Jerusalem News (12 February 2017, 16 Shevet, 5777)
Contents:
1. Israel Receives LESS Military Aid than Other US Allies!
Dispelling the Myth that Israel Is the Largest Beneficiary of US Military Aid By Prof. Hillel Frisch
2. Where are all the Pro-Palestinian Bleeding Hearts in Cases where Israeli is NOT involved?
Why doesn't CNN show the sufferings of Palestinians? Answer by Stav Bartel
3. Palestinians as Weapons of Europe Against Israel
Meditations on today's news by Vic Rosenthal quoting Eugene Kontorovich
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1. Israel Receives LESS Military Aid than Other US Allies!
Dispelling the Myth that Israel Is the Largest Beneficiary of US Military Aid By Prof. Hillel Frisch
Annual US military aid:
Aid in form of funding: Israel: US$3.1 billion Aid in form of cost of stationing US troops (does not include air and sea patrols or joint ground, air, and maritime exercises with host countries)
Japan: US$27 billion
Germany: US$21 billion
South Korea: US$15 billion
Italy: US$6 billion
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Dispelling the Myth that Israel Is the Largest Beneficiary of US Military Aid By Prof. Hillel Frisch,
February 10, 2017 BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 410, February 10, 2017
https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/dispelling-myth-israel-largest-beneficiary-us-military-aid/
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Extracts:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Many American detractors of Israel begin by citing that Israel receives the lion's share of US military aid. The very suggestion conjures the demon of an all-powerful Israel lobby that has turned the US Congress into its pawn. But these figures, while reflecting official direct US military aid, are almost meaningless in comparison to the real costs and benefits of US military aid, above all, American boots on the ground. In reality, Israel receives only a small fraction of American military aid, and most of that was spent in the US to the benefit of the American economy.
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Countless articles discrediting Israel (as well as many other better-intentioned articles) ask how it is that a country as small as Israel receives the bulk of US military aid. Israel receives 55%, or $US3.1 billion per year, followed by Egypt, which receives 23%. This largesse comes at the expense, so it is claimed, of other equal or more important allies, such as Germany, Japan, and South Korea. The complaint conjures the specter of an all-powerful Israel lobby that has turned the US Congress into its pawn.
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The response to the charge is simple: Israel is not even a major beneficiary of American military aid. The numerical figure reflects official direct US military aid, but is almost meaningless compared to the real costs and benefits of US military aid, Â which include, above all, American boots on the ground in the host states.
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There are 150,500 American troops stationed in seventy countries around the globe. This costs the American taxpayer an annual $US85-100 billion, according to David Vine, a professor at American University and author of a book on the subject. In other words, 800-1,000 American soldiers stationed abroad represent US$565-665 million of aid to the country in which they are located.
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Once the real costs are calculated, the largest aid recipient is revealed to be Japan, where 48,828 US military personnel are stationed. This translates into a US military aid package of over US$27 billion (calculated according to Vine's lower estimation). Germany, with 37,704 US troops on its soil, receives aid equivalent to around US$21 billion; South Korea, with 27,553 US troops, receives over US$15 billion; and Italy receives at least US$6 billion.
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If Vine's estimate is correct, Japan's US military aid package is nine times larger than that of Israel, Germany's is seven times larger, and Italy's is twice as large. The multipliers are even greater for Egypt. Even the Lilliputian Gulf states, Kuwait and Bahrain, whose American bases are home to over 5,000 US military personnel apiece, receive military aid almost equal to what Israel receives.
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Yet even these figures grossly underestimate the total costs of US aid to its allies. The cost of maintaining troops abroad does not reflect the considerable expense, deeply buried in classified US military expenditure figures, of numerous US air and sea patrols. Nor does it reflect the high cost of joint ground, air, and maritime exercises with host countries (events only grudgingly acknowledged on NATO's official site).
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US air and naval forces constantly patrol the Northern, Baltic, and China Seas to protect American allies in Europe and in the Pacific, Â at American expense. Glimpses of the scale of these operations are afforded by incidents like the shadowing of a Russian ship in the Baltics, near run-ins between Chinese Coast Guard ships and US Navy ships dispatched to challenge Chinese claims in the South China Sea, and near collisions between US Air Force planes and their Chinese counterparts in the same area.
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In striking contrast, no US plane has ever flown to protect Israel's airspace. No US Navy ship patrols to protect Israel's coast. And most importantly, no US military personnel are put at risk to ensure Israel's safety.
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In Japan, South Korea, Germany, Kuwait, Qatar, the Baltic states, Poland, and elsewhere, US troops are a vulnerable trip-wire. It is hoped that their presence will deter attack, but there is never any assurance that an attack will not take place. Should such an attack occur, it will no doubt cost American lives.
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This cannot happen in Israel, which defends its own turf with its own troops. There is no danger that in Israel, the US might find itself embroiled in wars like those it waged in Iraq and Afghanistan at a cost of
US$4 trillion, according to Linda J. Bilmes, a public policy professor and Harvard University researcher.
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Ever since the Turkish parliament's decision in March 2003 not to join the US-led coalition, and the Turkish government's refusal to allow movement of American troops across its borders, Israel has been America's sole ally between Cyprus and India with a strategic air force and (albeit small) rapid force deployment capabilities to counter major threats to vital US interests.
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The politicians, pundits, and IR scholars who attack Israel and the Israeli lobby for extracting the lion's share of US military aid from a gullible Congress know full well that this is not true. Israel receives a small fraction of the real outlays of military aid the US indirectly gives its allies and other countries. These experts also know that 74% of military aid to Israel was spent on American arms, equipment, and services. Under the recently signed Memorandum of Understanding, that figure will be changed to 100%. The experts simply cite the wrong figures.
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The US is now led by a businessman president who knows his dollars and cents. He has been adamant about the need to curb free-riding by the large recipients of real US aid. He will, one hopes, appreciate the security bargain the US has with Israel - Â a country that not only shares many common values with the US, but can make a meaningful contribution to American vital interests with no trip-wires attached.
Prof. Hillel Frisch is a professor of political studies and Middle East studies at Bar-Ilan University and a senior research associate at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies.
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IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
 Website: www.imra.org.il
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2. Where are all the Pro-Palestinian Bleeding Hearts in Cases where Israeli is NOT involved?
Why doesn't CNN show the sufferings of Palestinians?
https://www.quora.com/Why-doesn%E2%80%99t-CNN-show-the-sufferings-of-Palestinians
Answer by Stav Bartel
Extracts:
You say that as is the Palestinians are the only people around the globe who suffer. During this year, less than 100 people, Israeli or Palestinian, were killed during the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
On the same time:
2,037 people were killed in Nigeria.[1]
10,556 people were killed in Iraq.[2]
34,275 people were killed in Syria.[3]
1,601 civilians were killed in Afghanistan.[4]
2,020 people were killed in Somalia.[5]
1,958 people were killed in Turkey.[6]
1,337 people were killed in Pakistan.[7]
952 people were killed in Libya.[8]
524 people were killed in Yemen.[9]
696 people were killed in Egypt.[10]
3,865 people were killed in Sudan and South Sudan.[11]
420 people were killed in Ethiopia.[12]
443 people were killed in India.[13] [14] [15]
In addition to that, there are many incidents around the globe that get very little attention in western media. For example:
Last week, nearly 100,000 Syrians fled the fightings next to Hama in central Syria.
Last month, Ethiopian forces killed almost 100 protesters in a single weekend.
This year there was an 11% increase in anti-Semitic attacks in the UK
Still there are 14,400,000 food insecure people in Yemen
1,250 people were disapeared in Egypt last year, only to suddenly apear under urest.
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3. Palestinians as Weapons of Europe Against Israel
Meditations on today's news
http://abuyehuda.com/2017/02/meditations-on-todays-news/
Posted on February 10, 2017 by Vic Rosenthal
Extracts:
As Eugene Kontorovich explains,
# Israel's proposed 'Regulations Bill' has attracted broad international criticism, including from the U.S. State Department and the European Union, as well as from opposition Israeli politicians and some government lawyers. The bill seeks to solve a situation in which, over several decades, over one thousand Israeli homes in West Bank settlements have been built in open areas to which Palestinians subsequently asserted property claims, typically based on broad give-aways of state land by the King of Jordan during the Hashemite occupation (1949-67). The homes are in communities built with some level of government involvement. Thus the bill provides the government would compensate the landowners 125% of the value of the land, in order to allow the communities that have been built there to remain..... #
Of course the world leaders in virtue and morality, the EU and the governments of Germany and France, are dead set against the law.....
Later today I listened on the radio to the reactions of the European representatives in Israel. You would think that the Knesset had passed a law demanding that the Palestinians must throw all their male children into the sea, and not one that simply makes it possible to compensate people in return for taking property that they may not even have clear title to, and haven't used for years, if ever. I am becoming more and more convinced that after Iran, Europe is our greatest enemy, and the Palestinians their weapon.
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