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I hate the idea that people throw around that Israel has any influence over the US. They don't. Israel is a puppet of America. It only looks like they can influence us because we are already doing what they want. Because they are our puppet and we want a happy and strong puppet.
All this to say, let's not fall into stupid "Jews run the world" bullshit when the truth is much simpler. It'd be like saying "America runs Britain" because the French and Indian war. Empires go to bat for their colonies.
Edit: let me define influence in the way I am using it Incase some people get confused. Influence is the ability to make someone do something they would otherwise not do. Regardless of any colonial advocacy group, the US would fund Israel. The advocacy group simply communicates ways to make that funding more efficient and aligning already pretty well aligned goals. I wouldn't call that influence.
AIPAC money and geopolitical nonsense has the US actively assisting in a genocide as the media works overtime to earn their payday, spinning the bejesus out of the situation, doing massive political damage - because the US naturally wants Palestine genocided ^because ^^I ^^^dunno... ^^^^reasons.
...but Israel have no influence?
…but Israel have no influence?
They're coming from the weirdly common position of America as an evil empire they can oppose in all circumstances. Sure, one COULD actually examine the complex interplay of diplomacy and interests on the international scale, but who has time for that IR bullshit when you can just say "The Amerikkkans run the world on their puppetmaster strings!" and in the same breath mock the idea of Israeli influence as conspiratorial antisemitism.
Are you OK, my guy?
The recent Israeli influence on the US is undeniable. The rest is a strawman that's the product of an unhinged mind.
If you've got a point to make, be my guest... but this ain't it.
I'm not sure if I'm misunderstanding you or you're misunderstanding me.
I'm agreeing with you that their position that Israeli influence is negligible is incorrect, and saying in addition that their attempted justifications by conflating antisemitism and anti-Israeli sentiment and pushing an idea of America as an all-powerful entity on the world stage with very basic motivations does not actually help their point.
In that case, I guess one of us had a stroke... Though I can't rightly say who.
Edit: After re-reading, it was definitely me - my mistake.
No worries, it happens!
You think a western aligned colony of Europeans and Americans sitting in the middle of an otherwise hostile part of the world needs any more grease? You ain't thinking like a state. You ain't playing that mental game of interests and geopolitical boardgame shenanigans. You're thinking that there's no way America would do this on its own, that it has to be coaxed into supporting a genocide. Nah dude. Here's the simple breakdown. Israel will do what we say when we need to get something done in the region. After that, anything goes. This is basic American foreign policy. We supported mass killings and genocides our whole existence because the killers were technically our friends. Why would this time be any different? Or what next, you going to say Nicaragua owned American politics? How bout south Korea? Why would isreal be different.
You're conflating actively supporting the genocide of Palestine (something the US doesn't benefit from outside Israel) and maintaining a strategic partner/toehold in the region - even if they're an ethnostate (something the US does benefit from).
You ain’t playing that mental game of interests and geopolitical boardgame shenanigans.
That's incredibly ironic considering your Risk-level analysis of IR.
Oh my bad, you want a dissertation on the historical, economic and cultural reasons why a state would support a colony made of its own people? Cool, I'll get right to work on that.
"A colony made of its own people"
Holy shit.
I'm sorry? Where do you think the population of Israeli colonists came from? The sky? Just fell right from heaven itself? Americans and Europeans for God's sake. Look man. I ain't gonna tit for tat you all day for every silly complaint you have for me.
I'm sorry that you don't understand the history or demographics of Israel.
Breaking news update. Eastern Europe no longer considered European. Slavs heartbroken. More news at 6.
I hate the idea that people throw around that Israel has any influence over the US. They don't.
Counterpoint: AIPAC
The puppet made an advocacy lobby. A way to tell it's imperial master what it wants. This isn't influence, this is communication.
Lobbyists - famous for having no influence.
Recheck my edit on original post for an explanation of how I'm using the word influence.
This isn't influence, this is communication.
As for the US doing something it otherwise wouldn't do, the US gains nothing from the genocide of Palestine that doesn't relate directly to Israel. You've made two contradictory statements, and they're both wrong.
I hate the idea that people throw around that Israel has any influence over the US. They don’t. Israel is a puppet of America. It only looks like they can influence us because we are already doing what they want.
Jesus fucking Christ.
All this to say, let’s not fall into stupid “Jews run the world” bullshit when the truth is much simpler.
The "truth" being that Israel, unlike numerous other involved countries with the US, isn't running an effective lobbying campaign utilizing the open corruption of our government to leverage unconditional support by threatening both primary and general election candidates who don't tow the line?
I guess the Israelis are just too moral to do that.
It’d be like saying “America runs Britain” because the French and Indian war. Empires go to bat for their colonies.
What absolute brainrot.
Yeah dude. It's Jewish money flowing into American pockets that's why we do what we do. Nothing to do with America's long standing policy to support anyone who is friendly with us regardless of what they do to their own people or neighbors as long as we keep our access when we need it.
It's not like we haven't done this before. See: literally every dictator we have propped up. Why would Israel be any different? Why is it specifically isreal that geopolitical considerations ain't enough to get us to back another genocide? We have backed loads of genocides for less.
The difference is that those other genocidaires we've backed have had tangible benefits to American hegemony. For the record, every one of them is fucking atrocious and a stain on the US, but they are overwhelmingly "We're backing this brutal dictator because he's on 'our side'" - there is generally a realpolitik reason, ugly as it is, for playing such vile games.
Israel is a fucking canker sore that's managed to dig itself deep into the US's good graces by using the simple Iron Law of Institutions - institutions do not do what benefits them, institutions do what benefits the decision-makers.
By a mixture of active propaganda on the general public, peddling shite like 'the most moral army in the world', deliberately cultivating ties with apocalyptic Christofascist lunatics, and a staggering war-chest for electoral donations (objectively quite small as far as national expenditures go, but most countries aren't pouring in literal tens of millions of dollars to influence US elections), they've made opposition to Israel anathema in modern US politics. And that means that they can get away with doing immense damage to US interests on the world stage, because the politicians are acting according to what is rational for them to do, not for what is rational for the US government to do.
Hell, Israel used to be closer with the fucking Sovs than the US. This isn't some immutable thing, as much as Israel would love for everyone to believe it is.
They've definitely put in a lot of work to justify the position the US has, that's for sure and I ain't arguing that. What I am saying is that all of that is secondary to having American and European colonial nation strategically located in a conflict zone that has been a conflict zone for a long fucking time up to this point and will continue to be.
That's my whole point. That at the end of the day, money or no money, America would still support Israel. The inclusion of all that marketing makes it easier to justify. You could even say it changes the scale of that support. But with or without it, America is gonna do what America does. Back it's interests. Are we arguing over semantics here? Or are you really saying the #1 driving force of American support of Israel is this lobby group and it's surrounding antics? Or can we just admit that it's a supporting role?
Look. All I am trying to do is lessen a lot of the borderline Jewish conspiracies I have seen show up lately. I just dislike people playing into "Jews control the world" shit. I dislike that rhetoric and I believe it to be harmful as fuck to the people who don't know as much. I believe it confuses the motivations for the sake of being quippy and that blurry area that's created is filled with all the anti semitic shit people were exposed to all their lives. You're really going to sit and argue with me over all that? Go ahead. I made my point a few times over now. Take it away.
What I am saying is that all of that is secondary to having American and European colonial nation strategically located in a conflict zone that has been a conflict zone for a long fucking time up to this point and will continue to be.
"American and European colonial nation"
Lord.
That's not even getting into the fact that a good 3/4s of the fucking region is already deep in our pockets. FFS. This "THE US NEEDS ISRAEL" is a convenient lie peddled by the Israeli government, which is desperate to keep its sugar daddy without having to do anything of consequence to earn its keep, conservatives who crave the death of more Muslims, and, bizarrely, certain online leftists who don't seem to realize that most of MENA is already a US base, and Israel is, in terms of strategic value, a liability more than an asset.
That’s my whole point. That at the end of the day, money or no money, America would still support Israel.
Why.
Do you think there's just some sort of sense of White Solidarity(tm) between the West and the Mizrahi-Sephardic Israeli majority and the Ashekenazi minority (which, as we all know, White Power types ADORE)?
The inclusion of all that marketing makes it easier to justify. You could even say it changes the scale of that support. But with or without it, America is gonna do what America does. Back it’s interests.
I'm sorry you think that the Iron Law of Institutions is just something I made up on the spot. I might recommend a Sociology 101 course.
Are we arguing over semantics here? Or are you really saying the #1 driving force of American support of Israel is this lobby group and it’s surrounding antics? Or can we just admit that it’s a supporting role?
Yes, the #1 driving force of American support of Israel is the domestic benefit that American politicians recieve from it. I don't know why "All professions, but especially politicians, self-select for propagation of their own power and their continued status" is such a radical idea to you, but it's mainstream in most academia.
Look. All I am trying to do is lessen a lot of the borderline Jewish conspiracies I have seen show up lately. I just dislike people playing into “Jews control the world” shit. I dislike that rhetoric and I believe it to be harmful as fuck to the people who don’t know as much. I believe it confuses the motivations for the sake of being quippy and that blurry area that’s created is filled with all the anti semitic shit people were exposed to all their lives. You’re really going to sit and argue with me over all that? Go ahead. I made my point a few times over now. Take it away.
Oh yeah, you bet I'm gonna sit here and argue with you about that. "Antisemitism" is not a fucking excuse for downplaying Israel's behavior - which is exactly what you're doing. Israel is not all Jews - all Jews are not Israelis. I'm sorry that this is where your draw your line as to what is too complex to parse, but I assure you, it's true.
AIPAC just outed two progressive Democrats....
Incase
Like a tenor who can't clear his throat, this is where the poli-sci lecture fell apart.