Hacker News Reader

Comment by suprgeek | Hacker News Reader

Hate to turn this into a political thread when there is so much info about software but....

The sheer arrogance with with Israel operates is just something else. They seem to to believe that no action they take will ever be questioned or lead to any blowback.

The almost total control of US Foreign policy that they have now makes me think that the Iran deal being operationalized was nothing sort of a coup for Pres. Obama.

If I were a conspiracy nut, I would be looking very closely at how those two US naval boats drifted that close to an Iranian base on the eve of the agreement coming into force.

View on HN

why would they expect blow back? They literally bombed our naval vessel (the Liberty, IIRC) in the Mediterranean in the 70s, and there were zero consequences. For a bombing. Why would releasing a software project early cause anything bad to happen?

Israel operates with utter disregard for the US, and has done pretty well for itself by doing so.

It's hard to fault them for continuing their pattern of behavior.

"They seem to to believe that no action they take will ever be questioned or lead to any blowback" - That's not true. Like any country Israel wights the pros and cons of any decision. Some work in their favor some don't. If you think Israel doesn't taken into account the repercussions to it's actions you are gravely mistaken. I agree with you that Israel tries and succeeds in influencing US Foreign policy, why wouldn't any country do that if it works in their favor? Why is Israel being criticized of this when any other country including the UK, France, Germany, Iran, Egypt are doing the same?

> Why is Israel being criticized of this when any other country including the UK, France, Germany, Iran, Egypt are doing the same?

Because Israel could not do five percent of the things they are doing without the massive amount of military and financial welfare and protection they receive from the USA. The other countries you list do not have that luxury to nearly the same extent.

Massive amount? US foreign aid to Israel is about at most 3% of Israel yearly budget. Most of it Israel has to spend in a specific defined way, mostly buying from US companies. Some go to R&D which are joined operations with the US. Don't forget that Egypt and Jordan get foreign Aid, 1.5B$ while Israel gets 3B$. I don't see any comments on why US should stop it. UK, France, Germany are in NATO which gives them much more luxury to do what they want. Iran developed a Nuclear program, is funding and assisting terror organization which killed thousands of civilians, not to mention in details what's going on in Syria right now.

> Don't forget that Egypt and Jordan get foreign Aid, 1.5B$ while Israel gets 3B$

What? Egypt got no "foreign aid" until some post-Nasserite forces in Egypt got together and decided to kow-tow to Israel and the US during the Camp David accords. For Jordan it is pretty much the same thing, from the attacks on Black September on.

The politicians running these countries were bought off to play nice with Israel. This is more or less openly stated in journals like Foreign Affairs. The money to Egypt and Jordan is money being given indirectly to Israel.

Egypt gets Foreign Aid since 79', Jordan got economic and military aid since 1951 and 1957, respectively. Black September started on 6 September 1970.

I agree with you they were bought off, but was it better for them to be at a constant war with Israel?

> The money to Egypt and Jordan is money being given indirectly to Israel I'd very much would like an explanation on this.

"until some post-Nasserite forces in Egypt got together and decided to kow-tow to Israel and the US during the Camp David accords" Youre describing the camp david accord as if some jewish cabal took control of the administration of egypt. Egypt simply realized life would be better if it didn't go to war with a formidable enemy every 5 years (that is literally the average from 1948-Yom Kippur War in 1973), and it left the soviet orbit and aligned itself more the US.

>No foreign aid http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/united-states-wit... and it was even offered during your hero Nasser's regime

That's just not true. Israel's annual budget is $88 billion. Even if American aid was just tossed in with no strings attached, as opposed to all the indirect-subsidy-for-American-defense-corporations requirements, it's around five and a half percent of that amount.

This is a really bizzare statement. Of course, if you compare Israel to Iceland, as someone did in another comment, the difderence in behavior is noticeable. But do you consider the worlds these two countries are living in? Israel gets critisized for 1/10 of what all the surrounding countries commit without any international outlash. It have been at war since its creation — with the countries not across the world, but right at the border. Most of Israel's population comes from people who were expelled from these neighboring countries mere 70 years ago. So yeah, to survive in the environment where people are constantly trying to kill you — and just "you" as a country, but you personally, because of your ethnicity — you have to grow some arrogance.

> The almost total control of US Foreign policy ...

Which US foreign policy decisions in the past 10 years were "controlled" by Israel? Sanctions on Russia? Missile defence system in Europe? North Korea? Relations with China? War on Terror? Libya campaign? US non-response to the "Arab spring"? Campaign in Syria? Drone strikes in Pakistan? Relations with Latin America? War on Drugs? Spying on Angela Merkel?

Literally nothing of what the US did in the last decade had anything to do with Israel. Even when it comes to Iran - which Israeli leaders considered to be an existential threat - Israel completely failed to influence the US foreign policy.

The sheer arrogance with with $country operates is just something else.

Not all countries would be included there. The US? Russia? North Korea? Sure. Finland? Iceland? Not so much.

There is something to be said about a country's foreign policy and how 'arrogant' it is. A country can have a solid foreign policy (read: not be a pushover) and still not act like a giant bully.

One could argue that the whole independence thing is pretty arrogant in the case of Finland for example.

Someone else has pointed this out elsewhere but it's a bit odd to compare israel to scandanavian countries rather than the middle eastern countries that surround it.

So let's ask the same question again: is Israel's behavior arrogant? Possibly, but not really when compared to Iran, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Syria or Qatar

>They seem to to believe that no action they take will ever be questioned or lead to any blowback

Israel did not and never will colonize Palestine "properly" like the British Empire did. They are either afraid of the blowback or surprisingly restrained.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com