this post was submitted on 06 Dec 2025
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Manufacturing Consent
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When the media decides who you are rooting for.
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I keep saying that Israel isn't a proxy. It should be thought of more like the 51st state. Is Texas a US proxy? Obviously not!
Just because the US and Israel are two heads of the same entity doesn't mean that there aren't internal contradictions that manifest as differences in strategy and tactics. There's an ongoing intrafactional dispute over how the imperialist project should be carried out going forward as the empire transitions to a new phase - sort of like how we see Trump eroding US prominence by ending USAID, chaotically slapping tariffs on its own allies, completely throwing away the figleaf of international law, etc etc.
Playing nice with Russia isn't proof of much. There are bourgeois factions within the US that also want to bring Russia on-board for the encirclement of China, so the fact that Israel might also want to do the same thing shouldn't be surprising. Israel playing friendly with Russia isn't a betrayal of the US, but rather, a strategic ambiguity that leaves the door open for Russia to jump ship.
As for attacking Qatar, the US imposed a "peace plan" less than 3 weeks later which Israel immediately accepted. That doesn't look like Israel calling the shots, nor does it look like Israel is a proxy. They look like co-equal partners that sometimes disagree, but ultimately can unify when they need to for the sake of their overall agenda.
My bad I misunderstood what you meant. But the "51th state" narrative is completely false too. In fact it's literally the newest Israeli propaganda, since their "we are doing the dirty work for the US" narrative fell apart.
MondoWeiss - The Shift: 50 States, One Israel
This isn't entirely false but Israel and the US have very different goals. Israel doesn't abide by US weapon transfer laws, has its own legal system, and most importantly contrary to Ukraine, Israel gets their weapons for free with a direct full cash donation.
The way to make Israel part of the US is to make it reliant on the US is by debt-trapping it like the US debt-traps itself. But the US doesn't do that, because Israel refuses to be tethered to the US. It just wants free weapons... and somehow gets it!.
The US is in the position of power but is giving away all its cards for free.
The US let Israel bomb Qatar and knew Israel was going to do it.
The peace plan being Israel taking half the Gaza strip and getting all their captives back. And then continuously violating it. Israel clearly just did a PR stunt and got everything they wanted out of it. Even China and Russia bowing to Israel and handing Israel half of Gaza at the UNSC. And Israel is already moving bombing Lebanon, invading Syria, and very likely pulling the US into another Iran war soon.
To be clear, Israel doesn't fully controll the US. There are many different lobbies in the US. Healthcare, OPEC, Agro, Israel, etc. But all Israel's power revolves around a single topic which most other lobbies don't care about. So Israel can easily get their way most of the time. That said, when they start touching the other lobbies, especially the OPEC as Israel did in Qatar, we start seeing pushback.
But that gets to the crux of my point. The US doesn't support Israel out of self-interest. It supports Israel until Israel starts harming the self-interest of the US hard enough to get other big lobbies involved. And bombing Qatar was certainly one of those moves.