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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: tekboy who wrote (26624)	4/23/2002 4:09:42 AM
From: stockman_scott	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Israel remains largest recipient of US aid AFP [ MONDAY, APRIL 22, 2002 7:48:57 AM ] WASHINGTON: Israel has been the largest annual recipient of US foreign assistance since 1976 and the largest cumulative recipient of US assistance since World War II, according to government statistics. In the current fiscal year, the administration of President George W Bush requested $2.04 billion in military aid, $720 million in economic and $60 million in migration resettlement assistance for Israel, the service said. In 1983, the United States and Israel established the Joint Political Military Group, which meets twice a year. Both the United States and Israel participate in joint military planning and combined exercises, and have collaborated on military research and weapons development. The United States has provided Israel with $625 million to develop and deploy the Arrow anti-missile missile, $1.3 billion to develop the Lavi aircraft, $200 million to build the Merkava tank and $130 million to build a high-energy laser anti-missile system. Commitment to Israel's security and well being has been a cornerstone of US policy in the Middle East since Israel's creation in 1948, in which the United States played a key supporting role, according to the State Department. The United States is Israel's largest trading partner. In 2000, two-way trade totalled some $20.8 billion, and Israel had a $5.2 billion trade surplus with the United States, according to US government statistics. timesofindia.indiatimes.com

To: tekboy who wrote (26624)	4/23/2002 5:26:19 AM
From: LindyBill	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

"UPI hears" upi.com A sign of the times in Israel is the increased demand for security guards, but despite unemployment at 10.3 percent -- the highest level since 1993 -- there hasn't exactly been a rush of applicants. No wonder: Duties can include patroling popular shopping centers and guarding cafes to stop Palestinian suicide bombers. So the Tel Aviv social service office has adopted a simple strategy. Refusal to take the security job can result in cancellation of unemployment benefits. Even students no longer can count on their academic exemptions. The substitute head of the service, Ya'akov Nizri, said, "We need security guards at the current time, and I will do everything I can to supply the manpower." Many unemployed have argued that the work would put their lives at great risk, and a number are threatening to challenge the social security office's strategy in court. -0- The fallout from last week's failed coup in Venezuela continues to raise questions about how much the Bush administration knew and when it knew it. Despite pious denials that Washington had nothing to do with the enforced resignation of President Hugo Chavez and his surprise comeback 24 hours later, official sources in Caracas investigating the incident are leaking the fact that U.S. military attaché Lt. Col James Rodgers advised the generals behind the coup and stayed with them until the short-lived government of Carmona failed. According to Venezuelan investigators, Rodgers was with the coup plotters on the 5th floor of the army general command building in Fort Tiuna in Caracas from Thursday, April 11, to 5 p.m. on Saturday April 13, by which time power was being restored to Chavez. Several of the officers involved in the coup admitted during interrogation that they had been aware of Rodgers, and believed that his presence signaled American support for the operation. A spokesman for the U.S. embassy had "no reaction" to the report. -0-

To: tekboy who wrote (26624)	4/23/2002 1:45:53 PM
From: stockman_scott	Respond to of 281500

The president's troublesome tongue By Jules Witcover The Baltimore Sun Apr 22, 2002 ----------------------------------------------- WASHINGTON - Will somebody please tell George W. Bush to SHUT UP? His latest declaration that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon is a "man of peace" is both absurd and destructive to the determined efforts of Secretary of State Colin Powell to bring about effective negotiations for an end to the violence in the Middle East. Mr. Sharon's long record of pushing the envelope against the Palestinians with new Israeli settlements in the West Bank and his current attacks on Palestinian towns and refugee camps have made him a pariah in Arab eyes everywhere. For President Bush to offer such a characterization of Mr. Sharon only reinforces the Arab view that he is in the Israeli leader's pocket at a time successful diplomacy requires more even-handedness. This is not to say that the ghastly suicide bombings against Israeli citizens have not warranted forceful Israeli response or that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat should not be condemned by the United States for inadequate efforts to stop them. But Mr. Bush's ludicrous attempt to paint Mr. Sharon as complying with his earlier demand that the Israeli military action stop immediately is a weak cover for Mr. Sharon having, in effect, thumbed his nose at that demand. Even as Israeli forces were pulling out of several Palestinian towns and refugee camps, they were moving into others, and Mr. Sharon was emphatically stating the search-and-destroy campaign against Palestinian terrorists would continue until the job was finished. Mr. Bush's observation that Mr. Sharon "gave me a timetable and he's met the timetable" for withdrawal does not square with the president's tough-talking "enough is enough" call for a prompt end to the bloodletting on both sides. Indeed, as a practical matter, Mr. Bush is buying into the Israeli position that it will stop only when Mr. Sharon can say mission accomplished. The president's remarks put him back in the position he occupied earlier as a Sharon ally in the crisis, hardly the ideal posture from which Mr. Powell can be most effective in bringing about a cease-fire and fruitful negotiations. Mr. Bush's tongue is, in fact, Mr. Powell's worst nightmare. First the president held it so long, declining personal involvement in any peace-making role, that he seemed indifferent to the Middle East mayhem. He preferred to rail against his "axis of evil," seeking support - futilely - even in the Arab world for military action against Iraq's suspected development of "weapons of mass destruction" as an extension of the war on terrorism. Then, when the president finally and tardily yielded to world criticism and publicly scolded Mr. Sharon and Mr. Arafat, telling them he "expected" them to show "leadership" when he wasn't showing much himself in the Middle East, he sent Mr. Powell on a mission impossible. The secretary of state, a man who, unlike Mr. Bush, thinks before he speaks, wisely tried to keep expectations low, stating as he finally embarked on his peace-making assignment that the odds were strongly against his returning with a cease-fire in place. While Mr. Bush was trying verbally to make a silk purse out of the sow's ear of Mr. Powell's failed mission, the secretary himself settled for saying he was "pleased that the Israeli government is now continuing withdrawal" and expressed "hope it will be accelerated" and brought "to an end as quickly as possible." Mr. Bush's anointing of Mr. Sharon as a "man of peace" is not the first time his tongue has raised questions about his political judgment. In the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, his gun-slinging cowboy rhetoric was understandable and generally in tune with the justifiable outrage of an aroused American public. But at a time when the American president should be responsibly engaged in trying to make a contribution to a thorny and complicated crisis in the Middle East, he does not help that cause by so conspicuously seeming to take sides or by claiming diplomatic success where there has been little or none. ----------------------- Jules Witcover writes from The Sun's Washington bureau. Copyright © 2002, The Baltimore Sun sunspot.net _______________________________________________ btw, tek I'm not sure that you realized that your last response was posted over on Voltaire's Porch... Message 17370188 I agree that The U.S. must pressure all parties (and that would definately include the major Arab nations). It will be interesting to see what comes out of Bush's meeting this week with Crown Prince Abdulah of Saudi Arabia. Thanks again for sharing your perspective. scott@tryingtoremaincautiouslyoptimistic.com