Reviewed by Ludwig Watzal

(Zionism – The Real Enemy of the Jews, by Alan Hart, Clarity Press, Atlanta 2009-2010, Vol. I-III)

Alan Hart’s trilogy on the devastating impact of Zionism not only on the Palestinian people but also on Judaism is the most comprehensive and best analysis that has ever been written on this subject. The author takes the readers on an epic journey through a cocoon of propaganda lies that kept the Westerners, especially the U. S. Americans in line with a movement, which has been violating every value Western democracies pretend to defend. The message on the cover of the first volume is clear:

“Almost everything you have been conditioned to believe about the making and sustaining of conflict in the Middle East is not true. Israel’s existence has never – ever – been in danger from any combination of Arab military force. Zionism’s assertion that Israel’s Jews have lived in constant danger of being ‘driven into the sea’ was the propaganda cover that allowed Israel (a Zionist, not a Jewish state) to get away where it mattered most – in Europe and America – with presenting its aggression as self-defense and itself as the victim when, it was and remains the aggressor.”

Alan Hart wrote a very personal, revealing, and truth-telling article on “dissent voice”  that shocked me on the one hand; on the other hand, however, it backed up all my own experiences, which I had with “the Arabs” and with the destructive and wicked influence of the “Zionist Lobby”. This article was the key trigger to finally review the three books that have long rested on the pile of books, which I wanted to discuss. I totally agree with Hart’s statement: “I was naive to believe that Palestinian right could be assisted to triumph over Zionist might.” So far, I have not given up, although my support of the righteous cause of the Palestinian people has caused me nothing but problems. Perhaps, Alan Hart should reconsider his decision, if there is one Palestinian or Arab who thinks the fight for the right of the oppressed Palestinian people is worth some dollars.

In Volume One, which carries the subtitle “The False Messiah”, Hart unfolds the “modern” history of the collaboration between Western imperial interest and the desire of Zionism to establish a state. The political perversity comes to the open in the chapter “Waiting for the Apocalypse” that shows the total support of U. S. American religious fundamentalist for an Armageddon in order to bring about the final coming of Christ. Their teachings show how dangerous religious fairytales can be when misused for political ends.

The chapter “The Honest Zionist” shows that, at least the revisionist Zionists, were very honest about their real political intentions. Vladimir “Zeev” Jabotinsky, their “spiritual” leader, wrote this very clearly in his “classical” political pamphlet “The Iron Wall”. “All colonization, even the most restricted, must continue in defiance of the will of the native population. Therefore, it can continue and develop only under the shield of force which comprises an Iran Wall which the local population can never break through. This is our Arab policy. To formulate it any other way would be hypocrisy.” Just recently, Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu referred to his father Benzion, who was, inter alia, also Jabotinsky’s personal secretary and who died a few months ago at the age of 102, as an authoritative source what Israel’s future is concerned!

In Volume Two, Alan Hart discusses one of the most important propaganda slogans that justify Israel’s sway over the entire Middle East: “The Annihilation Myth”. The political rhetoric of “there is no partner” for negotiations or “peace”, like Ehud Barak said, when he returned from Camp David in July 2000, started in fact with David Ben-Gurion and has continued to the present. Second to none, however, is the “biblical” founded Zionist claim on the Land of Palestine (“Eretz Israel”). These “historical rights” are based on the “fact” that some 2000 years ago, Jews have lived there, which the Israeli historian Shlomo Sand exposed in his books as a myth.

In this volume, the author discusses how U. S. President Eisenhower struggled internally to contain Zionism, and President John F. Kennedy failed to prevent Israel acquiring the atom bomb. Although everybody knows that Israel is armed to its teeth with atomic weapons, neither Israel nor the U. S. admits to it to this very day. In this respect, the book ”The Passionate Attachment” by George W. Ball and his son Douglas B. Ball serves to be mentioned. It was published in 1992 by W. W. Norton and demonstrated that this close and “unbreakable” relationship between Israel and the United States has been detrimental only for the U. S. What was already true 20 years ago is today evident for all.

The authors argue that the economic costs have been enormous, but what is even more harmful to U. S. foreign policy has been the association with Israeli colonialism that has undermined America’s relations to the Third World. Already at that time, the Ball’s mentioned the double standard of U. S. policy. While the politicians in Washington condemned those responsible for “ethnic cleansing” in Bosnia as war criminals, were those welcomed inside the Belt Way who committed the same crime in Israel and Palestine. The book also shows the limitations of presidential power against, what John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt called “The Israel Lobby”. That is why; U. S. President Barack Hussein Obama is no exception from the rule.

Even U. S. President Eisenhower who made Israel to withdraw from the occupied Sinai was already thwarted by a “pork-barrel” U. S. Congress, which was unwilling to give him the support he needed “to get really tough with Israel”, writes Hart. “From the Zionist perspective Eisenhower was the enemy and the end of the Eisenhower era could not come quickly enough.” The author discusses also the policy of Moshe Sharett who was one of the few reasonable Israeli politicians at the time who wanted to make peace with the Arabs, which Ben-Gurion successfully obstructed. During this period, “reason was defeated in Israel” and the policy of rejectionism became the norm.

During the Kennedy administration the “Israel Lobby” was already present in the White House in the person of Myer (Mike) Feldman. JFK was fully aware of his work for Israel. Feldman tried to arrange a state visit for Ben-Gurion in the U. S. but Kennedy rejected. Finally the president met with Ben-Gurion at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York City. JFK also asked for IAEA inspections of Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona, which Israel has refused till this day. Kennedy wrote that the U. S. “would be compromised if a state regarded as being dependent on us, as Israel is, peruses an independent course”. Contrary to JFK, Lyndon B. Johnson “would put Israel’s interest first”.

In Volume Three, Hart demonstrates in nineteen chapters how Israel did not only pursue a policy of expansionism (Greater Israel), starting with the attack on June 6, 1967, but also a policy of “state terrorism” that became “the norm”. In this issue, the author states a central hypothesis that explains Israel’s policy since the Six-Day War: The compromising of Security Council integrity. By allowing Israel to violate international law and colonize the Occupied Palestinian Territories, the U. S. and its allies created two sets of rules for the behavior of nations – “one for all the nations of the world minus Israel and the other exclusively for it”.

For the first time, the Johnson administration had opened the doors for the Israel Lobbyists. With the attack on the USS Liberty in June 1967, the U. S. government allowed Israel to get away with “pure murder”, writes Hart. Also for the wishy-washy language of UN Security Council Resolution 242, the Johnson administration bears the responsibility. This document did not mention the Palestinians by name, which would have implied that they were a people with rights, and the wording of SC 242 allowed Israel to interpret it as it pleases.

Although Jimmy Carter had brokered a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt, Israel’s Prime Minister Menachem Begin demonstrated with a blitz on Lebanon that he was the one who determined the rules of the game. After five month, Carter could stop this arbitrary attack by threatening to cut off economic assistance to Israel, like the Bush senior government did in 1991 to hold back a 10 billion dollar loan guarantee for the settlement of immigrants from Russia, writes Hart.

The author started its trilogy with a personal appeal to the American people reminding them of their government’s double standard in foreign policy and its unconditional support for Israel. He mentions the total difference between Zionism and Judaism and that Israel was and still is the aggressor. “A prime cause of the re-awakening of anti-Semitism is the behavior of the Zionist state of Israel.”

In the “Epilogue” of Volume Three he takes this thread again and pleads to the American people: “If, Dear Americans, you continue to allow your government to support Israel right or wrong, you’ll not only betraying your own most cherished values and ideals, you will be inviting more and more people of the world, not just 1,4 billion Muslims, to see you as complicit in the Zionist state’s crimes. And that could make protecting America’s own best interests a mission impossible.”

Hart’s trilogy reveals the difference between Zionist propaganda lies and the real facts of history.  As long as this Zionist mist addles the political awareness of the people in the West, nothing will change. The three books contribute a great deal to thin the fog. Extraordinary work, Mr. Hart!

– Dr. Ludwig Watzal works as a journalist and editor in Bonn, Germany. He runs the bilingual bog “Between the lines” http://between-the-lines-ludwig-watzal.blogspot.de. He contributed this article to PalestineChronicle.com.