US, Israel one and the same: Netanyahu
\nshiapost | July 21, 2011<\/p>\n
Israel\u2019s prime minister has addressed the pro-Israeli Christians\u2019 annual gathering in Washington, calling the United States and Israel one and the same.<\/p>\n
Benjamin Netanyahu spoke via video link to Christians United For Israel (CUFI), which gathered in their thousands to reassert allegiance to Tel Aviv, Israeli newspaper Ha\u2019aretz reported on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you support Israel, you don\u2019t have to choose between your interests and your values; you get both,\u201d he told the mostly-evangelical Christians in the gathering.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur enemies think that we are you, and that you are us. And you know something? They are absolutely right,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The US and Israel have each considered the other as its most strategic ally.<\/p>\n
Washington has invariably stonewalled the United Nations\u2019 actions against Tel Aviv. It also provides Tel Aviv with USD 3 billion in military aid each year.<\/p>\n
Israel\u2019s Ambassador to the US Michael Oren also addressed the attendees and admired the CUFI\u2019s backing of Israel.<\/p>\n
He compared the US support of Israel with British military officer Orde Wingate\u2019s training of Jewish paramilitary units before Israel\u2019s 1948 occupation of the Palestinian land.<\/p>\n
The military action, after which Israel proclaimed existence, forced 711,000 Palestinians to leave their homeland. The number of Palestinian refugees is put at over 4.6 million, according to 2008 estimates.<\/p>\n
In 1967 and during what became to be known as the Six-Day War, Tel Aviv went on to occupy and later annex the Palestinian territories of the West Bank, East al-Quds and Gaza Strip in a move not recognized by international laws.<\/p>\n
Israel carried out a so-called withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, but has been keeping the coastal sliver under recurrent attacks. An all-scale Israeli offensive on Gaza at the turn of 2009 killed more than 1,400 Palestinians. …source<\/a><\/p>\n