Posted on 12/16/2001 10:32:01 AM PST by veronica
In a deeply flawed report aired December 11th on Brit Hume’s Special Report, Fox News correspondent Carl Cameron alleged, without naming a single source, that some of the roughly 60 Israelis arrested in law enforcement sweeps since the September terror attacks are suspected of being intelligence operatives engaged, among other things, in spying on Arabs living in the United States.
Cameron also alleged that US intelligence officials believe some of the plotters involved in the September 11 attacks were based in California and were being watched there by Israeli agents, and that Israel therefore “must have known” of their plans, but nonetheless failed to issue any warnings to the US.
These charges are arrant nonsense unworthy of the usually reliable Fox News. This is especially true because Cameron was well aware that similar allegations against detained Israelis have been shot down as baseless by no less an authority than Attorney General John Ashcroft.
As noted by the New York Times (Nov. 21), the Washington Post (Nov. 23), and most recently the Jerusalem Post(Dec. 7), of the roughly 60 Israelis arrested, none have been criminally charged, and most have been released and deported back to Israel. The eight still being held are expected to be “released and deported later this month,” according to the Jerusalem Post article. Since spying is illegal, and none of the detained Israelis had diplomatic immunity, why, if they were spies, did the US release and deport them? Rather than answering this clearly crucial question, Cameron instead keeps from viewers that most of the Israelis have been, or will soon be, released.
In addition, the Times and Washington Post reports noted that an Ohio immigration judge criticized the government’s continued detention of Israelis there. Judge Elizabeth Hacker found that the government “failed to submit any evidence of terrorist activity or of a threat to national security. There is no evidence of the risk of harm to the community.”
In another deceptive omission, Cameron neglected to mention the judge’s finding, instead portraying the young Israelis – who were working in mall kiosks selling cheap wind-up helicopter toys – as nefarious Mossad spies.
After press reports that kiosk workers were being detained, most of the Israelis quite reasonably abandoned their jobs(leaving the pushcart company with no workers) and tried to keep a low profile, the better to avoid detention for working illegally. Cameron however, claimed that “investigators” believed the kiosk jobs to be “fronts,” and darkly portrayed the disappearance of the Israeli workers as proof that they were actually spies.
You have some d*mn nerve, Mercuria. You know d*mn well it's exploited - it is a minor holy grail on every Nazi site you can shake a stick at. And the reference Veronica put up was from the website of one of the most well-known and vocal survivors.
Oh. :| I'm sorry. Forgive me for showing my ignorance. :|
But, then I don't understand. If Israel apologised, why is there still such a fuss? Not only do our vets act as though there has been no apology, but why do I see posts that dispute their culpability? IOW, why do we argue about it instead of just shaking our heads and saying "yes, that was a shame, and by the way, Israel has apologised."?
I just don't want us to look like the Muslims who give more apologetics than apologies.
And I only say these things because it is so important to me that nothing come between us.
And again, even if Israel never apologised, she would be a better friend to us, and deserve our support more, than most of our other "allies". Especially those in the current "coalition".
If you mean about the Liberty, Israel did apologize, and paid reparations.
I did not.
Yes, I saw that letter. I read it before YOU did, and before Veronica even posted it here, because I have read at that website extensively. I doubt you or Veronica could say the same.
Because if you did, you would realize this:
The brave gentlemen who survived (and several high-ranking officials who support them, which you would know, if you actually did detailed reading at that site) do not believe a half-hearted apology by Israel for this aggressive and purposeful attack - the apology being accepted before it was even made, I might add - and minuscule monetary reparation (assisted by our own financial aid to Israel) is adequate compensation considering the cover-up (continued to this day by both the U.S. and Israel with the concern, dismay, and rebuke to both governments of many fine, high-ranking officials), the threats against the lives of the survivors by their OWN GOVERNMENT should they EVER mention the details of the incident (and I pray for the protection of those who have come forward, believe me), and the continued insults to the memory of those we lost from people who want this to be completely forgotten for the most cynical of purposes.
Otherwise, why would they have put the site up in the first place, with as much information as it contains?
Despite their concerns about individuals and groups who would exploit the incident for their own nefarious means (which are completely understandable), do you believe the vocal survivors of the attack, who came forward at considerable peril and threat to their own lives to publish all the information they did, put up the site so that it would be brushed under the rug and forgotten, and their supporters of good will smeared as Nazis and anti-Semites?
What must you think of the survivors themselves, who had the unmitigated gall to display their eyewitness of an historical, military event?
If something that occurred within living memory can be swatted aside like a gnat and revised through omission of facts for political, ideological or foreign relations expediency...tell me, who is it that does that is any more noble or justified in doing so than those who revamp the events of World War II and Nazi Germany for the same reasons?
It is just as heinous to make the attack of the USS Liberty a Memory Hole operation for the comfort of those who want to present Israel as faultless and flawless (as if ANY nation has any claim to those attributes!) and use the mention of it as a flame outlet against those who dare to bring it up as it is to use it for the purposes of promoting anti-Israel propaganda.
These facts should not be twisted by EITHER SIDE to use for their own agenda.
If you do use it thus, you are just as guilty as those you claim to despise.
I do not need to frequent every thread about Israel and slam other members who disagree with me on matters concerning Israel, large or small, or who question Israel's forthrightness and honesty as "Nazis" or "terrorist-lovers" or "anti-Semites" or some other vulgar name-calling patter sequence or insult barrage to "prove" I am pro-Israel.
If it makes you feel better to do this, that's your free right to do so here, but it just makes you look like an epithet-flinging crank, which will severely impair the presentation of whatever legitimate evidence you provide.
Probably not. I read it at Ennis's site long before he moved his pages to where they are now. Also long before he shifted his rethoric to the orientation it has now.
And don't give me the cr*p about it being used by "both sides". That's just asinine. The matter (which has been laid to rest in countless threads on FR as well as several courts of inquiry) is almost always brought up by the more rabid anti-Israel crowd, and it's never brought up without that crowd turning the thread into a hate-in. As I said, it's a minor holy grail of the American neo-Nazi movement. Ennis at least recognized that. It seems you don't.
What you believe I "recognize" is of small interest to me, but I'm not quite as dim as you think.
You may do as you please, of course, but I still think attempting to smear anyone at all who mentions the Liberty as a closet Nazi is a major crock and a real attempt to totally negate the issue and flush it down the Memory Hole...which I doubt is what Mr. Ennis, Mr. Tourney, and the other survivors desired when they came forward.
The issue WON'T go away, simply because you have no patience with anyone who brings it up. And bringing it up doesn't make whoever did bring it up a closet bigot, no matter how loudly and persistently you insist that it does.
The rudest people who engaged in the discussion of the Liberty on this thread are those who are on the pro-Israel side, I'm sorry and ashamed to say.
But I've had my say, I feel absolutely NO qualms at all about taking the stance I have on the issue, and my conscience is perfectly clear as to my reasons for bringing it up in the first place.
Rough criticism by the survivors...I doubt we'll ever get to the bottom of this unless an open and detailed investigation is conducted, and it seems neither the U.S. nor Israeli governments are willing that this should happen.
And you're ignoring that Cameron's report said up to 140 Israelis had been detained before 9-11 as an investigation into a "possible" spy ring. That's what no other media has investiagted. And the "reporting" on the 60 Israelis (and everyone else) detained since then has been spotty.
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