In the latest development in the saga of Western countries’ support for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), the National Intelligence Council of the United States has ascribed “low confidence” to Israel’s claim that a small number of the organization’s staff members participated in Hamas’ surprise October 7 attack on Israel. The finding was reported this week in US media.
Israel’s claim that some 0.4% of UNRWA’s more than 30,000 employees were involved in the armed operation dominated headlines just days after the UN-backed International Court of Justice (ICJ) instructed Israel to take measures to prevent genocide in the besieged Gaza Strip. The accusation against UNRWA led the United States and more than a dozen Western allies to withdraw financial support for the agency, which is a lifeline for millions of Palestinian refugees.
But it now appears that decision may have been premature, with US intelligence experts publicly casting doubt on Israel’s incendiary claim. Journalist Dan Lazare joined Sputnik’s Political Misfits program Friday to discuss the fallout from the development and what it means for Americans’ trust in their own government.
“The US will appease Israel because at this point that alliance is stronger than NATO, and I just don't see the US breaking it,” said the author and political commentator, adding that “the Israeli assertions are difficult to back up.”
“I think that the US will go along [in undermining UNRWA],” Lazare said, despite the potentially embarrassing finding by US intelligence. “Ultimately the US is going to do whatever Israel wants it to do, and this is a classic case of the tail wagging the dog. Israel is an essential US ally and it's so essential that essentially the US defers to Israeli decisions.”
Host Michelle Witte agreed, claiming the United States’ lockstep subservience to Israel – even in apparent defiance of its own intelligence community – powerfully discredits the US government in the eyes of its own people.
“It has to have the effect of eroding confidence among the American people in the American government, in the American government speaking truth to its population,” said Witte. “Because we can see Israel keeps making these accusations, we keep acting on these accusations, and then they keep turning out to not be true.”
Many of the more outlandish Israeli assertions surrounding Hamas’ October 7 attack have also been undermined or debunked. Claims that Hamas fighters engaged in mass killing and beheading of Israeli babies were found to be based on unreliable testimony. That didn’t stop President Biden himself from falsely insisting he saw photos of the alleged atrocity.
Observers have long pointed out that the United States faces a crisis of confidence in its institutions, with approval ratings for everything from courts to Congress at record lows. The phenomenon has generated widespread cynicism, which occasionally even results in political violence. Witte claimed the United States’ backing of Israel – despite the repeated debunking of its rhetoric – can’t help but further damage faith in the US government.
“More and more people can see that and are interested in that and that has got to have an effect,” she insisted. “You know, we have all this hand-wringing, oh, faith in our institutions. Well, this is part of that reason, is part of that erosion, I would think.”
The poll suggests opposition to Israel is a mainstream sentiment in the United States, if not a majority position. But lest Americans think they live in a democracy, both major party candidates for the presidency express strong support for the longtime US ally.