[Jerusalem Post] Lenny Ben-David - By no means should anyone ignore or minimize the Washington leaks and attacks against AIPAC, the American Jewish community or Israel. But it should be understood that these actions are part of a historic, decades-long, beneath-the-surface, low-intensity war in Washington to weaken U.S.-Israel relations. Press leaks about Israeli spying, illegal weapons sales and the theft of military technology sprout almost like clockwork during periods of tension between the two countries. Former Vice President Hubert Humphrey, responding to the detractors of the pro-Israel lobby at the time of the Ford "reassessment" in 1976, told an AIPAC conference that "columnists [and] editorial writers have warned us about ethnic lobbies. We've heard careless and, I think, reckless things being said about the powerful Jewish lobby. As if somehow or another, it was against the law in this country to speak up for what you believe in."
2009-05-07 06:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive