Notorious
war hawk John Bolton – who has long been vying for a position in
Trump’s administration – has been especially eager to work with a
president with minimal foreign policy knowledge or experience,
allowing him maximum effect in achieving his policy goals.
by
Whitney Webb
Part
2 - Freelancing for Israel
Though
the domestic reaction to Bolton’s appointment was rather mixed, top
ministers of the right-wing Israeli government lavished praise upon
the soon-to-be National Security Adviser, calling him “one of
the most outstanding” allies to Israel in U.S. politics, and a
“true friend” to the Jewish state who brings “great
experience and original thinking” to “the most sympathetic
administration toward Israel of all time.”
Indeed,
Bolton’s ties to Israel are as deep as they are long-standing —
so deep that some have posited that his commitment to extreme Zionism
has led him to betray the national interest of his own country on
more than one occasion.
For
instance, Danny Gillerman, the former Israeli ambassador to the UN,
recently noted that Bolton, when serving in the Bush administration,
was prone to “direct fire on his own forces,” — i.e.,
the U.S. government — in order to advance the goals of the Israeli
government. Gillerman, speaking on the Israeli radio program Galei
Tzahal this past Sunday, stated: “[W]hen the State Department —
then headed by Condoleezza Rice, who wasn’t so friendly to Israel
even though the Bush Administration was very friendly — was about
to either make a decision, or not abstain, or not veto, or to advance
something that was against us [Israel], Bolton would call me, and he
would say ‘Danny, you’ve got to call the prime minister right
now, in order for him to phone the president to stop this.'”
In
addition, Bolton garnered a reputation – as well as the ire of
State Department officials at the time – for violating State
Department protocol by acting unilaterally in matters of diplomacy to
negotiate privately in Israel. The New York Times reported in 2005
that Bolton traveled to Israel without the required State Department
clearance in 2003 and 2004 in a direct effort to undermine
then-Secretary of State Colin Powell. As journalist Gareth Porter
noted: “[A]t the very moment that Powell was saying
administration policy was not to attack Iran, Bolton was working with
the Israelis to lay the groundwork for just such a war.”
Bolton’s
numerous private and unannounced visits to Israel entailed meetings
with officials of Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, including
Meir Dagan, then Mossad’s director.
Despite
his flagrant violations of government rules, Bolton remained the main
liaison between the U.S. and Israeli governments under Bush.
Bolton
has pressured Israeli officials to attack Iran even when calling for
such an attack was not the U.S. government’s position. According to
Shaul Mofaz, former Israeli defense minister, Bolton “tried to
convince me that Israel needs to attack Iran,” which Mofaz
recently asserted was not “a smart move – not on the part of
the Americans today or anyone else until the threat is real.”
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