 |
|
February 10, 2012
Lisa M. Krieger: Man with defibrillator demands access to his own heart's information
David G. Savage: Why activists may not be in a hurry to have High Court rule on alternative marriage
February 9, 2012
Laura McMullen: 10 Least Expensive Public Schools for Out-of-State Students
Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
Warren Richey: Why momentous Prop. 8 ruling might not satisfy gay-rights groups
Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
The Kosher Gourmet byDana Velden: Going to the bother of making soup? You know it better be good. This CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP certainly is! And it's a cinch to make, too (Includes techinques and serving secrets)
February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
Suzanne Bohan: Leaping lizards! Tiny reptiles advancing robot design
February 6, 2012
Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
|
| |
Jewish World Review
Sept. 14, 2005
/10 Elul, 5765
As Big Easy sunk, unprepared, under-staffed government responders rebuffed help from Israeli humanitarian aid delegation
By
Caroline B. Glick
The Bush administration is constantly declaring its revolutionary strategy of transforming the Arab world through democracy. But how can anyone take it seriously when it repeatedly humiliates the only democracy in the Middle East as it courts favor with anti-democratic, terror-supporting Arab autocracies
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
Last Thursday Israel sent a plane laden with relief supplies to New Orleans to aid victims of Hurricane Katrina. The Foreign Ministry's Web site noted that the shipment included "80 tons of food, disposable diapers, beds, blankets, generators and additional equipment which were donated from different governmental institutions, civilian institutions and the IDF."
The Web site's notice of the shipment is rather confusing. The first half of the entry announced that the IDF's chief medical officer, Brig. Gen. Yeheskel Levy, would be leading the Israeli delegation that was set to depart last Wednesday, Sept. 7.
A few paragraphs down, the same notice stated that on Sept. 8 a lower-ranking delegation, led Col. Yuval Kimhi, head of the Policy and Development Department in the IDF Home Front Command, would be leading the delegation. The Web site noted: "The contents of the shipment were chosen in coordination with the US government."
Three central questions arise from the contradictory announcement. First, why would the US ask for Israel to lower the level of a humanitarian aid delegation sent to assist US citizens in need? Second, why would the Bush administration hold up the arrival of assistance from a close ally whose government's offer of assistance had been announced a week before? And thirdly, given the IDF Medical Corps' enormous, hard-earned experience in contending with major disasters — man-made and natural — why would the Bush administration nix the participation of IDF doctors in the humanitarian assistance effort?
According to a documented report in the online newspaper worldtribune.com the reason for the delay, and presumably for the lowering of the level of the delegation, was the State Department's unwillingness to accept Israel's assistance.
Administration officials cited by the report claimed that the State Department delayed accepting Israel's repeated offers of assistance because it feared that accepting Israel's offer would make Arab states less likely to make offers of their own.
Indeed, the report notes that in multiple press briefings last week regarding foreign assistance to Katrina victims the State Department repeatedly ignored Israel's offers. It was only on Wednesday night that the State Department released a report noting Israel's assistance.
The article quotes an administration official stating, "At one point, the administration signaled that it would accept Israeli help, but preferred that it be as part of a mission organized by the American Jewish community. There appeared to be a problem with having the Israeli flag in a foreign rescue mission in the United States."
Why would there be a problem with Israel assisting the US? How dare the administration hint that Israel integrate its assistance with that of an American religious and ethnic minority — Jewish or otherwise? Did the US suggest that the Irish or Indian governments integrate their relief assistance with relief efforts being carried out by the Irish-American or Indian-American communities? Perhaps Israel should feel grateful that the Bush administration accepted our offer at all.
After all, it refused Israeli offers of assistance in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on New York and Washington. At that time a delegation from Zaka, the non-governmental organization of volunteers that collects body parts for identification and burial after terror attacks in Israel, was grounded at Ben-Gurion Airport when it received word that the Bush administration had adamantly rejected its offer to come to New York to help identify victims at the World Trade Center.
AT THE same time, as is the case today with Hurricane Katrina, the administration loudly applauded the "outpouring" of assistance it had received from such allies as Saudi Arabia. It took then New York mayor Rudolph Guiliani to set the record straight when, on October 10, 2001, Giuliani rejected a $10 million donation from Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal.
Giuliani discovered that the prince had claimed that "Israeli attacks on Palestinians" were the cause of the al-Qaida bombings in the US. In rejecting the donation Giuliani said, "Not only are those statements wrong, they're part of the problem."
Unfortunately, the problem continues.
Karen Hughes, President George W. Bush's close adviser who recently began her tenure as undersecretary of state for public diplomacy, last weekend gave her first public address in her new capacity to the Islamic Society of North America. As Frank Gaffney, the president of the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC noted in a column in The Washington Times, the group "is a front for the promotion of Saudi Arabia's Wahhabi political, doctrinal and theological infrastructure in the US and Canada."
Columnist Joel Mowbray explained in the same newspaper that the group's president has praised suicide bombers, and the organization's Web site includes articles lauding Osama bin Laden written by well-known anti-Semites and Holocaust deniers.
Mowbray offers in his column that perhaps Hughes was not sufficiently briefed by her aides before she accepted the invitation to address the group. Perhaps however, she was briefed by her close adviser, Edward Djerejian, former US ambassador to Syria and the director of the James Baker Public Policy Institute at Rice University in Houston.
Djerejian has for years called for the adoption of a hostile US approach to Israel within US policy making circles.
THE STORY of African-American sprinter Jesse Owens's great victory at the "Nazi" Olympics in Berlin in 1936 has always been upheld as a great symbolic victory of a multi-racial democracy against a racist totalitarian regime. Less widely known is that Owens won his fourth gold medal — in the 400-yard relay — because of anti-Semitism. Owens and Ralph Metcalfe, another African-American, were not scheduled to participate in the race. Their participation was the result of a last-minute decision by Avery Brundage, chairman of the US Olympic Committee and an enthusiastic supporter of Hitler, to remove two Jewish-American sprinters, Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller, from the lineup.
It is hard not to view the State Department's reticence over accepting Israel's offers of assistance to hurricane victims and victims of Arab terror on the one hand, and its enthusiastic playing up of assistance from Arab states on the other, as an historical parallel to Brundage's decision to prevent Glickman and Stoller from competing in the Olympic Games in Berlin.
The most disturbing aspect of this episode is that it shows clearly the enduring power of the darker side of America. There is the great America that stands as a beacon of freedom and democracy for the whole world. This is the America that is willing to send its forces throughout the world to defend America and bring freedom to millions who suffer under the yoke of tyranny.
But, on the other side, there is the America of special interests and of prejudice. This is the America that, at the behest of the Saudi government, announced its support for the establishment of a Palestinian state just weeks after thousands of Palestinians celebrated the destruction of the World Trade Center. This is the America that put forward a reform plan for the United Nations that makes no mention of reforming the organization's blatant, institutional discrimination of Israel.
The Bush administration is constantly declaring its revolutionary strategy of transforming the Arab world through democracy. But how can anyone take it seriously when it repeatedly humiliates the only democracy in the Middle East as it courts favor with anti-democratic, terror-supporting Arab autocracies while winking at their inherent, genocidal hatred of the Jewish people?
Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in Washington and in the media consider "must reading." Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
JWR contributor Caroline B. Glick is the senior Middle East Fellow at the Center for Security Policy in Washington, DC and the deputy managing editor of The Jerusalem Post. Comment by clicking here.
© 2005, Caroline B. Glick
|
