- Yes, says Victor Ostrovsky, a former Israeli secret agent.
In a new book, By Way of Deception: A Devastating Insider's Portrait of
the Mossad, Mr. Ostrovsky says the Israelis had advance notice of the suicide
attack that killed 241 Marines in Beirut in October 1983 but withheld the
information from the United States in the hope that the attack would poison
American Arab relations.
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- The Israeli government is desperately trying to block
publication of the book, which also says the Israelis are "actively
spying, recruiting, organizing and carrying out covert activities mainly
in New York and Washington, which they refer to as their playground."
-
- Although it can hardly succeed and will probably backfire,
the censorship attempt enjoyed initial success in both the U.S. and Canada.
Obliging courts in both countries have ordered that the book be at least
temporarily suppressed When it comes to Israel, freedom of speech and of
the press is considerably less than total, even in America.
-
- Mr. Ostrovsky says Israeli agents heard he had written
the book and tried to bribe and threaten him to dissuade him from going
into print. He is now in hiding.
-
- More than 17,000 copies of By Way of Deception are in
print, and many reviewers have already received copies. If the book divulges
sensitive information, as the Israelis' lawyers say, it's too late to stop
other governments from getting it. The only purpose of the censorship is
to stop Americans from reading Mr. Ostrovsky's account of how Israel allowed
U.S. Marines to be slaughtered.
-
- Books are rarely suppressed in America (at least not
by direct government intervention), and by the time you read this, By Way
of Deception will almost certainly be unshackled. Then the Israelis will
have to either discredit the author or argue, as they did in the case of
the spy Jonathan Pollard, that the decision to let the Marines be killed
was a "rogue" action.
-
- Mr. Ostrovsky's allegations should be shocking. Letting
the troops of a benefactor nation be blown up in their own compound is
hardly the act of a "reliable ally," as Israel is said to be.
-
- But you have to wonder whether anyone will really be
shocked. The act would be consistent with a long pattern of reprehensible
Israeli behavior toward the U.S. Some of it has been widely publicized;
no doubt the largest part of it has never been discovered.
-
- If anyone ought to be stunned, it's the many pundits
who echo Israeli propaganda to the effect that Israel is America's only
valuable and trustworthy ally in the Middle East. If they mean what they
say, they should be publicly changing their minds, or at least demanding
a thorough investigation into Israeli conduct toward this country.
-
- Congress ought to be shocked, too, to the extent that
its all-out support for Israel has been sincere rather than venal and cowardly.
But how many of our elected representatives will dare, or care, to ask
tough questions about whether our ties to Israel have done serious damage
to this country's interests?
-
- Such questions are not only long overdue, they are especially
urgent right now, when the United States may be on the verge of a full-scale
war in the Middle East, and the Israel lobby is eager to see America launch
hostilities against Israel's chief enemy, Iraq.
-
- The path of least resistance is to say nothing, to go
on pretending that the interests of the U.S. and of Israel are virtually
identical, to keep repeating that Israel is our "reliable ally"
and "strategic asset." Any politician or journalist who says
otherwise, even for the good of America, does so at risk to his career.
That's why there is so little open debate on these matters. Even our press
isn't fully free.
-
- And now the Israeli government has mounted a direct attack
on press freedom in America itself. It will be instructive to see whether
the press corps goes on acting unshocked.
-
- Joseph Sobran is a nationally syndicated columnist who
now maintains a Website at http://www.sobran.com.
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