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If there was no oil in the region the US wouldn't care and Israel would be a non-factor. Since there is oil, the US needs reliable partners. Saudi Arabia (tota

If there was no oil in the region the US wouldn't care and Israel would be a non-factor. Since there is oil, the US needs reliable partners. Saudi Arabia (totalitarian regime with an abysmal human rights record) and Israel (actively engaging in war crimes and apartheid) are the best America can manage. Saudi Arabia has more money than they know what to do with, and they're easily placated by selling them advanced weapons. Israel is on a much tighter budget and is more militarily vulnerable so they need a lot more help. That they've pissed off everyone in their immediate environment doesn't help, either. Sadly, pre-revolution Iran and pre-civil war Lebanon were vibrant, flourishing countries. Then some geo-political meddling went down and here we are, a total mess.

slv77 10y ago
Israel has an outsized role in US politics for reasons that have nothing to do with oil. In fact the US ability to maneuver in the Middle East would have been significantly less constrained with oil producing countries if Israel wasn't an ally. The US was initially a reluctant ally with Israel. The Soviet Union was actively arming Israel's Arab neighbors and fanning the flames of war to win influence with oil producing Arab states. At the same time the US had embargoes on selling arms to Israel because it was reluctant to fan the flames of war and also to antagonize Israel's Arab neighbors. Unbeknownst to the US Israel had developed a nuclear weapons capability and at the start of the Six Day war Israel felt threatened enough to deploy them. In what must have been an interesting phone call Israel informed the US both of their nuclear weapons capability and that they were going to nuke Cairo. In order to dissuade Israel from this course of action the US promised swift delivery of modern anti-tank weapons and depleted their Western European inventory of these weapons. This helped turn the tide of the conflict and reduce potential of a nuclear exhange in the Middle East. The result of the Six Day War was that the US committed to keeping Israel at par with its Arab neighbors conventional military capabilities if Israel would keep its nuclear capability in check. A great writeup of the history is here: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cpc-pubs/farr.htm http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cpc-pubs/farr.htm This still plays an active role in the US and Israeli relationship and was even a factor in the negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program but the nuances are rarely picked up by the US press. Israel also plays an outsized role in US politics because it is an influential issue with Jewish voters and also, oddly, Evangelicals. Evangelicals see the establishment of a Jewish State in Israel as a prerequisite to the rapture and the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. Great article on how the delicate compromises in the Middle East were almost toppled by a cow: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/readings/forcing.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/rea...
- astrodust 10y ago
  "...for reasons that have nothing to do with oil" "...win influence with oil producing Arab states..." Yeah, nothing to do with oil. It's all about oil. That whole area is about oil. A case could be made that World War I was about oil, that British naval supremacy depended on it, and everything since then is a mostly direct cascade from that. Also don't forget that the extreme Evangelicals believe that the establishment of and subsequent destruction of Israel is a necessary precursor to the Rapture. What a psychotic viewpoint.
  - alnoxs 10y ago
    "...for reasons that have nothing to do with oil" "...win influence with oil producing Arab states..." This is cherry picking sentence fragments to produce a misleading statement. The GP clearly states that US involvement in Israel was to avoid Israel using a nuclear weapon, not because of any interest in oil.
    - astrodust 10y ago
      The US has had an interest in Israel long before nuclear weapons were a factor. Stability is only a concern because of the critical suppliers there. Notice how little interest is paid to places like central Africa where, apart from Nigeria, there's no productive oil fields.
- dogma1138 10y ago
  If you are going to post so much material read it at least, it wasn't until the after the Six Day war when Israel had even began to build it's nuclear arsenal, by 67 it barely had amassed enough plutonium to build even a single weapon. Also there was no need for Israel to use it's nuclear weapons during the Six Day war, it destroyed the Egyptian Air Force within the first 5 hours of the war. I think you are confusing a lot of "facts" here, your story might fit more with the 1973 war, but during that war if were the soviets who've actively moved theater level nuclear weapons into Egypt and the US had put pressure on Israel to stop it's advancement. Overall if you read slightly better sources you would see that the Six Day war actually pushed the Israeli weapon program back, France have stopped the cooperation with Israel and the knock-out victory that the Israelis have dealt to the combined forces of Egypt, Jordan and Syria as as gaining control over the Sinai Peninsula which meant that Egypt can no longer blockade Israel as it lost the controls over the straits of Tiran made the need for a bomb not as urgent. The nuclear program has really stepped up after the 1973 war both because Israel decided that the added geographical depth of the Sinai wasn't sufficient and because the Soviets have actually pushed weapons into the theater which meant that Israel needed a MAD option and quickly.
maxthegeek1 10y ago
It's not as if we care about war crimes. The US has, and continues to commit greater war crimes than Israel could ever hope to.
- rbanffy 10y ago
  Sadly, it's evident they are working hard o that.

slv77 10y ago

Israel has an outsized role in US politics for reasons that have nothing to do with oil. In fact the US ability to maneuver in the Middle East would have been significantly less constrained with oil producing countries if Israel wasn't an ally. The US was initially a reluctant ally with Israel. The Soviet Union was actively arming Israel's Arab neighbors and fanning the flames of war to win influence with oil producing Arab states. At the same time the US had embargoes on selling arms to Israel because it was reluctant to fan the flames of war and also to antagonize Israel's Arab neighbors. Unbeknownst to the US Israel had developed a nuclear weapons capability and at the start of the Six Day war Israel felt threatened enough to deploy them. In what must have been an interesting phone call Israel informed the US both of their nuclear weapons capability and that they were going to nuke Cairo. In order to dissuade Israel from this course of action the US promised swift delivery of modern anti-tank weapons and depleted their Western European inventory of these weapons. This helped turn the tide of the conflict and reduce potential of a nuclear exhange in the Middle East. The result of the Six Day War was that the US committed to keeping Israel at par with its Arab neighbors conventional military capabilities if Israel would keep its nuclear capability in check. A great writeup of the history is here: http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cpc-pubs/farr.htm http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/cpc-pubs/farr.htm This still plays an active role in the US and Israeli relationship and was even a factor in the negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program but the nuances are rarely picked up by the US press. Israel also plays an outsized role in US politics because it is an influential issue with Jewish voters and also, oddly, Evangelicals. Evangelicals see the establishment of a Jewish State in Israel as a prerequisite to the rapture and the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. Great article on how the delicate compromises in the Middle East were almost toppled by a cow: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/readings/forcing.html http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/apocalypse/rea...

astrodust 10y ago
"...for reasons that have nothing to do with oil" "...win influence with oil producing Arab states..." Yeah, nothing to do with oil. It's all about oil. That whole area is about oil. A case could be made that World War I was about oil, that British naval supremacy depended on it, and everything since then is a mostly direct cascade from that. Also don't forget that the extreme Evangelicals believe that the establishment of and subsequent destruction of Israel is a necessary precursor to the Rapture. What a psychotic viewpoint.
- alnoxs 10y ago
  "...for reasons that have nothing to do with oil" "...win influence with oil producing Arab states..." This is cherry picking sentence fragments to produce a misleading statement. The GP clearly states that US involvement in Israel was to avoid Israel using a nuclear weapon, not because of any interest in oil.
  - astrodust 10y ago
    The US has had an interest in Israel long before nuclear weapons were a factor. Stability is only a concern because of the critical suppliers there. Notice how little interest is paid to places like central Africa where, apart from Nigeria, there's no productive oil fields.
dogma1138 10y ago
If you are going to post so much material read it at least, it wasn't until the after the Six Day war when Israel had even began to build it's nuclear arsenal, by 67 it barely had amassed enough plutonium to build even a single weapon. Also there was no need for Israel to use it's nuclear weapons during the Six Day war, it destroyed the Egyptian Air Force within the first 5 hours of the war. I think you are confusing a lot of "facts" here, your story might fit more with the 1973 war, but during that war if were the soviets who've actively moved theater level nuclear weapons into Egypt and the US had put pressure on Israel to stop it's advancement. Overall if you read slightly better sources you would see that the Six Day war actually pushed the Israeli weapon program back, France have stopped the cooperation with Israel and the knock-out victory that the Israelis have dealt to the combined forces of Egypt, Jordan and Syria as as gaining control over the Sinai Peninsula which meant that Egypt can no longer blockade Israel as it lost the controls over the straits of Tiran made the need for a bomb not as urgent. The nuclear program has really stepped up after the 1973 war both because Israel decided that the added geographical depth of the Sinai wasn't sufficient and because the Soviets have actually pushed weapons into the theater which meant that Israel needed a MAD option and quickly.

maxthegeek1 10y ago

It's not as if we care about war crimes. The US has, and continues to commit greater war crimes than Israel could ever hope to.

rbanffy 10y ago
Sadly, it's evident they are working hard o that.