by Susan Abulhawa

With 400 Palestinians killed and over 10,000 wounded (most of them severely), the Israeli lobby is requesting a new pile of American tax dollars ($450 million) for 'emergency aid.'  Part of this money is being requested to compensate Israel for withdrawing from a 20 year occupation of Southern Lebanon.  

Excuse me!

Israel invaded Lebanon, used the world banned cluster bombs to kill 20,000 civilians (stories that would make your skin crawl), destroyed the countries infrastructure and occupied its people for two decades.  Now they want to be compensated for finally obeying international law and getting out of land where they have no business being?  If anyone ought to be compensated, it's the Lebanese people.  At any rate,  its not the responsibility of the American tax payer to pay up. 

Israel is an outlaw state in violation of numerous UN Resolution and various tenets of international laws. Congress should stop behaving as though we're some kind of Israeli colony bowing to her every whim.

Israel, whose population is 0.1% of the total world population gets roughly one-third of all US foreign aid.  In addition to the $5,000,000,000 in aid, Israel enjoys the benefits of a whole lot more US tax payer money.  For example, there are special "gifts" like the Arrow Missile and Levi Fighter, totaling $1.3 billion.  Tax payers must also pay interest on money borrowed for Israel's grants-- about $500 million per year.  Private donations to Israel are tax-deductible and total about $1 billion annually.  This does not include the Israeli bonds sold in the US for $500 million each year.

Despite US restrictions on using money to build illegal settlements on Palestinian land, Israel has spent hundreds of millions of our dollars importing Jews from across the world, confiscating Palestinian land and demolishing their homes to make way for brand new settlements for the new arrivals.    

That's not all.  The US also pays Egypt $2.1 billion/year for signing a peace treaty with Israel and is asked to pay umpteen billions of tax payer dollars every time Israel notions that is will consider a pull-back from occupied territories.  For example, during peace talks with Syria, Israel demanded that the US foot a bill of $17 billion for its withdrawal from the Golan Heights, where it has illegally been occupying Syrian land and stealing Syrian resources for over 33 years.  Basically, the US taxpayers have to pay Israel in order for Israel to obey international law and respect the sovereignty of other nations.

At the same time Congress cut the welfare budget by $5.3 billions, aid to Israel that year was $5.2 billion.  Indeed, as filmmaker Tom Hayes said: "from the mouths of America's poor onto the necks of Palestinians."

The so called "peace process" is sure to cost us  yet more tens of billions of dollars in payment for Israel's insatiable appetite for Arab soil and its unrelenting thievery of other's resources.  Try getting an iota of that money for your state.  You're lucky if you can hold onto school lunch programs.

Of course, some of that money trickles back to the US in the form of campaign funding.  These campaign "donations" account for Israel's power over US foreign policies.

So, what has Israel done for us? 

Israel has spied on the US.  By the way, a contribution to the 'free Jonathan Pollard' fund is tax deductible.  According to the CIA, Israel commits industrial espionage against American businesses.  They have exported sensitive US technology to other countries, some of which are potentially hostile to the U.S., in direct contravention of U.S. law. 

In 1967 Israel attacked the USS Liberty killing 34 American crewmen and wounding 171.  Despite thirty three years of unrelenting pleas from the survivors of that ship, Congress will not afford our servicemen the decency of an investigation and has refused to hold a Congressional hearing for an act of aggression against Americans in a time of peace despite astounding evidence.  Maybe they will when there are no more survivors to speak and the only testimonies will come from Israeli-chosen "witnesses."

Israel has a healthy economy and gets piles of money and other aid from Germany every year.  If this US-Israel marriage is indeed in our best interest then why do they need such a strong well-funded lobby in our Congress? 

Continuing to be the lone veto that keeps the international community from investigating Israel's breaches of the Fourth Geneva Convention cannot possibly be in our best interest.  Patting Israel on the back while the rest of the world condemns it's flagrant violations of human rights does not mesh with the principles on which this country was founded.

Retired Navy Admiral, Thomas Moorer, was quoted in a book by Paul Findley, former congressman from Illinois, as saying "I've never seen an president- I don't care who he is- stand up to [the Israelis].  It just boggles your mind*.If the American people understood what a grip those people have got on our government, they would rise up in arms."