Mickey said:
SOS2008, if you can point me to a resource that shows US leadership in the creation of Israel, I would be thankful.
Also, I would like to know your view on Arab-Israeli conflict in the 20th century before 1948. How does that conflict relate to what you say is the "root" of Arab-Israeli conflict?
What was the UN working on in 1947?
Research on Truman (e.g., "Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel"
By Michael T Benson) who held a literal belief in the Bible (think Rapture) shows he was a factor in the U.S. role toward the creation of Israel as a nation state at the time Israel was formed (which had further been fueled by the unfortunate occurrence of the Holocaust and sympathy therefore). Though Wiki usually is considered a reliable and certainly the most up-to-date source, here are other sources:
U.S. support for Israel began when President Harry S. Truman extended U.S. recognition to the Jewish state immediately after its 1948 declaration of independence. Continued U.S. support for Israel has varied in form and intensity over time, but this support has remained a pillar of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East. U.S. support for Israel is based on several factors: a commitment to one of the few democratic states in the region, a need for stable allies, a sense of a shared Judeo-Christian religious tradition, and as a market for the products of the American defense industry.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/globalconnections/mideast/questions/uspolicy/
Sure efforts initiated by Zionists were originally championed by the British...until violence ensued, and sure a UN partition plan followed in hopes of alleviating the violence, but it was the U.S. that announced its recognition of Israel as a new nation--to be precise 11 minutes after Israel proclaimed statehood. And it has been the U.S. who has championed Israel ever since:
The US & Israel
Since the founding of a Jewish homeland in 1948, America's unique friendship with Israel has weathered war and crises. It is now drawing more public scrutiny than it has in a generation.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2001/1026/p1s1-uspo.html
Ultimately, however, something like the creation of a new nation state could not take place without support of the current world leader, hegemony, superpower (or whatever term preferred) and U.S. hegemony began during WWII.
Further on the issue of Arab-Israeli conflict before 1948 (e.g.,
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761588322/Arab-Israeli_Conflict.html
), as I've stated (maybe in another thread on the topic) historical movement of peoples in the region only show that the land belongs to no one people, so I prefer to discuss the present and possible solutions going forward. IMO the Palestinians must have their own country, which needs to be recognized just as Israel has been recognized.
For this to happen, the U.S. needs to understand Mideast culture and give up the notion that democracy, particularly modeled on the U.S. and western culture, is not the only acceptable form of government (among other things). But back to the topic of the thread, governments that are engaged usually become more moderate because they develop "skin in the game" and don't want to jeopardize that. Invasions such as that in 1982 tend to produce leaders like Nasrallah.
