The State Department and
Israel
Ruth King

When the United States recognized Israel in 1948, it was against the explicit wishes of the State Department which promptly invoked the rarely used Neutrality Act of 1794 to forbid sale or transfer of weapons to Israel. Indeed, until 1964, Israel received no military aid from the United States.
"Neutrality" did not deter the State Department from proposing that Israel weaken her ability to withstand aggression. "Territories for peace," long predates the 1969 Rogers Plan. John Foster Dulles, Secretary of State in the Eisenhower Administration, urged Israel to give up much of the Negev to Egypt: Dulles lamented that "even territory which is barren has acquired a sentimental significance [to Israel]."
During the Kennedy administration, although the president had a warm regard for Israel, his Secretary of State Dean Rusk was an early opponent of the state's establishment. In 1964, when Israel requested review of a possible military relationship, Rusk’s memorandum read: “We shall avoid establishing any type of special military relationship with Israel. To create what would in effect be a military alliance with Israel would destroy the delicate balance we have so carefully maintained in our Near Eastern relations and would bring insufficient compensatory advantages.”
During the 1967 war, the United States remained determinedly neutral. Rusk, who remained Secretary of State under President Johnson, repeated his assertion that Israel was not an ally. The official State Department memo stated: "Our position [on the war] is neutral in thought, word, and deed."
Israel's stunning victory in 1967 proved a watershed. Now established as militarily dominant in the region, Israel was seen as a deterrent to Soviet ambitions in the area. But the “special relationship” became a mixed blessing, as the State Department increasingly interfered with Israeli government policy to the point where Israel's sovereignty has become compromised. Moreover, Israel's security needs have regularly been undercut (remember the sale of AWACS surveillance planes of 1981) to serve our alliance with Saudi Arabia, a relationship that is especially “special” due to our dependence on that country's oil.
In the immediate aftermath of the 1967 war, Israel, anxious for State Department approval and nervous about the fallout from the mistaken bombing of the United States vessel the SS Liberty, offered to return all territory taken in the war in exchange for normal relations with its Arab neighbors. The resounding “no negotiations, no recognition, no peace” response shelved the issue until Nixon’s Secretary of State William Rogers, in 1969, offered his own plan for territorial withdrawal which has become the model for all so-called peace plans. In spite of initial Israeli denunciations of the plan, the relationship between both nations flourished. Yet this did not change the State Department policy calling for virtually total Israeli territorial withdrawal.
In 1973, following a sneak attack by Egypt and Syria, Israel’s early severe losses were followed by a dazzling reversal when then General Arik Sharon marched towards Suez encircling Egypt’s vaunted Third Army. This victory should have culminated in Egyptian surrender, but was turned to ashes when Secretary of State Henry Kissinger issued his thinly veiled threat of a “reassessment” of relations if Israel did not release Egypt’s army and withdraw.
In 1978, Menachem Begin expected to sign a treaty with Egypt after returning the entire Sinai, including air bases and settlements. Again, the State Department under Jimmy Carter, bolstered by Vice-President Mondale, pummeled Begin into accepting a framework which included a second document that would lay out the principles for future negotiations in the area, based on the idea that Israel would grant autonomy to the Arabs of Judea, Samaria and Gaza to be followed in five years presumably by independence. Failure to accept the entire framework would doom the entire process, Begin was told, and he would be painted as the spoiler.
In 1982 the State Department demanded Israel halt its Lebanon War. Israeli forces had entered Beirut and surrounded 6,000-9,000 terrorists, but they acceded to the State Department which negotiated a cease-fire that permitted the terrorists, including Arafat, to leave with their weapons.
During the first Gulf War, Israel, a non-combatant, was repeatedly bombed with SCUD missiles launched by Iraq. America refused to give Israel “friendly craft code” which effectively barred any retaliation. How did the State Department express its gratitude to Israel for staying out of the war and preserving the Arab coalition? Secretary of State James Baker (whose Princeton thesis argued that Israel should never have been born) demanded that Prime Minister Shamir send a top level delegation to Madrid to negotiate with the Arabs. Failure to do so, he warned, would bring a refusal of loan guarantees. Again, Israel accepted.
Since Oslo, which was the initiative of Shimon Peres (reluctantly endorsed by Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin), the United States State Department has refused to allow the process to die, however obvious its failure. Madeline Albright, who made no secret of her pro Arab proclivities, actually chased Arafat through the building when he walked out on Barak's offer of everything. To Secretary of State Albright, no Arab demand was unreasonable—and all Israeli positions were unreasonable.
Colin Powell may well have had more benign feelings toward Israel than his predecessors, but the State Department remains fixated on the same tired old nostrums.
Israel’s continual capitulation is now defended by those who claim that the United States is Israel’s only ally. In fact, it is also the other way around. Israel is America’s best and most enduring ally. Yes, Tony Blair is an ally, but his policy is intensely unpopular and England may soon go the way of the rest of appeasement-minded Europe. America and Israel, in spite of the euphemisms “war on terror” or intifada are facing the same implacable Jihadist enemies. A weakened and spineless Israel is the worst strategic nightmare for America, and an America that surrenders to the Islamo-fascists is the worst of all possible nightmares for Israel.
Nations repeal bad policies and reverse bad trends. It is high time for a properly grounded reassessment of the America-Israel alliance. Relations between both nations must be based on the need to confront the common enemy.