Ken Silverstein (no relation as far as I know) has uncovered some good dirt on new Giuliani campaign advisor, Daniel Pipes. He was first to report that Pipes had been hired by the campaign. Ken is also reading Pipes’ blog (it’s a dirty job but somebody’s gotta do it) and ferreting out some material that oughta embarrass the American public, if not Giuliani or Pipes:
Daniel Pipes…essentially argued for war crimes against Palestinians, and there was no cry of protest from the media or anywhere else.
“Believing that if you don’t win a war, you lose it, I have long encouraged the Israeli government to take more assertive measures in response to attacks,” Pipes wrote on his blog on September 6.
“In a Jerusalem Post piece six years ago, “Preventing war: Israel’s options,” I called for shutting off utilities to the Palestinian Authority as well as a host of other measures, such as permitting no transportation in the PA of people or goods beyond basic necessities, implementing the death penalty against murderers, and razing villages from which attacks are launched. Then and now, such responses have two benefits: First, they send a strong deterrent signal “Hit us and we will hit you back much harder” thereby reducing the number of attacks in the short term. Second, they impress Palestinians with the Israeli will to survive, and so bring closer their eventual acceptance of the Jewish state.”
The Geneva Conventions label collective punishments as a war crime. “No protected person may be punished for an offense he or she has not personally committed,” according to Article 33. “Collective penalties and likewise all measures of intimidation or of terrorism are prohibited.”
UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has warned the Israeli cabinet that implementation of the kinds of measures recommended by Pipes–similar to ones approved by the security cabinet recently–would be considered war crimes. So Rudy, how does it feel to employ someone advocating war crimes against Palestinians??
Would it be tiresomely obvious to point out how ludicrous such Pipes policy recommendations are? Of course, he cannot believe that razing entire Palestinian villages would “bring closer their eventual acceptance of the Jewish state.” Of if he does he’s one of the more wingnutty Jewish figures around. But more likely he just doesn’t give a shit whether Palestinians accept Israel or not. Probably as far as he’s concerned, shipping them off by force to Saudi Arabia as some Kahanist nutcases have proposed would be just fine; or picking them off one by one (or 10 by 10) until the rest flee in terror wouldn’t be a bad idea either.
I’ve written often here about Pipes and his schlock organ, Campus Watch. Be my guest, take a walk on the seamy side of Jewish right-wing politics. Hat tip to Mideast Undernews for this.
First not to totally belittle the UN’s definition of what a war crime is, there have been legitimately recognized war crimes such as Bosnia ,but how can you differentiate razing Arab villages from the total destruction of Jewish life which occured in Shomron and Aza two summers ago ? That evacuation of and surrender of Gaza combined with the irrational decision to bring Arafat and his cronies back and sign the Oslo agreement (which was responsible for the deaths of countless Jews) are two crimes which the Israeli government should be held responsible for. The The problem with the left is that your “Peace” plan only consists of giving up land . If you see it’s not working you decide hey let’s try a new and novel ways to make “Peace”, give up more land, more land more land and more land. You guys never learn that the only language Arabs understand is force. Violence and force is currency in the Arab world and if you haven’t learnt that by now you never will. So don’t go and dismiss alternate approaches such as Pipes before you look in the mirror and understand how damaging your “progressive” plans have been the Israel and the Jewish people.
Ah, so you’re saying that Ariel Sharon’s government and the nation of Israel he represented committed war crimes in withdrawing from Gaza?? That’s interesting & tells us a great deal about yr own take on things in the ME.
No, it consists of returning land conquered by Israel in order to achieve peace.
No, that’s what YOU characterize as my position. What my real position IS is that Israel must return most of the land it conquered in 1967, no more and no less. Since this option has never been tried before there is no such thing as “if you see it’s not working.” A return to 67 borders have never happened so it’s never “not worked.”
Looks like we have Danny Pipes, Jr. posting here. What tired old cliches you spin. Arabs don’t “understand” force. Palestinians haven’t understood it for the 40 yrs Israel has used that method to bludgeon them into submission.
Actually, the views of liberal Jews advocating peace will SAVE Israel, not destroy it. YOUR views on the other hand are what lead to the endless killing of Jews and Arabs.
The Israeli occupation and settlements have done great harm to the United States. The comment above advocates using more force against the Palestinians (with American money and weapon of course).
I went to the Mearsheimer and Walt presentation at UCLA and was surprised to hear and feel the rage of Americans who are fed up with the Israel Lobby and the right wing governments in Israel that have the US at war with the Muslim world.
Michael Scheuer former CIA head of the Bin Laden unit and author of “Imperial Hubris” and “Marching Toward Hell” was on the Bill Maher show Friday night (now on YouTube) where he stated that, “Israel is not worth an American life or an American dollar.” And,”Our unqualified support of Israel has caused the US tremendous pain and increasingly dead Americans- -fighting wars that are not ours to fight.” And, “America is fighting a war that doesn’t exist — our politicians have lied to us – this war is not because they hate freedom, women’s rights etc. — it is about our policies in the Middle East.”
The new book “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy” by Mearsheimer and Walt is on the Best Seller List.
Although the Israel Lobby is waging a “full court press’ to stop this discussion (the uncritical support for Israel), The toothpaste is out of the tube. And Israel and the Israel Lobby have no one to blame but themselves for finally wearing out their welcome on this issue—the brutal treatment of the Palestinians and theft of land and water in the West Bank.
I went to see Daniel Pipes at UCLA earlier this year, and he was too cowardly to even answer questions posed to him about the Mearsheimer & Walt book regarding the power/influence of the pro-Israel lobby as he wouldn’t respond either to the mention of James Bamford’s ‘A Pretext for War’ book which conveys how US support of Israel’s brutal oppression of the Palestinians was the primary motivation for 9/11 (and the earlier attack on the World Trade Center in 1993 as well). Simply look up ‘Israel as a Terrorist Motivation’ in the index.. Pipes simply looked down and avoided answering the questions posed above. He is nothing short of a blowhard and a coward to boot (when confronted with fact).
Just a footnote to my post above:
Pipes was also asked about the ‘Dying to Win’ book by Robert Pape in which Pape conveys that a majority of suicide bombers are driven to do what they do because of occupation of their land (Palestine, Iraq, etc.). Again, Pipes refused to answer as he cowardly looked down while the questioner kept asking during the ‘Q & A’ to no avail and was eventually asked to leave.. Incredible how Pipes handled himself at UCLA that night…
I went to the UCLA evebt also, but stayed only long enough to hear him say Palestinians must be crushed. My Women in Black friends and I, along with a few dozen UCLA students, stood up and walked out. Pipes ultimately learned our names and posted them on his blog. He tried to get UCLA to file charges against us but was refused on the basis we were exercising our right to free speech.
Once again the leader of Persia is attempting to save israel from itself: Somewhere between prophet and Cyrus, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad endured the childish abuse of the dean of the Columbia school of journalism and roared back with an indictment of israel for its gross violations of the Palestinian people and the moral blindness of israel’s American enablers.
“Sixty years” the Iranian president declaimed; “Sixty years.” “Sixty years.”
How curious that that whole downward spiral began 60 years when Truman was persuaded he would be as great as Cyrus if he supported israeli statehood.
Well, I’ll be. A real live member of the Ahmadinejad Fan Club–the only member I might add outside of Teheran. Or is Alison one of Mahmoud’s PR flacks?
Besides, the idea that Mahmoud is trying to save Israel from itself is ridiculous.