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Israel: Beyond Good and Evil?

Justin Raimondo | 02.09.2006 02:28 | Lebanon War 2006 | Analysis | World

Ehud Olmert's Nietzschean foreign policy

The viciousness of the Israeli assault on Lebanon is underscored by the IDF's use of cluster bombs against civilian targets. As Jan Egeland, who heads up humanitarian operations for the United Nations, put it:

"What's shocking – and I would say to me completely immoral – is that 90% of the cluster bomb strikes occurred in the last 72 hours of the conflict, when we knew there would be a resolution. Every day people are maimed, wounded, and are killed by these ordnance."

As close to a million refugees return to their homes, 100,000 unexploded cluster bombs – most of them dropped by the Israelis in the closing hours of the war – lie in wait for them and their children. Kids often pick up such ordnance because of its resemblance to toys. Such is the sickening legacy of the Israeli aggression, which will continue to deal death long after "peace" is declared.

The Israelis, for their part, defend their use of cluster bombs. Israeli government spokeswoman Miri Eisin philosophized that, while war is "regrettable," dropping the widely condemned ordnance on civilian targets in Lebanon was perfectly legal:

"Israel does not break any international laws in the type of armaments it uses. Their use conforms with international standards."

Eisin, you'll note, didn't even attempt a moral defense of the IDF's murderously cruel tactics: the Israelis long ago ceded the moral high ground and retreated behind a veritable Wall of Separation, beyond good and evil. The spirit of what might be called their Nietzschean foreign policy was well expressed in Israeli UN Ambassador Dan Gillerman's reply to those who decried Israel's response to the kidnapping of two soldiers as wildly disproportionate: "You're damned right this is disproportionate!"

The ordinary rules of morality don't apply to the IDF: Gillerman and his government are explicitly rejecting international moral norms, asserting that Israel has the right to commit any atrocity in the name of "self-defense." And if their "defense" requires the reduction of Lebanon to rubble, then so be it. Such is the creed of the new Israeli Overman.

In normal society, individuals who live by this Nietzschean code of anti-ethics are called sociopaths. Most wind up behind bars. Others find employment in the various branches of government. Gillerman is a proud spokesman for this disturbing trend in official Israeli circles – it was he who wowed the crowd at the March 6 AIPAC conference when he averred,

"While it may be true – and probably is – that not all Muslims are terrorists, it also happens to be true that nearly all terrorists are Muslim."

Insert "Jew" in place of "Muslim," and substitute "international bankers" or "Ecstasy dealers" for "terrorists," and imagine the resulting furor: the speaker would be likened to Hitler and run out of town on a rail. Instead, Gillerman's star rose in the American political firmament, so that by summer he was gracing the stage alongside Hillary Clinton at a pro-Israel rally in New York City:

"Let us finish the job! You know better than anyone else that what we are doing is doing your own work: fighting terror…. And to those countries who claim we are using disproportionate force, I have only this to say: you're damn right we are!"

This braying, swaggering arrogance is the sort of style one usually associates with the historic enemies of the Jewish people – jackbooted fascists and neo-Nazis, who wear their nihilistic ruthlessness on their sleeves alongside their swastika armbands. Here is yet more evidence of my thesis that Israeli society, deformed by perpetual war and disfigured by state controls, is morphing into a form of fascism, including a mass movement with global reach that mimics the historical forms of national socialism – minus, of course, the requisite anti-Semitism. The national-socialist Sparta of the Middle East, egged on by its radicalized American amen corner, is embarked on a campaign of aggression that can only end in disaster for all – the United States included.

The reality, in spite of Gillerman's contention that the Israelis are (somehow) fighting our fight, is that the Americans will be drawn into any war sparked by another proudly disproportionate strike by the IDF. We'll have to finish what they start. This is the one overriding principle of our policy, the mad "America last, Israel first" paradigm that distorts the rational pursuit of U.S. interests in the region. The IDF makes a mess in Lebanon – and we are charged with cleaning it up. When the Israelis aren't bulldozing the homes of their Palestinian helots, they're using them for target practice – and the ire of the Arab-Muslim world is directed at us, because those bulldozers and those bullets were paid for by American taxpayers, just as those cluster bombs that continue to kill and maim Lebanese civilians were made in – and paid for by – the U.S.

Amnesty International is urging the Israelis to provide maps of areas where cluster bombs were dropped, in an effort to clean up the deadly debris left behind by the invaders, but the Israelis, proud of their ruthlessness, are unlikely to assent. After all, can't you just hear Gillerman braying his defiance at those who "claim" that the IDF's dropping such deadly ordnance means Lebanese children are dying: You're damned right they are!

As for that investigation by the U.S. State Department into allegations U.S.-made cluster bombs were found in south Lebanon – and used in violation of several long-standing agreements to which Israel is a party, as well as U.S. laws, including the Arms Export Control Act – I wouldn't bet the ranch on any conclusive results or corrective action. As this New York Times piece suggests, no one expects the State Department probe, undertaken by the directorate of Defense Trade Controls, will lead to sanctions against the Israelis. By going through the motions, however, the Bush administration hopes to bolster its stock with its Arab allies – or, at least, prevent it sinking from sight.

Sinking very far from sight is the likely fate of the State Department investigation – unless antiwar activists keep the issue in the spotlight and force Congress (especially "antiwar" Democratic candidates for Congress) to take a position. Cluster bombs dropped on Lebanese civilians, Ned Lamont – are you for or against?

The U.S. is now demanding that sanctions be imposed on Iran for what Tehran might do in the future, for aggression that has not yet been committed, and yet the Israelis are immunized from any penalty for what they have already done. This kind of hypocrisy is astonishing – and yet more evidence that, even as the Israelis place themselves beyond good and evil, the U.S. is fully complicit in their crimes. And it's all paid for by you, the American taxpayers.

Justin Raimondo

Comments

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What happens when a German minister is disgusted by Israel's warcrimes?

02.09.2006 05:44

QUOTE
Jewish leader accuses Merkel minister of anti-Semitism
Aug 31, 2006, 3:45 GMT

Berlin - The leader of Germany's Jewish community had a hastily-arranged meeting Wednesday with Chancellor Angela Merkel after accusing a cabinet minister of anti-Semitism.

Charlotte Knobloch, president of the Central Council of German Jews, has been angered over calls by Development Aid Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul for a UN probe into Israel's use of cluster bombs in military strikes on Lebanese and Hezbollah targets.

Knobloch, a Holocaust survivor, has repeatedly complained about what she terms a growing mood against Israel and Jews in Germany.

After the one-hour meeting, a government spokeswoman did not say if the aid minister's views had been discussed. She said Merkel and the four-member Jewish delegation emphasized the 'partnership of trust' between the government and Jews.

In comments to Der Spiegel magazine's online edition, Knobloch had attacked German politicians for views hostile to Israel and singled out Wieczorek-Zeul and Left Party leader Oskar Lafontaine.

'These people support the anti-mood against Jews in Germany,' said Knobloch.

A clearly embarrassed Merkel later told reporters the views expressed by her minister on Israel, cluster bombs and the UN were private opinions and had not been cleared with the government.

Merkel leads the Christian Democratic Union party while Wieczorek- Zeul is a left-wing member of the Social Democratic Party, the junior government partner.

The number of Jews in Germany has increased to about 110,000, up from 30,000 in 1989, thanks mainly to immigration from the former East Bloc.

© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
UNQUOTE

Like the leadership of the jewish communities in the UK, Canada, France and the US, the leadership of the jewish community in Germany is evil beyond all comprehension. However, we have seen the same actions and words before, when the last so-called 'master-race' threatened Europe and the World, namely the nazis.

Same ideology, same tactics, same propaganda, same atrocities.

REMEMBER, the vile Human criminal garbage responsible for the depraved war crimes in Lebanon are free to enter and leave our nation (or those of the other nations mentioned above) with no fear of arrest or punishment, protected as they are by their fellows deeply embedded within our systems of law and politics. Criminals protecting criminals. Terrorists protecting terrorists. While the UK has people like Levy, Goldsmith, Straw, and Mandelson (each of whom are active supporters of Israel) in power, there will always be a hearty welcome for ANY jewish terrorist who wishes to visit or live in the UK.

Those people that sponsor, protect, fund, promote or glorify the racist, terrorist state of Israel should be rotting in our prisons, not strutting on our TV sets and smirking in our newspapers.

The German minister that expressed disgust at the JEWISH use of cluster bombs against the non-jewish civilians in Lebanon who could otherwise have safely returned to their homes, can now choose between death or ruin, for that is the fate of ANYONE in Germany who dares to notice and comment on the disgusting crimes against humanity that form the ONLY method of operation by the self-described 'jewish-state', Israel.

twilight


Meanwhile the Dolphins...

02.09.2006 13:24

zebra


Nietzsche

02.09.2006 19:40

I don't think you can pigeonhole Nietzsche as a supporter of what Israel is doing: he advocated creating your own moral values, but was a tireless critic of the state, and while he praised 'war', he famously called for "a breaking of swords". He's complex, contradictory and missunderstood, but he'd probably see Zionism as ressentiment par excellance.

(A)


Also

03.09.2006 01:02

Nietzsche's 'Beyond Good and Evil' was a call to abandon the manichean morality of the christian europe of his time, a call for a transvaluation of all values. You can't blame the guy who told us to question for the answers some militarists came up with. 'Beyond good and evil' is not a call for moral exceptionalism but a call to re-evaluate our ethical foundations in a world where god is dead in order to avoid nihlism. And the overman was about self-overcoming, not the domination of others, which again has little to do with the israeli foreign policies or the IDF.

You seem to be associating Nietzsche with fascist ideas, which is basically the Nazi's version of him - he deplored nationalism and statism. Theres a lot in Nietzsche worth reading, and a lot worth letting go, but he's no simple advocate of domination and moral exceptionalism.

(A)


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