THE  POLITICS OF EMPIRE
The US, Israel and the
Middle East
James Petras

ISBN: 978-0-9860731-0-6
$18.95 / 196 pp. / 2014








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978-0-9860731-1-3

    SYNOPSIS

       This book provides a unique conception of US empire
    building, linking overseas expansion with:

    1) the growth of a police state and declining living
    standards;
    2) advanced technologically driven global spying on
    adversaries and allies with declining economic
    competitiveness and military defeats;
    3) large scale, long term commitments of economic and
    military resources to wars in the Middle East to the
    detriment of major corporate interests, but for the benefit
    of a pariah state, Israel; and
    4) the power of a foreign state (Israel) over US policy via
    its domestic pro-Zionist power configuration.

           The interplay of these four specific features of US empire
    building has no past or present precedent among imperial
    states.  Because of Israeli-Zionist influence on US imperial
    policy, the main targets and objectives of imperial wars are
    located in the Middle East.  The objectives of Israeli and Zionist-
    influenced US policy in the Middle East is to enhance Israeli
    regional power and the dispossession of the Palestinian
    people.  The trillion dollar cost of US wars for Israel, however,
    has alienated the vast majority of US society and driven a wedge
    between the political elite backing new wars for Israel, and the
    public prioritizing of domestic economic welfare.  This study
    highlights how the domestic foundations of empire building
    have deteriorated and forced the imperial presidency to modify
    its approach, seeking diplomatic negotiations over new military
    interventions, specifically in the cases of Syria and Iran.

           Imperial politics is viewed as a multi-sided power struggle
    between military and economic elites, Israel and the Zionist
    power configuration, overseas resistance movements and
    nationalist regimes, and the US public.  The resolution of this
    power struggle is more than an academic question;  it will
    determine whether the US will become a full blown police state,
    ruled by the pawns of a racist-colonial state engaged in endless
    wars or return to its roots as an independent democratic
    republic “free of foreign entanglements”.


    AUTHOR

    James Petras is a Bartle Professor (Emeritus) of Sociology at
    Binghamton University, New York. He is the author of 67 books
    published in 29 languages, and over 560 articles in
    professional journals, including the American Sociological
    Review, British Journal of Sociology, Social Research, Journal
    of Contemporary Asia, and Journal of Peasant Studies.  He
    has published over 2000 articles in nonprofessional journals
    such as the New York Times, the Guardian, the Nation,
    Christian Science Monitor, Foreign Policy, New Left Review,
    Partisan Review, Temps Moderne, Le Monde Diplomatique,
    and his commentary is widely carried on the internet.   His
    publishers have included Random House, John Wiley,
    Westview, Routledge, Macmillan, Verso, Zed Books and Pluto
    Books. He is winner of the Life Time Career Award, Marxist
    Section, of the American Sociology Association, the Robert
    Kenny Award for Best Book, 2002, and the Best Dissertation,
    Western Political Science Association in 1968. Some recent
    titles include  Unmasking Globalization: Imperialism of the
    Twenty-First Century (2001); co-author The Dynamics of Social
    Change in Latin America (2000), Unmasking Globalisation
    (2001), System in Crisis (2003), co-author Social Movements
    and State Power (2003), co-author Empire With Imperialism
    (2005), co-author) Multinationals on Trial (2006).  His most
    recent titles, The Power of Israel in the United States and
    Rulers and Ruled in the United States (Clarity Press, Inc.
    2006), have been acquired for Japanese, German, Italian,
    Indonesian and Arabic editions. He has a long history of
    commitment to social justice, working in particular with the
    Brazilian Landless Workers Movement for 11 years. In 1973-
    76 he was a member of the Bertrand Russell Tribunal on
    Repression in Latin America. He writes a monthly column for
    the Mexican newspaper, Le Jornada, and previously, for the
    Spanish daily, El Mundo.  He received his B.A. from Boston
    University and Ph.D. from the University of California at
    Berkeley.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

PART 1 OVERVIEW :THE STATE OF THE EMPIRE

1 THE CHANGING CONTOURS OF US IMPERIAL INTERVENTION IN WORLD CONFLICTS
2  THE OBAMA REGIME'S MILITARY METAPHYSICS REJECTS DIPLOMATIC   
OPPORTUNITIES
3  THE DECLINE OF THE US (AND EVERYONE ELSE…)

PART 2 CYBER-IMPERIALISM

4 THE LOGIC BEHIND MASS SPYING:EMPIRE AND CYBER-IMPERIALISM
5 THE DEEPER MEANING OF MASS SPYING IN AMERICA

PART 3  POLICE STATE: DOMESTIC FOUNDATION OF EMPIRE

6 FABRICATING TERROR CONSPIRACIES IN DEFENSE OF THE POLICE STATE
7 THE RISE OF THE POLICE STATE AND THE ABSENCE  OF MASS OPPOSITION
8 PRESIDENTIAL RULE BY DECEPTION :THE MASTER CON-MAN
9 THE TWO FACES OF THE POLICE STATE

PART 4 THE POWER OF ISRAEL IN THE UNITED STATES

10 ISRAEL BUYS THE US CONGRESS
11 OBAMA WITH ISRAEL AND AGAINST THE WORLD
12 FIFTEEN MINUTES AN AMERICAN PRESIDENT
13 ISRAEL’S WILLING EXECUTIONERS: AIPAC INVADES WASHINGTON
14 THE GREAT TRANSFORMATION OF AMERICAN JEWISH CHARITIES

PART 5 IMPERIAL AND ZIONIST WARS AND TERROR IN THE MIDDLE EAST:PALESTINE,
IRAN,SYRIA AND YEMEN

15 ISRAELI TERROR: THE “FINAL SOLUTION “TO THE PALESTINIAN QUESTION
16 OBAMA AT THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY: SACRIFICING PALESTINE FOR CAMPAIGN
FUNDS
17 ISRAELI BOMBERS :AL QAEDA’S AIR FORCE
18 THE BLOODY ROAD TO DAMASCUS :THE TRIPLE ALLIANCE’S WAR ON A SOVEREIGN
STATE
19 SAUDI ARABIA:  A RETROGRADE RENTIER DICTATORSHIP AND GLOBAL TERRORISM
20 IRAN-US INTERIM AGREEMENT
21 THE ASSASSINATION OF ANWAR al AWLAKI  BY DECREE

PART 6 CONCLUSION

22 OLIGARCHS,DEMAGOGUES AND “MASS REVOLTS”… AGAINST DEMOCRACY
The UK Daily Telegraph listed Jim Petras as #59 most influential liberal
in the United States, ahead of Noam Chomsky and Stephen Colbert.
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    On December 8 2010 The Club of Mexican Journalists awarded James Petras  
    its prestigious International Journalism Prize for Investigation and Analysis of
    the News within the global context.

    "Dr. James Petras is one of the greatest personalities of critical intellect of our time. His
    numerous books, which have been translated into many languages, and his opinion articles
    which are invariably defined by their rigor and decisive data, widely documented and placed
    within their social context, have turned this thinker into one of the most lucid and coherent
    minds of recent times. Naturally, this has earned Dr. Petras the resentment of those who feel
    affected by his tireless efforts. Nevertheless, countless readers all over the world seek the words
    of this thinker to defend themselves from propaganda that intends to make us sympathize with
    the single-minded thinking of neoliberalism."