Feith, it seems has some interesting
ties of his own, as reported in Arabic by
the Beirut newspaper as-Safir
yesterday, February 20, 2002. Writing up
the New York Times story for his
Arabic readers the Beirut paper's veteran
Washington correspondent, Hisham
Milhem, supplemented it with the
following information:
"What
the New York Times didn't say about the
background of Douglas Feith, the
person politically in charge of
implementing the plan, is that he is
among the most intense partisans of
Israel in the administration of
President Bush (right). He
opposed the Camp David Agreements
because they meant that Israel would
give up 'Judea and Samaria' as he
refers to the West Bank.
"He
claims that the Palestinians do not
constitute a people in the recognized
sense of the word, and that Jordan
should be their homeland. Feith rejects
what he considers the 'claims' of the
Arabs that the core of the Arab-Israeli
conflict is the Palestinians who have
no homeland. He claims, rather, that
inasmuch as the Arabs reject Zionism
that an Israeli withdrawal from the
occupied territories will not solve the
conflict.
"In
the eighties and nineties Feith
expressed criticism of any American
policies that could be interpreted as
pressure on Israel. One example of this
was his criticism of President Bush,
senior, when he withheld guarantees for
loans to Israel, and because his
administration put pressure on the
government of Itzhak Shamir to
participate in the Madrid Conference.
Feith advised Washington to demand that
the Arabs 'abandon the principle of
land for peace' claiming that this
principle will lead to the breakup of
Israel in stages.
"Feith
also demanded that the West Bank and
Gaza no longer be described as
representing 20 percent of Palestine as
delineated under the British Mandate,
because, he claimed, it is Jordan that
represents 80 percent of 'Palestine' in
accordance with the British
Mandate.
"Feith
rejected the Oslo, Hebron, and Wye
Plantation Agreements. He described
Oslo as an agreement that would lead to
unilateral Israeli concessions and
inflate Palestinian expectations.
Notably, he objected to the Hebron and
Wye River Agreements, despite the fact
that these agreements were signed by
Benjamin Netanyahu whom Feith
supports and to whom he has given
political counsel. Feith, together with
Richard Perle, a former Defense
Department official, are among the most
prominent supporters of Israel in
Washington. (He works currently as an
adviser to the Defense Department,
though he is not considered an employee
of it).
"Feith
and Perle prepared a political plan for
the new Israeli Prime Minister in 1996,
Benjamin Netanyahu. Feith formerly
worked with Perle in the Defense
Department. Among proposals tabled by
Feith and Perle were 'total withdrawal
from the peace process,' and a
reemphasis of Israeli sovereignty over
the West Bank and Gaza through a
rejection of the principle of 'land for
peace.'
"Feith
is considered one of the most prominent
supporters of an attack on Iraq and the
overthrow of the regime of Saddam
Hussein. He also calls for punitive
measures against Syria to compel it to
pull its military forces out of
Lebanon.
"Before
joining the Defense Department last
year, most of the work done by the
legal office founded by Feith in
Washington was limited to representing
Israeli companies and interests, in
particular representing Israeli
companies that manufacture Israeli
weapons, especially those that
undertake joint ventures with American
militiary aircraft and rocket
manufacturers.
"In
1989 Feith registered a consulting
company that he headed with the Justice
Department as an agent of the Turkish
government in order to strengthen
military ties between Washington and
Ankara. This step was interpreted in
the Turkish press, however, as of great
importance because it reinforced
Turkish relations with the 'Jewish
Lobby' in
Washington."