US Must Stop Funding Israeli Crimes
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An interview with Dr. Franklin Lamb
11 October, 2011
Press TV
An exclusive interview with Dr. Franklin Lamb, international lawyer from Beirut.
A prominent political lawyer says that the US cannot continue to supply arms or economic aid to Israel which yet again is under international pressure for its atrocities against humanity. In an exclusive interview with Press TV, Franklin Lamb tells us more about the future of the US-Israeli relationship.
Press TV: As violent as that video we just aired was, it really shouldn't come as a surprise because, well, this type of behavior by Israeli forces is pretty much done on a weekly basis in the occupied territories. But you tell us what you think based on the video that has been released by human rights activists.
Lamb: The crimes against humanity which these video documents constitute, yet again, a clear and unavoidable challenge to American values and to President Obama’s administration that requires a forceful response. And that response from the Obama administration must be that it's time for America to cut ties with the brutal Zionist occupier of Palestine and disengage politically, militarily and economically.
It's not public, yet, but it will be this week via pro-Palestinian sources on Capitol Hill—yes, there actually are a few courageous souls up there--- that US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta spoke with Netanyahu in very, very strong terms last week. Panetta declared that the Israeli government, as it is today and the state of Israel itself, may well not survive the current Islamic and Arab awakening.
And this is exactly why.
The American people have no stomach anymore for this apartheid regime and I don't think that Obama can sustain the current course and his egregious groveling to Israel and its Congressional lobby and also in terms of the United Nations fiasco and now UNESCO.
This clear message ricocheting around the region, and increasingly in the West, is that Zionist Apartheid Israel has no place in the region, any region for that matter, and it has no basis for demanding its 6 billion dollars a year handout from the American tax payer, approximately $7 million dollars per day—every day of the year-rain or shine-- now in its 4th decade. We're fed up, we can’t afford it and God knows we have urgent domestic priorities that need our limited and shrinking available resources given the past decade of ill-advised wars of choice which have earned our good people the hatred of much of the world while making a mockery of American values and ruining our economy while depriving our youth of the opportunities they deserve. Regarding our youth, it’s the lack of hope, as much as the jobs, that hurts today's young unemployed.
Hopefully, Obama will sacrifice a second term, if that's what's necessary, in order to revive American principles and American values by standing up to the US Israel lobby as an American Profile in Courage and by acting in the interest of the American people who placed their confidence in him in 2008.
I think recent events show that it's that clear, it's essentially black and white. We can't waffle, we can't grovel anymore. It’s simply time for America to stand up to and reject the Zionist apartheid regime.
Press TV: You talked about the UN and, of course, the UN General Assembly wrapped up a couple weeks back. Tell us why it is that the UN does not really have any real effect about what Israel is doing? Of course, you can tell us more about the countless resolutions that Israel doesn't listen to. I want to talk about Ban Ki Moon, during the 2008 war, was standing in that debris in the Gaza Strip and seeing that this shouldn't be happening with smoke billowing from the background. But yet, we see time and again Israel committing these acts.
Lamb: Absolutely. As we know, the United Nations Security Council, as with NATO, has tragically been diminished to nothing more than an adjunct of the American-Israeli foreign policy. We have to revisit both of those international institutions. We must discard NATO as a dangerous out of control Cold War relic and reform the United Nations, frankly along the lines that President Ahmadinejad recommended during his 2010 lecture on this subject. A brilliant discourse that went largely ignored in the Western media.
It's true, as you say, we cannot rely on Israel to do anything of a humanitarian nature, but we can rely on the people in the streets, exiting the Mosques and gathering in American cities…inspired by the nine countries that are revolting here in this region and increasingly in the West and we now see also in Wall Street, Washington, and elsewhere.
It's up to us, individually, ultimately to bring about the necessary change. While we are very concerned about the inaction of these certain international institutions and our own governments, ultimately it's up to us to make change happen. That is the essence of Democracy isn’t it?
Regarding the demise of Israel, I think Panetta was right. And the report will be made public this week unless Israel can stop it and it argues that we're going to have to disengage. The quantum military edge which American has guaranteed to Israel that was incorporated into law in America in 2008 by Howard Berman, a pillar of the Zionist community, doesn't and shouldn’t apply anymore.
We're not going to be able to support Israel in terms of arms or economic aid, and we're going to have to discard our habit of putting Israel before our own interests and our own country. And that is what Panetta told Netanyahu in private. I think that's the direction we will be moving.
It's clear that this region is not turning back and that the genie is out of the bottle. All of this past when America put Israel above our own interests and sacrificed our real friends must be discarded and the new intifada from Tunisia to Yemen to Ramallah and increasingly to America is the future resistance era. I think all people of good will must support that and change the current apocalyptic direction and restore Palestine to her rightful inhabitants.
