Similar assertions concerning WikiLeaks' treatment of Syria and Israel had already appeared by autumn 2017, suggesting alleged biases at the publication were to become a new theme in the press. In December 2010, Haaretz published a report describing allegations that Assange had entered a secret agreement with Israel not to publish documents damaging to Israeli interests.
The liberal Israeli daily cited bloggers and "disgruntled Wikileaks volunteers" as quoted in an Arabic-language online publication. Al Haqiqa, the Arabic magazine, asserted that Assange had removed or destroyed documents related to Israel's 2006 and 2008-09 attacks on Gaza.
As in the case of Russia, WikiLeaks' available record on Syria and Israel was air-brushed out of the picture in both cases. The Gaza invasions figure prominently in the Israel-related documents examined here.
Consortium News examined the Russia case last autumn as part of this ongoing series. In this installment of "The Revelations of WikiLeaks" CN explores its releases on Israel and Syria. WikiLeaks has published extensive and often revealing diplomatic traffic between the U.S. and Israel covering the years 2007 to 2015.
WikiLeaks and Israel
The WikiLeaks releases of diplomatic cables related to Israel cover a nine-year period, 2007-15, and derive primarily from traffic between Washington and the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv. These cables, and in key cases email messages, are now part of the Public Library of U.S. Diplomacy. They reveal a consistent pattern in U.S.-Israeli diplomatic relations: Accommodation and acquiescence to Israeli preferences and intentions are the default American position, even when Israel is in contravention of international law or humanitarian norms.
At issue during the years spanned in the cables were Israel's political and military strategies in the West Bank and Gaza, the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and the nature of Iran's nuclear programs.
Even when Israeli officials advise American diplomats that they intended to use force against Palestinian civilians, or sabotage the Gaza and West Bank economies, the U.S. response in the cables is never more than timid criticism. Altogether, the WikiLeaks releases make plain the extraordinary extent of Israel's influence over American officials and legislators and their collusion as Israel continually resorts to violence against Palestinians.
Protest against Israel's Gaza Blockade and attack on humanitarian flotilla, Melbourne, Australia, June 5, 2010.
(Image by (Takver via flickr)) Details DMCA
A December 2009 cable from the Tel Aviv embassy, marked secret, followed by a few months Israel's extremely violent invasion of Gaza in 2008-09. It recounts an extensive Israeli briefing of a U.S. congressional delegation, in which an Israeli general declares Israeli Defense Forces' plans to attack urban areas in "the next battle," ignoring restrictions against attacks targeting civilians.
After border skirmishes in 2010 and 2011, the I.D.F mounted a series of violent attacks in Gaza in 2012. A full-scale war ensued in 2014. The 50-day campaign took the lives of at least 1,500 civilians, according to the U.N.'s office of humanitarian affairs.
As described in the cable, the briefing also covered U.S.-Israeli cooperation on missile defense, cyber warfare, and the Iran question. Lt. General Gabi Ashkenazi also took the occasion to thank the House Armed Services Committee for its support of the Israeli cause. Committee Chairman Ike Skelton, a Missouri Democrat, was part of the delegation. This cable can be found here.
Many cables reveal Israel's calculations vis-Ã -vis the relative strengths of the Palestinian Authority, Fatah (the largest party in the Palestine Liberation Organization), and Hamas, which governed in Gaza since it won Palestinian legislative elections in 2006. Several cables dated 2007 report that Benjamin Netanyahu and Tzipi Livni, opposition leader and foreign minister respectively at this time, are dismissive of the Palestinian Authority as ineffectual even as Israel was negotiating with it. They instead urged Washington to bring down the Hamas government by way of an "economic squeeze."
Here is an extract from a lengthy cable sent from the embassy in Tel Aviv on November 3, 2008. It went to the secretary of state (Condoleeza Rice at the time), the Treasury Department, the American Embassy in Cairo, and unnamed American officials in Jerusalem. The cable is marked "Secret" and is not signed.
It explains Israel's strategy of sabotaging the Gazan economy to undermine Hamas's authority and describes Israel's refusal to guarantee mandated monthly transfers of Palestinian funds to the Palestinian Authority -- in effect treating liquidity as a security matter and a means to exert control over the Palestinian government in Ramallah, at this time Israel's partner in negotiations for an Israeli-Palestinian settlement:
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