I was just reading some stuff on http://fromgaza. blogspot. com/, and it got me thinking. I did a bit of research on U.S. – Israel relations.
“About 1,300 Palestinians, at least 700 of them civilians, were killed during the 22-day offensive, while Israel put its death toll at 10 soldiers and three civilians. “
Source: http://www. reuters. com/article/middleeastCrisis/idUSLP674710
“17% of all U.S. foreign aid is earmarked for Israel. In fact, Israel is so devoted to U.S. military hardware that it has the world’s largest fleet of F-16s outside the U.S., currently possessing more than 200 jets. Another 102 F-16s are on order from Lockheed Martin. Israel is one of the United State’s largest arms importers. In the last decade, the United States has sold Israel $7.2 billion in weaponry and military equipment.
The U.S. also gives Israel weapons and ammunition as part of the Excess Defense Articles (EDA) program, providing these articles completely free of charge. Between 1994-2001 the U.S. provided many weapons through this program, including:
* 64,744 M-16A1 rifles
* 2,469 M-204 grenade launchers
* 1,500 M-2 . 50 caliber machine guns
* .30 caliber, . 50 caliber, and 20mm ammunition”
Source: http://www. worldpolicy. org/projects/arms/reports/israel050602. html
Also worth reading is http://www. commondreams. org/views02/0509-07. htm.
I don’t like that the American media portrays the U.S. as innocent bystanders. I’m not taking sides, but there has to be a better solution than murdering schoolchildren…
January 25, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Before you criticiase Israel, what about your own back door? 10,000 Afghanis have died for just a “few ” American and UK soldiers. Don’t play holier than thou, when you have your own mess to clear up.
Of course you could boycott Israel and her goods. Pls do. Much of Intel’s microchip tech is based in Israel, and thus you could not use your computer to run your blog.
January 25, 2009 at 11:18 pm
Oh, I agree. We have a lot of messes to clean up; however, the conflict in Afghanistan does not justify the slaughter of innocents, in Israel or anywhere. I was merely pointing out the possibility that the U.S. might be able to exert more leverage on Israel to help stop all of the bloodshed, since we support them financially and militarily.
p.s. I use an AMD chip, which I believe was made in Singapore : )