- Signs of the Times for Sat, 11 Mar 2006 -

No individual or group alive today can lay claim to having come up with the idea that an individual or a small group should possess inordinate power over the majority of humanity. Almost all peoples throughout recorded history were born into a world where some form of government or another already existed, including those individuals who, during their lifetime, became part of this ruling class.

There are two possible explanations as to why some form of government or other - a ruling class in opposition to the masses of humanity - has existed now for countless generations.

The first explanation is that it is fundamental to human nature to look to a leader or leaders to take and enact decisions on behalf of the rest. The argument goes that, due to another fundamental aspect of human nature - the tendency towards service to self - leadership by an individual or small group is necessary to ensure that a structured society, even the most primitive, can succeed without descending into anarchy, violence and survival of the fittest, and that even those humans who wish that it were not so, innately understand this and therefore willingly embrace a hierarchy as a necessary evil. Leadership, or government, then, is a structure that is put in place essentially to protect the people from themselves while maintaining the structure of society for the benefit of all, and places power into the hands of the few who present themselves as most able to do the job.

Let us notice this important fact: by and large in recent history, those that have presented themselves, or have been presented by others, as being fit for the job of leadership, have been elected or selected as a result of their own claims, or the claims of their associates, as to their competence rather than due to any apparent and innate leadership qualities that could be verified by the citizens to be governed. That is to say, society is too large for direct contact and intimate knowledge of the leaders by all of the people, so we end up having to trust the leaders' claims or the claims of their associates, as to their eligibility to hold positions of power over us.

This problem of who will protect the people from the leaders and regulate their actions if such a need arises does not seem to be provided for in any practical or rational way, and the 'governees' are left to hope that the leaders somehow possess, or will develop, the benevolent qualities befitting those who aspire to positions of power.

The paradox is, of course, in the fact that the lack of these benevolent qualities in humans in general, including the leaders, is what creates the need for leaders in the first place.

The second explanation, while accepting that human beings tend towards self service, proclaims that there exists also an innate altruistic aspect to human nature. Furthermore, it is proposed that the degree to which self centeredness and altruism are manifested can vary greatly from person to person. It is further argued that there exists the possibility that, if the human potential for altruism were to be cultivated (specifically by those elected to govern) a very different social structure might have a chance to develop. With this as its basis, the second explanation asserts that the concept that a few must naturally govern the many is not necessarily true and, in fact, is most often promoted by those in whom the service to self nature is strongest and who desire to attain to positions of power over others.

Indeed, it can be convincingly argued that, for those people of a predominantly self-serving nature, the first explanation is in fact very true, but only for them, and it is in this idea that a foundational problem of our existence arises.

In a world where some people (perhaps even a large majority) possess an innate tendency towards altruism, and some (perhaps even a small minority) do not, those that do not will, by their very nature, be able to provide false evidence that the first explanation is the truth, that anarchy does indeed result from a lack of leaders, which then precludes the possibility that anything other than a hierarchical structured society based on the self-interest of the few can ever exist. Furthermore, and again as a result of their predominating self-serving nature, we see that it is from the ranks of these people that the few that rule the many are most often drawn. Some might also call such a scenario "catch 22".

Of course, once in power, this small elite are well aware of the fact that, if they are to remain in power, their self-serving tendencies must be kept hidden from the rest of the population. To this end, such individuals will generally publicly espouse the second theory - that compassionate, responsible leadership is the key to a peaceful co-existence - while privately pursuing their self-serving agendas. Unsurprisingly, the result of such a configuration is government duplicity on a massive scale, and a gaping chasm between what our leaders say and what they do. We see these games of deception going on every day in the news. The invasion of Iraq and the lies used to justify this act - criminal under international law - are but one example. The lies told by the Israeli government to justify the murder of Palestinian children is another horrifying example.

By the beginning of the 21st century, the process of electing leaders and the governing of the masses by the few has become so refined as to be virtually an automated procedure (the 2000 and 2004 U.S. presidential elections being a case in point). Those predisposed to self-serving ideals join, and rise up through, the ranks of the existing ruling parties and continue the job of governing the many. A 'natural' and closed clique among the leaders results, and today's citizenry, whose ancestors long ago relinquished power to what has today become a self-perpetuating organism, must simply sit, wait, hope, and ultimately lie to themselves in order to believe that their leaders will act in the best interests of all.

The people however are not completely denuded of all resources to search for and uncover the truth about the real intention of their leaders. Deception is only an attempt to hide an already existent truth, it does not wipe out the existence of that truth. As such, those citizens of a diligent and truth-loving disposition can, with enough effort and desire, still discover evidence to corroborate the truth of the idea that was lost to our ancestors - that those who actively seek and attain political or government office are, by their nature, generally unfit for it.

Democracy, as opposed to dictatorship, merely serves to provide a cover of legitimacy for that small section of humanity that seem incapable of even conceiving of the idea of compassionate government to ascend to positions of power. The Democratic form of government, with its widespread popular representation, also seems particularly effective in providing a broader pool from which such psychopaths and self-centred people can be identified and vetted by their peers and brought into the ruling elite.

The fact that all that I have said above is eminently observable in current and historical world events, if we will only take the time to look, can be used to relive us of the burden of the constant wrangling over whether or not our leaders 'would do that'. Having been in this way abundantly furnished with the proof of logical reasoning which shows us that, by their very nature, our leaders would indeed and always have 'done that', we are then in a position to objectively confront events of global significance, like the attacks of September 11th, 2001 and it's aftermath, and draw the logical and entirely rational conclusion that we - the global population - are being set up to walk blindly along the path to our own destruction. More importantly, we would realise that we can do something about our predicament, if we will only recognise the somewhat unsavoury truth about our society, the way it is structured and the type of people who, up until now, we have misguidedly looked to for guidance.

As Dresden James said:

"The ideal tyranny is that which is ignorantly self-administered by its victims. The most perfect slaves are, therefore, those which blissfully and unawaredly enslave themselves."

But rather than ask the reader to rely on my testimony alone as to the reality of the general nature of those that rise to positions of power over us, I have included below details of historical events that provide objective evidence for the truth of what I say.

Pentagon Proposed Pretexts for Cuba Invasion in 1962

National Security Archive

In his new exposé of the National Security Agency entitled Body of Secrets, author James Bamford highlights a set of proposals on Cuba by the Joint Chiefs of Staff codenamed OPERATION NORTHWOODS. This document, titled “Justification for U.S. Military Intervention in Cuba” was provided by the JCS to Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara on March 13, 1962, as the key component of Northwoods.

Written in response to a request from the Chief of the Cuba Project, Col. Edward Lansdale, the Top Secret memorandum describes U.S. plans to covertly engineer various pretexts that would justify a U.S. invasion of Cuba. These proposals - part of a secret anti-Castro program known as Operation Mongoose - included staging the assassinations of Cubans living in the United States, developing a fake “Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington,” including “sink[ing] a boatload of Cuban refugees (real or simulated),” faking a Cuban airforce attack on a civilian jetliner, and concocting a “Remember the Maine” incident by blowing up a U.S. ship in Cuban waters and then blaming the incident on Cuban sabotage. Bamford himself writes that Operation Northwoods "may be the most corrupt plan ever created by the U.S. government."

(Ed: Since then, 9/11 has taken the place of Operation Northwoods as the most corrupt plan ever created and implemented by a U.S. government)

30-Year Anniversary: Tonkin Gulf Lie Launched Vietnam War

Fair.org By Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon July 27, 1994

Thirty years ago, it all seemed very clear.

"American Planes Hit North Vietnam After Second Attack on Our Destroyers; Move Taken to Halt New Aggression", announced a Washington Post headline on Aug. 5, 1964.

That same day, the front page of the New York Times reported: "President Johnson has ordered retaliatory action against gunboats and 'certain supporting facilities in North Vietnam' after renewed attacks against American destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin."

But there was no "second attack" by North Vietnam -- no "renewed attacks against American destroyers." By reporting official claims as absolute truths, American journalism opened the floodgates for the bloody Vietnam War.

A pattern took hold: continuous government lies passed on by pliant mass media...leading to over 50,000 American deaths and millions of Vietnamese casualties.

The official story was that North Vietnamese torpedo boats launched an "unprovoked attack" against a U.S. destroyer on "routine patrol" in the Tonkin Gulf on Aug. 2 -- and that North Vietnamese PT boats followed up with a "deliberate attack" on a pair of U.S. ships two days later.

The truth was very different.

Rather than being on a routine patrol Aug. 2, the U.S. destroyer Maddox was actually engaged in aggressive intelligence-gathering maneuvers -- in sync with coordinated attacks on North Vietnam by the South Vietnamese navy and the Laotian air force.

"The day before, two attacks on North Vietnam...had taken place," writes scholar Daniel C. Hallin. Those assaults were "part of a campaign of increasing military pressure on the North that the United States had been pursuing since early 1964."

On the night of Aug. 4, the Pentagon proclaimed that a second attack by North Vietnamese PT boats had occurred earlier that day in the Tonkin Gulf -- a report cited by President Johnson as he went on national TV that evening to announce a momentous escalation in the war: air strikes against North Vietnam.

But Johnson ordered U.S. bombers to "retaliate" for a North Vietnamese torpedo attack that never happened.

Prior to the U.S. air strikes, top officials in Washington had reason to doubt that any Aug. 4 attack by North Vietnam had occurred. Cables from the U.S. task force commander in the Tonkin Gulf, Captain John J. Herrick, referred to "freak weather effects," "almost total darkness" and an "overeager sonarman" who "was hearing ship's own propeller beat."

One of the Navy pilots flying overhead that night was squadron commander James Stockdale, who gained fame later as a POW and then Ross Perot's vice presidential candidate. "I had the best seat in the house to watch that event," recalled Stockdale a few years ago, "and our destroyers were just shooting at phantom targets -- there were no PT boats there.... There was nothing there but black water and American fire power."

In 1965, Lyndon Johnson commented: "For all I know, our Navy was shooting at whales out there."

But Johnson's deceitful speech of Aug. 4, 1964, won accolades from editorial writers. The president, proclaimed the New York Times, "went to the American people last night with the somber facts." The Los Angeles Times urged Americans to "face the fact that the Communists, by their attack on American vessels in international waters, have themselves escalated the hostilities."

An exhaustive new book, The War Within: America's Battle Over Vietnam, begins with a dramatic account of the Tonkin Gulf incidents. In an interview, author Tom Wells told us that American media "described the air strikes that Johnson launched in response as merely `tit for tat' -- when in reality they reflected plans the administration had already drawn up for gradually increasing its overt military pressure against the North."

Why such inaccurate news coverage? Wells points to the media's "almost exclusive reliance on U.S. government officials as sources of information" -- as well as "reluctance to question official pronouncements on 'national security issues.'"

Daniel Hallin's classic book The "Uncensored War" observes that journalists had "a great deal of information available which contradicted the official account [of Tonkin Gulf events]; it simply wasn't used. The day before the first incident, Hanoi had protested the attacks on its territory by Laotian aircraft and South Vietnamese gunboats."

What's more, "It was generally known...that `covert' operations against North Vietnam, carried out by South Vietnamese forces with U.S. support and direction, had been going on for some time."

In the absence of independent journalism, the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution -- the closest thing there ever was to a declaration of war against North Vietnam -- sailed through Congress on Aug. 7. (Two courageous senators, Wayne Morse of Oregon and Ernest Gruening of Alaska, provided the only "no" votes.) The resolution authorized the president "to take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression."

The rest is tragic history.

Nearly three decades later, during the Gulf War, columnist Sydney Schanberg warned journalists not to forget "our unquestioning chorus of agreeability when Lyndon Johnson bamboozled us with his fabrication of the Gulf of Tonkin incident."

Schanberg blamed not only the press but also "the apparent amnesia of the wider American public."

And he added: "We Americans are the ultimate innocents. We are forever desperate to believe that this time the government is telling us the truth."

Do Freedom of Information Act Files Prove FDR Had Foreknowledge of Pearl Harbor?

An Interview with Robert B. Stinnett by Douglas Cirignano

On November 25, 1941 Japan’s Admiral Yamamoto sent a radio message to the group of Japanese warships that would attack Pearl Harbor on December 7. Newly released naval records prove that from November 17 to 25 the United States Navy intercepted eighty-three messages that Yamamoto sent to his carriers. Part of the November 25 message read: “…the task force, keeping its movements strictly secret and maintaining close guard against submarines and aircraft, shall advance into Hawaiian waters, and upon the very opening of hostilities shall attack the main force of the United States fleet in Hawaii and deal it a mortal blow…”

One might wonder if the theory that President Franklin Roosevelt had a foreknowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack would have been alluded to in this summer’s movie, Pearl Harbor. Since World War II many people have suspected that Washington knew the attack was coming. When Thomas Dewey was running for president against Roosevelt in 1944 he found out about America’s ability to intercept Japan’s radio messages, and thought this knowledge would enable him to defeat the popular FDR. In the fall of that year, Dewey planned a series of speeches charging FDR with foreknowledge of the attack. Ultimately, General George Marshall, then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, persuaded Dewey not to make the speeches. Japan’s naval leaders did not realize America had cracked their codes, and Dewey’s speeches could have sacrificed America’s code-breaking advantage. So, Dewey said nothing, and in November FDR was elected president for the fourth time.

Now, though, according to Robert Stinnett, author of Simon & Schuster’s Day Of Deceit, we have the proof. Stinnett’s book is dedicated to Congressman John Moss, the author of America’s Freedom of Information Act. According to Stinnett, the answers to the mysteries of Pearl Harbor can be found in the extraordinary number of documents he was able to attain through Freedom of Information Act requests. Cable after cable of decryptions, scores of military messages that America was intercepting, clearly showed that Japanese ships were preparing for war and heading straight for Hawaii. Stinnett, an author, journalist, and World War II veteran, spent sixteen years delving into the National Archives. He poured over more than 200,000 documents, and conducted dozens of interviews. This meticulous research led Stinnet to a firmly held conclusion: FDR knew.

“Your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars,” was Roosevelt’s famous campaign statement of 1940. He wasn’t being ingenuous. FDR’s military and State Department leaders were agreeing that a victorious Nazi Germany would threaten the national security of the United States. In White House meetings the strong feeling was that America needed a call to action. This is not what the public wanted, though. Eighty to ninety percent of the American people wanted nothing to do with Europe’s war. So, according to Stinnett, Roosevelt provoked Japan to attack us, let it happen at Pearl Harbor, and thus galvanized the country to war.

Many who came into contact with Roosevelt during that time hinted that FDR wasn’t being forthright about his intentions in Europe. After the attack, on the Sunday evening of December 7, 1941, Roosevelt had a brief meeting in the White House with Edward R. Murrow, the famed journalist, and William Donovan, the founder of the Office of Strategic Services. Later Donovan told an assistant the he believed FDR welcomed the attack and didn’t seem surprised. The only thing Roosevelt seemed to care about, Donovan felt, was if the public would now support a declaration of war. According to Day Of Deceit, in October 1940 FDR adopted a specific strategy to incite Japan to commit an overt act of war.

Part of the strategy was to move America’s Pacific fleet out of California and anchor it in Pearl Harbor. Admiral James Richardson, the commander of the Pacific fleet, strongly opposed keeping the ships in harm's way in Hawaii. He expressed this to Roosevelt, and so the President relieved him of his command. Later Richardson quoted Roosevelt as saying: "Sooner or later the Japanese will commit an overt act against the United States and the nation will be willing to enter the war."

(Ed: Four years ago, what percentage of American citizens would have utterly rejected the idea of an unprovoked war on Afghanistan and Iraq, not to mention an endless 'war on terror' leading, inexplicably, to a clamp down on civil liberties at home? After 9/11, of course, they had no choice, they were 'victims' of an 'unprovoked' and 'surprise' attack by 'Arab terrorists', just as American citizens were 'victims' of an 'unprovoked' and 'surprise' attack by the Japanese.)

The Lavon Affair

By David Hirst

Excerpts from his book: The Gun and the Olive Branch, 1977, 1984, Futura Publications

In July 1954 Egypt was plagued by a series of bomb outrages directed mainly against American and British property in Cairo and Alexandria. It was generally assumed that they were the work of the Moslem Brothers, then the most dangerous challenge to the still uncertain authority of Colonel (later President) Nasser and his two-year-old revolution. Nasser was negotiating with Britain over the evacuation of its giant military bases in the Suez Canal Zone, and, the Moslem Brothers, as zealous nationalists, were vigorously opposed to any Egyptian compromises.

It therefore came as a shock to world, and particularly Jewish opinion, when on 5 October the Egyptian Minister of the Interior, Zakaria Muhieddin, announced the break-up of a thirteen-man Israeli sabotage network.

The trial established that the bombings had indeed been carried out by an Israeli espionage and terrorist network. This was headed by Colonel Avraharn Dar --alias John Darling-- and a core of professionals who had set themselves up in Egypt under various guises. They had recruited a number of Egyptian Jews; one of them was a young woman, Marcelle Ninio, who worked in the offices of a British company. Naturally, the eventual exposure of such an organization was not going to improve the lot of the vast majority of Egyptian Jews who wanted no-thing to do with Zionism. There were still at least 50,000 Jews in Egypt; there had been something over 60,000 in 1947, more than half of whom were actually foreign nationals.

The welfare of Oriental Jewry in their various homelands was, as we have seen, Israel's last concern. And in July 1954 it had other worries. It was feeling isolated and insecure. Its Western friends-let alone the rest of the world-were unhappy about its aggressive behaviour. The US Assistant Secretary of State advised it to 'drop the attitude of the conqueror'.53 More alarming was the rapprochement under way between Egypt, on the one hand, and the United States and Britain on the other. President Eisenhower had urged Britain to give up her giant military base in the Suez Canal Zone; Bengurion had failed to dissuade her. It was to sabotage this rapprochement that the head of Israeli intelligence, Colonel Benyamin Givli, ordered his Egyptian intelligence ring to strike.

On Givli's instructions, the Egyptian network was to plant bombs in American and British cultural centres, British-owned cinemas and Egyptian public buildings. The Western powers, it was hoped, would conclude that there was fierce internal opposition to the rapprochement and that Nasser's young regime, faced with this challenge, was not one in which they could place much confidence. Mysterious violence might therefore persuade both London and Washington that British troops should remain astride the Canal; the world had not forgotten Black Saturday, 28 January 1951, in the last year of King Farouk's reign, when mobs rampaged through downtown Cairo, setting fire to foreign-owned hotels and shops, in which scores of people, including thirteen Britons, died.

The first bomb went off, on 2 July, in the Alexandria post office. On 11 July, the Anglo-Egyptian Suez negotiations, which had been blocked for nine months, got under way again. The next day the Israeli embassy in London was assured that, up on the British evacuation from Suez, stock-piled arms would not be handed over to the Egyptians. But the Defence Ministry activists were unconvinced. On 14 July their agents, in clandestine radio contact with Tel Aviv, fire-bombed US Information Service libraries in Cairo and Alexandria. That same day, a phosphorous bomb exploded prematurely in the pocket of one Philip Natanson, nearly burning him alive, as he was about to enter the British-owned Rio cinema in Alexandria.

His arrest and subsequent confession led to the break-up of the whole ring-but not before the completion of another cycle of clandestine action and diplomatic failure. On 15 July President Eisenhower assured the Egyptians that 'simultaneously' with the signing of a Suez agreement the United States would enter into 'firm commitments' for economic aid to strengthen their armed forces.55 On 23 July --anniversary of the 1952 revolution-- the Israeli agents still at large had a final fling; they started fires in two Cairo cinemas, in the central post office and the railway station. On the same day, Britain announced that the War Secretary, Antony Head, was going to Cairo. And on 27 July he and the Egyptians initiated the 'Heads of Agreement' on the terms of Britain's evacuation.

The trial lasted from 11 December to 3 January. Not all the culprits were there, because Colonel Dar and an Israeli colleague managed to escape, and the third Israeli, Hungarian-born Max Bennett, committed suicide; but those who were present all pleaded guilty. Most of them, including Marcelle Ninio, were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. But Dr Musa Lieto Marzuk, a Tunisian-born citizen of France who was a surgeon at the Jewish Hospital in Cairo, and Samuel Azar, an engineering professor from Alexandria, were condemned to death. In spite of representations from France, Britain and the United States the two men were hanged. Politically, it would have been very difficult for Nasser to spare them, for only seven weeks before six Moslem Brothers had been executed for complicity in an attempt on his life. Nevertheless Israel reacted with grief and anger. So did some Western Jews. Marzuk and Azar 'died the death of martyrs', said Sharett on the same day in the Knesset, whose members stood in silent tribute. Israel went into official mourning the following day. Beersheba and Ramat Gan named streets after the executed men. Israeli delegates to the Egyptian-Israeli Mixed Armistice Commission refused to attend its meeting, declaring that they would not sit down with representatives of the Cairo junta. In New York there were bomb threats against the Egyptian consulate and a sniper fired four shots into its fourth-floor window.56

This whole episode, which was to poison Israeli political life for a decade and more, came to be known as the 'Lavon Affair', for it had been established in the Cairo trial that Lavon, as Minister of Defence, had approved the campaign of sabotage. At least so the available evidence made it appear. But in Israel, Lavon had asked Moshe Sharett for a secret inquiry into a matter about which the cabinet knew nothing. Benyamin Givli, the intelligence chief, claimed that the so-called 'security operation' had been authorized by Lavon himself. Two other Bengurion proteges, Moshe Dayan and Shimon Peres, testified against Lavon. Lavon denounced Givli's papers as forgeries and demanded the resignation of all three men. Instead, Sharett ordered Lavon himself to resign and invited Bengurion to come out of retirement and take over the Defence Ministry. It was a triumphant comeback for the 'activist' philosophy whose excesses both Sharett and Lavon had tried to modify. It was con-summated, a week later, by an unprovoked raid on Gaza, which left thirty-nine Egyptians dead and led to the Suez War Of 1956. 57

When the truth about the Lavon Affair came to light, six years after the event, it confirmed that there had been a frame-up-not, however, by the Egyptians, but by Bengurion and his young proteges. Exposure was fortuitous. Giving evidence in a forgery trial in September 1960, a witness divulged on passant that he had seen the faked signature of Lavon on a document relating to a 1954 'security mishap'.58 [...]

But Lavon was not the only real victim. There were also those misguided Egyptian Jews who paid with their lives or long terms of imprisonment. It is true that when, in 1968, Marcelle Ninio and her colleagues were exchanged for Egyptian' prisoners in Israel, they received a heroes' welcome. True, too, that when Miss Ninio got married Prime Minister Golda Meir, Defence Minister Dayan and Chief of Staff General Bar Lev all attended the wedding and Dayan told the bride 'the Six-Day War was success enough that it led to your freedom'.61 However, after spending fourteen years in an Egyptian prison, the former terrorists did not share the leadership's enthusiasm. When Ninio and two of her colleagues appeared on Israel television a few years later, they all expressed the belief that the reason why they were not released earlier was because Israel made little effort to get them out. 'Maybe they didn't want us to come back,' said Robert Dassa. 'There was so much intrigue in Israel. We were instruments in the hands of the Egyptians and of others ... and what is more painful after all that we went through is that this continues to be so.' In Ninio's opinion, 'the government didn't want to spoil its relations with the United States and didn't want the embarrassment of admitting it was behind our action'.62

But the real victims were the great mass of Egyptian Jewry. Episodes like the Lavon Affair tended to identify them, in the mind of ordinary Egyptians, with the Zionist movement. When, in 1956, Israeli invaded and occupied Sinai, feeling ran high against them. The government, playing into the Zionist hands, began ordering Jews to leave the country. Belatedly, reluctantly, 21,000 left in the following year; more were expelled later, and others, their livelihood gone, had nothing to stay for. But precious few went to Israel.

NOTES

49. Jerusalem Post, 12 December 1954.
5O. 13 December 1954.
51. 13 December 1954.
52. Berger, op. cit., p. 14.
53. love, Kennett, Suez: The Twice-Fought War, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1969, P. 71.
54. Ibid., p . 73.
55. Ibid., p. 74.
56. Love, op. cit., P. 77.
57. See p. 198.
58. New York Times, 10 February 1961.
59. Ibid
60. Jewish Chronicle, London, 17 February 1971.
61. Ha'olam Hazeh, 1 December 1971
62. Associated Press, 16 March 1975.

(Ed:: Right here, dear readers, we have concrete evidence that the concept of a 'false flag' operation formed a central part of Israeli intelligence operations over 50 years ago. Yet even before that, certain factions within the movement known as 'Zionism' were already selling out their 'own people' while maintaining that they were acting in the best interests of all.

Zionism Convicts Itself

51 Documents: Zionist Collaboration with the Nazis by LENNI BRENNER

On June 21, 1933, the German Zionist Federation sent a secret memorandum to the Nazis:

"Zionism has no illusions about the difficulty of the Jewish condition, which consists above all in an abnormal occupational pattern and in the fault of an intellectual and moral posture not rooted in one's own tradition. Zionism recognized decades ago that as a result of the assimilationist trend, symptoms of deterioration were bound to appear, which it seeks to overcome by carrying out its challenge to transform Jewish life completely.

"It is our opinion that an answer to the Jewish question truly satisfying to the national state can be brought about only with the collaboration of the Jewish movement that aims at a social, cultural and moral renewal of Jewry--indeed, that such a national renewal must first create the decisive social and spiritual premises for all solutions.

"Zionism believes that a rebirth of national life, such as is occurring in German life through adhesion to Christian and national values, must also take place in the Jewish national group. For the Jew, too, origin, religion, community of fate and group consciousness must be of decisive significance in the shaping of his life. This means that the egotistic individualism which arose in the liberal era must be overcome by public spiritedness and by willingness to accept responsibility."

By 1936, the Post ran a news flash, "German Zionists Seek Recognition":

"A bold demand that the German Zionist Federation be given recognition by the Government as the only instrument for the exclusive control of German Jewish life was made by the Executive of that body in a proclamation today. All German Jewish organizations, it was declared, should be dominated by the Zionist spirit."

Zionist factions competed for the honor of allying to Hitler. By 1940-41, the "Stern Gang," among them Yitzhak Shamir, later Prime Minister of Israel, presented the Nazis with the "Fundamental Features of the Proposal of the National Military Organization in Palestine (Irgun Zvai Leumi) Concerning the Solution of the Jewish Question in Europe and the Participation of the NMO in the War on the Side of Germany."

Avraham Stern and his followers announced that

"The NMO, which is well-acquainted with the goodwill of the German Reich government and its authorities towards Zionist activity inside Germany and towards Zionist emigration plans, is of the opinion that:

1. Common interests could exist between the establishment of a new order in Europe in conformity with the German concept, and the true national aspirations of the Jewish people as they are embodied by the NMO.

2. Cooperation between the new Germany and a renewed folkish-national Hebraium would be possible and,

3. The establishment of the historic Jewish state on a national and totalitarian basis, bound by a treaty with the German Reich, would be in the interest of a maintained and strengthened future German position of power in the Near East.

Proceeding from these considerations, the NMO in Palestine, under the condition the above-mentioned national aspirations of the Israeli freedom movement are recognized on the side of the German Reich, offers to actively take part in the war on Germany's side."

They hanged people all over Europe after WW II for notes to the Nazis like these. But these treasons against the Jews were virtually unknown in the run up to the creation of the Zionist state in May 1948

(Ed: We note in the above that the "Zionists" were essentially stating that they agreed with Hitler's stance on the Jewish question, and in veiled language were proposing a 'renewal' or rebirth of Jewish society and identity. It was a clear reference to the Zionist desire to create a Jewish 'homeland' in Palestine and their intention to co-operate with the Nazi regime in creating the conditions that would facilitate this. One of those 'conditions', of course, was the understanding among Jews that Europe was an extremely hostile environment for them, and that they should flee or accept deportation to their new 'homeland'. One has to wonder in this case just where and with whom the 'Jewish question' originated.)

"51 Documents: Zionist Collaboration with the Nazis"

Review by William Hughes

History can be deceptive. It's fair to say that some of the sensational never-published-before documents, in this book, will shock those who have accepted Zionism and its supposed history, at face value, as a political movement that was the hope of the Jews. Lenni Brenner, the intrepid author of “Zionism in the Age of Dictators,” reveals disturbing new evidence in his latest effort, that suggest just the opposite. In fact, he makes a compelling case that the Zionist record was “dishonorable.” You can consider this excellent tome as a worthy sequel to his first expose’ on the myopic Zionist zealots of that bygone era.

For openers, Brenner showed how the Zionists had a long history of shameless cooperation with the Nazis, especially after the dictator Adolph Hitler had came to power in 1933. The Zionists were also in bed, to some extent, with the other members of what later became known as WWII’s “Axis of Evil,” that included Benito Mussolini’s Italy, and Tojo Hideki’s Japan. For example, on March 29,1936, Zionists praised Il Duce, and his regime, at the opening of a maritime school, funded by the Fascist government, at Civitavecchia. This is where a Zionist youth group, the “Betar,” trained its sailors for the future Revisionist state. The speakers ignored the fact that on Oct. 3, 1935, Italian troops had invaded Abyssinia.

The Zionist also had a trade plan with the Berlin government by which German Jews could redeem their property in Nazi goods exported to then British-occupied Palestine. And to top it all off, the infamous SS-Hptscharf. Adolf Eichmann, had visited Palestine, in October, 1937, as the guest of the Zionists. He also met, in Egypt, with Feivel Polkes, a Zionist operative, whom Eichmann described as a “leading Haganah functionary.” The chain-smoking Polkes was also on the Nazis’ payroll “as an informer.”

Brenner isn’t the first writer to address the mostly taboo subject of how the Zionist leadership cooperated with the Nazis. Rolf Hilberg’s seminal “The Destruction of European Jews”; Hannah Arendt’s “Eichmann in Jerusalem”; Ben Hecht’s “Perfidy”; Edwin Black’s “The Transfer Agreement”; Francis R. Nicosia’s “The Third Reich and the Palestine Question”; Rudolf Vrba and Alan Bestic’s “I Cannot Forgive”; and Rafael Medoff’s “The Deadening Silence: American Jews and the Holocaust,” also dared, with varying public success.

After the Holocaust began in 1942, Eichmann dealt regularly with Dr. Rudolf Kastner, a Hungarian Jew, whom he considered a “fanatical Zionist.” Kastner was later assassinated in Israel as a Nazi collaborator. At issue then, however, was the bargaining over the eventual fate of Hungary’s Jews, who were slated for liquidation in the Nazi-run death camps. Eichmann said this about Kastner, the Zionist representative, “I believe that [he] would have sacrificed a thousand or a hundred thousand of his blood to achieve his political goal. He was not interested in old Jews or those who had become assimilated into Hungarian society. ‘You can have the others,’ he would say, ‘but let me have this group here.’ And because Kastner rendered us a great service by helping keep the deportation camps peaceful. I would let his groups escape.”

Readers, too, will be surprised to learn, that after the Nuremberg Anti-Jewish Race Laws were enacted in Sept., 1935, that there were only two flags that were permitted to be displayed in all of Nazi Germany. One was Hitler’s favorite, the Swastika. The other was the blue and white banner of Zionism. The Zionists were also allowed to publish their own newspaper. The reasons for this Reich-sponsored favoritism was, according to the author: The Zionists and the Nazis had a common interest, making German Jews emigrate to Palestine.

(Ed: Those tasked with the job of leading the people seem to believe that the very fact that they find themselves in a position of power, proves that they 'deserve', or possess some innate right to be in such a position - a self-fulfilling prophecy if you will, and it matters not what they had to do to get there. In fact, the 'resourcefulness' that they exhibited to climb the ladder of success is simply further proof for them that they are eminently deserving of their positions.

By this thinking, it follows then that if the great unwashed find themselves in a position of powerlesness, they also 'deserve' to be there. It is an ideology based on survival of the fittest, or, rather, the most ruthless. In short, the scum always rises to the top.
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Another Day in The Empire

It is interesting to follow the corporate media’s take on Iran’s response to threats of military action, most recently amplified by John Bolton and Dick Cheney in speeches delivered to the primary constituency of the United States government, AIPAC. Iran’s “President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s [comments about retaliating if his country is attacked] came as Tehran struck an increasingly threatening tone, with the top Iranian delegate to the U.N. atomic watchdog agency warning a day earlier that the United States will face ‘harm and pain’ if the Security Council becomes involved,” according to ABC News. “Some diplomats saw the comments as a veiled threat to use oil as a weapon, though Iran’s oil minister ruled out any decrease in production. Iran also has leverage with extremist groups in the Middle East that could harm U.S. interests.”

Of course, the “veiled threats” of Cheney and Bolton do not merit such commentary from these anonymous diplomats, more than likely neocons. ABC simply characterizes U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns’ threat to “seek a so-called [United Nations] Chapter 7 resolution, which can be enforced with military action” as the “toughest talk so far has come from Washington.”

It would be perfectly natural for Iran to use oil as a weapon if attacked by the United States, Israel, and any nation that supports a Chapter 7 resolution resulting in a military attack. It also makes perfect sense for Iran to leverage “terrorist” organizations during an attack (Iran allegedly supports Hamas, the PIJ and Ahmad Jibril’s PFLP-GC in Palestine and Hezbollah in Lebanon; it should be noted that both Hamas and Hezbollah are democratically elected political organizations).

Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei was spot on when he declared: “This time they have used nuclear energy as an excuse. If Iran quits now, the case will not be over. The Americans will find another excuse” as a pretext to shock and awe his country, as they went through several excuses in the lead-up to the invasion and occupation of Iraq.

In addition to the United States, several European countries are lining up behind the Straussian neocon threat to attack Iran, as most recently demonstrated by Austrian Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel, who indicated the “USA, Russia, China and Europe are in agreement on” preventing Iran’s nascent nuclear program, completely legal under Article IV(1) of the 1968 Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, signed by Iran in 1970.

“Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes,” the article states. Iran claims its nuclear program is for energy purposes.

Meanwhile, in the House of Corporate Whores, otherwise known as the House of Representatives, Thomas Lantos of California, senior Democrat whore on the International Relations Committee, has declared his intention to “push forward with legislation imposing mandatory sanctions on foreign firms working in Iran, despite administration concerns that the bill could split the international coalition against Iran’s nuclear programme,” in other words such a bill may jeopardize the impending Straussian neocon effort to shock and awe Iran.

“Iran’s quest for nuclear arms requires us to do two things: squeeze Iran’s economy as much as possible and do so without delay,” averred Lantos. Of course, an effort to “squeeze Iran’s economy” will result in misery and privation for the Iranian people, but then this does not bother Democrats. It should be remembered that the “feel your pain” Democrat Bill Clinton was responsible for most of the human misery inflicted under the medieval siege-like Iraq sanctions.

“After a year of intensive diplomacy, the five major nuclear powers—the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China—are united in agreeing that ‘Iran is seeking nuclear weapons’ but the proposed law could blow the coalition apart,” Nicholas Burns warned. For the Straussian neocons, such a blow-out would be unfortunate, although it certainly wouldn’t put a kink in their effort to target Iran, as they have held this threat dear for more than a decade.

Finally, Condi Rice has thrown in her two cents. “We may face no greater challenge from a single country than from Iran, whose policies are directed at developing a Middle East that would be 180 degrees different than the Middle East we would like to see develop,” Rice told a Congressional hearing in Washington. “This is a country that is determined, it seems, to develop a nuclear weapon in defiance of the international community which is determined that they should not get one.”

Never mind that the above mentioned countries are not about to give up their nukes and the sanctimonious United States is the only country to actually ever use nukes—not against a true adversary, mind you, but an all-but defeated enemy, or rather its civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

“Rice also alleged that Iran was the ‘central banker for terrorism” in the Middle East, accusing the Islamic Republic of supporting terrorist attacks in Iraq, the Palestinian territories and Lebanon,” reports al-Jazeera. Of course, Condi did not offer any evidence that Iran supports attacks against the occupiers in Iraq—never mind that Iran’s support of the Sunni and Ba’athist resistance would be absurd, considering the country fought a horrific war against the secular Saddam Hussein in the 1980s.

No mention either of Israel’s terrorist attacks against thousands of people in “the Palestinian territories,” the vast majority innocent civilians (according to the Palestine Red Crescent Society and the IDF, or rather IOF, since September 29, 2000, 3,821 Palestinians and 1,084 Israelis have been killed; see this chart). Nor did Condi bother to mention that in fact the “terrorist” group in Lebanon is Hezbollah, a legitimate resistance organization formed when Israel illegally invaded Lebanon and supported by most Lebanese.

As the shock and awe campaign against Iran unfolds before our eyes, such details are irrelevant. However, it appears the United Nations is no longer irrelevant, as Bush claimed it was in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq, and Europe is eager to put to rest its stigmatization as a passel of wimps, irresolute in the face of Islamic terrorism, never mind that much of this terrorism was created by the United States, Britain, and their various clients.

Aspects of Vice President Dick Cheney's quail hunt make ethical hunters and hunter safety instructors cringe. From reports, we know that this hunting party consisted of three hunters and, thus, three guns. This is highly unusual and generally seen as unsafe. Nearly every hunting preserve I know of here in the Southeast restricts upland bird hunt parties to two guns, for obvious reasons: one hunter takes the left side, one the right side. There is generally a dog and a guide (the dog handler), who is very careful to stay behind the guns after the dogs go on point ... Reports say the hunters were hunting by car. Too old and feeble to walk? Too lazy? An upland bird hunt by car is an offensive idea to any honest, ethical hunter. This sounds like irresponsible cruising for easy shooting, rather than the time-honored tradition of slowly walking the fields and brush, watching the dogs work, and -- if you're lucky -- finding a covey or two of quail ... The idea of hunting from a car is bad. It's dangerous because hunters would be getting in and out, guns pointing every which way, losing track of the wind, the weather, the angle of the sun, the energy level of the dogs. Hunting from a car is, for able-bodied hunters at least, completely antithetical to honest, ethical hunting. One of the cardinal rules of any bird hunt: Don't shoot low birds. Why? It is more difficult to see birds against the ground than against the sky. It is possible that something besides a bird might be on the ground, and thus in the way; generally this would be the dog ... As a hunter and conservationist, I feel misrepresented by Cheney and his ilk. They portray hunting as a sport for the rich, carried out on vast private lands, where pulling the trigger takes priority over everything else. (http://www.charlotte.com/mld/observer/news/opinion/13866143.htm)

Quail hunting for years has been called the sport of aristocracy ... Quail hunting is a gentleman's game and is often a spectator and participator sport at the same time ... most quail hunts involve a pair of dogs and a pair of hunters in the field at the same time. Each dog is competing to see which one can locate a covey of quail first. Once one of the dogs zeros in on his quarry, he will freeze on "point." The other dog is trained to "honor" the pointing dog by actually freezing and pointing that dog. This is when the excitement builds in anticipation of an explosion of whirring wings known as the covey flush. An awareness of all of the gunners responsibilities and location of each prior to the flush is an absolute necessity. Strict gun discipline is required. While wind conditions and proximity of escape cover for the flushing birds may alter what I am about to say, as a rule of thumb the hunters should approach their dogs from behind the dogs. The gun muzzles should be oriented skyward and the shotgun needs to remain on safety until mounted to one's shoulder. The two hunters should approach the dogs, one on either side, and in a straight line with one another. This straight line is very important for the safety of each hunter. Prior to moving on up and allowing the birds to flush, each hunter should visibly and mentally locate: each other, both dogs, the hunting rig, and the hunting guide if on a guided hunt. Each hunter should know in advance where he can and cannot swing the muzzle of his gun to follow an escaping quail. Each hunter's range of gun swing should be from the mid-point between him and his partner and out to his side. He should never cross the mid-point to shoot at a quail flying on his partner's side. Not only is this poor shotgunning etiquette, it is dangerous. Additionally, a quail hunter should never take a shot at a low flying quail that would cause him to lower the muzzle of his shotgun below a horizontal plane with the ground. Taking a shot at a low-flying quail has ended the life of many fine pointing dogs since the inception of this great sport. If each hunter places safety and sportsmanship at a much higher priority than actually pulling the trigger, quail hunting is truly a unique hunting experience.
(http://www.riverviewplantation.com/Quail_Hunting_Tips/quail_hunting_tips.html )

• Harry Whittington was not shagging a downed bird when he was shot, and he probably wasn't wearing hunting gear.
• Cheney almost certainly wasn't shooting at a bird when he blasted Whittington.
• Whittington was hit in the kill zone from relatively short range with a stationary (point and shoot) shot fired from Cheney's gun, which strongly suggests that the shot was fired intentionally.
  
• Nevertheless, Harry Whittington was likely not the intended target.
• The incident took place in Kenedy County -- a sprawling, 1,500-square-mile patch of land in South Texas that is fully owned and controlled by a network of wealthy families, and that is - with the exception of a few public roads - completely inaccessible to the general public, and that is, by all appearances, beyond the reach of any law enforcement agencies.
• The Armstrong Ranch, and Kenedy County in general, would be the ideal place for a sociopath like Dick Cheney to indulge in his most depraved fantasies.
• Dick Cheney could not possibly have mistaken Harry Whittington for a bird.
• Cheney could, however, have easily mistaken Whittington for another person.