"... “Don’t forget that the office of the Secretary of Defense [sees its role as to] ride herd on the uniformed personnel,” the Washington Institute for Near East Policy’s Patrick Clawson said. Part of their job "is to keep the uniformed military [from] speak[ing] out on policy issues.”
The suggestion is that Gates’s showing of high honor to the Israeli defense chief may have been a message to those specifically in the office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Central Command to, in essence, clam it. ......
...... At a joint Gates-Barak media appearance at the Pentatgon Tuesday, Israeli Channel 10’s Gil Tamari asked ... “Secretary Gates and Minister Barak, …. if you can just explain us, why do you host this press availability now?" Tamari asked. "Is it because this administration would like to portray a feeling of business as usual with the Israeli government when the general perception, as you well know, is that business is not so usual between Israel and the United States right now?“
“And … is the real perception of the Pentagon -- that, like [Centcom commander] General [David] Petraeus suggested, that the United States is paying a price with the life of American soldiers when Israel is not reaching peace with the Palestinians?” Tamari continued.
Gates jumped in to answer the second question.
“First of all, General Petraeus did not say that the lack of progress in the peace process is costing American lives,” Gates said. “And no one in this department, in or out of uniform, believes that.”
2 comments:
The Israeli occupation of Palestine wouldn't end until the American people will overthrow the Israeli occupation of Washington.
General Petraeus have tried to liberate the American people but was defeated.
Nothing Israel does costs the U.S. any, what's the phrase, "blood and treasure," let us say. Gates is a former analyst, so he should know: nothing is connected to anything else. The treacherous sinking of the U.S.S. Liberty was not connected to anything. The deaths of over 200 U.S. Marines who happened to be in Lebanon just after no one invaded and occupied the whole southern half of the country was in any case not connected to anything either. And no Muslim ever had Palestine in mind when he happened to find himself committing suicide in an airplane over New York or in Iraq shooting at Americans who had just removed the region's primary opponent of Israel. Life is hard; things just happen. No one is to blame. If anyone were to blame, it would be adversaries - that, after all, is what adversaries are for. But, in fact, no one is to blame. Stuff just happens.
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