Wading into the Fray
Tony Judt's piece in the New York Times today on the controversy over Steve Walt and John Mearsheimer's article on "the Israel Lobby" convinced me that it is time for us at America Abroad to join the discussion.
Walt and Mearsheimer's two opening paragraphs summarize their argument:
"For the past several decades, and especially since the Six-Day War in 1967, the centrepiece of US Middle Eastern policy has been its relationship with Israel. The combination of unwavering support for Israel and the related effort to spread ‘democracy’ throughout the region has inflamed Arab and Islamic opinion and jeopardised not only US security but that of much of the rest of the world. This situation has no equal in American political history. Why has the US been willing to set aside its own security and that of many of its allies in order to advance the interests of another state? One might assume that the bond between the two countries was based on shared strategic interests or compelling moral imperatives, but neither explanation can account for the remarkable level of material and diplomatic support that the US provides.
Instead, the thrust of US policy in the region derives almost entirely from domestic politics, and especially the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby’. Other special-interest groups have managed to skew foreign policy, but no lobby has managed to divert it as far from what the national interest would suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US interests and those of the other country – in this case, Israel – are essentially identical."
They go on to document their claims in ways that Judt describes as "drawn from standard sources" and "mostly uncontentious." Daniel Drezner, on the other hand, describes Walt and Mearsheimer's claims as "piss-poor, monocausal social science." Much of the rest of the reaction to the article has focused much more on whether it is anti-Semitic or not than on whether it is right or not.
Yet the truth of the article, not its wisdom or even its tone, is the issue we should be discussing. Instead of condemning Walt and Mearsheimer's claims, their critics should be responding to them -- on social scientific grounds, claim by claim, source by source, argument by argument. That is precisely what Walt and Mearsheimer argue cannot happen -- because "the Lobby" has no interest in reasoned debate and will bury it under claims of anti-Semitism. Yet as Tony Judt points out, it is in Israel itself "that the uncomfortable issues raised by Professors Mearsheimer and Walt have been most thoroughly aired."
I would prefer actually to have a debate, rather than debate whether we should or can have one. In this vein, see Eric Alterman in the current issue of The Nation and Juan Cole' in Salon, responding to Alan Dershowitz's attack on Walt and Mearsheimer.
For my part, I think Mearsheimer and Walt have performed a valuable service by daring to write about AIPAC just as other scholars write about the Taiwan lobby, or supporters of the IRA, or any other powerful influence on U.S. domestic politics. At the same time, their analysis is strongly, and in my view wrongly, colored by two assumptions. First is their deep opposition to the war in Iraq; they came out in favor of continued deterrence of Saddam early, and with the luxury of hindsight, probably rightly. But because they passionately opposed the war from the beginning, they find it hard to imagine any reasons to support the war other than the Israel Lobby. Yet George Packer, whose superb book The Assassins' Gate is a must read, notes that Douglas Feith, Richard Perle, and David Wurmser, all strong "pro-Likud Americans," ended up in high positions in the Bush administration and pushed for war in Iraq. He writes:
"Does this mean that a pro-Likud cabal insinuated its way into the high councils of the U.S. government and took hold of the apparatus of American foreign policy to serve Israeli interests? . . . For Feith and Wurmser, the security of Israel was probably the prime mover. But for others, such as Wolfowitz, Iraq stood for different things -- an unfinished war, Arab tyranny, weapons proliferation, a strategic threat to oil, American weakness, Democratic fecklessness -- and regime change there became the foreign policy jackpot." Just because Walt and Mearsheimer discount each one of these factors does not mean that they were equally discounted in Washington, leaving only Israel's security as an argument for war.
Second, Walt and Mearsheimer are realists, which means that they assess the strategic value of states solely in terms of their relative power, regardless of regime type. In English, that means that Israel's status as the only stable, mature democracy in the Middle East is irrelevant in assessing America's strategic interest. We liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power. That does not mean that we should support Israel automatically or uncritically, but it does provide a powerful reason for why supporting Israel -- and above all Israel's continued existince as a liberal democracy, which may often require taking a tougher line with the Israeli government that we have been prepared to do in recent years -- is very much in America's strategic interest.
Anne-Marie where have you been? This sight has become virtually unbearable due to the anti-Semitism iherent in Mearsheimer and Walt and the defense of their paper at the Cafe. Your statement "For my part, I think Mearsheimer and Walt have performed a valuable service by daring to write about AIPAC just as other scholarss write about Taiwan lobby, or supporters of the IRA, or any other power influence on U.S. domestic politics." suggest you did not read their paper all that careffully. Initially, they define the Israeli Lobby as being more than AIPAC to include a myriad of organizations and the usual Evangelical Christians. They do say they do not mean all American Jews. However, by the very next page they are talking about all American Jews.
When they get around to discussing how it is the Israeli Lobby has its power their answer is American Jews vote and contribute money to Democratic candidates. The Paper also presumes that American Jews control newspapers and think tanks and are responsible for America's policy toward Iraq, Syria and Iran. I have written about this Paper, in both versions, giving page numbers so often I think I have memorized it.
Walt and Mearsheimer may not be anti-Semites but their paper adopts age old anti-Semitism to explain away a policy that they believe is not understandable in any other way.
One last point. Dick Cheney, not Jewish nor a neo-con, insisted that William Cohen focus his briefing of President-elect Bush on Iraq. Bill Clinton knew that Bush was aiming at Iraq in his brief of the soon to take office Bush. This is all in Cobra II. It suggests that the neo-Cons were brought into office because they agreed with views that Bush and Cheney already had.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 7:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
Regarding the idea that it is in the US strategic interest to support Israel as an ethnically Jewish state, or as a democracy that will not accept Palestinian refugees for demographic reasons, that idea is wrong.
First, there is now a counter-example, Hamas. Unlike US ally Mubarak Hamas is not delaying elections and have taken no steps towards dictatorship.
The US does not support them. That marks the end of the argument that "we liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power". Note also the democratic process that resulted in Sadr's unacceptable political influence in Iraq and the US reaction to that.
As to other US strategic interests in the region, it is pretty clear that the US disputes with most Arab people - about the legitimacy of Israel as an ethnically Jewish state and about the primacy of the rights of Palestinian refugees to return home - makes every other US interest in the region more difficult to accomplish.
For example, if not for Israel, Saddam would have been just as willing to be a pro-US authoritarian dictator as Mubarak and Jordan's King Abdullah are. In the absence of the dispute over Israel, a pro-US Iraq could have been accomplished with some mutually beneficial arms sales. In the presence of the dispute over Israel, creating a pro-US Iraq requires an invasion, occupation, 2,000 dead soldiers so far and at least a half a trillion dollars.
In the absence of the dispute over Israel, Egypt and Jordan could be encouraged/pressured to hold fair elections. Because of the dispute over Israel, Mubarak and the Americans understand that fair elections would mean victories for the Egyptian version of Hamas. The US interest in maintaining Israel's ethnic configuration may not nullify any US interest in Middle East democracy, but it makes fullfilling the US interest in democracy much more problematic.
Another example is preventing the Middle East from becoming communist. Islamists, naturally hostile to communism which is a militant atheist worldview, vastly prefer cooperating with the US, as a nation of people of the book than with the USSR. Because of the perception that the US favored Israel more than the USSR essentially from the time of Israel's foundation, the USSR was able to get a foothold in the region that should have been impossible. The USSR was prevented from dominating the region at great expense to the United States.
A last example is that the US has an interest in Saudi Arabia being friendly and secure from threat. The US identity as Israel's major patron provides an important rallying point for Saudi domestic opposition and weakens the legitimacy of any Saudi government that is friendly with the US, making it harder for any such government to remain secure.
There is really no rational definition of strategic interests for which supporting Israel in its efforts to ensure it has a permanent Jewish majority can be said to be consistent with US strategic interests.
April 20, 2006 8:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Did you miss the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait? it had nothing to do with Israel. I it so amusing about those who are rabidly anti-Israeli, probably true of all bigots, how many facts have to be ignored.
Egypt and Jordan have peace treaties with Israel. Jordan has had elections. However, the Jordanians are as worried about the Palestinians as the Israelis, maybe more so. Also what worries the Mubarak and Abdullah isn't Israel it is Islamic fanatics. Mubarak wants to anoint his son as his successor, not much to do with Israel, and the Hashemites were given the Trans-Jordan as a consolation prize by the British. Also nothing to do with Israel.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 9:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Please point to the specific statement in my post you believe you are responding to.
It might serve you well to copy a statement from my post, italicize or blockquote it, and then make your argument that the statement I made is wrong.
The previous post seems less like a response to my post than like a stream of consciousness, you just dumping out everything you can think of that I might disagree with.
I don't want to argue just to argue. If you concede that the points in my post are true but you just want to add some other statements you consider true, I'm quite happy with that. If you believe I have written statements that are not true, challenge those statements and I'll defend them. I'm happy with that too.
April 20, 2006 9:41 AM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel Greenbaum demonstrates further the thesis of Walt and Mearsheimer with his statement:
There is undeniably a pro-Israeli lobby in the United States that has been extremely successful in having this Nation appease Israeli crimes against humanity. Israel is the only Western Nation currently occupying and brutalizing another people. The West should have treated this brutal Israeli occupation with the same vitriol and the same force that it used to end the German occupation of Europe and the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait. Instead, the American idiots in the pro-Israeli lobby have led this Nation to betray its core principles and to support an evil Israeli occupation of the Palestinian people.
The exposure of their perfidy by the Mearsheimer/Walt paper has obviously rattled a pro-Israeli lobby that has become habituated to seeing its racist bile published uncritically across the entire spectra of media in the United States. The real threat to public discourse in this Nation does not come from those brave individuals, routinely and basely slandered as anti-Semites, who oppose the racist evil that is the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories. The real threat comes instead from those American idiots whose racism blinds them to the evil they so fervently and candidly support.
April 20, 2006 9:56 AM | Reply | Permalink
Second, Walt and Mearsheimer are realists, which means that they assess the strategic value of states solely in terms of their relative power, regardless of regime type. In English, that means that Israel's status as the only stable, mature democracy in the Middle East is irrelevant in assessing America's strategic interest. We liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power.
OK, I'm not a political scientist, but this description seems inaccurate to me. Most realists accept that regime type contributes to a state's underlying power, as well as being a relevant causal factor in other properties of states that influence their extraterritorial behavior.
Insofar as realism offers a normative account of international relations, and not just a causal account, realists have tended to argue that states should pursue their own interests as understood in conventional prudential terms based on power and prosperity. The type of regime possessed by other states is supposed to be relevant to us to the extent that it is a significant causal factor in our own pursuit of wealth and power. It is not that realists assess states in terms of their relative power, regardless of regime type, but rather that they believe regime type should be taken into account only insofar as it bears our own pursuit of our power interests.
I don't think "liberal" is a very useful category of analysis, since it blurs important distinctions. For example, there is the vague connection of liberalism with the so-called democratic peace theory. The latter is the empirical claim that democratic states tend to be more stable and less prone to aggressive warfare. This claim can be appended to a realist normative framework, and could lead to the recommendation that fostering the spread of democratic regimes can contribute, in the right circumstances, to the advancement of our own power interests by, for example, helping to spread peace and stability in an area that is of vital economic interest to us. Of course, many realists are skeptical about the democratic peace theory and might reject their colleagues' recommendations. But this disagreement is not a disagreement between realists and non-realists, but rather a disagreement within realism about the empirical facts.
A realist could conceivably find other reasons to favor democracy promotion, in the right circumstances, even if they are skeptical about the democratic peace theory. For example, suppose they believe democracy promotion might actually destabilize a region, and lead to more interstate wars in that region. But suppose they want to destabilize the states in that region, and promote war there, because they believe that would further our own power interests. Such realists would again have a reason to favor democracy promotion.
However, some thinkers and pundits have defended democracy promotion for non-realist reasons. Some reject the realist understanding of national interest in terms of power and prosperity, and argue that our national interests include our "moral interests" as a nation, and that we should pursue those interests along with our pursuit of wealth and power. This seems to be a popular view among neoconservatives. Others would prefer not to think of morality and moral obligation as a component of "national interest" in any way, but have argued that we should pursue certain moral goals even if the pursuit of those goals sometimes harms our national interests.
Now in the case of Israel, Walt and Mearsheimer, along with many others, have argued that the extraordinary level of US support for Israel over the past few decades has not benefited US interests, as understood in conventional terms. As I read them, they hold that the damage this relationship has done to US interests is so great, and so obvious, that it cannot be the result of mere miscalculation by officials who are earnestly seeking to advance US interests, but getting it wrong. They believe their must be some other explanation for those officials' behavior.
Their favored explanation is that the policy results from the influence of domestic pressure groups. I tend to agree that that is the largest factor, but I think Walt and Mearsheimer tend to underestimate the extent to which domestic groups of various kinds, each pursuing their own interests, determine US foreign policy. They seem to operate on the assumption that foreign policy, in the normal course of events, is determined by official policy-makers pursuing national power interests, with limited wisdom, but with overall rationality and in good faith. Thus they suggest that the situation with the Israel lobby is in some way extraordinary.
But surely in the United States there are many, many organized interests that are driven by particular and narrow group aims, and that seek control of the state in order to advance those interests. People on the left, I assume, don't need to be persuaded that this is the case in the area of certain corporate interests, for example.
Something else that Mearsheimer and Walt do acknowledge, but which hasn't been at all clear in much of the subsequent discussion of the article, is that it is entirely possible that the members of a lobbying group, or other kind of pressure group or activist group, might in the pursuit of their distinct and overriding aim sincerely believe that the pursuit of their group interest is also in the US national interest, in either stark realist terms or more expansive "liberal" terms. Certainly this is the case with many of the most passionate supporters of Israel, and most of the ones I have encountered personally.
But I take it that Mearsheimer and Walt are of the opinion that, however much that sincerity may characterize the behavior of many members of the pro-Israel lobby, it does not account for the behavior of the official policy makers, because once again they believe that the harm done to US power interests by the current US-Israel relationship is so great and obvious that no competent policy maker could be deluded into thinking the relationship was advancing those interests. They seem also to assume that the policy makers are not by and large incompetent. Thus they seem to suggest that those official policy-makers are motivated by something else. What are the possibilities? There are at least these two:
I think the first accounts for a minority, but that the latter is more important.
April 20, 2006 10:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
They are just ordinary politicians dedicated to advancing their careers, and serving the interests of the most powerful members of the coalition that elected them and put them in power, and upon which they will depend for future re-election.
I just want to reinforce that the second of your two options is consistent with the MW paper and the MW position that the pro-Israel US domestic lobby distorts US Middle East policy.
April 20, 2006 10:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
"above all Israel's continued existence as a liberal democracy"
But that's just what Israel isn't. Israel is a herrenvolk democracy where all public policy is decided in the interests of the dominant ethnic group, with a combination of persistent-discrimination-against and partial-civil-rights protections for the minority arab groups, that the mainstream of Israeli jewish politics openly discusses the best way of expelling.
"We liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power"
I would think that liberal theorists of international relations (as opposed to 'liberals' as in NY Times subscribers) would say that the best organised social groups in particular issue areas dominate state decision-making and impose externalities on the rest of society. Someone wrote a good book about the EU on that theme. Worth remembering re. the plausibility of Walt/Mearsheimer's argument.
April 20, 2006 10:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
Daniel Greenbaum's a walking billboard for the M/W thesis - in neon lights
April 20, 2006 10:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well, from what's easily to hand, see this LRB piece on the politics of Israel's "demographic problem" i.e. too many arabs in Israel and, I need hardly add, none of them are planning to leave voluntarily. You may want to search the web for Netanyahu's previous statements too.
April 20, 2006 10:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for the good laugh.
Not only do you write two days after the murder of 8 Israelis and the endorsement of that murder by Hamas but you contribute nothing new.
There would be a certain good if the US reduced assistence to Israel. Israel mighth have to revise its political system so that it will be more flexible and not so dependent on small political parties. They also might make the economy even more capitalistic which would make it even more dynamic.
The Palestinians have had multiple opportunities for statehood, 1937, 1947 and 2000 and they chose to try to drive the Jews out instead. Talk about idiots.
"The hopes of peace were also wrecked on the rocks of a dysfunctional Palestinian system led by a leader, Arafat, incapable of renouncing the drug of Palestinian martydom, and fearful of the task of leading the big leap to the end of the conflict. This was made patently clear when Ehud Barak's bold, even if awkward and sometimes erratic, pursuit for peace, and President Clinton's readiness to compromise the legacy of his entire presidency by advancing the most far-reaching parameters for an Israeli-Palestinian peace were turned down by the Palestinian leader. Arafat's rejection of the Clinton peace parmeters was, as a close witness to the process, the Saudi ambassador in Washington, Bandar Bin Sultan, defined it, 'a crime against the Palestinian people' and the peoples of the region." (Slomo Bin-Ami, Scars of War, Wounds of Peace: the Israeli-Arab Tragedy, p320). Ah, those Saudis obvious memebers of the Israeli lobby.
What made the site hard to bear as anti-Semitism coming from those who are obviously fact deprived. I am not usually so exposed to bigots.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 10:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
Israel is a liberal democracy. It is also singularly untrue that maintream Israeli politician are talking about removing Palestinians. Only those from the far righwing advocate that as a solution and that only because of the failure of Oslo.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 10:50 AM | Reply | Permalink
You mean I tell the truth as opposed to you? As the old saying goes better to stay silent and let people believe you are a fool than to speak and remove all doubt.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 10:51 AM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel - I did not find Mearsheimer and Walt's article in the least bit threatening or anti-semetic. I only agreed with about half of it and thought there was too much hyperbolizing. I am also Jewish with a sister living with her family in Ariel so I also have a lot at stake.
I have thought this site has debated the Israel issue well even though your position is in the minority. Most of the time you offer a valid defense.
However, aside from your passion for Israel(perfectly okay) there seems to be almost a panic in some of your writing that criticsm of Israel and Zionism means a pogrom is right around the corner. I don't see it but maybe I'm misreading things. I'm sure you've noticed I read your postings avidly even though I mostly disagree but I have friends and family who would agree with you 120%.
April 20, 2006 10:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree that the far right-wing advocates removal of the Israeli arabs, but unfortunately much of mainstream Israeli jewish politics, including the Labor party, is far-right wing in ethnic-nationalist terms. Go read Barak talking about the need to get the Israeli arabs out of Israel. http://www.nybooks.com/articles/15501
Barak says, of course, "this could only be done by agreement". But this sort of talk has been part of ethnic cleansers and racists vocabulary in many cases. The removal of the Israeli arabs from Israel is something that the Israeli arabs will never agree to. It's just warming up towards expulsion, just as any heated contemporary discussion of sending African-Americans "back" to Africa "only by agreement" would have the same underlying objective.
And see the LRB article too.
April 20, 2006 11:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
Israel Beitenu IS a mainstream Israeli party that currently holds 12 seats in the Knesset - a mere 17 seats less than the largest party. That the "far rightwing" in Israel can openly espouse immoral and racist views is not a consequence of Oslo - it is a consequence of an American failure to condemn this descent into racism. An American failure brought on by an overly-powerful pro-Israeli lobby that has betrayed the core principles of this Nation.
April 20, 2006 11:42 AM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel - PLEASE be specific on what constitutes bigotry and anti-semitism in your mind. Point to specific sentances in other's postings. I honestly want to know where you feel criticsm crosses a red line because I do not feel this site and the posters exhibit it.
I feel that the comments and critcsms of Bush and Republicans is far more vicious and inflammatory than against Jews and/or Israel.
April 20, 2006 11:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
We liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power. That does not mean that we should support Israel automatically or uncritically, but it does provide a powerful reason for why supporting Israel -- and above all Israel's continued existince as a liberal democracy, which may often require taking a tougher line with the Israeli government that we have been prepared to do in recent years -- is very much in America's strategic interest.
Speak for yourself Dr. Slaughter. It is hard to imagine the US at war in Iraq but for US policy toward Israel, 9/11 "we're all Israelis now", and the hard right Israel government and their Lobby.
THe only remaining pieces to the puzzle, though unseen at present are discernable, Mossad, Sharon and the intrabureacratic wars in the Bush regime.
Yes with hindsight, Mearsheimer and Walt's foresight was 20/20.
April 20, 2006 11:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
Forgive me but since ours is an age of political slogan, when in Versailles by the Potomac
April 20, 2006 11:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Well as the most active poster regarding this piece, you might be careful who you caution about staying silent.
While I prefer to stay out of the larger debate, if there is one here, I must say that I find the old "any criticism of Israeli policy is akin to Anti-Semitism" argument to be the most intellectually craven sort of non-response imaginable.
If there is no substance to a critique of Israel, then prove that lack of substance. If a critique is uninformed, then inform the criticquing party. If there is another side to the argument that you feel is necessary to point out, do so. Dropping the old anti-semitism canard in response to a critique of Israeli policy (or here, in response to a critique of a pro-Israel lobby's influence over U.S. policy) eliminates the possibility of intelligent discussion. There has got to be an equivalent of Godwin's law here. Greenbaum's law?
April 20, 2006 11:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
April 20, 2006 12:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
U.S. Financial Aid To Israel: Figures, Facts, and Impact
April 20, 2006 12:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Israel is the only Western Nation currently occupying and brutalizing another people."
Other "Western" countries with territorial disputes with minorities:
Spain and the Basques
France and the Normans
England and the Welsh, Irish and Scottish
Belgium with the Flemish
Northern Italian domination of Southern Italy
Poland and the Prussian territories
The Czech Republic and Sudetanland (solved thanks to the ethnic cleansing of half a million German civilians after WWII)
Serbia and the Roma and Albanian minorities
Croatia and the Serbian minorities
Greece and its Albanian minority
Russia and dozens of cases of minority regions that would prefer to be independent
Japan and its Korean minority
Australia and its aboriginal minority
New Zealand and its Maori minority
All of those minorities above have active political groups demanding independence and claiming brutalization, persecution and denial of basic human rights. And that's just the West--if you want to see real ethnic cleansing, talk to any Sikh you meet--the chances are that he or she has multiple relatives killed or expelled by the Pakistanis. Or have a conversation with a Turkish Kurd or a Tibetan about 'brutalization' and 'colonialization'.
And yet the far ends of the left and right of the U.S. political spectrum are interested in only one tiny country and its treatment of a minority population. Why? It can't be because of the degree of brutality--Israel's treatment of the Palestinians ranks far below most of the above-mentioned countries and their treatment of their minorities. So why the fixation? Here are two possible reasons:
*Hatred of Jews is so deeply ingrained in western culture that it surfaces in otherwise intelligent and reasoned discussions of global problems as a primary source of people's motivations.
*Fear of Arab terrorism is so great that people feel that if we only surrender the Jews to them, those Jihadis will stop killing us.
Please give me another reason that makes sense for your fixation on Israel as the source of all evil, because the above two reasons are incredibly depressing.
April 20, 2006 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry, this just doesn't fly. This would be perfectly fair as a defense that Israel's treatment of Israeli Arabs as second-class citizens shouldn't be cause for its ostracism from the community of civilized nations - this issue is roughly compatible with most of the examples you mention (save the French/Normans example, which I can't make any sense of. Are you thinking of Bretons?)
But Palestinians are different. All the examples you give are of people who are citizens of the country in question, and are able to vote and be represented in elections there. In many of those countries, people of the minority group have major governmental positions - Gordon Brown is a Scot; the prime minister of Belgium is Flemish; various Italian political leaders are from the South.
The Palestinians are not citizens of Israel. They live in an area which is not claimed as part of Israel, and are denied any kind of sovereignty.
You can defend the Israeli occupation and treatment of the Palestinians on various grounds, but you can't pretend that it's the same thing as other western governments' problems with minority populations.
April 20, 2006 1:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
I just wanted to note that, contrary to Anne-Marie's implication, Mearsheimer and Waltz clearly address the "but Israel is a democracy and we should support democracies" argument:
That Israel is a fellow democracy surrounded by hostile dictatorships cannot account for the current level of aid: there are many democracies around the world, but none receives the same lavish support. The US has overthrown democratic governments in the past and supported dictators when this was thought to advance its interests – it has good relations with a number of dictatorships today.
Some aspects of Israeli democracy are at odds with core American values. Unlike the US, where people are supposed to enjoy equal rights irrespective of race, religion or ethnicity, Israel was explicitly founded as a Jewish state and citizenship is based on the principle of blood kinship. Given this, it is not surprising that its 1.3 million Arabs are treated as second-class citizens, or that a recent Israeli government commission found that Israel behaves in a ‘neglectful and discriminatory’ manner towards them. Its democratic status is also undermined by its refusal to grant the Palestinians a viable state of their own or full political rights.
Now, this may not be convincing (I think it's resonably convincing as an argument that "the fact that Israel is a democracy is not sufficient to explain American support for Israel"), but it most certainly doesn't mean that M&W don't consider the issue of Israel as a democracy. They do, and they say a) yeah, sure Israel's a democracy, but there's tons of other democracies, why Israel in particular; and b) Israel is a particularly flawed democracy whose values don't mesh with ours in certain key ways.
The first argument seems hard to argue with - why Israel, indeed. The second argument one can nitpick - most democracies have some serious flaws (but I think it's hard to see many democracies with flaws as serious as the occupation and settlement issue is for Israel - the other stuff doesn't strike me as especially worse than any other democracy - Germany's citizenship is based on blood kinship; the US has big problems with treatment of minorities.)
April 20, 2006 1:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
Since the fact that Israel is a democracy, at least for certain of its citizens, and that fact trumps all other concerns, liberals need not "debate" the realist follow-up questions.
Like "so what"?
April 20, 2006 1:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
A few days ago on these very "pages" someone noted that as if on cue, the Lobby's propaganda arm, launched a warmongering campaign aimed at Iran. The Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard and the National Review, were sooned joined by neocon wannabe Marty Peretz's New Republic.
Well, here's how the hand plays in no-trump.
Surprised? None should be. All part of "Securing the Realm"April 20, 2006 1:35 PM | Reply | Permalink
In an utterly deceptive attempt to direct focus away from the unique nature of the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian Territories samjaffe provides a list of "[o]ther 'Western' countries with territorial disputes with minorities." Samjaffe, of course, ignores the singular difference between Israel and the members of his list. Every entry in samjaffe’s list is a dispute of varying degrees of intensity INSIDE internationally recognized borders. Israel, however, is brutally occupying Palestinian Territories OUTSIDE its internationally recognized borders. Furthermore the stupidity of several entries on this list suggests that samjaffe has little understanding of the disputes referred to.
Samjaffe continues with the mendacious suggestion that:
This is pure mendacity. Does samjaffe honestly believe that the Spanish treatment of the Basques or the English treatment of the Welsh, for example, is remotely similar to the brutal treatment the Israelis visited upon the Palestinians during a thirty year occupation.
Far from being fixated on Israel, as samjaffe suggests, I am acutely interested in several of the internal issues raised by samjaffe. For example, if the people of Southern Italy ever decide to forgo the northern feeding trough and leave Italy it will be fine and dandy with me. The reality is that, unlike the American supporters of Israel on this site, I believe in the Universality of Human Rights and I do not believe that Israelis have any right to subjugate and dominate the Palestinian people.
Having disposed of the dishonest response by samjaffe I will repeat my assertion that Israel deserves our condemnation because it is the only Western Nation currently occupying and brutalizing another people.
April 20, 2006 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel, you say again,
No, they aren't. You may genuinely have interpreted what they are saying as such, and the various other things you keep insisting they are saying, but that isn't what they said.
Another excerpt from the NYT piece is relevant here:
I would agree that there are flaws in the paper, but those flaws aren't evidence of anti-Semitism.
April 20, 2006 1:47 PM | Reply | Permalink
Suggesting that Israel is not a democracy is an outrage. To support policies and actions whose only purpose is to lead to lead to Israel's extermination is anti-Israel. To argue that it is illegitimate to argue in defense of Israel is anti-Semitic. To claim as Mearsheimer and Walt do that people who are American Jews placed Israel's interests ahead of the United State's is the most base anti-Semitism.
No one who says Bush's policies are wrong or immoral suggests the United States should be eliminated or give up its character. Have the Israelis been as forthcoming as they might be, of course not. Have their policies always been wise or the most noble, no. Debate the policies, not Israel's existential right to exist. As long as their is a little bigoted group here who are mighty casual about Jews dying I plan to speak up.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 2:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
An excellent list. You did however leave out the United States and the Amerindian. What you will find from the bigots is they they will try to disallow your lists with slick arguments that are totally illogical.
I find it amusing the holier than thou self-righteousness of a group of people here at the Cafe who not only are living in settlements gained through wars of extermination but they are not offering to leave.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 2:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
I am a New Yorker which may explain it but I have never experienced such anti-Semitism as I have here. I also have a few relatives who live in Israel but to be clear I do not think that many of Israel's policies are wise.
I do not understand your read of Mearsheimer and Walt. They dimiss Israeal but that is ok they make no real effort to prove their case against Israel they just assume it. What they want to explain is how the unworthy Israel gets U.S. support and how such a foolish war in Iraq happened. Their answer is not AIPAC, that I might accept, but it is American Jews. They are arguing that there is something illegitimte about Jews participation in America's political life and disloyalty to America.
I have had non-Jews read it and without prompting they immediately linked to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion and other such anti-Semitic screeds. This is a reading the Bret Stephens in the WSJ and Eliot Cohen of Johns Hopkins in the WaPo laid out in detail.
I regret we got off to a bad footing but you totally misread my view of Iran's nuclear program.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 2:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
For a relatively small, not financially-entrenched interest group with a significant impact on US policy, foreign and domestic, how about Cubans? Besides Cubans' vote the US policy relative to Cuba makes no foreign policy sense.
Back to the WM paper, I find it thought provoking and a challenge to the conventional wisdom of what can be discussed. Just the reaction to the paper here suggests that it is very hard to actually discuss what is in US interest, and how that interest is defined.
April 20, 2006 2:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Debate the policies, not Israel's existential right to exist."
That's what the M/W paper, and most of the posters supporting it, are trying to do. In case you didn't notice, the debate was intended to be about American foreign policy, not about Israel's right to exist or the rightness of the foreing and doemstic policies practiced by
Israel.
But you are sickened by the "anti-semitism" "rampant" on this site.
Of course, you thought the Shah of Iran was A-OK because he supported Israel and kept the oil flowing. You need a morality check, my friend.
April 20, 2006 2:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wordie
You are just mistaken. They first define the Israeli Lobby as so broad as to exclude who? Then they they want to guard against the charge of anti-Semtism and try to exclude a certain number os Jews. This poll data really does not prove very much since every Jews I know woud fit into the catagory as not very concerned with Israel. That is a bit different than how many American Jews would oppose Israel from being expterminated.
One the very next page, which you just are ignoring Mearsheimer and Walt talk about the ways American Jews have to influence policy. That is anti-Semitic.
Levy wrote here. He simply rewrote Mearsheimer and Walt's Paper. He made it about AIPAC. If you want to argue that AIPAC is very conservative or way too pro-Likud or whoever now opposes withdrawal from the West Bank that is clearly true. AIPAC which claims American Jews should never criticize Israeli governments did so to the Barak government all the time.
While Shlomo Ben-Ami, former foreign minister of Israel agrees that only the United States and the Arabs will help Israel and the Palestinians reach peace he also clear points out, and he was there, that peace was missed because Arafat would not say yes to Clinton's program.
The suggestions that Clinton's plan all of Gaza, 92% of the West Bank, 8% from Israel, Jerusalem divided in half and a corridor between Gaza and the West Bank to be barred to the Israelis was killed by anyone but Arafat is just not true.
AIPAC may make it easier for the settlers to stand up to their government but it has very little to do with peace in Israel. AIPAC also has very little to do with the war in Iraq or the fact that American Jews basically keep Democrats in office.
Mearsheimer and Walt's paper is anti-Semitic. Nothing anyone here has said changes their words. You tell me who do they say the Israeli Lobby is? How do they say the Israeli Lobby gets its power? What makes the Lobby's role in newspapers, think tanks, the Clinton and Bush Administrations? Do you believe that the neo-cons because they are Jewish are more interested in the well being of Israel than the America?
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 20, 2006 2:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel - It's the debate we are having. I don't recall any specific comment on the site that advocates Israel should be wipped off the map. I may have overlooked a ridiculous comment or two but the vast vast majority of posters have not, and I believe never would advocate Israel should cease to exist.
However, some posters, myself included, have advocated policies which you believe would lead to Israel's demise but we feel those same policies might actually be in Israel's long term interest. Whether you are correct in these assumptions or we are is DEBATEABLE. None of us are omnicient.
I do not believe that most of the people on this site do not believe Israel is a democracy. What many are saying is it's not a democracy in conventional western meaning of the term because of the favored status of Jews.
No one is arguing that Israel cannot defend itself. The debate is over the form such defense is taking and if there might be more effective alternatives. As a Jew I am of course concerned about Jews being killed. I am equally concerned over Palestinian deaths.
April 20, 2006 5:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel...it's not accurate to say that only the extreme right wing wishes that the Palestinians would leave. Haaretz reported on a March, 2005 poll that stated otherwise:
Anyone who is aware of all the other restrictions placed on Israeli Arabs (and I'm referring not to Palestinians in the WB, but residents of Israel proper), such as the restrictions on movement in Jerusalem, the restriction that disallows the purchase or lease of Israeli state land to non-Arabs, and the law that says that marriages between Israelis and residents of the Occupied Territories are not allowed by the state (there are exceptions, but not meaningful ones), it's just not possible to avoid the conclusion that Palestinians are being encouraged to leave the Isreali state, no matter what the politicians may say in public. It's the actions that count.
April 20, 2006 7:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
J. McCutchen "JmacSF"
San Francisco. CA
The Financial Times calls it "moral blackmail"
There's great merit to the Debate about Debating for therein lies the proof of the proposition
April 20, 2006 9:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
In their own words… here’s a word-for-word slice of the Mearsheimer and Walt polemic, with just a few words (in CAPS) substituted for their own…
“Clearly neither strategic nor moral arguments can account for MEARSHEIMER'S AND WALT'S support for the ARAB cause. So how are we to explain it? The explanation is the unmatched power of the ARAB lobby. We use “Lobby” as a shorthand for a loose collection of individuals and organizations who actively work to steer U.S. policy in a PRO-ARAB direction….ARAB Americans… Christian organizations such as many JESUITS, as well as BIG OIL, and prominent conservatives like PAT BUCHANAN. Major media like CNN and NPR regularly run sympathetic profiles of PALESTINIANS UNDER ISRAELI OCCUPATION while ignoring the far worse suppression by ARAB REGIMES of THEIR OWN PEOPLE. Occasionally, one of the networks will air reports that are more even handed, because it is difficult to cover events in THE ARAB WORLD without acknowledging ARAB RULER'S actions on the ground… There is a moral dimension here as well. Thanks to the Lobby, HARVARD PROFESSORS have become the de facto enabler of ARAB REGIMES AND TERRORIST GROUPS, making them complicit in the crimes perpetrated against AMERICANS AND ISRAELIS. This situation undercuts their efforts to promote democracy abroad and makes them look hypocritical when they press others to respect human rights."
Fact is, the Mearsheimer and Walt piece is not a balanced academic inquiry, but an anti-Israel, anti-Jewish polemic. Switch around a few words, and you have an equally silly polemic for the other side. It’s tough to accuse M&W of anti-Semitism, because they don’t stop at being offensive to Jews. They go on to effectively slander every American who supports Israel’s steps to defend itself, from President Bush to Bill Clinton, as a dupe of the LOBBY. That may not be anti-Semitism, but it is pretty lame nonetheless. Maybe, just maybe, the majority of Americans support Israel not because we’re dupes, but because we understand that our own nation’s moral and strategic interests lie not with the perverse regimes of the Arab world, but with the one Middle Eastern country (yes, one little country) that shares our fundamental hopes and aspirations as a free people.
Kosmos
April 20, 2006 9:30 PM | Reply | Permalink
The problem with TPMCafe is that when you make a slick argument that is illogical, somebody refutes it. But someone makes a slick argument that is illogical that you disagree with, you change the subject. And call the person making the argument a bigot.
I don't know if that fulfills some inner need for you, but it leaves TPMCafe with all of your arguments refuted and most of the arguments you disagree with uncontested.
It may be time to change strategies.
April 20, 2006 10:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
While I think Mearsheimer and Walt are wrong, and that Daniel Greenbaum is right when he says that Bush and Cheney picked people who agreed with them, I think they have a right to publish it and that it's better to counter their arguments (which people have done).
However, it seems to me that some people I've met who are vitriolic about how the "Jewish lobby" is apparently stifling debate they are just as quick to accuse people of *Islamophobia* or bigotry when anything at all critical of certain cultures (or terrorism even) is mentioned. This includes Muslims activist groups as well as non-Muslims (including professors such as Juan Cole). And, unfortunately, there are the infamous cases of pro-Palestinian people being shouted down at protests because they are critical of Palestinian (and Arab treatment in general) of women and gays.
Free speech applies to all or no one. There shouldn't be double standards.
April 21, 2006 7:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Read the posts any from Arnold Evans or Richard Steven Hack to name to two.
However it Israel is a democracy by any standard you want to use. Any Israeli can vote. One million non Jews do. Israel is a country like any other one founded by a nationalists movement.
What policy do you think I support? I would give up virtually all of the settlements in order to reduce the number of Palestinians within the borders of Israel. However, unlike the current trends of American colleges which are infected with the thoughts of both Edward Said and post-Modernism I recognize that Palestinians did not have a nation or a national movement when the Zionists first arrived in Palestine and that the Palestinian leaders have so sold their people on the idea that Israel will be wiped out that they both rejected a comprehensive deal that Israel accepted and then lied about what was in the deal.
Israel is a country of 7 million people surrounded by about 700 million Arabs. For much of their existence the Soviet Union not only armed Israel's enemies but egged on warfare against Israel. You also left out that during the first Gulf War Iraq lobbed missiles at israel a noncombatant.
Israel needs a political system more like Americas which can produce a government less dependent on minority parties. However, the Palestinians more than Israel is going to have to come to terms with reality. Yes, the IDF uses massives force against the Palestinians but as the bombing in Tel Aviv shows the Palestinians will have to offer a deal as Sadat did.
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 21, 2006 8:14 AM | Reply | Permalink
I would give up virtually all of the settlements in order to reduce the number of Palestinians within the borders of Israel.
This is exactly the attitude that makes many liberals uncomfortable about the Israeli version of democracy. Because Israel wants to remain a Jewish state, it can remain democratic only by limiting the number of Arabs within its borders--and by denying citizenship to the Arabs it controls in the West Bank and Gaza. The fact is, Israel/Palestine has as many Arabs as Jews, and a democratic Jewish state can be maintained in Israel/Palestine only by expelling or repressing the Arabs. Whoever is at fault for the current plight of the Palestinians, the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine could never have been accomplished without some sort of expulsion or repression of the Palestinian Arabs.
April 21, 2006 8:37 AM | Reply | Permalink
Part of the foundations for any democracy is some degree of shared purpose or common values. The track record on multi-national democracies (as opposed to immigrant states such as the US and Australia) is shaky at best. Compare the relative success of Europe's homegenous democracies, drawn along national lines, and Africa's failed states, whose borders were arbitrarily drawn by European colonialists.
The partition of Palestine into Israel and a majority Arab state [whether it be Jordan, an independent Palestine or both]
was necessary and remains necessary. It is perfectly consistent with a liberal viewpoint to support such a partition (as it was to support the partition of Bosnia or the creation of an independent Kurdistan). Utopianism is particularly dangerous when applied to the Middle East.
April 21, 2006 10:23 AM | Reply | Permalink
Partition isn't the issue, it's the expulsion (and oppression via occupation) of the Palestinians that's problematic.
April 21, 2006 1:04 PM | Reply | Permalink
Back to some semblence of the debate at hand:
Is supporting Israel in the U.S.'s strategic interest?
There are many reasons why it is not in the U.S.'s STRATEGIC interests. I am wondering if they are are any STRATEGIC (not ideological, not cultural, not historical) reasons for the kind of investment in foreign assistance and political credibility the U.S. makes in Israel.
The thrust of Walt and Mearsheimer's argument is that the pro-Israel political influence has made U.S. foreign policy incongruent with its pure strategic interests. This is not to say that the U.S. does not have other interests in Israel based on other values.
The fact of the matter is, the U.S. has a much greater strategic interest in many places where it spends a tiny fraction of the foreign assistance that goes to Israel each year. We need to ask ourselves how this situation arose, and Walt and Mearsheimer give one valid interpretation.
April 21, 2006 1:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Wow, there are some interesting points being made here, in addition to a lot of pretty extreme statements. A few thoughts. . .
Like others, I also thought that M & W were overly simplistic and monocausal in many of their views. The strength of the "Israel lobby" does not explain all of the U.S.'s conduct that they claim it does, or at least, not fully.
On the other hand, I thought that they did a service by raising many of the issues that they discussed. Their views were, to me, clearly worthy of discussion, not opprobrium. Can it be argued that, as a nation, we do not offer Israel extraordinary, unconditional support, financial and diplomatic? We might decide that there are good reasons for this, but there should be a thoughtful discussion on the subject. I think they correctly point out that such a discussion rarely takes place, and the reaction to their piece illustrates why.
When I read the article, I knew that they were right that some people would accuse them of being anti-Semitic. That is because they clearly do not view Israel as a country to which the US should offer any particularly favorable treatment. Rather, in their view as “realists,” our relationship to them should be dictated purely by U.S. strategic interests – like any other country. I think that some Jews in particular (and maybe some non-Jews as well) find this hard to stomach because for them, in some important way, Israel is not “any other country,” and deserves special treatment. I think that they tend to mistake people like Waltz & Mearsheimer, who don’t hold this same view and are overtly unsentimental toward Israel, as anti-Semitic. This, I believe, is deeply unfair to them and dilutes the true meaning of anti-Semitism, which has to do with hating people (or worse) because of their ethnic/religious identities as Jews. It’s as if being critical of Israel to a certain point is okay, but if you're too critical, then you are anti-Semitic. (It reminds me of the scene from Woody Allen’s “Bananas,” when Miss America is testifying in court against Fielding Melish who is on trial for Treason, and says: “Differences of opinion should be tolerated, but not when they are too different. Then you become a subversive mutha.”)
Did I read Daniel Greenberg’s comment correctly, as saying that he’s never experienced so much anit-Semitism as he has in New York!? Outside of Israel, New York has got to be the only place in the world you can live without realizing that most people are not Jewish. For God’s sake, all of the Islamic and Sikh taxi drivers in the city know all of the Jewish holidays better than I do. I am Jewish and grew up in New York for the first 30-odd years of my life, and can’t remember encountering anti-Semitism of any kind. I think that the kind of person who feels that they’ve experienced monumental anti-Semitism, in New York of all places, is definitely someone who would perceive the MW piece to be anti-Semitic.
I think it’s deeply important not to confuse “insufficiently” pro-Israel political views with hating Jews. People with passionate attachment to Israel need to guard against this.
April 21, 2006 1:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
The emigration of Palestinian Arabs in 1948 has been shown to have been based on a number of factors, only one of which was actual expulsion by Israeli forces. Given that the Jews of the Arab world were forced to emigrate in the following decades, what you have is an exchange of population not radically different from other population exchanges that occurred during that time period (Greece/Turkey following WWI; India/Pakistan in the 1940s). The only difference is that the Arab refugees from Israel were never settled, but rather kept as indefinite refugees for political purposes. The events of 1948 do not justify liberal squeamishness towards supporing Israel.
As for the post '67 occupation, it wasn't planned, but it became extended indefinitely out of inertia. Unfortunately, this led to the Greater Israel philosophy taking over, with the delusion that there were no problems to the occupation and that it could be sustained indefinitely. However, this position has been firmly rejected by the majority of Israelis. The debate in Israel resolves not around whether to end the occupation, but how to end it. Contrary to the anti-Zionists, there are no easy answers for Israel. There is no responsible government for Israel to turn the territory over to, and the Oslo experiment failed utterly in creating one. So, while it is understandable that liberal sympathize with the plight of Palestinians that are occupied, Israel's failure to end the occupation is not in and of itself problematic.
April 21, 2006 2:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
The emigration of Palestinian Arabs in 1948 has been shown to have been based on a number of factors, only one of which was actual expulsion by Israeli forces.
According to historians like Benny Morris, most Palestinians were simply fleeing the fighting. Not allowing the Palestinian refugees to return after the fighting ended, however, amounted to a form of expulsion. I think liberals can legitimately be concerned about this.
As for the post '67 occupation, it wasn't planned, but it became extended indefinitely out of inertia.
It wasn't just "inertia." Israel had (and still has) an active settlement policy, for instance. I think liberals can also be legitimately concerned about this.
April 21, 2006 3:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Palestine was going to be partitioned in 1937 and 1947. One Arab State. One Jewish State. The Jewish state was going to be rather tiny. In the war of 1948 Palestinians left areas that were meant to be part of Arab State. Additionally Jordan, that is an Arab State, invaded the West Bank and took it over. Given the periodic efforts to destroy the Jewish State and failing liberals will have to get used to Israel surving as a Jewish State. If liberals work hard enough though they can drive Jews to the Republican Party and guarantee not seeing another Democratic in office in their lifetimes.
When Jews have lived in multi ethnic states they have been murdered in large numbers. This has been true for centuries, thus Zionism. The borders I was refering to are the borders demanded by the Palestinians. They are the borders established by international agreements. Arafat in 1988 called for a two state solution. The proposed withdrawal to the 1967 borders solves the imbalance caused by Israel holding on to the West Bank. One last points. 1 million none Jews vote in Israel. Why are liberals unfortable by Israel's existence as a Jewish
State when Arabs have more political rights in Israel than they do in any Arab State?
Daniel A. Greenbaum
April 21, 2006 6:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
Colore Oscuro, the USA is another Western nation currently occupying and brutalizing another Middle Eastern nation. America's core principles have sadly been more often breached than observed in its often criminal foreign policy. I think that the West should treat the current Israeli occupation as Eisenhower, to his great credit, treated Israel when it occupied and attempted to annex Gaza and parts of the Sinai in 1956-57 after it waged a war of aggression - forceful and intelligent diplomacy and the threat of severe chapter VII economic sanctions or worse - and which is also how it should have treated Iraq's occupation of Kuwait (which of course could very probably have been avoided if the USA said no to Saddam beforehand) - or how the rest of the world should treat the US after its latest criminal war of aggression.
April 22, 2006 2:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
Why are liberals unfortable by Israel's existence as a Jewish State when Arabs have more political rights in Israel than they do in any Arab State?
If Israel were to accept all the Palestinians as equals with full political rights, liberals would applaud. The problem is that while Israel allows its remaining Palestinians to vote, they are second-class citizens in the Jewish state--and their numbers are strictly limited. While a million Palestinian Arabs can vote in Israel, millions more have been prevented from returning to their homes in Israel and/or are living under occupation with minimal political rights. Given that the (large) indigenous Arab population was and continues to be opposed to living in a Jewish state, Israel can exist as a Jewish state only by repressing or expelling that indigenous population. The creation of Israel as a specifically Jewish state could succeed (and has succeeded) only by removing and/or oppressing the Arabs. The creation of a Jewish state in Palestine inevitably resulted in the dispossession of the Palestinian Arabs. There's just no way around this. If a huge percentage of the population of an area is opposed to a particular type of state, you can have that type of state only by oppressing or expelling that portion of the population. Anyone who argues otherwise is simply being disingenuous.
All this is not to say that Israel is somehow "evil." The fact is, these kinds of conflicts are common throughout human history. The European settlers to America displaced, oppressed, killed and marginalized the native Americans in pretty much the same way. Most liberals feel as uncomfortable with America's treatment of the native Americans as we feel uncomfortable about Israel's treatment of the Palestinians. One doesn't have to hate European Americans or hate Israeli Jews to feel uncomfortable with their policies toward indigenous groups. On the contrary, one can even feel sympathy for the settler-colonialists who were often fleeing oppression or persecution elsewhere. But one can also hope for a better way--some sort of solution that allows both groups to share the land harmoniously. Liberals are uncomfortable with Israel not because they are biased against Jews or because they think Jews do not have a right to live in Palestine but because they are uncomfortable with the dispossession of Palestinians and with Israel's policies that have caused that dispossession.
April 22, 2006 5:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
jexter, you said:
And while I would agree that the pro-Israel neo-con hawks in the administration were instrumental in pushing for the war, where you, and the M&W paper get it a bit wrong is in assuming that this was the primary reason for the War. There are many other possibilities, such as a larger geopolitical strategy that was aimed at hegemony in the region, the need to ensure the free flow of oil, a misplaced response to 9/11, a sense among some that there was undone business from the first Gulf War, etc. Many of the reasons may be intertwined with concerns about Israel for some of the war's advocates, but Israel wasn't the only reason.
April 22, 2006 8:24 AM | Reply | Permalink
Daniel...we've already discussed most of what's in your post; you clearly see it quite differently than I do, so I won't rehash the parts I responded to previously, except to say once more that if you think that M&W are referring to "all Jews" as being a part of the Israel Lobby you are misreading the paper.
I think this must be the section that you are so focused upon:
When I read that I don't think that the paper, which goes to great lengths to define the Israel Lobby clearly, is suddenly transformed into something that is an attack on all Jewish people, nor do I think it means that all Jewish people are a part of the Lobby. It just points out that many organizations that lobby the government regarding Israel have been set up by Jewish Americans, which is true. What's anti-Semitic about that? M&W even clarify their thoughts on this in the next paragraph:
And then just a bit later they say this:
Then you said, "The suggestions that Clinton's plan...was killed by anyone but Arafat is just not true." And I would again disagree, pointing out that there has been ongoing controvery about this. One essay I recently read stated that the entire thinking process on the negotiation was flawed, in that if focused on what Israel would "give up" in terms of territory seized in 1967, when in terms of international law the issue should have been on what Israel was required to "give back." Many reports, including M&W's, note Arafat's feeling that he was negotiating with two, rather than one Israeli team, the second being the Americans themselves.
Then you said,
And I would have to say that if AIPAC makes it easier for the settlers to stand up to the Israeli government, then AIPAC does have a lot to do with peace in Israel, adding that the PR efforts of AIPAC, and the lobby in general, which present a black-and-white picture of the conflict to the American public and government (we tend only to see the Israeli side of things), are also an impediment to peace. We cannot be an honest broker of a peace process, if we have taken sides.
As for your comments about what led us into the war in Iraq, I will again refer you to the statements in the excellent paper, "Did Israel Lead the US into the War in Iraq," published by Jewish Voice for Peace:
This pretty much parallels my own views. It points out that not all neo-cons are Jewish. (And I must add that I find it odd that it seems to be primarily Jewish people who are promoting the idea that when anyone mentions "neo-cons" they are referring to only Jewish people.) It points out that the particular Jewish people who were promoting the war were all quite hawkish, which you and I agree is not typical of American Jews in general. Why is it anti-Semitic to say that this particular group of Jewish neo-cons had Israel on their minds when pushing for war with Iraq, if one recognizes that that represents a minority view within the Jewish community? And I don't think that these Jewish neo-cons are particularly more interested in the well-being of Israel than America, but that they think the interests of Israel and America are indistinguishable. I see no reason to assume that the hawkish pro-Israel neocons were not of the belief that what they were promoting was good for America as well as Israel. It isn't a question therefore of "disloyalty" (as you have said that the M&W paper is claiming), but of a world view that goes too far in mistakenly intertwining the interests of the two countries.
I also don't think that this intertwining of interests is particularly bad in and of itself, nor is it unexpected. As human beings we all have a world view based upon our own experience; it's not reasonable to expect Jewish people to be any different in this regard. The problem is that we cannot discuss this world view, and whether the actions promoted by those holding it, are right or not for our country without having the charge of anti-Semitism leveled. I happen to think that the hawkish pro-Israel neo-con world view is seriously flawed, and I think a debate regarding it, and those organizations that promote it, is completely warranted.
April 22, 2006 8:57 AM | Reply | Permalink
A Palestinian Speaks Out!
Saturday, May 06, 2006
Where We Part Ways!
A quotation from Anne Marie Slaughter in "Thoughts on The Israeli Lobby" poses fundamental questions about "morality" and , possibly , explains the ever widening divide between the Arab/Moslem world and the Judeo-Christian West.
It reads:
" We liberals, on the other hand, essentially think that regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power. That does not mean that we should support Israel automatically or uncritically, but it does provide a powerful reason for why supporting Israel -- and above all Israel's continued existence as a liberal democracy, which may often require taking a tougher line with the Israeli government that we have been prepared to do in recent years -- is very much in America's strategic interest. "
Although this failed to note the important fact that Israel is a "partial democracy", by which I mean that although "Israeli" Arabs are allowed to vote they are then totally banned from active participation in Israeli political life, the following questions should, still, be addressed by the "liberals" she speaks for:
1-Does the adoption of a "liberal democratic" system exonerate a state from crimes committed at its conception ?
I am referring here to the basic , undeniable, historical facts that led to the establishment of the state of Israel in Palestine namely:
1.1-Jewish immigration into Palestine which radically changed its demographic composition was achieved :
a) By collusion with an imperialist /colonialist power (GB) and
b)Against the express will of the overwhelming majority of its indigenous population , both Moslem and Christians.
c)With relentless denial of the indigenous population its Right to Self Determination
1.2-The conquest and annexation of lands (20%) beyond what was , presumably, the basis of its international legitimacy:UNGA Partition resolution, 72% versus 52% of historical Palestine.
1.3-The ethnic cleansing campaign that depopulated most of the areas that fell under Israeli authority from its indigenous Arab population.
2-Is a "liberal democratic" system compatible with:
2.1-The enactment of racist laws (e.g. the Law of Return) that restrict entry and settlement in "Israel" to a specific confessional group with strong pretensions to a common ethnic origin; the Jews?
2.2- The adamant refusal to implement UNGA resolution re the Right of Return of Palestinians refugees to their homeland and the repossession of their legal property?
2.3-The occupation and annexation of more West Bank lands as in the annexation of Arab East Jerusalem, the construction and expansion of Settlements and the Wall which has already , before its completion , devoured 12 % of the West Bank?
Slaughter's "moral" argument boils down to :" irrespective of the crimes committed against the Palestinian people at its inception and thereafter including its persistent denial of Palestinian refugees their Right to Return to their native land the mere fact that Israel is a "liberal democracy" its "regime type trumps virtually every other measure of power."
By considering the mode of its conception :"displace, dispossess and supplant" and its continued
denial of basic inalienable human rights and its expansionist designs Israel, more than any thing else, degrades the concept "liberal democracy" and makes it to us , morally, worthless!
That is where and why we part ways!
May 6, 2006 10:03 AM | Reply | Permalink
I would think that someone who was committed to "liberal interventionism" would want to intervene ASAP in Israel to end its illegal and increasingly dangerous (to the world; it's always been so for the occupied) occupation of Palestinian territories. Funny how one never sees that argument made. Pulling the plug on all money unless Israel sits down with whomever the Palestinians elect to represent them -- you negotiate with enemies, not friends -- would be a nice, liberal intervention.
The debate with Walt and Mearsheimer is not about which "theory" of IR is correct, primarily. At least not to me, as I don't sit on the CFR, am not an IR academic, and am not positioning myself for a Democratic presidency, if such is possible in our current "democracy" in which not all votes are counted -- and in the millions.
Yes, I am now a "conspiracy theorist" -- "anti-Semitism" isn't the only conversation-stopper in our, for lack of a better term, discourse.
Which brings me to another point: where is the historical evidence that so-called or self-understood democracies (republics, I take it) cannot do horrific things, both at home and abroad? I find that naive in the extreme, or perhaps the inevitable residue of a chronically synchronic IR-esque view. But we are not here to debate the relative value of disciplines, as I said. Israel is a republic. It is also based on a racialist policy. This may or may not have been justified, after the Holocaust, but one need not be realist or a liberal to realize that the sins of the Zionist fathers need not be visited upon their grandchildren.
I certainly don't see why the sins of the Zionists should continue to be visited, and increasingly so, on the Palestinians. That is in no way just, and when you push a "pro-"Israeli on this topic, they usually, and quite revealingly, point to other nations' bad behavior. So, since nation "x" wiped out people "y," we should aid and abet Israeli behavior? The moral conclusion is obvious.
Nor do I see the connection between a Holocaust, in which I lost family members (I have to say this in order to become merely a "self-hating Jew" rather than an "anti-Semite"), and current Israeli policy. I understand the psychological connections, but the problem is, so does AIPAC. And the ADL, etc. The unstated, subliminal message is that the wrongs done the Palestinians are somehow the perhaps regrettable price that the world had to pay for centuries of anti-Semitism. This works -- I've seen it in action in both Jews and non-Jews, and if one thinks that AIPAC, et al, don't use well-known PR/marketing/advertising techniques, well, one would be unbelievably naive.
One need only look at the US media blackout, relative to Europe, on the recent Lebanon and (practically forgotten, though ongoing) Gaza wars to see how well consent can indeed by manufactured. I don't see the majority of Americans supporting either the Iraqi invasion and occupation (they don't, now) or the Israeli policies in the occupied territories if they had full access to video of what it actually does to real, live human beings. Funny how one doesn't see that, especially in comparison to coverage of suicide bombings. (I guess I need to state the obvious now: I think suicide bombings are morally wrong. I also, however, think one needs to understand why they occur.) Perhaps this lack of coverage has something to do with the fact that the IDF will shoot journalists if they feel like it, whereas the US merely bombs TV stations it disagrees with.
The problem now is not the foundation of Israel. The problem is that those Zionists' grandchildren are now electing and supporting governments that are fueling the destruction of their nation, the Palestinians, and maybe us, too. Israel is in a suicidal tailspin. (Perhaps the US is as well; perhaps that is the real connection between these ex-frontier societies that see themselves as God-ordained?) I don't see how that's in our interests, theirs, or the Palestinians -- and you don't need to subscribe to any "theory" of IR to see that as plain as day.
A two-state solution has been blocked repeatedly -- with the sole exception of Taba -- by the US and Israel, always seeking a "real partner," usually deferring in an amazing fashion to (yes) the Israeli lobbies. I would pluralize it, but AIPAC, the ADL, and a host of others are part of exactly what W/M described: a loose coalition that lobbies very effectively, due to the universal corruption of our "liberal democracy" by lobbyists representing all interests, domestic and foreign.
It is so screamingly obvious that blind support of Israel is woefully dangerous for us Americans that it needs explanation. The Israeli lobbies are a big chunk of that explanation. The very act of asking the question and recoginizing that it requires explanation is what has been viciously attacked. And "rightly" so -- once the cat is out of the bag, once it's no longer "anti-Semitic" to question Israel (a quizzical notion that is, actually, anti-Semitic! -- Jews do not equal Israel!), the box is opened. This is what "pro-"Israeli apologists fear the most. It has zero to do with the social-scientific truth of W/M's paper.
W/M do reject other possible explanations for American support of Israel, such as the spear-carrying work Israel most definitely does for the "Pax" Americana, despite dismissive statements about Noam Chomsky by Slaughter elsewhere on this blog. And, yes, it's true that going into Iraq was the result of many things.
But without the PNAC folks -- and just look at their writings about Israel and American "security" -- 9/11 would not have been jumped on in the same way. And W/M do leave out the role of the military-industrial-Congressional complex and the oil lobbies in not only the decision to invade but also the way in which the occupation of Iraq has been run. Far less "disastrously" -- according to any oil company's interests, wholly supported by this oily administration -- than you find discussed, well, just about anywhere in MSM.
But W/M can't say it all in 80+ page working paper. What they did, and I think we all know it, is to use their impeccable credentials and reputations to break a taboo. That's the larger point that wasn't much discussed in the March debate sponsored by the London Review of Books. That was, literally, outside the bounds of the debate, even though it is the crucial point.
Constructing a debate with extreme time limits, both for all the panelists and the audience, while not done "on purpose," perhaps, leaves the impression that due diligence has been done. The debate's been had. To Slaughter's credit, she did draw attention to that fact, I think honestly, at the debate itself. But it might have just been a throwaway line, like the one that the very presence of the debate was proof against W/M's paper. Or maybe that *wasn't* such a throwaway line?
Not identifying for the audience the CVs of all the debaters was less than honest -- this is not Slaughter's responsibility, perhaps; I don't know. Not allowing for a fuller debate is perhaps the LRB's fault. The "Great Unwashed" used to sit through six or seven hours of debate in the nineteenth century (Lincoln-Douglas), in the sun.
But one cannot come away from that debate, limited to "social scientific" critique of the *truth* of W/M's claims, without seeing it, structurally, as as an amoebic and anemic incorporation of the W/M points into the "mainstream" for the purpose of policing discoursal borders. A tactical retreat and counterattack, so to speak.
I am not accusing Slaughter or anyone else of purposely doing this. I am saying that a real debate would be ongoing, more open, at least *longer*, and not bedeviled by that ubiquitous entreaty: "Breifly, briefly!"
Some things cannot be said in a soundbite. Why wasn't more time allotted? Or more debates scheduled? Why did Indyk start speaking so slowly as the debate wore on? Hmmmm...
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As for the comments in this and related strings, I think it just goes to show that the nationalistic sentiments of the Romantics, of which Zionism is only one flower, really does blind people on all sides. I don't consider myself innately superior; I just think that I'm lucky enough to have had the education, moral and "social scientific," to see that tribalism, wherever it comes from, will lead our species to destruction. Perhaps very soon. If we can't outgrow or overthrow its most pernicious aspects, of which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is but one (and I mean both nationalities' views), we, as a species, are simply not going to make it. Certainly not in any polity resembling "liberal," "democratic," or any other such term we worship but rarely enact. And we have gigantic global challenges in the near-term that could overcome even a united species.
This concern, that blood-and-soil religious nationalism and liberal republics cannot coexist, a well-founded concern if you glance only at, say, recent European history, is the core of Judt's argument for a binational state in Israel/Palestine.
He's right, proscriptively. It's possibly more achievable than one might think. But a two-state solution would be good enough -- and far better than the tailspin we now have, which is far more dangerous. In any event, one can't be both for blood and soil and for a republic -- historically, sure, one can; descriptively, obviously, yes. But the two concepts will inevitably clash with each other. With bad results. I don't know if that's "realist" or "liberal" or whatever; I don't think the labels matter much outside of academia.
(Refering to scholastic debates reminds me that the Christian Zionist movement is under-researched in W/M's paper, even though they do mention it, I think. Far more votes therein than that fraction of elite Jews who support Foxman, AIPAC, et al.)
Anyway, not everything the Enlightenment philosophers had to say made sense, let alone stands the test of time. But the necessity to see common human interests as primary couldn't be more correct or relevant. Which, I think, was Slaughter's point about the dangers of being number one (the US, I mean). And with that, I wholeheartedly agree.
October 10, 2006 9:32 PM | Reply | Permalink