Home   Bookmark and Share

 Print Friendly and PDF
The announcement last week by the United States of the largest military aid package in its history – to Israel – was a win for both sides.

Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu could boast that his lobbying had boosted aid from $3.1 billion a year to $3.8bn – a 22 per cent increase – for a decade starting in 2019.

Mr Netanyahu has presented this as a rebuff to those who accuse him of jeopardising Israeli security interests with his government’s repeated affronts to the White House.

In the past weeks alone, defence minister Avigdor Lieberman has compared last year’s nuclear deal between Washington and Iran with the 1938 Munich pact, which bolstered Hitler; and Mr Netanyahu has implied that US opposition to settlement expansion is the same as support for the “ethnic cleansing” of Jews.

American president Barack Obama, meanwhile, hopes to stifle his own critics who insinuate that he is anti-Israel. The deal should serve as a fillip too for Hillary Clinton, the Democratic party’s candidate to succeed Mr Obama in November’s election.

In reality, however, the Obama administration has quietly punished Mr Netanyahu for his misbehaviour. Israeli expectations of a $4.5bn-a-year deal were whittled down after Mr Netanyahu stalled negotiations last year as he sought to recruit Congress to his battle against the Iran deal.

In fact, Israel already receives roughly $3.8bn – if Congress’s assistance on developing missile defence programmes is factored in. Notably, Israel has been forced to promise not to approach Congress for extra funds.

The deal takes into account neither inflation nor the dollar’s depreciation against the shekel.

A bigger blow still is the White House’s demand to phase out a special exemption that allowed Israel to spend nearly 40 per cent of aid locally on weapon and fuel purchases. Israel will soon have to buy all its armaments from the US, ending what amounted to a subsidy to its own arms industry.

Nonetheless, Washington’s renewed military largesse – in the face of almost continual insults – inevitably fuels claims that the Israeli tail is wagging the US dog. Even The New York Times has described the aid package as “too big”.

Since the 1973 war, Israel has received at least $100bn in military aid, with more assistance hidden from view. Back in the 1970s, Washington paid half of Israel’s military budget. Today it still foots a fifth of the bill, despite Israel’s economic success.

But the US expects a return on its massive investment. As the late Israeli politician-general Ariel Sharon once observed, ­Israel has been a US “aircraft carrier” in the Middle East, acting as the regional bully and carrying out operations that benefit Washington.

Almost no one blames the US for Israeli attacks that wiped out Iraq’s and Syria’s nuclear programmes. A nuclear-armed Iraq or Syria would have deterred later US-backed moves at regime overthrow, as well as countering the strategic advantage Israel derives from its own nuclear arsenal.

In addition, Israel’s US-sponsored military prowess is a triple boon to the US weapons industry, the country’s most powerful lobby. Public funds are siphoned off to let Israel buy goodies from American arms makers. That, in turn, serves as a shop window for other customers and spurs an endless and lucrative game of catch-up in the rest of the Middle East.

The first F-35 fighter jets to arrive in Israel in December – their various components produced in 46 US states – will increase the clamour for the cutting-edge warplane.

Israel is also a “front-line laboratory”, as former Israeli army negotiator Eival Gilady admitted at the weekend, that develops and field-tests new technology Washington can later use itself.

The US is planning to buy back the missile interception system Iron Dome – which neutralises battlefield threats of retaliation – it largely paid for. Israel works closely too with the US in developing cyber­warfare, such as the Stuxnet worm that damaged Iran’s civilian nuclear programme.

But the clearest message from Israel’s new aid package is one delivered to the Palestinians: Washington sees no pressing strategic interest in ending the occupation. It stood up to Mr Netanyahu over the Iran deal but will not risk a damaging clash over Palestinian statehood.

Some believe that Mr Obama signed the aid package to win the credibility necessary to overcome his domestic Israel lobby and pull a rabbit from the hat: an initiative, unveiled shortly before he leaves office, that corners Mr Netanyahu into making peace.

Hopes have been raised by an expected meeting at the United Nations in New York on Wednesday. But their first talks in 10 months are planned only to demonstrate unity to confound critics of the aid deal.

If Mr Obama really wanted to pressure Mr Netanyahu, he would have used the aid agreement as leverage. Now Mr Netanyahu need not fear US financial retaliation, even as he intensifies effective annexation of the West Bank.

Mr Netanyahu has drawn the right lesson from the aid deal – he can act against the Palestinians with continuing US impunity.

- See more at: http://www.jonathan-cook.net/2016-09-19/palestinians-lose-in-us-military-aid-deal-with-israel/#sthash.fL4Eq28N.dpuf
Trump Says Any Conflicts Of Interest Were Priced Into Your Vote

It’s all the media’s fault, of course.

By Paul Blumenthal

 

November 22, 2016 "Information Clearing House" - "Huffington Post" -   Thirteen days after winning the presidential election, Donald Trump announced on Twitter that no one should worry about the potential conflicts of interest he could face over his range of global properties because everyone knew about them when they elected him. He blamed any questions of impropriety on the media for reporting on them.

The evening tweet from the president-elect reads: “Prior to the election it was well known that I have interests in properties all over the world.Only the crooked media makes this a big deal!”

The declaration that he currently has global properties comes after promising that he would separate himself from his Trump Organization and hand the company off to his adult children Ivanka, Donald Jr. and Eric Trump in a so-called blind trust. He has so far done no such thing. In fact, his tweet is a statement in the present tense ― “I have interests in properties all over the world” ― that affirms his current ownership and management of his business empire.

The children continue to take part in their father’s presidential transition despite their supposed work leading the Trump Organization. Ivanka Trump even appeared at a meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and reportedly was handed the phone to speak to Argentinian President Mauricio Macri when he called to congratulate her father. Trump is working to build an office tower in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

During the campaign, Trump stated, “[I]f I become president, I couldn’t care less about my company. It’s peanuts.” He added, “I wouldn’t ever be involved because I wouldn’t care about anything but our country, anything.”

“President-elect Trump seems to think that he will be able to enrich himself as president and blame the press when he is caught,” said John Wonderlich, executive director of the pro-transparency group The Sunlight Foundation. “He’s going to learn soon that campaigning is very different from leading a country built on integrity and the rule of law.”

Trump is responding to the parade of stories detailing his immense portfolio of potential conflicts of interest. He met with his Indian business partners one week after winning the presidency. He continues to hold a government lease for his Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., even though the lease declares that it cannot be held by a government official. Last week, the hotel held an event to pitch its luxury rooms to foreign diplomats as a way to ingratiate their countries with the president-elect. And there have been reports about Ivanka Trump’s appearance at the meeting with Abe and her talk with Macri.

The New York Times further reported on Monday that Trump told British European Parliament member Nigel Farage, the former head of the right wing anti-immigration UK Independence Party, and other UKIP leaders that they drum up opposition to the kind of offshore wind farms that are proposed for construction near his golf course in Scotland. They did exactly that.

Andy Wigmore, a media consultant present when Trump spoke to Farage, told The New York Times, “He did not say he hated wind farms as a concept; he just did not like them spoiling the views.”

Trump owes hundreds of millions of dollars to the Bank of China, which is owned by the government of China. The Constitution’s emoluments clause states that no government official shall receive favorable payment from a foreign government, foreign government-owned company or foreign official without the consent of Congress. Trump also rents space in his Trump Tower, where he is managing his transition, to the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, another government-owned bank.

He also owes hundreds of millions of dollars to Deutsche Bank, a privately held German bank. While the emoluments clause does not apply to payments to Deutsche Bank, there is a major potential conflict because the bank is facing a multibillion-dollar settlement with the Department of Justice over its illegal mortgage practices. Trump will soon be selecting the top leadership of the Department of Justice. There are also questions over whether Deutsche Bank will be able to survive the hefty settlement without government support. Will Trump save his lender?

Similar potential conflicts exist at the National Labor Relations Board, which Trump will also soon be able to staff. The independent labor regulatory agency ruled on Nov. 3 that Trump’s Las Vegas hotel had violated its workers rights to organize a union when it refused to recognize their affirmative vote. Trump’s hires at the NLRB will likely be colored by his ownership of properties with unionizing workers.

Technically, federal conflict-of-interest laws do not apply to the president. This does not mean that his business holdings do not manifest as conflicts of interest, just that he is not mandated to place his assets into an actual blind trust managed by an independent trustee. He has done no such thing. He has also failed to disclose his tax returns, the first elected president in nearly 60 years to not reveal them, which would provide insight into his investors and lenders.

Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) introduced legislation that would extend the federal conflict-of-interest laws to cover the president and vice president. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) introduced legislation to require all presidential candidates and the president to file their three most recent years of tax returns.

The Wall Street Journal has called on Trump to liquidate his business and put the proceeds into a true blind trust. His tweet clearly suggests he is not willing to give up control.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story described Farage as a British parliament member.

Click for Spanish, German, Dutch, Danish, French, translation- Note- Translation may take a moment to load.

 Please read our  Comment Policy before posting - 
It is unacceptable to slander, smear or engage in personal attacks on authors of articles posted on ICH.
Those engaging in that behavior will be banned from the comment section.
 
 

 

 

In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. Information Clearing House has no affiliation whatsoever with the originator of this article nor is Information ClearingHouse endorsed or sponsored by the originator.)

Privacy Statement