"The idea that you can bomb your way to peace flies in the face of reality."

"Laws are only pieces of paper; they are tools. If we don't pick them up and make them our instruments then they are worth nothing."

-Phyllis Bennis

(This lady is very quotable.)

Phyllis Bennis did not claim that Israel is "$3 Billion dollars away from being unable to even field an operation this small..."


And I don't like mis-interpreting people, but the exact exchange which I watched several times to get correct is:


Question:Is it conceivable that Israel could pull of this kind of operation without US support?

Answer: There is no question that the Israeli military attack could not have happened without US support, both military and diplomatic. The direct support, the military support is that the US provides military grants of almost $3 billion a year to Israel, of which 75% is spent on US produced military hardware weapons, planes, bombs. 25% is used to invest in their own weapons production facility.


Bennis, who ever she is, said There is no question that the Israeli military attack could not have happened without US support and that aid amounted to $3 billion a year.

I don't really think I'm stretching anything by what I described. I also think it very accurate to say that if $3 billion a year less would mean Israel couldn't even launch this offensive then Israel is the biggest under dog in the middle east. Knowing that Israel is in fact probably one of the strongest militaries in the middle east, I think Bennis is dead wrong to say that this offensive couldn't happen without US support.

I'd also say that quantity of US support is a quibbling point, but it does speak heavily to the quality of Bennis representation of the situation.

"If Israel is only $3 billion dollars away from being unable to even field an operation this small, they are the biggest underdog in the entire Middle East. They of course are the singularly strongest military in the region and losing US aid would only make them the strongest by a smaller margin."

Phyllis Bennis did not claim that Israel is "$3 Billion dollars away from being unable to even field an operation this small..."

US aid amounts to $3 Billion/year.

Bennis is the megatonne brain behind the Iraq war primer from IPS.

http://www.ips-dc.org/