose shared technology has even contributed to the success of the American weapons industry. What have the Palestinians or the Iraqis contributed to the U.S. economy which would justify American efforts to shield them from Israeli justice? To paraphrase the famous retort, "It's Not the Economy, Stupid." And even if it were, the bitter experience with the Shah of Iran should have taught the U.S. that investment in a friendly Arab regime is high-risk indeed, for the expected returns can go up in the smoke of the next revolution.
Let's consider the less likely theory of an altruistic U.S. goal to promote Arab interests for their own sake - to spread democracy among the Arab peoples of the Middle East, as Tenet's Senate briefing would imply. If this is the effort being threatened by Israel, we reach the absurd conclusion that the strength of the (democratic and stable) Jewish State is holding its Arab neighbors back from taking the same progressive step with Uncle Sam, thus contributing to regional unrest and the growing instability of those regimes. Does anyone believe that Israel's collapse would trigger a transformation of Arab rule from corruption and despotism to democratic values and regional peace? In reality, Arab leaders tend to view democracy as a threat to regional stability, fearing that their own citizens will be tempted to emulate the Israeli Arabs, the only Arabs in the Middle East who can openly challenge their government. And none fears democracy more than Palestinian "President" Yasser Arafat, who has forgotten to schedule any elections since taking office, who routinely ignores his legislative body, and who diligently suppresses Palestinian anger at his rampant corruption. That anger is rechanneled into "rage at the Israeli occupation", even though this "occupation" has been replaced by Arafat's rule for 95% of all Palestinians. Yet a desperately needed PA reform, so vital for Palestinian interests, is not even on the agenda of CIA "diplomat" George Tenet, Ambassador Kurtzer, Secretary Powell, or of any other American involved in the peace process.
Theory Two: Protecting "America's War on Terror."
One would think that the terrorism sponsored by most Arab nations would make them less desirable for American security interests, especially since the shattering disaster of September 11, 2001. One would think that Israel's expertise in fighting the terrorist scourge would make them a more strategic investment than ever before. Yet after 9/11, the Blue-and-White Scare seemed to intensify rather than abate, and it went beyond simply "protecting" the War on Terror by excluding Israel from the official warrior roster. The War on Terror itself briefly became an extension of the Scare, an undeclared manhunt for Israeli "terrorists" (a label never publicly announced, but already familiar to Adam Ciralsky).
The grand sweep to round up Middle-Eastern terrorists hiding out in the States inexplicably included around 60 (some say up to 150) young Israelis, whose greatest offense was working illegally - or in one case, clowning in front of a camera with the burning towers behind them. These boys and girls, all in their early twenties (and some recently discharged from counterterrorist units in the IDF), were denied the quick bonded release and deportation customary for foreign visa violators. With their hearings being repeatedly delayed by the Immigration and Naturalization Service, some were denied legal counsel or contact with home, and many report being interrogated as suspected Mossad agents. One youth held in Brooklyn was subjected to a polygraph test which inexplicably focused not on terrorism but on his Israeli military service (he was then told that he had "failed" the test, but no charges were filed). Despite the obvious lack of any links to terrorism, an estimated 30 or more were not released until late November; and by December, over two months later, eight were still in jail.
This was when a new but unpublicized immigration law began to flex its muscle on the Israelis, a law which allowed the U.S. government to disregard the immigration courts in "special interest" cases, meaning those suspected of 9/11 terrorist links. Despite a Sep.25 ruling by immigration courts to send them home (after a 16-hour interrogation revealed no terrorist connections), five Israelis were held for two months under the "special interest" clause in a Brooklyn maximum security prison, suffering solitary confinement, brutal treatment and threats of murder (charges denied by U.S. officials). They finally returned from New York to Israel in late November, shaken and considering a lawsuit. Eleven Israelis living in Finlay, Ohio were jailed in Cleveland, cuffed hand and foot even during meals, and were held several weeks after immigration courts ordered their release - two of them under the mysterious label of "safeguard order" which the INS refused to define. Some of them were questioned for hours about their Israeli military service. No evidence was presented to the (very skeptical) court for the delays, except invocation of the "special interest" clause, plus the claim that the Israelis' employer was being investigated for the illegal hiring. But when Attorney Tom Dean, who represented that employer, tried to hand over the company files, he was told that the FBI "didn't want to see anything." What then did they want to see concerning these particular illegal foreign workers who were of "special interest"? After a confused Dean consulted with other immigration lawyers and the Israeli Consulate for possible clues as to how Israeli Jews could be terror suspects, he said that "the only thing we could scrape up" was a choice between two paranoid theories: (1) the FBI actually believed the wild Internet rumors that the Jews had masterminded the Twin Towers attack, or (2) the FBI feared that Israeli intelligence was at work and would somehow uncover vital State secrets in rural Ohio. (_Cleveland Free Times_, Dec.12, 01)
American Jews and Israelis living in the U.S. appeared to quickly bow to the 9/11 update of the Blue-and-White Scare. According to Booni Cohavi, the Israeli Consul in Chicago, some feared that being associated with the detained Israelis, innocent though they were of serious crime, would damage their own reputations (_IsraelInsider_, Nov.13, 01). And while objective observers like immigration attorney David Leopold expressed his outrage at the idea of holding "this group of kids" as suspected terrorists without evidence, ADL's Abe Foxman dismissed the general affair as "an unfortunate consequence of the new reality" that requires "ethnic profiling" of "Semitic-looking people". (Jewish Telegraph Agency, Nov.30, 01) In so saying, Foxman showed a willful disregard of the fair-skinned Israelis in many of the press photos. He did, however, object to the fact that Brooklyn law enforcers deliberately put the Israelis in cells with Arabs and allowed them to be beaten. In contradiction, the Israeli Consulate, who was only allowed to speak with the Brooklyn detainees after several requests and by special arrangement (and then in English only), dismissed those complaints as groundless. The Israeli Embassy in Washington likewise refused to acknowledge that such bizarre treatment for minor visa violations was in any way abnormal, with spokesman Mark Regev simplistically intoning, "Israelis who break the law must understand that there will be consequences for their actions."
Significantly, a Fox News report on the detained Israelis tells of "classified documents" which show that "even prior to Sept. 11, as many as 140 other Israelis had been detained or arrested in a secretive and sprawling investigation into suspected espionage by Israelis in the United States. Investigators from numerous government agencies are part of a working group that has been compiling evidence in the case [sic] since the mid-1990s." ("Suspected Israeli Spies Held by U.S.", Dec.12, 01) The timing of this "secretive and sprawling investigation" corresponds with the harrassment of Ciralsky, Tenenbaum and others. It's no wonder then, that months after 9/11, Ciralsky, Tenenbaum, Pollard and other American Jews are still struggling to secure their basic civil rights from a singularly paranoid and obtuse government, whose Justice Department refused to even publicize a list of the 9/11 detainees until sued by the ACLU, and whose Attorney General (John Ashcroft) took offense at the mere mention of mistreated Israelis by the Zionist Organization of America: "I would hope that those who make allegations about something as serious as a violation of an individual's civil rights would not do so lightly or without specificity or without facts. This does a disservice to our entire justice system." (JTA, Nov.30)
And yet, since none of the Israelis targeted by the "sprawling investigation" have been charged with espionage, either before 9/11 or since, it would appear that the U.S. "case" against Israel since the mid-1990s is not driven by security concerns in the War on Terror. One is tempted to think that the 9/11 panic simply provided U.S. security agents with an opportunity to execute a pre-formulated plan to pick up Israelis, hold them without charges and interrogate them about activities unrelated to terrorism but nevertheless "of special interest" to U.S. security - now aided by sweeping emergency legal provisions and minimal protest from a frightened public.
As a final footnote to America's "war on terror", retired U.S. Navy Lt. Commander Al Martin contributes an eyebrow-raising report with the headline, "U.S. State Department Sponsors Training of Would-Be Terrorists". Appearing to draw on inside information, Martin describes in great detail the operations of the Redstone Arsenal's Hazardous Devices School, "the most exclusive explosives school in the United States", where soldiers and intelligence personnel are trained. It is inexplicably run by the State Department rather than the military. And its recent trainees have included Palestinians, registered as other nationals (from Taiwan or elsewhere). The school was shut down immediately after the Twin Towers disaster, writes Martin, and a State Department Internal Security team set to work shredding all documents as fast as possible, even sending an emergency request to the Defense Department for extra shredders.
Maybe there was something to hide from the Israelis in rural Ohio, after all.
Theory Three: Protecting "Arafat, the Not-Really-a-Terrorist."
The CIA agent who distinguished between Abu Nidal the "terrorist" and Yasser Arafat the "freedom fighter" was far from fringe. U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell paraphrased this general distinction as U.S. foreign policy in his much-publicized comment to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee (Oct.24,01): "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."   Powell went on to hint at "gray areas that might need to be treated politically," commenting more pointedly, "You can be quite challenged in explaining these differences with respect to the Middle East." (Reuters) The government body under Powell has indeed been challenged in explaining the Palestinian terror groups missing from their "wanted terrorists" list. Senator Schumer, whose integrity caused him to speak up for Pollard, lodged a protest on this in Dec. 00 with then-Secretary Madeleine Albright. The tireless ZOA has been lobbying the State Department about it since 1998. Yet U.S. State's "oversight" was not corrected until Nov. 01, and observers say that all Arafat-controlled groups are still conspicuously absent. [Actually, the entire page of "most wanted terrorists" at the designated DoS website has been inaccessible for some time.]
Meanwhile, the State Department has managed to miss two deadlines (May 29 / Nov. 29, 01) for submitting its mandatory semi-annual report to Congress on efforts to capture the Palestinian terrorists responsible for more than 90 American deaths. It's not that there's nothing to report; Israeli intelligence passed on the whereabouts of 23 of these wanted men, all of whom are living in Arafat's domain and five of whom report directly to him. Perhaps the American State Department is simply so "challenged in explaining the differences" between "terrorists" and Palestinian "freedom fighters" that they have chosen to violate the law rather than face Congress. A very recent news item (Arutz-7, Mar.7, 02) indicates that some kind of a progress report has finally been submitted, attached with an explanatory note that the names of all terrorists have been included except for Palestinians. The ZOA, however, tracked down the missing names and identified "two long-time confidants of Arafat, three officials of Arafat's Palestinian Authority, three members of Arafat's Force 17 presidential guard, and five members of Arafat's security forces."
U.S. State has also been found throttling American media in the Middle East to avoid offending the Palestinians, as happened when a State Dept. memo from the "executive secretariat staff" axed an editorial at Voice of America Radio which condemned the terrorist attack on the USS Cole in Yemen. The editorial was disallowed on the grounds that "the 17 or so dead [U.S.] sailors does [sic] not compare to the 100+ Palestinians who have died in recent weeks where we have remained silent." (Associated Press, Oct.20, 00) The State decision was reversed a few hours after Fox News picked up the story, and it was later disowned by spokesman Richard Boucher.
The State Department is not alone among U.S. authorities in granting Arafat and his associates an exemption from the "terrorist" label. The ultra-secret eavesdropper of U.S. intelligence, the National Security Agency, stands accused by former employee James J. Welsh of actually destroying taped conversations in which Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat directly ordered the murder of two U.S. diplomats in Khartoum, Sudan, in 1973. (Joseph Farah, WorldNewsDaily, Apr.17, 01) Likewise, news of Arafat's involvement in planning the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center (reported by the Israeli journalists Yehoshua Meiri of _Hadashot_ and Steve Rodan of the _Jerusalem Post_) was quietly sidelined and buried within a year. Even in recent days, when Arafat's calls for "a million martyrs" and his shiploads of weapons could no longer be ignored, a White House warning that there "are no 'good' terrorists" was accompanied by a simultaneous warning to Israel against toppling the PA leader from power. To all appearances, Yasser Arafat's stability is safeguarded by the U.S. as though he were performing some valuable service to Americans. Meanwhile, as attacks on Israeli citizens escalate to daily murders, Powell has adopted the habit of rebuking Arafat for "not doing enough to reduce the violence", still unable to admit that Arafat is promoting terror and has been given no incentive to change. [A refreshing contrast was Czech Prime Minister Milos Zeman, who found it no challenge at all to call Arafat a terrorist, comparing him to Hitler and urging Israel to remove him - and in the process provoking anger from the EU for his moral clarity. See on-line _Jerusalem Post_, Feb.18-19, 02. It should also be noted that U.S. congressmen, such as Eric Cantor, Chairman of the House Task Force on Terrorism and Unconventional Warfare, have been sponsoring bills calling for an end to American aid to "Mr. Arafat and his terrorist groups."]
Colin Powell is by no means the first global figure to recite the curious relativistic mantra, "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter." We have UN Secretary General Kofi Annan reciting it earlier, verbatim, in a satellite-beamed address on Oct.11 (Associated Press, Oct.12, 01); and Steven Jukes, Reuter's global head of news, writing it earlier yet, verbatim, in an internal memo in mid-Sep. 01. (Howard Kurtz, _Washington Post_) The same strangely worded slogan has been quoted by pundits great and small as "an old adage" of uncertain origin, and it is nearly always applied to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Another global security chief, the "High [sic] Representative" for the Western European Union's "Common Foreign and Security Policy", Javier Solana, didn't quite call Arafat a freedom fighter. But as an active player alongside CIA Director George Tenet in the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, Solana did insist that it is a mistake to call Arafat a terrorist. (Interim European Security & Defense Assembly of WEU, press release, Dec.5, 01) This was in response to the Israeli government's declaration of two days earlier, officially declaring Arafat's regime a terrorist-supporting entity. But one can't blame the WEU when Israel's own Shimon Peres rebuked his government for "defaming" Arafat's name in international circles by publishing that declaration. (_Arutz-7 News_, Jan.1, 02)
Cancelling Arafat's clear terrorist credentials, which continue to be verified in both word and deed, is a widespread phenomenon which must have a compelling reason. It's hard to ignore the similarity between Powell's hints that "terrorists" and "freedom fighters" may change places in the Middle East, and the previously quoted CIA statement that this switch has already been made in Arafat's case. While Powell and others decline to explain why they have trouble calling Arafat a terrorist, the CIA source was blunt: "...'cause he only kills Jews." We should note that the CIA man doesn't bother to qualify the victims as "settler" or "hardliner" or "Israeli" Jews. Reflecting on the Palestinian leader himself, who greets the slaughter of Jewish women and children with the same enthusiastic "shahid" salute as the slaughter of armed IDF soldiers, U.S. foreign policy would seem to agree that a lack of distinction among Jewish victims does not display a terrorist mentality. However, we are advised that "Jewish" is itself a distinction among victims, based on U.S. Ambassador Kurtzer's selective protest over U.S. citizens endangered by the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
This sets the precedent for any terrorist who limits his targets to Jews (most of the time, at least), that he may be exempted from terrorism and instead be viewed as striking a blow for "freedom" - a kind of freedom that apparently does not conflict with American interests, and may conceivably further them. But what sort of "freedom" could be held as a common value by Arafat and the U.S. State Department (as well as the UN)? The Palestinians are thinking in terms of their own homeland and Islam, but the West has no reason to identify with Islamic conquest (except as a victim), or with the regional aspirations of a morally bankrupt terrorist gang who abuse their own people. There must be some other "freedom" the CIA and the State Department have in mind, which will be served by Arafat's dedication to murdering "only" Jews, even at the price of a few murdered non-Jewish U.S. citizens on occasion.
There is only one "freedom" which civilized nations acknowledge may be achieved through wanton bloodshed, and that is a desperate fight to save a people from the threat of extinction. Palestinian propaganda which claims to be resisting Israeli attempts to exterminate them has never been given credence by U.S. intelligence. Even if it were believable, such a threat would never be exported as applying to any other nation. There must be some threat of equal magnitude that all these intelligence and foreign-policy people fear, which just happens to intersect with Arab and Palestinian interests for the time being. Moreover, it must be a crisis pressing enough to allow for an extraordinary moral inversion which is never clearly stated but is continually reinforced. That inversion can not only make a terrorist into an instrument for "freedom", but accepts his racist orientation as relevant to that "freedom", and conversely transforms his victims from those whose existence is threatened into those who threaten the existence of others, or something, far beyond the Palestinians. And with this in mind, we can approach something like an answer.
Theory Four: Protecting "The Future of Humanity."
A "threat" and a "freedom" which can be shared by such diverse groups as the CIA, the U.S. State Department, the UN, the CFR and others, must be of a kind that transcends national interests, geographical boundaries and the safety of individuals. In other words, it must have a global dimension which affects all of humanity. As to the source of such a threat, we note that the highest-ranking global leaders seem to agree that Arab bloodletting among the Jews is not "terrorism", nor is it even a problem which requires direct confrontation. There is evidence that for at least some of them, it may be privately viewed as a solution to a problem - a problem which can potentially threaten the future destiny of the entire human race. This allegation is not only serious, but also implies a cosmic mysticism which seems incompatible with the hard pragmatism of world politics. However peculiar this may seem, there is evidence that global leaders are indeed mixing politics with mysticism, to such a degree that the mysticism is becoming the driving force.
As most readers know, the UN has continually undermined the welfare and legitimacy of Israel with a unique intensity. What is not so widely known is that Jewish NGOs are also marginalized to a startling degree in the UN's powerful ECOSOC. Even fewer know how to explain this UN policy. The answer is rooted in the fact that the UN officially subscribes to "The Plan of the Ascended Masters", a blueprint for the future passed on by occultist Alice A. Bailey which is considered divinely inspired by its adherents. This Plan calls for a New Humanity which will move into a state of divine unity, conscious of its own godhood and ready to cooperate with the "Masters", a cadre of disembodied superior beings. To prepare the next generation for this "planetary ascension", the United Nations is actively promoting Bailey's teachings among the world's children through their World Core Curriculum (designed by UN maven Robert Muller, an open Bailey disciple). But for the present humanity to attain this new level in a critical mass, it must first be freed from several "world problems", one of which is the Jews. One role of the UN in particular is to prepare for the physical arrival of the "Hierarchy of Ascended Masters", who will use a reorganized United Nations to administer their Plan on earth. But again, the "externalisation of the Hierarchy" is hindered by the presence of a people who have been a tool of the "Dark Force" from ancient times: the Jews.
There is evidence that many European leaders have followed the UN lead in becoming disciples of these "Masters". They have been taught from Bailey's writings that Maitreya, the "Master" who will be known as the "World Teacher", can only reveal himself and bring world peace when the planet is free of the Zionist State. Speaking of world peace, this helps explain the strange lack of interest by world leaders in the international grassroots call to revoke Arafat's Nobel Peace Prize: there are those who believe that a bloodsoaked terrorist can be an instrument of world peace - not politically but in an esoteric sense - when dealing with "the Jewish problem". [For general background on this peculiar doctrine, see Bailey's esoteric teaching on the benefits of the destructive "Shamballa force".]
Could American security chiefs also be among those who believe in this globally embraced Plan? Currently there is no specific documentation, just enough hints to make the theory plausible.
(1) The U.S. Department of Defense has shown public support for the Plan since 1980. The keynote speaker at their national conference that year was Marilyn Ferguson, who was just releasing her landmark manifesto for the Plan, _The Aquarian Conspiracy_. In this book, she openly states that the "Benevolent Conspiracy" to actualize the Plan includes many government officials, specifically citing "federal agencies", "the cabinet level of the United States government", and "virtually all arenas of policy-making" in the U.S. Assuming that her claim is even remotely reliable, one can only guess at the number of "conspirators" after more than 20 years of growth and national acceptance.
(2) The exclusive and publicity-shy Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), from which most of America's policymakers and intelligence chiefs are drawn, counts among its members many devotees to the goals of the UN. Its Study No. 7 (Nov.25, 59) declared its ultimate purpose as "building a New International Order". Andrew Carnegie, millionaire CFR member and founder of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, looked forward to a decidedly mystical "unification of the entire human race." (Henry & Danna Thomas, _Fifty Great Americans_, p.241) One CFR veteran, John Temple Swing, held a number of CFR honors unparalleled by other members (President, Executive Vice President, Secretary, and Vice President - some of them concurrently), only to "graduate" to a calling as a UN image promoter with the UN Correspondents Association.
(3) Career diplomat Wayne S. Peterson, an open disciple of Maitreya, claims there are many influential people in the American government, as well as European leaders, who share his devotion to the "Masters of Wisdom". (_Extraordinary Times, Extraordinary Beings_) But he says that their identities must be kept secret for the present, implying that the nations they ostensibly serve would be shocked to learn that their leaders have "higher" allegiances than those which they swore to uphold.
In summary, the only theory which adequately explains the Blue-and-White Scare is a rather mystical one, but no stranger than the Scare itself: a dedication by U.S. intelligence and security agencies to this Plan for the New Humanity, and with it a corresponding fear that a strong Israel will indefinitely postpone that Plan and deprive mankind of that divine leap in spiritual evolution. At the birth of modern Israel, the world saw how the Jewish people in every nation drew spiritual strength from its existence, even to the point of a resurrected Jewish identity among people who thought they had left it far behind. The "disciples of the Plan" then understood that the disappearance of the Jews as a people, and the birth of the New Age with a "free" Humanity, will simply not come about while a viable Jewish state exists on the planet. Being thoroughly indoctrinated with a transformed definition of "human rights" (now driven by the principle of sacrificing the rights of some for the good of all), the Plan's devotees see Israel's demise as a necessary and moral sacrifice to hasten the end and the "new beginning". Hence, the concerted efforts to incrementally isolate Israel from popular support, while at the same time sabotaging Israeli security and arming her enemies to administer the death blow. Readers should be aware that the "enlightened" individuals who set and execute these policies do not necessarily hate Israel or the Jews; they more likely see it as a thankless job, but a noble one undertaken to save the future of Humanity.
Meanwhile, the socially engineered Blue-and-White Scare in the U.S. is designed to discourage Israel's largest single source of support, the Jews of America, from interfering in this process due to misguided loyalties to an outmoded identity which is endangering human evolution. Once they are convinced that "good Americans" will not hesitate to smother their Zionist loyalty, the anxiously cooperative American Jews will act to weaken their own personal and communal identity with Israel, as well as that of the next generation, all of which will help speed up Jewish extinction. [Skeptics will reply that there is another source of strength for global Jewish identity: the Jewish religion, which in fact sustained Jewish identity when there was no Zionist option. My theory is thereby reinforced, because in tandem with the Blue-and-White Scare is a separate but coordinated effort to bring Judaism to extinction as well. But that documentation is for a future report.]
Aside from pretending that this article has no basis in fact, there are only a few choices for American Jews living in the shadow of the Scare:
(1) Conform to the progressively intensifying image of Zionism as an expression of disloyalty to the United States, accept that being monitored by a suspicious government simply because they are Jews is the norm, and hope that they don't inadvertently draw attention to themselves with some new example in the unpublished "security risk" profile.
(2) Hope to somehow turn the tide that has been flowing for decades through U.S. government agencies, by garnering enough political clout to completely reverse priorities and procedures in the State and Defense Departments, the CIA, the FBI, the NSA and heaven knows how many other unelected bodies.
(3) Subscribe to the new "human rights" mentality, and voluntarily hand over both Israel's future and Jewish identity for the good of the New Humanity... also accepting the teaching that the physical presence of the Jewish "race" on the planet is a "world problem", to be eventually resolved through "right human relations" and "corrective karma" (what unenlightened folks call "self-erasure" and "genocide").
(4) Read the handwriting on the wall reluctantly but honestly, and admit that the Blue-and-White Scare is deeper than a passing political paranoia, and that as the American Dream slowly merges with the dream of the New Humanity, the Jews are destined for a replay of an all-too-familiar nightmare. The sensible thing for such realists would be to relocate their families and personal assets to Israel, where daily life is far more secure and rewarding than the (deliberately?) depressing media reports would indicate, and where American Jews who love Israel are welcomed and encouraged to contribute to their own and their people's welfare... without dual-loyalty conflicts.
At least for the present, they still have that choice.
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-- HN
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