Date: July 22, 2006 7:22:38 AM PDT
Subject: [SPY NEWS] The History of the Green Light
The History of the Green Light
21/07/2006
By Mohammed Ali Saleh
With no let up in Israeli attacks on Lebanon, Amr Moussa, Secretary
General of the Arab League angrily said, on Saturday, "The United
States has given Israel the green light to do what it wants in
Lebanon."
At the same time, Bryan Knowlton wrote in the New York Times, "The
U.S has given Israel the green light and contradicted the view of the
majority of its allies who insisted on a halt to Israel's vengeful
attacks on Lebanon."
Yet, others believe that the issue is bigger than a green light, as
US support to Israel extends throughout the US administration. With
mid-term Congress elections scheduled for later this year, many
members of Congress have rushed to show support for Israel. George
Allen, a Republican Senator, recently said, "We have to stand with
our friends the Israelis". For his part, Christopher Dodd, a
Democratic Senator said, "I know that Hezbollah and Hamas are
responsible for what is happening now."
Yet, according to Dr. Jon Alterman, Middle East program director at
the Center for Strategic and International Studies, " Israel doesn't
need a green, yellow or red light. The era of traffic lights in the
US-Israeli relation has ended."
When President George W. Bush, "announced a war on terrorism and put
Syria, Hezbollah and Hamas at the top of the list, he settled this
issue. Israel became certain that its enemies are those of the United
States."
In the current crisis between Israel and Hezbollah, Tel Aviv "didn't
need a green light," perhaps because the current US President is more
hostile to Hezbollah than Israel itself.
Breaking away from the behavior of US presidents before him, Bush
publicly supported Israel's attacks on Lebanon and allowed it to
continue its military campaign until it achieves its preliminary
goals. In a conversation with British Prime Minister Tony Blair at
the G8 summit in St. Petersburg, the US president was accidentally
overheard saying, "What they need to do is get Syria to get Hezbollah
to stop doing this shit and it's all over..."
In a recent press conference, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice
did not only support Israel's attacks on Lebanon but also supported
waiting before bringing an end to hostilities. "Yes, a ceasefire is
necessary. But it won't be beneficial if it is exploited by Hezbollah
to fire its missiles at Israel, or for Hamas to exploit it and
benefit from it in the future when it kidnaps an Israeli citizen."
The above statements indicate that a green light still regulates
Washington's relationship with Tel Aviv. In the last week, the US has
used it twice: to target Lebanon and to continue the bombing.
Sheldon Richman, an expert at the Cato Institute in Washington D.C,
wrote about the history of bilateral relations between the US and
Israel and the role of the green light in the last 60 years. He
indicated that the first green light was given for the foundation of
Israel itself in 1948. A decade later, President Dwight Eisenhower
refused to give Israel the green light to participate with France and
the United Kingdom in invading Egypt, as part of the Suez war.
According to Richman, the US leader, "opposed the return to colonial
policies and tried to win over third world countries. He was afraid
of Soviet Russia widening its sphere of influence in the region."
For his part, President Lyndon Johnson hesitated for some time before
giving Israel the green light to attack Egypt, Jordan and Syria, in
the six-day war in 1967. Abba Eban, the Israeli foreign minister at
the time, traveled to the US capital and met with Johnson on 26 May
1967, ten days before the start of the war. He told his American host
that Israeli intelligence had gathered information on Egyptian troop
movement in the Sinai Peninsula, after Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel
Nasser shut the Gulf of Aqaba. He asked Johnson to give Israel the
green light to attack.
But Walt Rostow, national security advisor at the time, opposed
Israel's request because Israel had refused to support the American
intervention in Vietnam. Dean Rusk, the Secretary of State, also
opposed the request, "because declaring war would be a horrible
mistake", while Robert McNamara, the Defense Secretary, said, "We are
busy in Vietnam and don't want to open a new front".
With Johnson not ready to reject his advisors' recommendations, Eban
asked him, "Where does your conscience stand, Mr. President?" to
which Johnson replied, "I am from Texas and I am 6'4'' and a friend
of Israel." Therefore, the green light was given.
In 1973, US President Richard Nixon did not need to give any light to
send Israel huge quantities of weapons, as he believed the Yom Kippur
war had been started by Egypt and Syria.
It is no secret that the US Secretary of State at the time, Henry
Kissinger, was pro-Israeli, during his marathon visits to the region,
in order to reach a ceasefire and then oversee the disengagement plan
between Egypt and Israel.
A secret document, made available to the public for the first time
three years ago, by the National Security Archive at George
Washington University, revealed that Kissinger had given Israel the
green light to breach the ceasefire and send its forces, which had
crossed the Suez Canal, closer to Cairo.
With the beginning of the 1980s, the conflict between Israel and the
Arab world morphed into a war between Tel Aviv and Palestinian and
Lebanese organizations. At the time, US President Ronald Reagan gave
Israel the green light to strike at Palestinian fighters who were
firing missiles towards northern Israel, from Lebanese territory.
Later that year, Reagan gave Israel another green light to bomb the
Iraqi nuclear reactor Osirak. In a statement on the attack, the White
House declared, "The United States government condemns the Israeli
air strike because it increases the gravity of the situation in the
region."
Once more, in the summer of 1982, Reagan gave Tel Aviv the green
light to invade Lebanon, reaching as far north as the capital,
Beirut. Jimmy Carter, the former US President, wrote that Ariel
Sharon, then Israel's Defense Minister, had visited Washington D.C
and met with Casper Weinberg, the US Secretary of Defense at the
time. He told him, "Israel has to quickly move towards Lebanon."
Carter added, "After it gained the American green light, Israel
invaded and killed, according to Lebanese government statistics,
twenty thousand Lebanese and Palestinians."
When the Israeli army invaded the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in
2000 to allegedly "confiscate weapons and missiles used against
Israel", the Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported that Ehud Barak
had "obtained the go-ahead to carry out military action."
It was obvious that the "green light" was connected to President Bill
Clinton's anger towards Yasser Arafat because he rejected the US
proposals at the Camp David talks, a few months before Clinton's term
in office ended.
Rumors circulated, at the time, that revenge motivated Clinton to
give Ariel Sharon, who was then in opposition, the green light to
visit Al Aqsa mosque in September 2000 sparking the second Intifada,
but this remains unconfirmed.
Under the presidency of George W. Bush, it appeared that the US
leader did not trust Arafat because of his political maneuvering and
what Bush considered the Palestinian president's failure to keep his
promises to the US administration and allied Arab governments.
When the US vetoed a UN Security Council resolution calling on
international monitors to be deployed in the Occupied Territories in
2001, in order to stop the Israeli operations, Israel considered this
a green light and announced that the Palestinian Authority was a
terrorist organization. Tel Aviv also escalated its operations, in
order to isolate Arafat from his Palestinian people and the rest of
the world.
Uncorroborated reports have also indicated that the US gave Israel
the green light to assassinate Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, the spiritual
leader of Hamas and the go-ahead to ready itself to target Iranian
nuclear reactors.
It is clear that Israel has always looked for and found the green
light from Washington D.C in order to carry out its military
operations. The ongoing attacks on Lebanon are no exception.
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