Democratic Palestine : 4 (ص 35)
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- Democratic Palestine : 4 (ص 35)
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Zionism 'S Global Role
THE
ISRAELI ROLE IN UNITED STATES GLOBAL STRATEGY
by Steve Goldfield, Ph. D.
The Israeli economy is a militarized economy, more so by
far than any other in the world. It relies on the export of arms
and military services for more of its exports than any other
country in the world.
U.S. military and economic aid have enabled the Israelis
to build up this military economy and U.S. interests determine
who gets these arms. U.S. aid also shields the Israeli popula-
tion, including the working class, from the consequences of
militarization: unemployment, inflation over 130 percent, and
loss of purchasing power.
Israeli military exports are an important component of U.S.
strategy in Asia, Africa and Latin America, going to the regimes
which the United States wishes to support but feels politically
constrained to arm because of world or American public opin-
ion. The Israelis are a key element in U.S. strategy to circum-
vent Congressional and public opinion in the United States.
Israel’s international role, not sympathy for victims of the
Holocaust or simply its regional role, explains why it receives
more U.S. aid than any other country. Important as the Israeli
role in its own region is for U.S. interests, this Israeli interna-
tional activity is equal in importance and explains why the
Israelis are permitted by the United States government to do
almost anything they want in their own region without risking
loss of U.S. support.
Consider any third-world area that has been a
trouble spot in the past ten years and you will dis-
cover Israeli officers and weapons implicated in the
conflict, supporting American interests and helping
in what they call «the defense of the West». The
symbols of this involvement are familiar: the Uzi
submachine gun and the Galil assault rifle, and
Israeli officers named Uzi and Galil and Golan.
They can be found in Iran, Nicaragua, El Salvador,
Guatemala, Haiti, Namibia, Taiwan, Indonesia, the
Philippines, Chile, and Bolivia to name a few.
In South Africa, for example, Israel is actively
involved in defending what Washington sees as a
«Strategic outpost» with the complicity and encour-
agement of the United States. In this case, Israel's
help is particularly important because although the
United States is committed to the survival of the
South African regime, Washington feels that the
overt support it can give to South Africa is severely
limited by world public opinion.
Throughout the third-world, Israel has suc-
ceeded where other Western powers have failed in
using force to blunt the edge of native radicalism.
And they do it with what Washington sees as
aplomb, enthusiasm, and grace. The Reagan
administration cannot send military advisers to
Zaire, Guatemala, South Africa, or Haiti. Nor would
many of America’s European allies willingly aid re-
pressive regimes like, say the Chilean junta. What
others regard as «dirty work», Israelis regard as
defensible duty and even in some cases, an exalted
calling.'
This somewhat agitational but scrupulously accurate
statement appeared in the pages of the New York Times, in
January of 1983. Its author, Benjamin Beit Hallahmi, teaches
psychology at the University of Haifa. Beit Hallahmi went on to
point out that «there is virtually no Israeli opposition to this
global adventurism...no ‘human rights lobby’».
While western media have recently focused some atten-
tion on massive Israeli arms shipments to dictatorships in
Central America, little analysis of the full Israeli role as a junior
partner of the United States has appeared. Here we present a
review of the Israeli economy and armaments industry, a sum-
mary of Israeli global military activities, and an assessment of
the contribution of U.S. aid to Israeli industrial potential, and
then weigh the overall significance of Israeli service to the
United States government.
Israeli Arms Production
The two largest Israeli military producers, Israel Aircraft
Industries and Israeli Military Industries (also known as Ta’as),
are both owned by the government and are the two largest
Israeli industrial firms and the largest exporters.? In fact,
according to the British Financial Times of December 18, 1981,
300,000 workers, or 25 percent of the Israeli labor force, work
in military-related jobs.* Although this figure includes the army,
which numbers about 165,000%, it is still a staggering propor-
tion of an economy devoted to war. Of Israeli industrial work-
ers, about 14 percent produce weapons.°
The military sector is the single largest part of Israeli
economic life. In the seventies according to Ha’aretz, it
absorbed nearly 37 percent of the budget and 16 percent of the
total economic resources, four and five times the rates of milit-
ary expenditures in NATO and the Warsaw Pact countries.*®
Military expenditures account for almost 30 percent of the
gross annual product; the 1981 military budget amounted to
$7.34 billion.’
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