I wrote: > > >And that is why the US is so closely allied with Israel on the Hamas problem, > >Minoru. It reflects a common interest in fighting the joint enemy of the day.
And John G. responded: > Surely this US-Israeli connexion dates back 4 decades: > > http://badley.info/history/Nixon-Doctrine-USA.event.html > > I seem to recollect that the National Security Council recommended that Israel > could provide a barrier to Arab nationalism in 1958 (I was still young). > Yes, absolutely, and that (the Nixon administration) is also the time when the Shah of Iran took on much greater importance as one of the US' regional gendarmes, and was much of the reason for his fall (too much oil wealth, too much inflation and corruption, too much money spent on armaments at the US' behest). My point about the 1950s was that despite the Eisenhower administration's distaste for Nasser (it was considerable; for one thing, Nasser stole money that had been paid by CIA agent Kermit Roosevelt to a corrupt Egypt general and used it to build a radio tower, subsequently called "Roosevelt's erection" (!), and used the tower to broadcast pan-Arabist, anti-US and anti-Israeli broadsides all over the Middle East; http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/JFKroosevelt.htm), there was still considerable antipathy towards Israel at that time too, and it did not abate until Kennedy took office. This is confirmed by Avner Cohen's book "Israel and the Bomb", which shows conclusively that the pro-Israel tilt of US policy dates from Kennedy's time in office. And a postcript from John G. too: > > PS Nice piece though > Why, thank you, John. Now the hard part of the day, have to locate and purchase a Wii for my daughter. John M. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Persons posting messages to not_honyaku assume all responsibility for their messages. The list owner does not review messages, and accepts no responsibility for the content of messages posted. -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
