By Ted Belman
Recently Andrew McCarthy roasted Romney in his article Romney’s Syria Problem. Then Cliff May, FDD, took MCarthy to task and Mcarthy responded with Stay of of Syria:
- When I argued, in the column to which Cliff is responding, that Mitt Romney and the Republican party’s transnational-progressive wing had aligned themselves with al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood against Assad, I was not saying that, as between competing evils, these GOP heavyweights had a mere rooting interest in seeing Sunni supremacists prevail over Shiite supremacists. I was pointing out that they were bent on empowering one set of America’s enemies against another. This is no passive preference. The Butch & Sundance team of John McCain and Lindsey Graham are not just cheering on their team, the way Chávez and I were pulling for Johan; the senators want to arm the predominantly Islamist, demonstrably murderous Syrian “opposition” — to strengthen America’s enemies with training and weaponry that America would either coordinate or provide directly.
- Yet, in a “two can play that game” retort, Cliff asserts that he and other pro-interventionists could just as colorably say that my argument aligns me with MoveOn.org, Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, and Iran’s “Supreme Leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. It is a wayward analogy, for several reasons.
Jerry Gordon, New English Review, co-copied me with an email of his:
- The issue is how Russia can keep Syria as a client state and its warm water port at Tartarus, while Israel convinces it that the current alliance with Iran is counter-productive to any relationship.
Clearly Russia has dissed the Arab League with its current stand. No loss there. On the geo-resource front, Russia has supported Cypriot development of its gas fields in its Exclusive Economic Zone and confronted Turkish encroachment. Israel is providing security for and negotiated co-development deals with its US and Israeli partners, Noble Energy of Houston and Delek Partners.
The bogeyman for Putin is the prospect that if Assad goes, then what follows are Muslim Brotherhood Islamists supported by Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the Obama West Wing. Russia brutally suppressed the Islamists in Chechnya, although the latter are still there and have caused Russia grief in the northern Caucusus. I gather that Putin has a good rapport with FM Avigdor Lieberman, as the latter, a native of Moldavia, speaks russki mamaloschen. Those Russian marines and Spetnaz could be of assistance in ‘controlling’ Syria’s CBW storehouse. The current thinking based on yesterday AEI Syria assessment is that these units would be used to establish a safe haven on the coast for Alawites. The Spetnaz located and destroyed similar WMD for the late Saddam Hussein just prior to the US invasion in 2003 according to my buddy Ken Timmerman noted in his book Shadow Warriors. Russia also has the codes for the S-300 anti-air systems that it may have provided the Assad regime in Syria . While, I would not expect much from Putin’s visit to Israel. What is the expression; “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”, eh?
I couldn’t resist putting in my two cents:
- Thinking out loud, When Russia was booted our of Iraq and Egypt she remained in Syria and Iran to a degree. If Russia looks to a post Assad Syria, she might find herself protecting the Alawites and thus the port as you have suggested. Why would she not embrace the Kurds in Iraq, Syria and Turkey as well. That would give them enormous clout in Turkey, Iraq and northern Syria. Then Its only a hop , skip and a Jump to create an alliance with Israel who as we know is on the outs and forever will be with the MB. They could embrace the Syrian Christians as well.
Russia doesn’t need America in Syria but America needs Russian cooperation.
If Russia made a unilateral move to oust Assad and protect the minorities as Jerry and I suggested above, what could America say. How could it complain of the outcome if it solved the humanitarian crises and protected the minorities.
Israel doesn’t have to overtly be in the Russian camp but could well coop[erate with Russia. Soiunds like a plan.
Hmmm.
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Joseph Pudar, a friend of mine recently wrote
Later this month, Russian president Vladimir Putin is scheduled to make a state visit to Israel. It will be Putin’s second visit since 2005 (Obama should take notice). Putin, who began his third term as President of Russia last month, served as Prime Minister in the intervening years. In Israel, Putin will be meeting with his counterpart Shimon Peres, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Putin’s trip comes amidst the controversial role Russia is playing in the civil war currently unfolding in Syria. His support for the Assad regime diplomatically and militarily, in providing it with attack helicopters and other heavy arms that the regime has used to butcher civilians, and Russia’s obstruction of any attempt in the UN to condemn the Syrian regime, is antagonizing Western powers. Syria, however, remains Russia’s only ally in the Middle East and provides Moscow with a naval base in the Mediterranean. And Russia, like Israel and some other Western powers, are concerned that an Islamist regime will replace Assad.
Putin’s current thinking is that the U.S. and its Western allies will not act militarily against the Assad regime, and that the regime will eventually quell the rebellion. Russia is therefore unwilling to risk its comfortable position with the Assad regime (with Syria as a major arms purchaser and Russian banks holding more than $6B in Syrian assets) unless it appears that the Free Syrian Army has the upper hand in the apparent civil war.Russia, however, finds itself on the opposite side of Israel and the U.S. on the issue of Iran’s nuclear program and has undermined Western attempts to force Iran to give up its nuclear weapons program. Russia built/sold Iran the nuclear facility known as Bushehr. Russia’s relations with Iran are characterized by the rivalry between a pro-Western group, which advocates the benefits of cooperation with the U.S. as opposed to questionable partners such as China, Iran, and other unsavory third world states, and the old Russian Defense Industrial Complex (OPK), which promotes the traditional strategic and economic ties with China, India, Iran, Syria, and North Korea.
Iran’s Press TV reported on June 8, 2012 that the “Secretary General of Iran’s Supreme Council Saeed Jalili says the promotion of strategic relations between Tehran and Moscow will serve the interests of the regional nations.” Jalili added, “The strategic cooperation between Tehran and Moscow has the potential to align the balance of power with the interests of regional nations. Iran-Russia constructive interaction will result in regional stability and security.” These comments were made during a meeting between Jalili and the Secretary of the Russian Security Council Nikolai Patrushev.
At the same time, Russia appears to have shelved its plans to sell Iran S-300 ground-to-air missiles on the grounds that such a sale is forbidden under the UN sanctions ruling. Back on July 24, 2010, a BBC report suggested that Saudi Arabia had offered to buy $2 billion worth of Russian weapons on condition that Russia does not sell Iran the S-300 missiles and would stop supporting Iran at the UN.
While Russia is a major supplier of arms and nuclear technologies to Arab nations and Iran, it has a growing security relationship with Israel which includes the purchasing by the Russian military of Israeli-made spy drones or unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
With more than one million Russian-speaking Israelis, Putin considers Israel a Russian-speaking state. In an interview with Euro-Asian Jewish Congress in July 2011, Putin stated, “Israel is, in fact, a special state to us. It is practically a Russian-speaking country. Israel is one of the few foreign countries that can be called Russian-speaking. It’s obvious that more than half of the population speaks Russian.”
One of the stated reasons for Putin’s visit is to attend the unveiling ceremony of a memorial in Netanya in honor of the Red Army soldiers killed during World War Two.
Commenting on the occasion of the 20-year renewal of relations with Russia, Israel’s Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman said, “Renewal of diplomatic relations between Israel and Russia twenty years ago was an important historic event that impacted on the connection between the countries and peoples and on Israel’s history, bringing more than a million new immigrants from the former countries of the USSR to Israel. Since then, the relations between the states have expanded, and I am convinced that cooperation in all areas will only grow stronger.”
The Moldova native Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman and Russian President Vladimir Putin share a common language – Russian. This no doubt has helped forge a closer relationship between the two countries. Ironically, while the U.S. is Israel’s closest ally and friend, U.S. President Barack Obama is not considered friendly by most Israelis; conversely, Russia, while not considered a friendly state, its president, Vladimir Putin, is regarded by many in Israel as a friend.
Visiting Russia during the controversial legislative (Duma) elections last December, Avigdor Liberman stated that the “elections were absolutely fair, free and democratic.” Taken as an endorsement of Putin, this statement cemented the warm relationship between the two.
The relationship between the two states is founded on the realization that over a million Israeli Jews (and non-Jews) from the former Soviet Union live in Israel and have kept their traditions and heritage alive during the past two decades. The Russian-speaking community in Israel holds a wide variety of positions of influence in Israeli society. They have integrated well into Israeli economic, scientific and cultural life, and hence form a vital bridge between the two states by promoting closer ties.
The bilateral relations, however, are secondary to the wider strategic interests of the two states in the Middle East region.
Radical Islam, as a by-product of the “Arab Spring” poses a threat to both Russia and Israel. Russia is concerned that the “Arab Spring” may influence and radicalize its own Muslim population. Israel is challenged by the victories of the Muslim Brotherhood in several Arab states and especially in Egypt. And Jordan as well might succumb to the Muslim Brotherhood triumph. These realities, coupled with the pro-Islamist policies of Turkey’s Prime Minister Erdogan, present another set of challenges for both Russia and Israel.
In light of these circumstances in the Middle East, Russia considers Israel a potential asset in its efforts to deal with its economic, political, strategic, and security challenges. Israel is regarded as a strong regional power that might help Russia regain parity with the U.S. in the region. For Israel, moving Russia away from its enemies – Iran, and Syria – would greatly enhance Israel’s security.
Putin’s visit to Israel comes amid a realignment of forces in the Middle East, with Russia willing to reassess its foreign policy in order to meet emerging political challenges. Under these circumstances, it is reasonable to assume that Russia is willing to strengthen cooperation with Israel in a bid to promote its national interests. Considering the threat posed to both countries by the rise of Islamism, a Russian-Israeli partnership has the potential to benefit both countries. Moreover, in view of the rapidly changing balance of power in the Middle East, this alliance could potentially stabilize an unstable region during a time of great uncertainty.Prime Minister Netanyahu will no doubt be weighing the possibility of a second Obama term as he meets with Putin, and that prospect alone would call for a more solid relationship with Russia.
@ yamit82:
Not meat (typo) meant.
@ yamit82:
my reply to Laura disappeared????
Think 24 hrs long enough to retrieve and post?
@ Laura:
It was meat to be supportive of what you said. 😉
How does your link differ from what I said? Only Nigeria is shown to have a more postive view of Israel than does America.
@ Laura:
Thursday, May 17, 2012
“Israel among countries with most negative global influence”
@ Arnold Harris:
Don’t know what revisionist History of Russia you base your opinions on but one thing is for sure most of it based on what little you write is mythical especially your characterization of Stalin, your HERO!
my reply to Laura disappeared????
@ Laura:
Wide prevalence of mixed marriages. Jewish men with non Jewish wives meant their children are not Jewish. Law of return with an eye to Nuremberg laws allowed those with a Jewish grandparent to emigrate and receive Israeli citizenship but not Jewish identity. Many many of those documents showing a Jewish grandparent were forgeries. Once non Jewish russians were allowed in the applied for and demanded that their close and immediate non Jewish relatives also be admitted entrance. Many Russians came to get immigrant benefits and an Israeli passport then skipped for places like Germany and America after selling all their free stuff here and skipping out on obligations to others who co-signed for them like apts. cars and other cheap loans. Some returned to Russia when things began to improve economically. Later Christians began to sponsor and pay the costs of non Jewish immigration converting some, who converted others etc.
The Israeli anti Jewish elements favored bringing in non Jewish Slavs to counter the growing demographic trends favoring fast growing religious demographics here in Israel. Same for Christians they and our secularists have made common cause from different motivational positions but both want to diminish the growing majority of religious Jews.
The American assimilation rate almost mirrors Russian Jewry in the 70’s and 80’s. Even if there were a movement of American Jews wishing to move to Israel we would need to reject many if not most.
Laura,
Josef Stalin was one of my heroes for the same reason he was a hero to General of the Armies Dwight D Eisenhower, and to most other Americans who lived and were active during the era from 1941-1945. You ought to read his 1948 book covering his leadership activities in World War II if you think otherwise. Our sole concern then was beating the life out of the Nazi empire of Adolf Hitler. Stalin’s Red Army was the main force that accomplished that, and without the terrible sacrifices of the great Russian nation, who lost more than a score of a million sons and daughters in 24-hours a day 365 days per year armed combat for almost four years against Hitler’s armies, then the allied forces of the British Commonwealth and the United States never could have mounted our invasion of the Atlantic coast of France. And if Russia had collapsed during World War II, Adolf Hitler and his successors would have controlled Europe and Eurasia from the Atlantic coast possible as far as the Pacific Ocean. Under those circumstances, no Jew any in territory under their control would have survived, and Nazi Germany would have had and would have utilized the military power to destroy the remains of the British Commonwealth armed forces of the Middle East, and the Jewish population then residing in British-controlled Palestine would eventually have been rounded up, gassed in the extermination factories of occupied eastern Poland, and their bodies burned in the industrial-grade mass crematoria which the Germans designed for exactly that purpose. Whatever Josef Stalin and his communist henchmen personally thought of Jews is irrelevant. I am interested solely in the fact that theirs was the only organized system of power in all of Europe that put guns into the hands of their Jewish citizens and enabled them to defend themselves for victory or death.
Russia from 1928 to 1941 had been transformed from a backward society of inefficiently-utilized rural peasants and underemployed city residents, to the second strongest industrial power on earth. Stalin’s unwavering leadership of his country accomplished all that, irrespective of his bloody Communist Party purges and the millions of his citizens whom he locked up in the Gulag forced labor camps. His accomplishment made Peter the Great look like a village blacksmith in comparison. And without that accomplishment, and his forced relocation of the much if not most of the Soviet heavy industries and armaments industries far eastward to the Ural Mountains and out of reach of German bombers and German Panzer divisions, then Russia could not have survived the initial onrush of some 3-4 million German, Romanian, Hungarian and other troops in Operation Barbarossa in the summer and autumn of 1941, and then starting their national offensive against the Hitlerites the next year at Stalingrad. Serious historians have long regarded Stalin as the most important of the great national leaders of World War II. I agree with them wholeheartedly.
Laura, my temperament is cold, analytical and objective. I am not and never have been interested primarily in democracy or democratic values. I regard all that as a temporary luxury that was achievable and maintainable only in some of the cultures of northwestern Europe transplanted to our shores in the western hemisphere. These considerations last only so long as populations and the means of feeding, educating, employing, transporting and amusing them are relatively stable. For much of the world, the systems and institutional arrangements that delivered all such means of human amenities are falling into chaos, disrepair and bankruptcy. I can see signs of this all across the United States of America, and my studies of such phenomena across the world in general confirms my certainty that for most of the population of this planet, a dark age awaits.
I hope the Jewish nation can escape from the effects if not the advent of such an age. But I cannot sincerely say that I think the the world situation will improve. But in order for Israel and the Jewish nation to improve the odds, I want Israel always to be on the side of the strongest power in position to dominate the arc of lands in southern and southwestern Asia. Great Britain was that power in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Then America played the leading imperial role in that part of the world after World War II and until the loss of a friendly government in Iran, followed by the expensive and largely useless military efforts in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now, our country no longer has the industrial or financial strength and national will power to play an imperial role either in the Middle East of its more distant environs. The tightly-organized former communist empires of Russia and China will be the dominant forces, and the are proving wise enough to cooperate with each other in service of their obvious national interests. If it is possible, I want Israel to steer the Jewish nation in their direction.
I am writing all this as honestly as I can, Laura. And I try to write as carefully as I have been trained to think.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Why were non-Jews allowed to immigrate to Israel? One should have to be ethnically and religiously Jewish to be Israeli. Otherwise I see no reason to support a future non-Jewish Israel.
These were communist party members who had no connection to their Judaism.
A dictator who starved, brutally repressed and massacred millions, is your hero? I don’t know what to say to that. So long as you weren’t one of his victims I guess that doesn’t matter.
For some reason Israpundit seems to attract communists and America-bashers. Someone here the other day bizarrely was praising communists as being pro-Israel. Never mind that the Soviet Union backed and armed Israel’s enemies and created the PLO to destroy Israel.
For those who condemn America as not supportive of Israel, this is the only country in the world which the people view Israel positively. Americans are the only ones with moral clarity regarding the Mideast.
And China in Hebrew is Sin.
To change the topic, here is my daughter speaking about going up to the Temple Mount:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2Hbw7FdxnU&feature=colike
G-d speaks to us through all the languages of the world.
When the rabbis were considering whether to support the Czar or Napoleon, it was pointed out that Napoleon was destined to fall as his name began with the letters Nun, Peh and Lamed, spelling Nofel implying his fall. Evenso, the history of Russian vicious antisemitism should not be forgotten and glossed over.
When it comes to Russia, wouldn’t we be wise to consider that the name Russia sounds ominously like Rasha -the Evil One!
I have been a bit away from Military Avionics for a few years but up until the year 2006 Israel had a Western infrastructure and for the most could not incorporate Eastern systems w/o extensive re tooling and re training at all levels.
Not impossible but neither simple.
Russia and China may be co opted for specific mutually gainful projects. Strategically they seek ruthlessness as their co travelers mainstay and that is hardly the unJews setting except against Jewish interests.
Maybe…
Arnold, it is rare that I differ from your opinion; however, this time you are totally wrong. Stalin and Putin are cut from the same cloth, extremely shrewd and with a desire to rebuild the USSR. They never do anything without a good reason and they have no reason to aid Israel and/or the US. They have taught Iran to be patient to reach their goals and giving up on Syria is not in their plans. With US, EU and Israeli aid, the Kurds hold the key to defeating Assad.
@ Arnold Harris:
The planes we got were junk in need of repair and they all crashed. If Stalin really wanted to help us he could have shipped top of the line planes tanks and artillery. Stalin like Truman never expected us to survive and wanted the war to continue just long enough for the Arabs to liquidate all the Jews whom he hated. He had his own final solution in th works but died the day before he was to sign the order shipping all Russian Jews to Siberia where they were to be worked and starved to death. He is said to have died on Purim.
@ Laura:
Iran denies the report.
Russia is antisemitic? Who isn’t? Russia unlike America does not as a rule throw their allies and vassals under the Bus.
Laura,
I see no reason why Israel cannot and should not seek equally good relations with the USA, Russia, China, India and Japan.
I have not forgotten that in 1948-1949, Josef Stalin, of all people, was the man who, when the USSR controlled everything in Europe east of line running straight south from Stettin on the Baltic Sea to Trieste on the Adriatic Sea, made sure that Israel could purchase German-designed Bf-109E fighter-bombers from the arms factory in postwar-Czechoslovakia where they were being manufactured, and further arranged with Josip Broz Tito, the Jugoslav leader, to trans-ship these vital aircraft disassembled through his country to the new State of Israel. That was a time when all the USA would do for the new Jewish state was to recognize its government, but strictly banned any arms sales to the Jews when they needed them the most.
In addition, I am aware of the fact that Stalin’s Red Army, with the full knowledge of the State Defense Committee of the USSR, has appointed more than 100 Jewish generals, most of them in combat leadership roles in the Red Air Force and Red Army. There was nothing even remotely like that situation in the US armed forces in World War II.
Israel should be nobody’s cat’s paw. And the independence and defensive strength of the Jewish state must never again be put in position to be dangled by a string awaiting the outcome of any US presidential election.
In any case, America is far away, across the Atlantic Ocean, the Straits of Gibraltar and the full length of the Mediterranean Sea from Israel. Russia — mighty Russia — is close, and with them moving into a position of real power in Syria, they will be even closer. And unlike the governing class of the USA, nobody in Russia, including its government, gives a remote damn about supposed civil liberties of people such as frenetic and febrile crowds rioting almost daily in the streets of just about any large Arab city.
All things considered, Russia could be considered a better potential ally of the Jewish state and of the Jewish nation than any other empire that I could think of.
In addition to that, I will admit that my family comes from good tough Russian-Jewish bloodlines. No Poles, Germans, Romanians, Yemeni, or any of the rest of various strains of the Jewish diaspora. So I have a pervasive pro-Russian prejudice, even though my father taught me that Bolshevism was no damned good; which today’s generation of Russians will freely admit. Even so, Stalin is still one of my heroes.
Arnold Harris
Mount Horeb WI
Ted, be careful what you wish for in endorsing an Israeli-Russian alliance. The Russians are no friends of Israel. Report: Iran, Russia, China, Syria to stage joint war games: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=4745