Israeli Lobby Exempt From Scholarly Debate?

Foreign Policy Magazine has a multi-tier debate by various protaganists and scholars on the vexing question: is criticizing Israel's American friends who lobby strenuously on Israel's behalf anti-Semitic in whole or in part? Just a few off-the-cuff observations.

Back in the seventies and eighties, the "Lobby that dare not speak its name" was a taboo subject in the public marketplace of ideas. One faced being called a Holocaust denier if the argument was made that the Israeli Lobby [always called "Friends of Israel" in public] had inordinate and even unparalleled influence over U.S. foreign policy. Henry Kissinger responded once that the Greeks also had an effective lobby, and no one claimed that the Greek-Americans had excessive influence [actually, the Turkish Lobby did, but was lacking influence to the point of invisibility].

Now that the U.S. faces a burgeoning international crisis in the Middle East, the question has remained topical. The fact remains that Israel gets more U.S. aid per capita [over and under the table] than any other foreign country by a factor of ten. And yet America has deferred having a seat at the table of Israeli policy formulation vis-a-vis Arab countries which are also American friends in the troubled region.

Having lived in the Middle East for half a decade and learned the Arabic language, I am aware that all the troubles there do NOT stem from the Israeli presence in the region, as many Arabs covering up their own internecine strife with one another chant as a mantra on any and every occasion. And I do believe that Arafat, in 2000, passed up what would have been an iconic moment when a liberal Labor Israeli PM offered about all he could offer given Israeli domestic politics, and Arafat walked away from the table.

Really, the Middle East has had long-term endemic problems since forever historically, stemming from thousands of years of history which lie on one another like geological strata. The break-up of the Ottoman Empire in the early 20th century and the aftermath of the Great War spawned dozens of nationalist movements, of which some were recognized by Versailles and many others, like the Kurds, were not. Then the Second World War generated a second wave of diasporas as the European genocide drove Jews to aggressive measures to build a state, with Britain playing its usual ambivalent role. Everyone seems to overlook the Suez Crisis, but Eisenhower's abrupt ultimatim to withdraw from Egypt convinced Israel that a mobilization of its friends and ethnic relatives in the U.S. was necessary to keep the country from being a vassal of international superpowers.

For a very short time, I worked as a consultant for NAAA, the counterpart to the Israeli Lobby, which mobilized Arab-Americans---preponderantly back then Lebanese Christians---to provide a counterpoint to the overwhelming influence of AIPAC and the network of political action committees it developed and largely controlled. Interestingly enough, the NAAA had some influence on GHWBush [remember his refusal to move the American Embassy to Jerusalem in '92?], but Congress was almost completely under the influence of AIPAC.

Now that the second Bush president has invaded Iraq, with what proved to be insufficient or trumped-up intelligence information, I support our staying there until some modus vivendi is reached. The consequences of a premature American withdrawal would be cataclysmic to American interests around the world and encourage America's real enemies, who really do exist, to go on the offensive to the point that a real worldwide Jihad, much larger than the current network of conspiracies, would attack America's allies in the Arab world and beyond.

Bin Laden attacked the United States because of the American presence in Saudi Arabia, which enflamed fanatical believers to a fever pitch of religious fervor. UbL only regards Israel as a sideshow, and means to cut America off from its sources of energy supplies in the Middle East. Israel serves as an irritant, and any attempts to throw the baby from the troika to the wolves will only inflame their appetite.

The Middle East is chock-a-block with near-failed states or countries on life support. Lebanon is the only country in the region which has not treated its minorities [or in Iraq and Syria, the non-militarized majority---Sunni in Syria and Shia in Iraq] as full participants in political society. Indeed, every large country in the region even including Israel and Saudi Arabia, has been dominated by military elites not very interested in representative government [even Israel---with Olmert for the first time run by a life-long civilian---marginalizes its large Israeli-Arab minority].

So perhaps FDR was partially correct when he first observed that "Arabia is too far afield for us" or words to that effect during WWII. But after meeting Ibn Saud for several hours on the USS Quincy on his way to Yalta, FDR remarked to an aide that he had learned more in several hours with the Saudi King about the Middle East than he had in years before as President.

Sooner or later, the U.S. will have to grasp the nettle of actually pursuing a "just and lasting peace," to use Lincoln's famous words, in the Middle East.

Perhaps it is already too late, but if the Iraqi circle can be squared, GWB or perhaps a more diplomatically adept administration might sometime in the future try to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

However, if there is some sort of end-game which might generate a reasonably even-handed solution to the "Damnable Problem" confronting the region, all sides will have to compromise---in the spirit of "no victors, no vanquished"---and avoid the appearance of a diktat.

And if the U.S. is to be recognized as a bona fides participant in this final process, some sort of free-wheeling debate inside the U.S. must occur that does not have "exempt" players who can point fingers, but cry foul when they themselves are accused of bad faith or special pleading.

So Walt and Mearsheimer are justified in bringing up the question of Israeli influence, just as Chinese influence and Russian influence are constantly debated in different contexts.

Right now I'm packing and I'm off with wife and daughter for two weeks and will be mostly far from the internet, so this will be a short sayonara for the time being.