T. Belman. This article is very unfair to Israel aside from calling it a “parasitic culture”. Israel is an independent state entitled to seek trade and alliances with whomever it wants just like any other independent state is. It suggests that China has undue influence over Israel but fails to note that China has even more influence over the US.
Also, it is up to the US to protect its red lines by getting Israel to agree to them in advance. Whenever Israel offends the US in some fashion, it is quick to toe the line when asked.. Yes, Israel is America’s greatest ally by far.
To give you an example of how extreme this author is, he writes “If U.S. leaders were smart, they would completely ban immigration from Israel and China, end all forms of military aid to Israel, and decouple from China’s economy.” This sentence is problematic on many levels. Military aid to Israel is of huge benefit to America which America is not about to do without. Also the relationship between Silicon Valley and Tel Aviv is so beneficial to both, neither side will contemplate disrupting it.
By Pedro Alvarado, RED ELEPHANT February 20, 2021
America’s greatest ally. Right?
Not so fast.
According to a report by Breaking Defense, Israel refused a recent request by the American government to inspect a new port in the city of Haifa that China helped build. SIPG, a Chinese company, will operate this port for the next 25 years.
This move has opened up discussions about Israel’s intriguing relationship with China, which comes at a time when the U.S. is involved in an ever-increasing case of security competition with the East Asian nation.
Since China went from a Maoist disaster and transitioned towards a mixed economy, the country has sought all sorts of trading partners. Israel became one of those partners after China kicked off formal diplomatic relations with the Jewish state in 1992.
China tends to be inclusive in its dealings with Middle Eastern countries. In other words, it tries to be friendly with all states. Even with countries such as Iran and Saudi Arabia, who are engaged in a proxy conflict of their own, China tries to maintain cordial relations with both countries despite their ongoing conflicts.
The Chinese have also served as mediators between the Israelis and Palestinians in their dispute. From the late 1970s until the 1990s, China and Israel entered a number of arms deals, which caught the U.S.’s attention. Even worse, Israel has a long history of selling U.S. military secrets to China. Yet, there is little talk in national security circles about the Israeli-China partnership that could potentially undermine American interests.
According to Rupert Stone of the Middle East Eye, “By the mid-2000s, military ties had flatlined, and the relationship focused more on economic cooperation” after the U.S. caught wind of Israel’s exploitation of its China ties.
However, the Israeli-China connection has remained intact. When tensions between former American President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu started to mount and Europe’s economy began to slow down during the Great Recession, Israel began looking to its east. Netanyahu went on a state visit to China in 2013 and two years later joined the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which China dominates. The U.S. did not approve of this move. To top it off, Netanyahu signed 10 agreements in Beijing.
The U.S. has made somewhat of an effort to address Israel’ questionable ties with China. The China virus compelled the U.S. to take a much harder stance against China and make sure its own allies are not completely under China’s thumb. If the U.S.’s allies are under substantial Chinese influence, American interests could be substantially undermined in the long-term.
This explains why Secretary of State Mike Pompeo paid a brisk visit to Israel back in May 13, 2020, to discuss China’s growing influence and other issues with Netanyahu’s new government. For instance, Israel seemed to yield to American demands after it did not grant a contract for a desalination plant to a Hong Kong-based company and instead opted to award the contract to a domestic firm. Additionally, Huawei is not being used in Israel’s 5G network tender.
Trade between China and Israel has increased significantly over the years. According to Rupert Stone, Israel’s exports to China grew fourfold. China is Israel’s second-biggest trading partner. Israelis view China in a very positive light. For instance, 66% of Israelis hold China in high esteem. On the other hand, 26% of the Israeli public views China positively
Various Chinese companies are actively setting up infrastructure projects in Israel. From the looks of it, the Chinese want to add Israel to its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), a connection of land and sea routes that China is spearheading. Several years ago, Shanghai International Port Group received a contract to operate the Haifa container port, beginning in 2021. Similarly, another Chinese company was awarded a contract to run the Ashdod port.
These contracts have generated significant controversy. Take for example, the case of the Haifa terminal. It’s next to an Israeli naval base, where the U.S. Sixth Fleet frequently docks its ships at.
As far as technology goes, Chinese companies such as Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent have invested in Israeli’s “Silicon Wadi”, the Israeli version of Silicon Valley, in an effort to put China on the path to being a technological titan through its Made in China 2025 initiative.
According to Stone, Chinese investment in the Israel tech sector increased tenfold from 2015 to 2016. In 2017, Alibaba set up a research center in Tel Aviv. Allegedly, high-ranking government officials from both countries have forged an innovation partnership. A general fear among cybersecurity experts is that Chinese investment in the Israeli tech sector could have Israel and the U.S. susceptible to Chinese cyber attacks and other forms of espionage. Certain tech stalwarts like ZTE, a firm with strong ties to the Chinese Communist Party, has key investments in Israel.
Hypothetically speaking, a deterioration in American-Israeli relations could see Israel pivoting towards China for trade and other forms of cooperation, all at Americans’ expense. There was already a case earlier this month where Shin Bet (Israel’s internal security services) busted a ring of Israeli aerospace engineers who sold advanced Israeli missile technology to China for millions of dollars.
20 Israeli nationals were involved in this illegal trade of missiles. Even more curious, these individuals served in the IDF in intelligence and weapons development roles. Other members of the criminal ring worked for Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), while some ring members were employed in Israeli companies that produce missiles. One could only imagine what would happen if these missiles were American in origin and ended up being sold to the Chinese.
As mentioned before, Israel is willing to take American tech and sell it to China. If the U.S. doesn’t review its relationship with both China and Israel, it will continue to be exploited by these countries. China and Israel are host to parasitic cultures and in many regards their cooperation is a match made in heaven. If U.S. leaders were smart, they would completely ban immigration from Israel and China, end all forms of military aid to Israel, and decouple from China’s economy.
America is not a shopping mall that predatory ethnic groups can freely exploit.
@ Adam Dalgliesh:
Scroll up to the name Pedro Alvarado, click on the words Red Elephant and go from there.
@ Reader: What is his website, Reader? Can you give us a URL? Can you direct us to other antisemitic articles he has written and/or published? Any articles that expose him as an antisemite and explain his personal history, such as his use of pseudonyms? I like to research these people.
@ Ted Belman: Thanks for your gracious and generous compliment, Ted.
Email rec’d:
@ Ted Belman:
Just did some quick research.
I didn’t know anything about this website until you published their article.
I am sure you can find some more gems there.
@ Reader:
Thanks. How did you know that?
@ Ted Belman:
Vincent James, who also goes by the pseudonyms of Vincent Foxx and Vincent James O’Connor
Reader Said:
Didn’t know that, Who is he?
@ Adam Dalgliesh:
“a more of less mainstream, respectable conservative publication”
The founder of The Red Elephants is a known antisemite, and it is not the only antisemitic publication on his website.
“Antisemitism” has been universal for thousands of years and was not invented by the Soviets and does not come in different varieties.
Jews need to get out of the US ASAP before it’s too late.
@ Adam Dalgliesh:
@ Adam Dalgliesh:
Good work, as always.
Thanks for your effort.
. This statement reveals that the author views Jews as a “predatory ethnic group.” Note also that he describes Americans of Chinese origin, who play an increasingly prominent role in American life as a “predatory ethnic group” as well. This guy is a recist and an anti-Semite.
The claim that Israel is considered America’s “greatest ally” is also rubbish. Brtain has been considered by Washington to be Americas’s greatest ally at least since 1941. And this is reasonable given the very close links between the militaries of both countries, the extremely close economic, cultural and linguistic ties between the two countries. Britain, unlike Israel, is a great power
Israel is not techically an ally to the UNited States at all. The U.S. has never signed a treaty with Israel and has never guaranteed its security. Unlike Brtain, Israel is not a major military power.
The author’s allegations of Israeli military collusion with China are all unsourced, and I have not seen most of them in either the Israeli or American press. Even if his claim that a “ring” of Israeli scientists sold missile technology to China, is true, which I doubt, he doesn’t explain why, if Israel is in China’s camp, the Israeli security police “busted” the alleged spy ring. Notice also that he slides quickly from saying that the alleged Israeli spies sold “missile technology” to the Chinese to claiming that they sold “missiles” to the Chinese (not the same thing).
He also fails to point out that numerous Chinese and Chinese-Americans have sold or given U.S. military secrets to the Chinese have either received ridiculously light sentences or charges against them have been dropped completely. How then has Israel “delivered” more U.S. milirary secrets to the Chinese than America’s own citizens and welcome guests? Why is Israel more of a threat to the United States than Anerica’s own immigration and naturalization services, and its own State Department’s visa office?
Criticizing Israel for maintaing economic ties to China is absurd, given the massive U.S. trade with China, the huge number of Chinese businesses, many of them owned in whole or in part by the Chinese government, that are listed on the U.S. stock exchange, and the vast profits that these companies export to China from the United States. Israel’s trade with China is in comparison miniscule.
As for Israel being “parasitic,” as Ted points out, Israel has delivered far more intelligence information and military technology to the United States than vice versa, and this assistance has been extremely helpful to the U.S. military and intelligence services. It has compensated the U.S.many times over for the aid that the U.S. gives Israel.
Notice that he describes China and Israel as equally powerful countries. This is typical of antisemites through the ages, who have always vastly exaggerated Jewish power in order to justify their hatred and malice.
Again, an extremely worrisome sign that this antisemitic filth has been published in a more of less mainstream, repectable conservative publication.
THis article is so viciously antisemitic that I had trouble reading it.
Anti-Semitism has become universal on the left, and a staple of leftist propaganda. It grew steadily from once it became a major staple of Soviet propaganda around 1967, and gradually expanded from its base among the Communist factions into”moderate” social-democratic left. Now it has taken over all leftist factions However anti-Semitism on the right, which was blatent in the first half of the twentieth century, had sp been in remission in recent years. But it is now growing in the mainstream right for the first time since William F. Buckley banished it from the flagship righist journal, the National Review.
Contemporary American politics proves Menachem Beigin’s dictum, “When goyim kill goyim, everyone comes to hang the Jews.”
@ keelie:
Love your comment and suggested title.
Very well stated, Keelie. I agree with you 1000%.
Every country is now playing footsie with every other country. The US and Israel are not exceptions. The US would be foolish to trust Israel and China, Israel would be foolish to trust the US and China, and China would be foolish to trust the US and Israel. I dare say, everyone knows this and nobody trusts anyone.
Perhaps the writer didn’t notice that the guy in charge of the US is “China Joe”. And that he and his cadre of leftist friends are highly anti-Israel. Just like his fabulous boss was while he was boss…
Having said this, we should change the title to “Is Israel’s “Greatest” Ally Teaming Up With China to SCREW Israel?”
This piece is just another distraction from what’s really going on in the US.
China is going to SCREW America with the help of corrupt American politicians and without the need for tiny Israel’s intervention.