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The Forum > Article Comments > Israel's bomb, and international finance as the undoing of foreign policy > Comments

Israel's bomb, and international finance as the undoing of foreign policy : Comments

By N A J Taylor, published 26/7/2012

Countries' sovereign wealth funds often invest in companies that run counter to their foreign policy.

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Oh well,

As some Iranians have said, and many Arab commentators have re-iterated, Israel is a "one bomb country." One bomb and it effectively ceases to exist.

So for Israel to have a credible nuclear deterrent it needs to put some of its nuclear assets to sea. That guarantees it has a "second strike" capability. It can absorb a full on attack and, in its death throes, take out its enemies along with around a third of the world's oil pumping capacity. Now may be a good time to buy a bicycle.

Israelis, of course, can hear frenzied Imams shrieking for the extermination of Jews over the airwaves every day. That and a recent Holocaust gets you a lot of paranoia and, of course, these paranoids have real enemies.

Maybe a nuclear Armageddon in the Middle-East is inevitable.

Would Israel in its death throes confine its attacks to its Muslim neighbours or would it spare a few nukes for some European cities in a final act of revenge for allowing the Holocaust to happen? We are in unknown territory here. No nuclear armed state has ever faced annihilation before.
Posted by stevenlmeyer, Thursday, 26 July 2012 10:05:59 AM
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"Would Israel in its death throes confine its attacks to its Muslim neighbours or would it spare a few nukes for some European cities in a final act of revenge for allowing the Holocaust to happen?" posits Steven.

A very interesting question indeed especially as it involves a tiny nation of racist religious zealots who have a large arsenal of nukes and will use them if push comes to shove.

Could it be that a group of people, who make up less than 2% of the world's population, could, with American support, initiate a nuclear war that would render humankind extinct?

When are the other 7 billion people who inhabit Planet Earth going to realize the danger the world is in and do something about it?
Posted by David G, Thursday, 26 July 2012 1:12:37 PM
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Thanks for a very good article.
Posted by Johnbr, Thursday, 26 July 2012 2:57:07 PM
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Hi David G

You're slipped a decimal point old son.

We happy band of "racist religious zealots" with our large arsenal of nukes make up only 0.2% of the world's population. Not 2%. You've overstated our numbers by a factor of 10.

Will the Israeli branch of us "racist religious zealots" use the nukes if "push comes to shove"?

Only one way of settling the question. Keep pushing and shoving and see what happens.

On the other hand maybe some experiments are just too dangerous. Maybe it would be better if Israel's genocidal neighbours stopped pushing and shoving and toned down the exterminationist rhetoric a bit.

But they probably won't so I guess it's going to be ka-BOOM!

Oops, there goes Aleppo, Alexandria, Baghdad, Beirut, Cairo, Damascus, Mecca, Qom, Ryadh, Tehran, …

And maybe Berlin, Budapest, Hamburg, Paris, Warsaw,..?

I think most Israelis, and indeed most Jews, have taken Dylan Thomas' advice to heart.

"Do not go gentle into that good night
"Rage, rage against the dying of the light".

Being threatened with a second Holocaust will do that to you. It beats being led like lambs to the slaughter

>...The dream of my life has risen to become fact. Self-defense in the ghetto will have been a reality. Jewish armed resistance and revenge are facts. I have been a witness to the magnificent, heroic fighting of Jewish men in battle.>>

See The Last Letter from Mordecai Anielewicz

Warsaw Ghetto Revolt Commander*

(April 23, 1943)

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/Anielewiczlet.html

C'est la guerre
Posted by stevenlmeyer, Thursday, 26 July 2012 3:34:31 PM
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Dear David,

<<a tiny nation of racist religious zealots>>

Tiny - agreed. Not just "less than 2%", but in fact about 0.1%!

Nation - so in that, besides all those Israelis who just happened to be born there and don't feel affiliated, you also count over a million Arab (Muslim/Christian) Israelis? no doubt, under a nuclear attack, they too will die.

Racist - about half of them.

Religious - Nonsense if you refer to the Jews among them: Judaism is not a religion, it's a tribal identity-group (sometimes camouflaged as a "religion", but where their concept of god has only a subsidiary role, being fawned to when he seems to promise to save the tribe and ignored otherwise).

Zealots - that's about 20% of the Israeli Jews.

Yes, by acquiring a nuclear arsenal and 2nd-strike capabilities, people that are threatened to extinction are doing the second-to right thing in their situation (second only to turning the other cheek, which honestly not too many people are capable of).

You may not like the way Israel treats Palestinians or their American connection: that's fair enough, but has nothing to do with the fact that people thus attacked and threatened have every right to obtain nuclear weapons for their self-defense. These are separate issues.

<<Would Israel in its death throes confine its attacks to its Muslim neighbours or would it spare a few nukes for some European cities in a final act of revenge for allowing the Holocaust to happen?>>

Yes, I have personally heard Israelis claim that if attacked with nuclear weapons they will go for the throats the whole world, not just the Arabs. Therefore, beware and behave nicely to my family!
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 26 July 2012 3:37:10 PM
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Stenelmeyer,Israel has at least 200 nukes and the means to deliver them.So don't try to down play their military prowess.

The Zionists in Israel have created their own enemies by treating Palistinians and their neighbours with violence and contempt.They show no contrition and just continue to meddle in the affairs of other nations for their own advantage.
Posted by Arjay, Thursday, 26 July 2012 5:28:30 PM
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Thanks Yuyutsu

David G, Arjay

Let me spell it out for you.

I grew up among Holocaust survivors. I knew people who had been in camps including two of my grandparents.

But do you know what was worse than hearing about the camps David G?

It was hearing about what went on before the camps, about being shunned by people you thought were your friends, about being sacked from your job, about having your business go down because your customers went away. It was about not being able to complete a medical degree because the professor didn't want you in his class.

It was about sending your children on "Kinder Transport" to distant England knowing that you would probably never see them again but hoping they, at least, would be safe. There are still people from Kinder Transport here in Melbourne. I know some of them.

Then there was the radio, the shrieking radio, blaring out a message of hatred day after day.

Many German Jews had difficulty comprehending the scale of what was befalling them. They could not understand how civilised Germany went from relatively "Jew friendly" to hell in a few short years. "Surely," they thought, "this madness will blow over. Surely sanity will be restored. Somebody will stop these mad Nazis."

But nobody did and so one in three Jews in the whole world died in Nazi camps. A tiny sliver of humanity became tinier still.

And here are the two lessons of the Holocaust

--When someone says they want to exterminate you take them at their word and plan accordingly.

--When the chips are down nobody is going to help you, not in the death camps, not in Srebenicza and not in Rwanda. "Never again" really means "always again."

So when your neighbours shriek their hatred of you, you arm yourself with the most potent weapons you can find and you let them know that, when "push comes to shove" you will use them.

And sanctimonious blathering from a safe island continent will count for nothing.
Posted by stevenlmeyer, Thursday, 26 July 2012 5:34:43 PM
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Dear Arjay,

<<The Zionists in Israel have created their own enemies by treating Palistinians and their neighbours with violence and contempt.>>

But so far, no such selective nuclear weapon was ever invented which hits Zionists alone and leaves others untouched. In the case of a nuclear attack against Israel, innocent people, including Israeli Arabs and Palestinians, will not be spared - to the contrary in fact, because their building and sheltering standards are relatively lower than their Jewish neighbours (yet still relatively better than Australian standards!).

<<They show no contrition and just continue to meddle in the affairs of other nations for their own advantage.>>

The way Israel treats its neighbours (as opposed to the issue of this article - having nuclear weapons and the means for a second-strike), is NOT in Israel's own advantage, only in the PERCEIVED advantage of its leaders.

Those two issues are separate. By all means, do show Israel the way to treat its neighbours better, nudge it if necessary, but trying to destroy its people with nuclear weapons is not the answer - and if you truly care for Palestinians, do think twice about the impact on them!

And thanks, Stevenlmeyer - indeed, Hitler's Jewish policy, pretty much as a nuclear bomb, did not distinguish between "good" and "bad" Jews, Zionists and others, German patriots, practicing Jews, atheists, Jews who converted to other religions and those who didn't even know they were of Jewish origin.
Posted by Yuyutsu, Thursday, 26 July 2012 6:06:47 PM
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Zionism is the enemy of the Jews and Israel.Zionism is to Israel what Nazism was to Germany.

The Third Reich has now moved to the USA.Obama and Bush have stripped away the US Constitution with the Patriot Act, Preventative Denention, NDAA,legalised assassination and now control over the media.

Time to wake up Steven and smell the fascism.
Posted by Arjay, Thursday, 26 July 2012 7:20:41 PM
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For goodness sake Arjay, have a bex and a good lay down ... There's a good boy ...

France and Britain also have nuclear power. Old enmities are never forgotten, it seems.

You may recall that Britain did its testing on our soil and has paid no compensation to those whose family members have died, nor those who have become ill ... are let's not forget the territory which belongs to our indigenous people, who can't return.
Posted by Danielle, Monday, 30 July 2012 1:52:49 AM
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I can't really believe this breathless article by NAJ Taylor...

Has he not done his research properly? What is his supervisor doing?

Investment in foreign, indeed enemy weaponry is hardly new.

Both WW I and WW II witnessed indirect investments by both sides in enemy weaponry.

And let's not forget pharmaceutical industries which were providing rather nasty substances for the war effort.

Indeed, a particular pharmaceutical company is a provider in Australia. Much of their earlier research was gleaned by experiments conducted by the Nazis.
Posted by Danielle, Monday, 30 July 2012 5:23:08 PM
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LOL Danielle

The article is simply a skeleton on which the author hangs some Israel bashing - which is all he really wants to achieve.

The posters understand this. None of them have addressed the sovereign wealth fund issue.
Posted by stevenlmeyer, Monday, 30 July 2012 7:00:48 PM
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Yes, indeed Steven.

A diatribe of opinion and nothing else. This article is also appallingly written.

Extraordinarily naive.

Is this the level of post-graduate work that is coming out of our universities? Heaven help us.
Posted by Danielle, Monday, 30 July 2012 8:48:44 PM
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Danielle

My guess is that Taylor is part of a coterie that does not like Israel. Israel bashing is quite common among the trendy leftie set many of whose members are to be found littering Australian campuses.
Posted by stevenlmeyer, Monday, 30 July 2012 8:53:06 PM
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It is about time they grew up and found out what the real world is about. Do some in-depth research before rushing into print. That would be a good start.

And especially, instead of relying upon what their leftie buddies tell them, do in-depth research about Israel. There are enough primary sources and analyses both online and in university archives (one would hope).

Whatever happened to independent thought. So very depressing ...
Posted by Danielle, Monday, 30 July 2012 9:07:19 PM
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