"Israel or Else" Is Not America First
An Open Letter to the President of the United States of America
Dear Mr. President,
On October 10, 2023, three days after the exceptionally brutal attack on the state of Israel I wrote the following
The incremental encroachment on the part of the Israelis builds in the hearts of Arab-Palestinians as they watch their houses demolished and their property stolen one at a time. At some point the Hamas take advantage of the build up, attack the Israelis, and the Israelis retaliate causing far more damage…. The world looks on with horror. The bitter sentiment felt on the part of the Arab-Palestinians is replaced with deep sorrow, and they resign themselves to their fate, while the Israelis continue their encroachment until the next build-up and the cycle repeats itself. My sympathy goes out to the Arab and Jewish Palestinians who are caught between the greed of the Israeli state and the wrath of Hamas.
My intent was to wash my hands of what I knew would follow and return to my work. After all, what power have I, but to speak out, encourage others to speak out, vote according to my conscience, and offer my service wherever possible — all things that I have done in the past, but to no avail. Now that we are on the brink of war with Iran, I feel compelled to speak out still again.
The conflict between the Arabs and Jews in the former British protectorate of Palestine has existed since before I was born in 1949. You and I probably both watched the movies Sound of Music, Exodus, and Ben Hur as teens, we probably both grew up with Jewish neighbors and friends, and likely held similar ideas regarding the state of Israel. Then too, I did not grow up in New York City, and I was not raised as a political Democrat. No, I grew up in the Midwest, in America’s heartland, where you find a very large number of your supporters today. Both my parents voted Republican.
Last year I called my younger brother and discovered that he voted for you in the last general election, as did I. It is my bet that many with whom I went to grade school voted for you as well. Unlike you and likely most of my childhood schoolmates, however, I also spent a third of my life overseas getting to know the language, culture, history, economy, and politics of eight nations on three continents where I learned that my strong support for Israel was largely misplaced. Indeed, Mr. President, the state of Israel has never been what we surely once both thought, and you continue to think, Israel to be.
This said, when you recognized the Israeli government’s claim to the Golan Heights and moved the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem I did not seek to interfere. In fact, unlike your predecessors in the Oval Office, you did what they said they would do, but never did. After all, the city of Jerusalem never became the international city-state that the United Nations had envisioned it to be. And, solidifying the international borders of the Israeli state could only help to stabilize the politics of the region in which our nation, for better or for worse, became so intensely involved after the Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, assumed control of the Suez Canal in protest over the Israeli state in 1956. Then too, I was less accommodating with your attempt to integrate the state of Israel into the international community of Arab States by normalizing diplomatic relationships between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan. Obviously it was not designed to resolve the conflict between Israel and the plight of Arab Palestinians living under Israeli state control and would be of little consequence on the peace front as a result. It was disingenuous, but still I remained “mostly quiet”.
Mr. President, the US Government’s relentless support for the state of Israel has alienated a vast swath of the Muslim world — some 20 percent of the world’s population — and has created important political division within the United States and the West in general.
We are foolish to believe that Israel’s “love” for America is anything but opportunistic. In general, Jews reject Jesus Christ as their messiah, and the only reason that Christian Holy sites on the West Bank and in East Jerusalem are threatened is because the state of Israel controls both.
In fact, the Islamic faith holds Jesus Christ in far higher esteem than does Judaism. Among Jews Christ is viewed as little more than a political rebel whose preaching led to political turmoil, the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 A.D., and the expulsion of Jews from Jerusalem in 135 A.D. In contrast, Muslims view Christ as a Holy prophet and uphold many of the miracles surrounding his presence on earth including the notion that he was born of the virgin Mary. You can read it in the Surah Maryam (19: 16-21) and the Surah Ali Imran (3: 33-53) of the Qur’an.
In short, the Christian Holy sites of the region are being held hostage by the Israeli state, and American Christians would squander our nation’s resources in its favor. It is ludicrous!
The United States of America provided asylum for many of the Jewish nation during Hitler’s persecution of Jewish and communist Europeans during Germany’s Third Reich. Furthermore, unlike any historical obligation that Germany might feel toward its former Jewish citizenry, we the American people owe the Jewish nation nothing that is not accorded any other citizen of the United States — namely, the right to believe and practice one’s faith in accordance with the laws of our great land.
The state of Israel’s behavior toward Arab Palestinians has been every much as horrific as Germany’s conduct toward its Jewish citizens under the reign of Adolf Hitler. Germany has never been an apartheid state for example! And, starvation, a technique used by the British empire in India — once its “Crown [colonial] Jewel” — to humble those it wished to subjugate on the Asian sub-continent, is now par for the course in Gaza. The only difference between Germany under Hitler and the state of Israel under its several prime ministers is the press coverage and cinematic propaganda that American Zionists and the Israeli government have created and promoted to make the Israeli state appear in a better light.
Now, I understand well your desire to prevent Iran from building a nuclear arsenal, but, unlike Iran that is a member state of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and has repeatedly agreed to nuclear inspections, Israel is not a signatory to the agreement, and has never agreed to an inspection of its own nuclear arsenal. The hypocrisy of the American government in this regard is not only blatant, but it greatly diminishes your own argument to compel Iran through the use of Israeli military force to whatever agreement the Iranian state eventually succumbs.
The goal of Israel is to see its neighbors either weak or in a state of chaos, and with the help of the United States government it has largely succeeded in this goal. One has only to look to Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon for chaos, and Jordan and Egypt for weakness. More chaos in the region is not what is needed! It is not in America’s best interest.
There is also good evidence that shows Israeli territorial ambitions to be much larger than the Occupied Territories. The work entitled “The Zionist Plan for the Middle East” by Oded Yinon — often called the Yinon Plan — is probably the most ambitious example of such aspirations.
Next to Ukraine into which we have poured many tens of billions of US dollars over the past few years, Israel is America’s largest recipient of foreign aid — what is on its face absurd, as Israel enjoys a standard of living above that of most OECD countries. Still, every year the American taxpayer subsidizes the Israeli state with some three billion US dollars! Now, I understand that three billion dollars is a teeny sliver of the US Government’s annual revenue, but our nation is in serious debt, and we should no more be supporting Israel’s military than that of NATO countries that do not pay their dues.
No, Mr. President, I do not support political terror by either state or non-state actors. Unfortunately, I can see no greater proponent of terror in the world than the state of Israel. Its very existence is disgusting to many. Mind you, Mr. President, I do not believe that Israel should be pushed into the sea, but the defense of Israel is simply not in our best interest.
Let Israel take care of Israel. It could not be treating its Arab neighbors any worse than it already is, and the resistance that it would face without our support would likely result in a far less pompous attitude and a much better chance at real negotiation — and this, rather than the strategy of attrition in which Israel has been engaged for the past several decades.
Mr. President, we would be much better off cultivating our friendships with the Arab nations of the region than nurturing the state of Israel. Yes, there are Arabs that do not like us, but not without good reason. This said, the Saudis, for example, are our friends. During the four years that I spent living and working in Saudi Arabia I met very few Saudis that expressed hatred toward America despite our staunch and foolish support for the state of Israel. No, Saudis are not Christians, and culturally speaking, they have no desire to entertain a Christian presence in their country. It is their country, however, not ours, and they are far more tolerant than most Americans realize.
Christianity, Judaism, and Islam all share the same God, Mr. President, but the state of Israel is not about sharing. It is better characterized by vengeance, greed, and deception. It is a bad political marriage, and it is time, Mr. President, that our nation seek separation.
In liberty,
Roddy A. Stegemann, First Hill, Seattle 98104
Author of Mount Cambitas - The Story of Real Money, “A Call for the Restoration of Monetary Order” (Parts I and II), the Substack series “Let’s End the Money Racket”.