Over the last week or so I’ve engaged in some vibrant email exchanges with some of the most prominent movers and shakers in the 9/11 skeptics community, most of whom are reluctant to emphasize the Israeli dimension of 9/11. While I would not publish the private correspondences of others without their permission, I thought some readers might like to appraise what I had to say.
By Joshua Blakeney,
www.veteranstoday.com
I wrote this in response to two 9/11 academics who had taken issue with me distinguishing between different states (i.e. the U.S. and Israel):
Thank you both for your responses. Here’s my two-penneth; I agree that attempting to discuss politics based on ethnic or religious distinctions is usually misguided (although the various groups which constitute the ‘Israel Lobby’ are almost totally motivated by ethnic and religious based ideologies and imperatives). But it gets more tricky when it comes to analyzing the interface between states. I think we do need to recognize that the U.S. and Israel are two different, autonomous, sovereign states whose interests often differ markedly in the Middle East. It is commonly held in international relations theory that states act in their own interests.
This is the so called “realist” school of thought. What many scholars, such as Walt and Mearsheimer, James Petras, Jonathan Cook, Stephen Sniegoski, Virginia Tilley and others, have observed is that due to the influence of a foreign state, Israel, the U.S. often acts against its interests in the Middle East. This geopolitical reality has garnered a great deal of attention from political scientists because U.S. policy in the Middle East often falsifies “realist” theory. The neoconservatives and those partisan to Israel have invested much energy and money trying to persuade the U.S. elite and U.S. electorate to view Israel’s priorities as its priorities.
One of you contended that it is better to view the world through a horizontal lens (people vs. power, oppressed vs. oppressor) rather than through a vertical lens (i.e. distinguishing between states or ethnic groups); I think we need a bit of both. Could we call this a diagonal lens? It is true that there is overlap in the intelligence community between MI5, MI6, CIA, Mossad, ISI etc. But they are not the SAME agencies with the same goals ALL of the time. The goals of those agencies converge at some points and diverge at others. Israel has a long history of spying on the U.S., infiltrating its government with agents and has even attacked the U.S. on several occasions (1954, 1967, 9/11??) often evoking the wrath of those in the higher echelons of the CIA as well as the Brzezinski faction who are schooled in the “realist” mindset of prioritizing U.S. imperial interests over those of Israel. You should check out Brzezinski’s criticism of the neoconservative movement. A good example of the U.S. putting its interests over Israel’s in the Middle East was the Gulf War of 1991 where Bush senior successfully secured Kuwaiti oil and then withdrew WITHOUT deposing Saddam Hussein. Bush, as an oil man, wanted to return to the status quo ante of stability in the Middle East rather than create the kind of ethnic and religious civil war which we’ve seen since 2003. For doing so, Bush senior angered the neoconservatives, angered Israel lobbyists (who began supporting his opponents) and angered the government of Israel. Israel always hated Saddam because he was one of the only regional threats and he supported the Palestinian resistance. This is why in Iran-Contra we see Israel channeling weapons to Iran. A strong Iran attacking Iraq was good for Israel. What we’ve seen since 9/11 is the putting of Israel’s interests over those of the U.S. non-Israelcentric elite.
I feel in the 9/11 truth movement there has been a failure to engage with the scholarship which provides evidence to suggest that the war against Iraq and the broader ‘war on terror’ was primarily waged at the behest of a Likudnik faction. This essay by Walt and Mearsheimer ignited the whole debate in 2006 and many scholars have discussed and debated the issue since.
During my undergraduate degree in Sociology James Petras’s scholarship was required reading. Thus, I was surprised when I read his books on the Israel/Palestine conflict to see that he explicitly lays most of the blame for the ‘war on terror’ on what he identifies as the “Zionist Power Configuration.” This is pretty forthright coming from a scholar held in such high regard by establishment academics.If I am barking up the wrong tree (as alleged by one professor) I would appreciate some further debate, discussion etc. In these recent emails I’ve been hoping to edify 9/11 Studies by bringing my own readings and understanding of geopolitics to the discussion. To repeat, I think it is important we understand 9/11 and the 9/11 wars in the correct context.
I wrote this to one prominent 9/11 academic:
Thank you for your response. I appreciate you taking the time to write back to me.
Firstly, I felt that Professor X’s attempt to discredit Dr. Kevin Barrett’s vast and extensive oeuvre based on his alleged views about events in 1930s and 1940s Europe (a subject which neither I nor I suspect Prof. X are experts in) was intellectually disrespectful and thus beneath my contempt. I do believe that Dr. Barrett’s contribution to the quest for 9/11 truth has been indispensable. You are welcome to attempt to persuade me otherwise, although I doubt you would be able to.
Dr. Kevin Barrett has conducted vital research into the Israeli dimension of 9/11
[The 9/11 academic had claimed in his email to me that the Bush family are anti-Semitic]
I think we need to distinguish between Prescott Bush, his son and his grandson. George W. Bush is far from anti-Semitic. Indeed if ‘W’ was anti-Semitic he wouldn’t have been able to go to work each day because a preponderance of his foreign policy advisors were Jewish. Although George W. Bush isn’t noted as a prolific reader or scholar, his support for the Middle East interventions was compounded to a large extent from his reading and rereading of the book “The Case for Democracy” by Natan Sharanky, the Israeli minister of social and Diaspora affairs in the Sharon government who was described in the Washington Post as “so hawkish that he accused Ariel Sharon of being soft on Palestinians. ‘W”s speech writer David Frum according to journalist Robert Novak “repeatedly refers to his own Jewishness. It is hard to recall any previous presidential aide so engrossed in his own ethnic roots. Frum is more uncompromising in support of Israel than any other issue.”
David Frum according to journalist Robert Novak "repeatedly refers to his own Jewishness. It is hard to recall any previous presidential aide so engrossed in his own ethnic roots. Frum is more uncompromising in support of Israel than any other"
One could speculate that there might be a relationship between the media promoted perception of the Bush family being anti-Semitic and the fact that Bush senior was one of the only U.S. presidents to publicly denounce the Israel lobby and stand up to Israel on several issues, including asking Congress to stop loan guarantees to Israel until they ceased settlements. Indeed, one could speculate, I repeat speculate, that 9/11 was done to prevent the political representatives of Big Oil and the detentist, isolationists in the Republican Party (who typically advocated market imperialism as opposed to military imperialism) from continuing Bush senior’s Middle East policy of putting Israel in its place and strengthening relations with Arab strongmen who might threaten Israel. Without 9/11 Israel would have ended up in the same position apartheid-South Africa found itself in. Once the U.S. empire realized it was against it’s interests to support the pariah state of apartheid South Africa it abandoned it.
You ask “who manufactured Al Qaeda?” I think we need to understand that not all Islamic patsies are necessarily connected to the Afghanistan based mujaheddin of the 1980s. We know that nearly all powerful governments in the world from China to Russia to the U.S. to Israel to Britain to France (in Algeria for example) have Islamic terror cells who work for them. I think it would be a mistake to conflate all these cells under one rubric “Al Qaeda” as the propagandists for the ‘war on terror’ did. I think it is hard to gauge the extent to which U.S. support for certain theocrats in Afghanistan is demonstrably and directly relevant to 9/11. Most powerful governments supported theocrats during the Cold War. In his book “Dollars for Terror” Richard Labeviere has a chapter called “Islamism and Zionism: Complimentary Enemies” which details the utility of Islamic theocrats in the Zionist project. Furthermore, Bin Laden himself has been quoted on several occasions, including in CNN, denying any involvement in 9/11. So why should we assume that the alleged hijackers had anything to do with the Islamic patsies who were used by the Brzezinski faction in the Cold War and afterwards in Yugoslavia and other conflict theatres? Wayne Madsen has reported that according to British Intelligence the 9/11 hijacker cells were penetrated by Mossad.
You ask:
- Who disabled the US air defenses on 9/11?
- Who disabled the US chain of command on 9/11?
Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld
When it comes to answering these questions we have to then deal with Mr. Cheney and Mr. Rumsfeld both of whom are not Jewish and who are therefore falsely assumed to be ideologically different from the likes of Wolfowitz, Perle, Mr. and Mrs. Wurmser, Feith, Libby, etc. If you read Karen DeYoung’s biography of Colin Powell you’ll see that she notes that Powell (who wasn’t a neoconservative, “Israel firster” himself) used to refer to the “Cheney-Rumsfeld axis” as the “JINSA crowd” because both Cheney and Rumsfeld supported the Israel firsters’ position on most Middle East matters (Cheney was on the board of advisors of JINSA (the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs). Had the neocons not come along with grand proposals for invading and Lebanizing the Middle East Cheney and Rumsfeld would have been redundant Cold Warriors with no purpose in life. Plus, both had something to gain personally from the 9/11 wars. The fact that they had something to gain personally doesn’t mean that Cheney and Rumsfeld represented traditional U.S. imperial interests and weren’t pursing a Likudnik agenda. It just means that they were opportunists who jumped at the chance given to them by the “Israel firsters” to wage wars which they could benefit from. Rumsfeld in particular wanted to test his unconventional military strategies. As Dr. Sniegoski writes in his excellent history of the neocons:
“The neocon Iraq policy provided him [Rumsfeld] with the type of war to demonstrate the merits of his military thinking…In a mutually beneficial symbiotic relationship, the neocons praised and supported Rumsfeld, while Rumsfeld enabled the neocons to play a fundamental role in shaping foreign policy.”
Karen Kwiatkowski’s testimony suggests that the Pentagon had effectively morphed into an embassy for Likudnik foreign policy crystallizing most transparently in the Office_of_Special_Plans in 2002. The likes of Feith and Wolfowitz filled Pentagon offices full of “Israel firsters” from think tanks such as the American Enterprise Institute and the Washington Institute for Near East Affairs. So when we’re talking of the “chain of command” the unconventional operation and priorities of the Pentagon which I’ve mentioned should be considered.
You ask: Who destroyed the WTC buildings?
This is the million dollar question. I’m sure you know more about this than me. I’m not claiming to be an expert on every facet of 9/11 studies. Indeed it was Prof. X’s immediate, expedient, dismissal of a facet of 9/11 Studies which I’ve focused on that irked me. We all need to do our bit and then put our conclusions out there for others to read.
I think my attempt to get people to seriously think about who had a motive to do 9/11 and who benefitted from 9/11 is of some use. These are the sorts of questions any detective would ask. I hope more will engage with the evidence linking the State of Israel with the actual events of 9/11 which I’ve drawn attention to as well.
I listed a number of topics that imply Israeli fingerprints being on the 9/11 incident in a previous email. I adumbrated the following: “the dancing Israelis, the art students, Larry Silverstein’s Israelcentrism, the Likudnik nature of the neoconservative cabal, Mohamed Atta speaking Hebrew, British Intelligence reports that the 9/11 hijacker cells were Israeli run, recent reports that Mossad agent Mike Harari boasted about planning 9/11.”
Prof. Y characterized this evidence implicating Israel with 9/11 as “circumstantial, but it is at this point strong circumstantial evidence” he added ”Josh has listed some of this evidence…there’s more.” I agree with Prof. Y that the evidence is best characterized as strong circumstantial evidence. We should remember that much of the evidence adduced by 9/11 researchers who are not hard scientists is often circumstantial, some of it strong and some of it weak. That reality makes my contribution similar to that of others’.
Prof. Y sent me some documents two days ago including one compelling article by Mark Gaffney about the former IDF paratrooper, Eddie Shalev, who gave Hani Hanjour good ratings as a pilot even though all other instructors had deemed him to be a shoddy pilot. He also sent me a document pertaining to the Israeli “art student” spy ring. He also sent me information to do with Israeli security companies at airports. I think there is indeed strong circumstantial evidence linking 9/11 and the State of Israel.
[The emailer had claimed that without providing "actual" evidence of Israeli involvement in 9/11 I was only hurting the 9/11 truth movement]
I think the evidence I have directed you to is “actual” rather than virtual evidence. I am attempting to ascertain whether or not a Likudnik faction might have instigated 9/11. One is often forced to start with the circumstantial evidence first in such a line of inquiry. This is what researchers do with the Saudi dimension or Pakistani dimension of 9/11. Are researchers of the Saudi dimension of 9/11 or Pakistani dimension of 9/11 ”simply hurting the 9/11 truth movement” when they invoke circumstantial evidence? It seems even more necessary to explore and make room for evidence pertaining to the Israeli dimension of 9/11 because the State of Israel clearly had agents shaping foreign policy within the Bush administration and working throughout the North American media unlike the Saudis (other than overemphasized Bush family connections) and Pakistanis. It must be acknowledged by 9/11 skeptics that the Likudnik faction is one obvious beneficiary of 9/11.
I think I am barking up the right tree and if it weren’t for the pervasive fear of being called anti-Semitic more would be joining those of us who acknowledge the Israeli dimension of 9/11. If it hurts a “movement” to speak the truth then that movement ought to consider abandoning the word “truth” from its sobriquet.
I posted this on 9/11 Blogger in response to those who felt it was wrong for me to emphasize the reality that Israel’s fingerprints are all over 9/11 during an academic Skype conference I participated in at McMaster University:
Firstly, it is not anti-Semitic to indict agents of the Israeli government anymore than it was anti-Afrikaner to indict agents of the racist government in apartheid South Africa or anti-German to indict Nazis during WWII. If viewers of the You Tube video fail to fathom this elementary point then I can hardly be blamed for such ignorance.
If you had bothered to watch the rest of this video you would have seen that the next time I was provided with an opportunity to speak I began to elaborate on my irrefutable contention that the fingerprints of elements within the Israeli government are all over 9/11.
According to Israeli media source Haaretz Larry Silverstein and Benjamin Netanyahu were such close friends that they spoke on the phone every Sunday
I mentioned for example Larry Silverstein’s close relationship with Netanyahu. I mentioned the Mossad agents apprehended after dubious activity in NYC on 9/11. I provided an historical context by partially adumbrating Israel’s extensive history of false-flag terrorism. I mentioned the Likudnik inclination of many neocons. I then went on to say that I wasn’t talking about all people in Israel but only certain elements who support Likudnik reordering of the Middle Eastern ensemble. I also affirmed that I wasn’t claiming that I had full evidence that Israeli agents were behind 9/11. I was merely trying to include what I’ve studied about the neoconservative movement, Israel, and 9/11 in the discussion.
I recommend you read ex-CIA asset Susan Lindaur’s recent testimony in which she provides evidence that some affiliates of the CIA were aware of Mossad involvement in 9/11.
I refuse to deny the documentary record out of fear that the National Post’s Jonathan Kay might exploit historic Jewish suffering and label me an anti-Semite. Again, I cannot be blamed for others’ ignorance.
If other scholars haven’t had the time or will to investigate or acknowledge the Israeli aspect of 9/11 then that is up to them. I’ve done my homework on this issue and refuse to shy away from mentioning the documentary record out of fear that Jonathan Kay (who is a neocon himself) will criticize me.
One owes it to oneself to read the scholarship of James Petras – who mentions the Israeli dimension of 9/11 in his books. He is one of many credible scholars who have taken the inexpedient decision to expose the Likudnik dimension of the lies and crimes of 9/11 and the fraudulent war on terror.
There are many other professors including Walt and Mearsheimer who have argued that most neocons were “Israel firsters” and that the attack on Iraq served Israel’s interests rather than the interests of Big Oil. The University of Chicago and Harvard professors wrote in this seminal piece in the London Review of Books “Pressure from Israel and the Lobby was not the only factor behind the decision to attack Iraq in March 2003, but it was critical. Some Americans believe that this was a war for oil, but there is hardly any direct evidence to support this claim. Instead, the war was motivated in good part by a desire to make Israel more secure.”Furthermore, Dr. Kevin Barrett has done some groundbreaking work on this issue which seldom gets the recognition it deserves. Jonathan Cook’s “Israel and the Clash of Civilizations” is worth consulting with too. I think this scholarship should be considered when we discuss the events of 9/11 because the Lebanization of Iraq could not have happened without 9/11. I am not claiming that I have proof Likudniks did 9/11 but I do claim that Likudnik fingerprints are all over 9/11. I think those who really aspire to find out who orchestrated 9/11 should contemplate the vast literature which suggests that the Global War on Terror was primarily a construct of a Likudnik faction which used the political tactic of entryism to guide Republican Middle East policy towards what they perceived were Israel’s interests. In any investigation the first question which should be asked is: cui bono?
I also posted this on 9/11 Blogger: 
Naomi Klein author of "The Shock Doctrine" argues that the "Likudisation of the world is the real legacy of 9/11"
Naomi Klein author of "The Shock Doctrine" argues that the "Likudisation of the world is the real legacy of 9/11"
I’m merely attempting to keep the Likudnik faction on the suspects list as we move into the important period of the 10th anniversary of 9/11. The contention that “Israel’s fingerprints are all over 9/11″ seems irrefutable to me. I would like to see the individuals who constitute the Likudnik faction brought before a court of law. They are innocent until proven guilty nonetheless.
I found this interesting analysis of the post 9/11 world order by Naomi Klein yesterday. She opines:
“Common wisdom has it that after 9/11, a new era of geo-politics was ushered in, defined by what is usually called the Bush doctrine: pre-emptive wars, attacks on terrorist infrastructure (read: entire countries), an insistence that all the enemy understands is force. In fact, it would be more accurate to call this rigid worldview the Likud doctrine. What happened on September 11 2001 is that the Likud doctrine, previously targeted against Palestinians, was picked up by the most powerful nation on earth and applied on a global scale. Call it the Likudisation of the world: the real legacy of 9/11.
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