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Israel Shahak (concentration camp survivor & Israeli professor) on Israeli aims

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Consuela
  11/07/26


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Date: November 7th, 2026 7:41 PM
Author: Consuela

This is too long for a note but not the right content for a post, and it’s not good timing to have read/commented on this as it feeds an artificial media-driven Current Thing pile-on, but it is what it is. Here’s progressive Israeli academic and concentration camp survivor Israel Shahak in Open Secrets (published 1997, articles from 1991-1996):

1. Israeli Aims. p. 3: “[Israeli regional aims] can be scribed as having two intertwined aims: hegemony-seeking and the support of the ‘stability’s most of the now-existing regimes in the Middle East, with the notable exception of Iran, and (only for a relatively short period, now ended) of Iraq. Although Israeli policies directed toward the overthrow of the Iranian regime (now a chief Israeli aim) are being justified, especially in the US with claptrap about ‘fighting Islamic fundamentalism’ for the supposed benefit of the West, this explanation, tamely accepted by many US ‘experts’, is in my view obviously incorrect. First, as is known to everybody who follows the Hebrew press, Israel has for years supported Hamas and other Islamic fundamentalist organizations against the PLO, when it thought that such support would serve its interest. Second, the most fundamentalist Islamic state in the Middle East is Saudi Arabia, which Israel, in spite of some frictions, is certainly not opposing. Therefore, the real reason for the Israeli enmity to Iran, which may yet lead to an Israeli assault on it is, in my view, quite simple: Israel’s hegemonic aspirations. A state aspiring to hegemony in an area cannot tolerate other strong states in that area….Everything else is and was just propaganda, needed, by the way, not so much for Israeli domestic purposes as for foreign consumption….After all, Peres is on the record in this book stating that Israel does not want peace with Iran under any terms.” p. 60: “Quite apart from the risks such a state may pose to Israeli hegemonic ambitions, Orientalist ‘expertise’ requires that natives of the region always remain weak, to be ruled always by their traditional notables but not by persons with intellectual capacity, whether religious or secular.”

2. On the Gentile. p. 7: “There exists outside Israel a grave misunderstanding about its policies. Israel discriminates not only against Arabs, or only against Palestinians, as it incorrectly supposed (especially amongst the Arabs) outside Israel, but against all non-Jews, including its best non-Jewish friends. It follows from that official attitude which Israel tries to inculcate among all its Jewish citizens that Israel must regard even its best non-Jewish friends as its potential enemies.” p. 35: “This phrase [the entire world] reflects another concept underlying Israeli strategic thinking. The concept is that in addition to the Arabs or the Muslims who are open enemies, other Gentiles, regarded as a single entity and united in pursuing aims correctly detectable and decipherable by Israeli Intelligence, are without exception both evil and stupid.”

3. On Iran. p. 55: “ [The indoctrination campaign] is accompanied by what could be called semi-official horror scenarios purporting to detail what Iran could do to Israel, the West and the entire world when it acquires nuclear weapons as it is expected to a few years hence….In February 1993 minutely-detailed anticipations of Iran becoming a major target of Israeli policies became intense.” p. 65: “[Israel’s] chief aim undoubtedly remains the neutralization of the power of Iran. To all appearances, Israel would like to overthrow the present Iranian regime and replace it with another one.”

4. On Israeli Influence over America. p. 64: “Israel is vitally interested in maintaining its influence upon he Clinton administration so as to prevent any reduction in the present levels of American aid and any serious US protest against its independent policy ventures. Israeli independence can work as long as Clinton remains ready to finance (or press other countries to finance) that ‘independence’.” p. 68, where Moshe Zak in Hallam Ha’ze states: The leaders of China firmly believe that the US and Israel coordinate their policies and that Israel has a great influence in Washington…when the entire Chinese leadership spoke with Rabin about the scope of Chinese relations with Israel , they did not neglect to emphasize frequently that those relations are with the Jewish people anywhere, whose power and influence surpasses beyond any comparison that of the four-and-a-half million Jews residing in Israel.” p. 125: “Israel wields a tremendous influence within the US, in my view regardless of whether Israeli policies accord with US interests or not. Although to some extent this can be attributed to the support Israel receives from many strains of Christian fundamentalism, there is no doubt in my mind that its primary reason is the role performed by the organized Jewish community in the US in backing Israel and its policies. The proportion of organized Jews within the body of US Jewry can be roughly estimated as close to 50 per cent.” P. 141: One of the most prestigious of Israeli commentators, Yoel Markus (Haaretz, 31 December 1993) recently spoke of the ‘courtship’ of Israel by various states, concluding that ‘this courtship has nothing to do with the peace process: its only reason is the entire world’s recognition of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as true. When the US is being ruled by an administration as favorably disposed to Israel as the present one, conviction spreads in every state that the only way to America’s purse leads via Israel. It is as if this accursed book were not written by an anti-semite, but by a clever and far-sighted Jew.’ I myself would perceive the scope of that influence s more restricted….The topic is taboo in the US (although not in Israel), with all major American Jewish organizations exerting themselves to maintain the taboo, often with the help of philosemitic Christians, who delude themselves that by gagging discussion of Jewish affairs, and in particular about Jewish chauvinism and exclusivism, they ‘atone’ for the Holocaust.” p. 146: “‘Dayan didn’t hesitate to threaten the Americans openly and directly, telling them that if they ever dared to send a photo-taking aircraft over the Israeli bank of the Suez Canal, he was going to order to down it.’”

5. On Israeli Influence Over the Middle East. p. 105: “Beyond the screen of incessant sloganeering about their unshakable commitment to Palestinian cause and to ‘the armed struggle’ against Israel the three ‘radical’ Arab dictators, Gaddafi, Assad and Saddam Hussein, have for years been supplying Israel with much of its foreign currency reserves. And it can be assumed that, in the absence of publicity, they will continue to do so in the future as well. A generalization is called for here. With the exception of some minor states such as Yemen, Mauritania or even Algeria (whose case will yet be discussed), the more an Arab state is or pretends to be hostile towards Israel, the higher are its purchases of Israeli-made goods and the closer are its covert relations with Israel. The reverse also holds true. The two most moderate Arab states, Egypt and Jordan, have been the only ones which actually barred nearly all Israeli exports.” p. 162: “Israel (and the Zionist movement) vigorously oppose democratization of Arab societies, and are mortally afraid of such a process. The more undemocratic, unpopular and corrupt an Arab regime, group or leader is, the more likely it is that Israel will either ally itself with it or support it….There are several reasons for following this policy. The most important is that the Israeli establishment knows that an Arab democracy will be much stronger than any Arab autocratic regime, even if such a regime happens to be temporarily popular. This is also true of the Palestinians….It should be recalled that an Arab democratic state will be able to form a much more efficient army than ‘an autocratic form of regime.’”

https://www.amazon.com/Open-Secrets-Nuclear-Foreign-Policies/dp/0745311512?th=1

(https://autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=5920090&forum_id=2#50241578)