MUST READ — Mixed Signals from Moscow: Putin’s Russia, Israel and the Middle East

via Non-Aligned Media
by Brandon Martinez
Sep 26, 2015

We have been hearing loud assertions of Russian benevolence towards the Arab world for some time, usually emanating from certain dogmatic quarters of anti-Zionist, anti-imperialist circles on the web.

These analysts see themselves as top class mind readers, tapping into the brain of Vladimir Putin and interpreting his every geopolitical move in a positive manner, no matter how ugly or duplicitous it may appear to be on the surface.

Putin is playing a master class chess match against the New World Order, these partisan analysts say, ignoring or downplaying anything that doesn’t conform to their Russophilic talking points.

Putin is a super secret anti-Zionist who will ‘checkmate’ Israel any day now, these dogmatists theorize with confidence, without providing a tangible piece of evidence that this is true.

Putin is a Pragmatist, Not an Anti-Zionist

Russia under Putin’s leadership has pursued a delicate balance between ideological support as well as economic and military cooperation with Israel on the one hand, and cashing in on lucrative oil, gas, nuclear energy and military contracts with several Arab/Muslim states on the other.

Spellbound Putin supporters point to the ex-KGB strongman’s whimpered public statements in support of a “Palestinian state” as evidence that he’s an anti-Zionist.[1] These lackluster analysts knowingly fail to point out that such rhetoric from the Kremlin is completely offset by Putin’s much more forthright and unequivocal proclamations in support of Israel in its current configuration.

During a meeting with a delegation of Israeli and Russian Jewish religious leaders in July 2014, Putin said he identifies with and supports the “struggle of Israel” against the native Arabs whose land and resources have been consistently usurped by European and Russian Jews who mass migrated to Palestine and then took much of it over through violence and terrorism in 1948. One rabbi at the meeting ‘blessed’ Putin’s leadership in Russia, saying it was the ‘will of god.’ Putin told the rabbis that he is a “true friend of Israel” and of its extremist prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.[2]

Putin has described Israel as part of the “Russian world” because 15 percent of its population is of Russian origin.[3] Despite living in Israel, many of these Russian-Israelis vote in Russian elections, and a good number of them cast their ballot for Putin.[4] At a 2011 dialogue conference featuring organizations representing the major religious and ethnic groups in Russia, Putin stated that Israel is “a special state to us” because it is “practically a Russian-speaking country.”[5] Russian-speaking Israelis form the base of the ultra-Zionist Yisrael Beiteinu political party[6], headed by Israel’s former foreign affairs minister Avigdor Lieberman who recently called for “disloyal” Arab citizens of Israel to be “beheaded.”[7]

During a 2013 joint press conference, Putin and Netanyahu both affirmed that ties between Russia and Israel are getting ‘stronger and stronger.’[8] Putin said that “our relationship with Israel is both friendly and mutually beneficial.” He stressed that Russia and Israel cooperate in a “wide variety of areas,” including political, cultural, economic and military. He proudly noted that under his watch the Russian city of Gelendzhik was twinned with the Israeli city of Netanya.

Russia has fuelled Israel’s war economy, purchasing more than $550 million of Israeli drones since Putin became president.[9] In 2010, Russia and Israel signed a five-year military contract that boosted “military ties between the two nations to help them fight common threats, such as terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.”[10] Increased cooperation and information sharing between Russian and Israeli intelligence services was one result of the agreement.

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October 4, 2015 | Categories: co-opting and/or destabilization, Iran, Israel, Palestine, Russia, Syria, tyranny, war | Tags: Holocaust, Zionism | Leave a comment