But there are a lot of ‘controlled burns” going on in writing about this subject. The liberal or non neo Jews can’t just throw off the whole thing off on a few whacky neo Jews without examining their own faults.

All of us who have watched this aberration closely know that the jewish neos are a small segment of the jewish community.

But….there is more to the US-Israel issue than a few neocons.

There is the fact that a large segment of the jewish community believes that they somehow have a “right” to “dual loyalty” or a higher loyalty to Israel than the nation they actually live in and are citizens of simply because they are Jews. Without this widespread belief the neos couldn’t have gotten the foothold they have gotten in our government and policy and AIPAC couldn’t wield the power it does on congress.

The brave jews who point out the truth about the jewish neos Israel delusions then go on and ruin everything they just said by declaring their own fidelity to Israel. Evidently they still want the US to continue everything we are doing for Israel but with just a wee bit less violence.

The same could be said of the Cuban exile effect on US Cuban policy. The question of having or maintaining a loyalty to and lobbying for benefits and actions in behalf of a foreign country being a ‘right” of those who live in our country under the US “right to representation” is actually a perversion of our democratic tools and a fundemental problem that needs to be addressed.

And of course none of this would be possible without our corrupt congress and political system.

Everytime I hear a presidential candidate swear his fidelity to Israel and promise to use his office to spend American’s blood and money in behalf of Israel and the Jews I cringe.

As Klein notes, U.S. neoconservatives have a dual loyalty. But their second loyalty is not to Israel. It is to the Likud and its expansionist agenda. The neocons have contempt for the sensible majority of Israelis (and American Jews) who favor a just two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. They display this contempt often in their words and deeds. For example, the neocons have opposed the Israeli government when it took initiatives for peace–recall their opposition to Yitzhak Rabin in 1994-95 (leading to Rabin’s showdown with AIPAC’s leadership), and the more recent efforts of Bush administration neocons to prevent the Olmert government from negotiating with Syria.

So it is WRONG to accuse the neocons of loyalty to Israel. They have a far narrower loyalty, to Likud extremism.

Bless Joe Klein for calling the neocons to account for this ugly second loyalty.