James Besser, "Don’t Let Pro-Israel Extremists Sink Chuck Hagel": The New York Times Wages War Against Israel

The New York Times is waging a furious war to have Chuck Hagel approved as Obama's secretary of defense, and inasmuch as all's fair in love and war, the Times is ready to slime anyone who stands in his or its way.

Yesterday, Thomas Friedman sorted Hagel's opponents into two "baskets," the "disgusting" and the "philosophical" (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2012/12/thomas-friedman-give-chuck-chance.html). Needless to say, there was no mention by Uncle Tom that in 2006 Chuck Hagel was one of 12 Senators who wouldn't ask the EU to declare Hezbollah, Iran's surrogate in Lebanon, a terrorist organization. Hezbollah was responsible for the 1983 Beirut Barracks Bombing, which killed 241 American soldiers.

Today, in a frivolous Times guest op-ed entitled "Don’t Let Pro-Israel Extremists Sink Chuck Hagel" (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/27/opinion/dont-let-pro-israel-extremists-sink-chuck-hagel.html?_r=0), someone named James Besser, who, we are told by the Times "was the Washington correspondent for The Jewish Week from 1987 to 2011 and was a syndicated columnist for several Jewish newspapers," is also given a pulpit to advocate on behalf of Hagel. Referring to "fringe-driven politics that accounted for the Republican Party’s dramatic electoral losses" and the National Rifle Association’s "playing to zealots," Besser warns that "American Jewish leaders . . . increasingly tremble in the face of a small minority of zealots." Besser further states:

"Intimidated by pro-settler zealots, right-wing donors and those who liken the slightest criticism of Israeli policy to Israel-bashing (or even anti-Semitism), pro-Israel leaders are increasingly allowing the fringes of their movement to set the pro-Israel agenda in Washington.

. . . .

Support for the Jewish state remains strong among both parties on Capitol Hill and across the American electorate, and it won’t disappear anytime soon. But that support will wither if Aipac and other mainstream Jewish leaders don’t forcefully reject the zealots in their midst."

So, yesterday I was "disgusting," and today I am a "zealot," notwithstanding my support for a two-state solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict along the 1967 lines with necessary land swaps.

Time for another JG Caesarea challenge: Read Besser's guest op-ed again, and tell me what's missing. One . . . two . . . three. Sorry, time's up.

Of course there is no mention by Besser of Hagel's refusal to ask the EU to declare Hezbollah a terrorist organization, notwithstanding the 1983 Beirut Barracks Bombing; notwithstanding Hezbollah's kidnapping and murder by torture of William Francis Buckley in 1984; and notwithstanding Hezbollah's bombing of the Jewish community center building in Buenos Aires in 1994, which killed 85 people and injured hundreds.

For that matter, there is no discussion whatsoever by Besser of Hagel's outrageous comments concerning homosexuals, Armenian genocide and Iran. In his only reference to Iran, Besser alludes to Hagel's advocacy of "dialogue to thwart Iran’s nuclear ambitions." Hagel only supports dialogue? In fact, Hagel is apparently willing to tolerate an Iran armed with nuclear weapons. In his 2008 book, "America: Our Next Chapter," Hagel declares:

"[T]he genie of nuclear armaments is already out of the bottle, no matter what Iran does. In this imperfect world, sovereign nation-states possessing nuclear weapons capability (as opposed to stateless terrorist groups) will often respond with some degree of responsible, or at least sane, behavior. These governments, however hostile they may be toward us, have some appreciation of the horrific results of a nuclear war and the consequences they would suffer."

When it acquires its first nuclear weapon, Iran will "respond with some degree of responsible, or at least sane, behavior," and for that reason, the US and Israel should ignore almost daily declarations out of Iran, calling for Israel's annihilation? Given how Iran hangs homosexuals, stones to death women, and oppresses its Baha'i, Kurdish and Sunni minorities, I don't share Hagel's blithe optimism concerning Tehran's future conduct. Nor do the Saudis.

But let's return to Besser's allegation that "zealots" are responsible for the opposition to Hagel's nomination. Remarkably, Besser fails to mention that even the uber-liberal Washington Post opposes the appointment of Hagel as Secretary of Defense (http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/chuck-hagel-is-not-right-for-defense-secretary/2012/12/18/07e03e20-493c-11e2-ad54-580638ede391_story.html):

"Mr. Hagel’s stated positions on critical issues, ranging from defense spending to Iran, fall well to the left of those pursued by Mr. Obama during his first term — and place him near the fringe of the Senate that would be asked to confirm him."

I thought that The New York Times and Andrew Rosenthal had hit rock bottom in their war against Israel when they published Sarah Schulman's "Israel and 'Pinkwashing'" (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/23/opinion/pinkwashing-and-israels-use-of-gays-as-a-messaging-tool.html?hp). Apparently, I was dead wrong.