American politicians are pro-Israel because that's what
the public wants. Right?
Wrong.
A July 1, 2008 poll found
that Americans do not favor taking either
Israel or Palestine's side:
A new WorldPublicOpinion.org poll of 18 countries
finds that in 14 of them people mostly say their government
should not take sides in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Just three countries favor taking the Palestinian side
(Egypt, Iran, and Turkey) and one is divided (India).
No country favors taking
Israel's side, including the United States, where 71 percent
favor taking neither side.
One can travel from the farthest right fringe
of the GOP to the heart of the Democratic Party leadership
and hear exactly the same thing: Israel is always right.
Israel must not be criticized. Israel never bears any
blame. Any action taken by Israel is justified. No matter
the situation, that just gets repeated over and over like
some hypnotic bipartisan mantra. Meanwhile, American citizens
overwhelmingly ... want their Government to be "even-handed"
in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Yet that view is
simply ignored, disregarded, not even viable for any American
mainstream political leader to express.
As with the Iraq war, the bailout, torture, and everything
else, the powers-that-be in the U.S. government ignore
what Americans want and do whatever they like.
