The U.S.-Israel Relationship Is One Thing, But The GOP-Netanyahu Relationship Is Something Entirely Different

I was born the same year as Israel and I grew up committed and proud of the socialist-run Jewish state. Watching the Sacha Baron Cohen Netflix mini-series, The Spy, I remembered it-- or at least the conclusion of it-- vividly, in real time, when I was getting ready to graduate high school and go to college. The pictures of Eli Cohen hanging in Damascus covered in Arabic placards were seared into my memory and shocked when when they appeared in the TV show over the credits. Too real. That Israel is long gone-- no longer a heroic David facing Goliath but more like an oppressive, fascist apartheid state that makes me feel shame for once having wanted to go there and join their military.





On Tuesday, Trump's first Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, was interviewed for 90 minutes at Harvard, as part of the American Secretaries of State Project, by a distinguished panel of academics. According to the Harvard Gazette, Tillerson "called Netanyahu 'an extraordinarily skilled' politician and diplomat, albeit 'a bit Machiavellian,' who forges good and 'useful' relationships with leaders and nations he anticipates he’ll need at a future time.

Tillerson said despite Israel’s closeness with the U.S., “In dealing with Bibi, it’s always useful to carry a healthy amount of skepticism in your discussions with him,” recounting that Israel would share "misinformation" to persuade the U.S. of something if necessary.

“They did that with the president on a couple of occasions, to persuade him that ‘We’re the good guys, they’re the bad guys.’ We later exposed it to the president so he understood, ‘You’ve been played,’” said Tillerson. “It bothers me that an ally that’s that close and important to us would do that to us.”

When he entered office, Tillerson, who had deep familiarity with leaders and issues in the Middle East, including conditions surrounding the Israel/Palestine peace negotiations, said he thought there was a chance-- finally-- for peace.

“I did believe that we were at a moment in time where perhaps we could chart a way where the Arab world could support an outcome that the Palestinians might not think was perfect-- and in the past, if it wasn’t perfect, it didn’t happen-- but with enough encouragement, pressure from the Arab world, that we could get it close enough that the Palestinians would finally agree,” he said. “And in my view, it was a two-state solution.”

But his plans were hampered by a frosty relationship with President Trump, who solicited foreign policy advice from an array of outside sources and delegated several key portions of the portfolio, like drafting an Israeli/Palestinian peace accord, to his son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

So, in the end, Tillerson took a back seat on most issues involving the Middle East and served as an informal counselor, offering his input “to help them identify obstacles or gaps to the [peace] plan to give it the highest chance of success,” he said.

So far there are 3 Republicans competing take on Democratic Senator Tina Smith in 2020, a far right paintball store owner (Forest Hyatt), composer Rob Barrett and recently defeated Republican Congressman Jason Lewis. Lewis seems to be making an unusual bet. Last year he was defeated by a mediocre Democratic candidate, Angie Craig. His old congressional district (MN-02) has a PVI of R+2, much easier for a Republican than the D+1 PVI for Minnesota statewide. The vast majority of votes in the district come out of Dakota County, which, like most of the Minnesota suburbs, has turned into a Democratic bastion. Last year Amy Klobuchar won it with 61.3%. In the gubernatorial race, Tim Walz won it with 53.9% and in her own race, Tina Smith took the county with 52.9%. Dakota performed at a D+11 level for Angie Craig against Lewis and he lost the district 177,958 (52.8%) to 159,344 (47.2%). If he couldn't win a Republican-leaning district how does he think he's going to win a Democratic-leaning state? Especially with the detested Trump-- minus 14 points approval statewide-- at the top of the ticket?

Yesterday, Lewis, a former Hate Talk radio host, made news back home when tapes of him talking about the Republican Party's relationship with Israel surfaced. The topic was touchy one: "dual loyalties." He said that support for Israel was based on a "very strong American Jewish lobby" (AIPAC), a position that conservatives always label as anti-Semitic.

Lewis, who also argued that the Israel lobby controlled the Republican Party, said in a February 2013 radio show that many in the party viewed the country as the "51st state." He claimed policymakers in President George W. Bush's administration, including former UN Ambassador John Bolton, were dual citizens of Israel and the United States. (Bolton, who was fired last week by President Donald Trump, is neither Jewish, nor is he a citizen of Israel.)





"You've got a number of dual citizens, by the way, citizens of Israel and citizens of the United States serving in government," Lewis said. "In any other country that might be seen as a problem, but it's not here because of that special relationship."

"John Bolton's a dual citizen for instance of Israel and America," Lewis added later. "There's no question that there are a number in-- during the Bush years-- there were a number of dual citizens, citizens of Israel, citizens of America who were making policy."

Lewis made his comments during the confirmation process of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who faced criticism for his use of the phrase "Jewish lobby" during an interview in 2006 to describe the lobbying power of pro-Israel groups. Lewis defended Hagel's comments, adding that Republicans knew they would lose money from "AIPAC or Jewish Americans or Sheldon Adelson" if they voted for Hagel's confirmation.

Asked for comment, Lewis blamed the focus on his past commentary on his opponents and "pawns in the partisan media." He called the scrutiny "pathetic" and a "worn-out playbook of attacking my 25-year career as a political commentator-- which naturally meant asking rhetorical questions, challenging audiences, playing devil's advocate and seeing both sides of every issue."

But on the substance of his views on Israel he drew a contrast between his criticism in 2013 and his voting record, during his one term in the US House of Representatives, saying "as my voting record clearly demonstrates, these are not my views about American support for Israel, period." His campaign also forwarded along a fact sheet on his votes titled: Congressman Jason Lewis & the 115th Congress: Supporting the Israeli/U.S. Relationship.

Lewis also pivoted to criticize Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar saying she has "genuinely anti-Israel views." Omar faced widespread condemnation, including from many fellow Democrats, earlier this year for comments similar to those Lewis made on his show... [At the time, he had accused Ilhan] of "anti-Semitic rants" and "throwing our foreign allies under the bus," adding in a radio interview in early September, "I don't think the Jewish community is happy with Ilhan Omar at all. They've got every reason to be upset."

...Lewis said on his radio show in 2013 he was speaking out on the issue because he believed the Republican Party was controlled by the Israel lobby.

"One of the reasons that I'm speaking out on this particular issue is not because I'm a big fan of Chuck Hagel," Lewis said. "It's not because I think that the Israeli lobby controls the country. There are plenty of Democrats or liberals that oppose them, but they do have, they do control of the Republican Party right now. The Republican Party is essentially a neo-conservative party that believes on unending support for Israel. A blind loyalty towards Israel is the linchpin of being a good Republican. And when you get those sort of dual loyalties, what happens if it's not in America's best interest?"





"I don't think the Jewish lobby, the Israeli lobby controls America because there are plenty of opponents," he later added. "I do believe, as I said, they are controlling the Republican party."





Lewis later speculated that Republicans knew they would lose money from prominent Jewish organizations for supporting Hagel.

"I think Lindsey Graham and John McCain and every Republican, including Ted Cruz, know exactly how much money they will lose if they support Chuck Hagel from AIPAC or Jewish Americans or Sheldon Adelson for that matter," Lewis added. "I don't think there's any doubt about that."





Lewis said he did not subscribe to the idea "Jewish cabal" controlled the country, but said neo-Conservatives viewed Israel as the 51st state.

"Look, let me be clear about what I'm saying here. Is this nation controlled by a Jewish cabal? The Jewish banker theory? Of course not," Lewis said. "Is the Republican Party, however, unduly influenced by AIPAC and the Israeli lobby? Of course they are. The neoconservatives in the Republican Party from John Bolton on down view Israel as a 51st state. And if you dare, dare not to support what Israel does, if you dare not support going to war with Iran-- so Israel is safe-- you are not only not a good Republican, not fit to be Secretary of Defense, you are an anti-Semite."





Speaking on why the Republican Party supported Israel so strongly, Lewis said one reason was because of the influence of supporters.

"Contrary to what the punditry class said, AIPAC and a very, very strong American Jewish lobby," he added. "I don't say that as a negative. I mean, I think they'd been very proficient and they're successful people and therefore they've got power in Washington."

How Good A Friend Is Israel? It Sure Isn't The 51st State, Even If Trump Treats It That Way

Obama did it least of all and Trump does it more than anyone-- but American presidents seem to cede U.S. Middle East policy to Israel. The U.S. has bribed-- billions worth of our tax dollars-- Egypt to play nicely with Israel and has destroyed-- more billions of our tax dollars-- the military capacity of Israel's two most implacable foes, Iraq and Syria. I watched the Netflix miniseries The Spy this week, the story of a spectacularly successful Mossad spy in Syria in the early-mid 1960s. I was graduating from high school when he was captured an executed and I remember the story very well. The miniseries was really good and filled in a lot of blanks for me. I remember having had very positive feelings about Israel and Mossad for having had a spy, Eli Cohen, at the top levels of the Syrian state for 3 years.

I was considerably less enthusiastic about Israel in 1967, a couple of years, after Cohn's execution, when 4 Israeli jets and torpedo boats bombed the shit out of the USS Liberty, a super-secret spy ship in international waters the eastern Mediterranean north of Egypt. 34 American sailors were killed in the attack. Israel lied about it and the U.S. government allowed them to get away with it, although Israel did pay about $12 million in compensation out of the billions in U.S. military aid it gets.

This week Daniel Lippman ran an interesting story in Politico about how Israel has been spying on Trump himself, as well as on his top aides. He wrote that "the U.S. government concluded within the past two years that Israel was most likely behind the placement of cellphone surveillance devices that were found near the White House and other sensitive locations around Washington, according to three former senior U.S. officials with knowledge of the matter. But unlike most other occasions when flagrant incidents of foreign spying have been discovered on American soil, the Trump administration did not rebuke the Israeli government, and there were no consequences for Israel’s behavior, one of the former officials said."

Based on a detailed forensic analysis, the FBI and other agencies working on the case felt confident that Israeli agents had placed the devices, according to the former officials, several of whom served in top intelligence and national security posts.

That analysis, one of the former officials said, is typically led by the FBI’s counterintelligence division and involves examining the devices so that they “tell you a little about their history, where the parts and pieces come from, how old are they, who had access to them, and that will help get you to what the origins are.” For these types of investigations, the bureau often leans on the National Security Agency and sometimes the CIA (DHS and the Secret Service played a supporting role in this specific investigation).

“It was pretty clear that the Israelis were responsible,” said a former senior intelligence official.

An Israeli Embassy spokesperson, Elad Strohmayer, denied that Israel placed the devices and said: “These allegations are absolute nonsense. Israel doesn’t conduct espionage operations in the United States, period.”

A senior Trump administration official said the administration doesn’t “comment on matters related to security or intelligence.” The FBI declined to comment, while DHS and the Secret Service didn’t respond to requests for comment.

After this story was published, Trump told reporters that he would find it "hard to believe" that the Israelis had placed the devices.

"I don't think the Israelis were spying on us," Trump said. "My relationship with Israel has been great... Anything is possible but I don't believe it."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also denied after publication that Israel was behind the devices. "We have a directive, I have a directive: No intelligence work in the United States, no spies," he said in a gaggle with reporters. "And it's vigorously implemented, without any exception. It [the report] is a complete fabrication, a complete fabrication."

But former officials with deep experience dealing with intelligence matters scoff at the Israeli claim-- a pro forma denial Israeli officials are also known to make in private to skeptical U.S. counterparts.

One former senior intelligence official noted that after the FBI and other agencies concluded that the Israelis were most likely responsible for the devices, the Trump administration took no action to punish or even privately scold the Israeli government.

“The reaction ... was very different than it would have been in the last administration,” this person said. “With the current administration, there are a different set of calculations in regard to addressing this.”

The former senior intelligence official criticized how the administration handled the matter, remarking on the striking difference from past administrations, which likely would have at a very minimum issued a démarche, or formal diplomatic reprimand, to the foreign government condemning its actions.

“I’m not aware of any accountability at all,” the former official said.

Beyond trying to intercept the private conversations of top officials-- prized information for any intelligence service-- foreign countries often will try to surveil their close associates as well. With the president, the former senior Trump administration official noted, that could include trying to listen in on the devices of the people he regularly communicates with, such as Steve Wynn, Sean Hannity and Rudy Giuliani.

“The people in that circle are heavily targeted,” the former Trump official said.

Another circle of surveillance targets includes people who regularly talk to Trump’s friends and informal advisers. Information obtained from any of these people “would be so valuable in a town that is like three degrees of separation like Kevin Bacon,” the former official added.

That’s true even for a close U.S. ally like Israel, which often seeks an edge in its diplomatic maneuvering with the United States.

“The Israelis are pretty aggressive” in their intelligence gathering operations, said a former senior intelligence official. “They’re all about protecting the security of the Israeli state and they do whatever they feel they have to to achieve that objective.”

So even though Trump has formed a warm relationship with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and made numerous policy moves favorable to the Israeli government-- such as moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, ripping up the Iran nuclear deal and heavily targeting Iran with sanctions-- Israel became a prime suspect in planting the devices.

While the Chinese, who have been regularly caught doing intelligence operations in the U.S., were also seen as potential suspects, they were determined as unlikely to have placed the devices based on a close analysis of the devices.

“You can often, depending upon the tradecraft of the people who put them in place, figure out who’s been accessing them to pull the data off the devices,” another former senior U.S. intelligence official explained.

Washington is awash in surveillance, and efforts of foreign entities to try to spy on administration officials and other top political figures are fairly common. But not many countries have the capability-- or the budget-- to plant the devices found in this most recent incident, which is another reason suspicion fell on Israel.

IMSI-catchers, which are often used by local police agencies to surveil criminals, can also be made by sophisticated hobbyists or by the Harris Corp., the manufacturer of StingRays, which cost more than $150,000 each, according to Vice News.

“The costs involved are really significant,” according to a former senior Trump administration official. “This is not an easy or ubiquitous practice.”

Among professionals, the Israeli intelligence services have an especially fearsome reputation. But they do sometimes make mistakes and are “not 10 feet tall like you see in the movies,” a former senior intelligence official noted.

In 2010, the secret covers of a Mossad hit team, some of whom had been posing as tennis players, were blown after almost 30 minutes of surveillance video was posted online of them going through a luxury Dubai hotel where they killed a top Hamas terrorist in his room.

Still, U.S. officials sometimes have been taken aback by Israel’s brazen spying. One former U.S. government official recalled his frequent concern that Israel knew about internal U.S. policy deliberations that were meant to be kept private.

“There were suspicions that they were listening in,” the former official said, based on his Israeli counterparts flaunting a level of detailed knowledge “that was hard to explain otherwise.”

“Sometimes it was sort of knowledge of our thinking. Occasionally there were some turns of phrase like language that as far as we knew had only appeared in drafts of speeches and never been actually used publicly, and then some Israeli official would repeat it back to us and say, ‘This would be really problematic if you were to say X,’” said the former official.

Back when the Obama administration was trying to jump-start negotiations with the Palestinians, for example, the Israelis were eager to get advance knowledge of the language being debated that would describe the terms of reference of the talks.

“They would have had interest in what language [President Barack] Obama or [Secretary of State John] Kerry or someone else was going to use and might indeed try to find a way to lobby for language they liked or against language that they didn’t like and so having knowledge of that could be advantageous for them,” the former official said.

“The Israelis are aggressive intelligence collectors, but they have sworn off spying on the U.S. at various points and it’s not surprising that such efforts continue,” said Daniel Benjamin, a former coordinator of counterterrorism at the Obama State Department and now director of the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth.

Benjamin, who emphasized that he was not aware of the FBI's investigation into the cell-phone spoofing, recalled once meeting with a former head of Mossad, the premier Israeli intelligence agency, when he was out of office. The first thing the former Mossad official told Benjamin was that Israel didn’t spy on the U.S.

“I just told him our conversation was over if he had such a low estimate of my intelligence,” Benjamin said.

Israeli officials often note in conversations with their American counterparts-- correctly-- that the U.S. regularly gathers intelligence on Israeli leaders.

As for Israel’s recent surveillance of the White House, one of the former senior U.S. intelligence officials acknowledged it raised security concerns but joked, “On the other hand, guess what we do in Tel Aviv?"

Especially interesting in light of the widespread rumors that Jeffrey Epstein was a Mossad operative. Since 1985, the U.S. has given Israel around $3 billion a year, something like $121 billion, since Israel became a nation. How much of that has been used against us?