Dying to Forget

Oil, Power, Palestine, and the Foundations of U.S. Policy in the Middle East
With a new preface
ISBN: 978-0-231-15289-1
Verlag: Columbia University Press

Buch, Englisch, 432 Seiten, Print PDF, Format (B × H): 151 mm x 228 mm, Gewicht: 614 g

Irene L. Gendzier presents incontrovertible evidence that oil politics played a significant role in the founding of Israel, the policy then adopted by the United States toward Palestinians, and subsequent U.S. involvement in the region. Consulting declassified U.S. government sources, as well as papers in the H.S. Truman Library, she uncovers little-known features of U.S. involvement in the region, including significant exchanges in the winter and spring of 1948 between the director of the Oil and Gas Division of the Interior Department and the representative of the Jewish Agency in the United States, months before Israel's independence and recognition by President Truman.

Gendzier also shows that U.S. consuls and representatives abroad informed State Department officials, including the Secretary of State and the President, of the deleterious consequences of partition in Palestine. Yet the attempt to reconsider partition and replace it with a UN trusteeship for Palestine failed, jettisoned by Israel's declaration of independence. The results altered the regional balance of power and Washington's calculations of policy toward the new state. Prior to that, Gendzier reveals the U.S. endorsed the repatriation of Palestinian refugees in accord with UNGA Res 194 of Dec. 11, 1948, in addition to the resolution of territorial claims, the definition of boundaries, and the internationalization of Jerusalem. But U.S. interests in the Middle East, notably the protection of American oil interests, led U.S. officials to rethink Israel's military potential as a strategic ally. Washington then deferred to Israel with respect to the repatriation of Palestinian refugees, the question of boundaries, and the fate of Jerusalem—issues that U.S. officials have come to realize are central to the 1948 conflict and its aftermath.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Gendzier, Irene L.

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Politikwissenschaft Allgemein Politische Studien zu einzelnen Ländern und Gebieten
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Internationale Beziehungen Geopolitik
• Geisteswissenschaften Geschichtswissenschaft Weltgeschichte & Geschichte einzelner Länder und Gebietsräume Geschichte einzelner Länder Naher & Mittlerer Osten
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Regierungspolitik Außenpolitik
• Sozialwissenschaften Politikwissenschaft Militärwesen Nationale und Internationale Sicherheits- und Verteidigungspolitik

Inhaltsverzeichnis

AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Open SecretsPart I: The Postwar Petroleum Order and the Palestine Question, 1945–19461. The Primacy of Oil2. The Palestine Question: 1945Part II: The Question of Partition and the Oil Connection, 1947–19483. The Critical Year: 19474. The Winter of Discontent: 19485. The Oil ConnectionPart III: Beware "Anomalous Situations," 19486. The Transformation of Palestine7. Truce and Trusteeship8. Recognition and ResponsePart IV: Rethinking U.S. Policy in Palestine/Israel, 19489. Reconsidering U.S. Policy in Palestine10. The Palestine Refugee Problem11. The State Department on the RecordPart V: The End as the Beginning, 1948–4912. The PCC, Armistice, Lausanne, and Palestinian Refugees13. The View from the Pentagon and the National Security Council14. The Israeli–U.S. Oil Connection and Expanding U.S. Oil InterestsPart VI: In Place of a ConclusionReflections on Discovery, Denial, and DeferralNotesIndex

Über Autor(innen)

Irene L. Gendzier is professor emerita in the Department of Political Science at Boston University. She is also the author of Notes from the Minefield: United States Intervention in Lebanon and the Middle East, 1945–1958 and Frantz Fanon: A Critical Study, and she is a coeditor, with Richard Falk and Robert Lifton, of Crimes of War: Iraq.