The horrific
execution by police of an Australian woman in her pajamas that took
place last week in Minneapolis has again produced a torrent of criticism
over killings initiated by law enforcement in situations in which the
officers are in no way threatened. America has always been a violent
place relative to much of the rest of the world, but even so there has
been a noticeable shift in how, since the trauma of 9/11, some policemen
believe themselves to be superior to and detached from the society they
are supposed to be protecting.
And the public is
reciprocating, seeing the police frequently as a force that is no longer
there to serve the people and instead something that should be feared.
Even in the upper middle class predominantly white county that I live
in, residents not infrequently discuss the increasingly visible and
aggressive police presence. It is widely believed that arguing with cops
or showing even the slightest attitude in contacts with them is done at
one’s peril.
Even in low crime
parts of the country, the police are able to deploy fully armed and
equipped swat teams that are more military than civilian in their
threatening demeanor as well in the body armor and weapons they carry.
Many cities and counties now have surplus military armored vans for
crowd control even if they have no crowds. Armed drones are increasingly
becoming part of the law enforcement arsenal and it sometimes appears
as if the police are copying the military as a model of “how to do it.”
The various
levels of government that make up the United States seem to be preparing
for some kind of insurrection, which may indeed be the case somewhere
down the road if the frustrations of the public are not somehow dealt
with. But there is another factor that has, in my opinion, become a key
element in the militarization of the police in the United States. That
would be the role of the security organs of the state of Israel in
training American cops, a lucrative business that has developed since
9/11 and which inter alia gives the “students” a whole
different perspective on the connection of the police with those who are
being policed, making the relationship much more one of an occupier and
the occupied.
The engagement of
American police forces with Israeli security services began modestly
enough in the wake of 9/11. The panic response in the United States to a
major terrorist act led to a search for resources to confront what was
perceived as a new type of threat that normal law-and-order training did
not address.
Israel, which, in
its current occupation of much of Palestine and the Golan Heights as
well as former stints in Gaza, southern Lebanon and Sinai, admittedly
has considerable experience in dealing with the resistance to its
expansion manifested as what it describes as terrorism. Jewish
organizations in the United States dedicated to providing cover for
Israeli’s bad behavior, saw an opportunity to get their hooks into a
sizable and respected community within the U.S. that was ripe for
conversion to the Israeli point of view, so they began funding
“exchanges.”
Since 2002 there
have been hundreds of all-expenses-paid trips including officers from
every major American city as well as state and local police departments.
Some have been sponsored by the American Jewish Committee (AJC) and the
Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA). The
Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has also been directly funding trips
since 2008, explaining that “As a people living under constant threat
of attack, the Israelis are leading experts in security enforcement and
response strategies.” The intent? To “learn” and “draw from the latest
developments” so the American cops can “bring these methods back home to
implement in their communities.”
AIPAC has several pages in its website dedicated to security cooperation between the two countries. It asks
“Did you know? In May 2010, 50 retired Generals and Admirals wrote to President Obama, highlighting the value of U.S. Israeli cooperation.”
It goes on to cite an Alabama sheriff who enthuses that
“There is no other country [Israel] that shares the same values and overarching goal to allow others to live in peace.”
Regarding airport security, it also quotes a U.S. “security expert” who states
“We should move even closer to an Israeli model where there’s more engagement with passengers…We’ve just stated to do that at TSA…”
Indeed. That’s called profiling and pre-boarding interrogations.
Even the federal
government has gotten onto the Israel bandwagon, perhaps not a surprise
given the number of Israel Firsters in Congress. In 2003, the Department
of Homeland Security established a special Office of International
Affairs to “institutionalize the relationship between Israeli and
American security officials.” The New York City Police Department has a
branch in Israel and carries out frequent exchanges.
It should be
noted from the git-go that Israel is no more knowledgeable about
possible responses to acts of terror than is anyone else. The techniques
employed to create physical barriers, to develop sources for
intelligence gathering, and to train in tactical responses are quite
familiar to anyone who has studied modern-style terrorism since it
emerged in Western Europe in the 1970s.
Most countries
that have a high or even moderate risk level deriving from terrorists,
either domestic or foreign, have recruited and trained special police
and paramilitary forces that are familiar with the basic techniques and
are quite capable of responding. Ironically, even though the United
States government and local police forces have tended to look at the
“real pro” Israelis for guidance, state of the art resources for
learning about how to deal with terror are available right here at home.
JSOC has teams that are every bit as effective – and lethal – as
anything the Israelis can muster and the CIA and FBI together know far
more about terrorists and how they behave than do the ideologically
driven Mossad and Shin Beth.
The American
policemen who go on the “exchanges” are probably only dimly aware that
what they are being shown is part of Israel’s military justice system,
which has nothing to do with Israeli criminals, but instead is designed
to keep the lid on the millions of Palestinians who live in what has
become a virtual outdoor prison camp. It is an apartheid police state
that uses deadly force as a form of crowd control. And the Palestinian
former residents of the lands Israel now holds are the “terrorists” that
Israel is protecting itself against.
You can bet that
the American guests for their part clearly do not realize that they are
being trained as prison guards and you also can be sure that they never
catch so much as a glimpse of the 300 child prisoners that Israel continues to hold without charges.
Israel’s
reputation for “dealing with” terrorism has in any event been glamorized
by the Israel-friendly media and entertainment industry while also
being promoted by Jewish organizations. It has meant in practical terms
that many of the contract security firms operating at airports in the
United States and Europe are Israeli. They have also infiltrated state
Homeland Security agencies and corporate security in the U.S. Many of
the Israeli companies with offices in the United States work closely
with Mossad and might reasonably be considered arms of the Israeli
government.
Where Israel
really excels is in its willingness to kill large numbers of Arabs of
all ages and genders using the excuse that they are terrorists. It does
so with impunity because Israeli courts almost never hold the army and
police accountable for whatever they do. It might reasonably be
suggested that when American police officers go through their training
in Israel they acquire at least a bit of that attitude from their
instructors.
Recognizing that
Israel is not exactly a model to be emulated when it comes to the human
rights of its Palestinian victims, there is alternative viewpoint which
suggests that American law enforcement might just be learning the wrong
things when it travels to Israel. Amnesty International asks
“With Whom are Many U.S. Police Departments Training? With Chronic Human Rights Violator Israel.”
It notes that last August
when the Department of Justice documented numerous violations by the
Baltimore Police Department the report failed to mention that policemen
from that city had received training in Israel.
Amnesty makes clear what we are dealing with when our policemen are being trained –
“…military, security and police systems that have racked up documented human rights violations for years…carrying out extrajudicial executions and other unlawful killings, using ill treatment and torture (even against children). Suppression of freedom of expressions/association, including through government surveillance, and excessive use of force against peaceful protesters.”
And actually, it
is worse than that. The American visitors will be welcomed to
contemplate the Potemkin village miracle of a democratic, multicultural,
inclusive, clever Israel. They will not be allowed to see how the
soldiers training them, representatives of “the most moral army in the
world,” force Palestinian women to give birth at military checkpoints
and watch their babies die, shoot Palestinian teenagers as they are
running away for throwing stones, drag men and women out of their beds
and kill them while terrorizing their children and dragging them off to
jail during midnight raids.
Amnesty’s article documents many of the abuses by Israeli security forces and concludes that using
“Public or private funds spent to train our domestic police in Israel should concern all of us. Many of the abuses [in the U.S.] parallel violations by Israeli military, security and police officials.”
I would also add that the
training provided by JINSA, ADL and the AJC is also partly on the
American taxpayers’ dime as the organizations are all tax exempt.
Finally,
Israel’s ability to market its state sponsored brutality has even become
a form of light entertainment. A company in Israel called Caliber 3
that was set up by a reserve colonel in the Israeli army is offering
what has been described as a two hour “boot camp” counter-terrorism
experience. It includes a life size target consisting of a man in Arab
attire holding a cell phone. The mostly Jewish American audience ponders
if he should be shot, but the instructors eventually intervene and
declare that he does not quite meet the standard for being killed.
Visitors are also treated to simulations of Israeli commandos taking
down terrorists and can even shoot live rounds from a semi-automatic
weapon at a firing range. Ironically, the Caliber 3 gated compound camp
is located in the Gush Etzion settlement bloc on the West Bank, land
that was stolen from the Palestinians.
Featured image is from the author.
The original source of this article is The Unz Review
Copyright © Philip Giraldi, The Unz Review, 2017
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