Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, November 2007, pages 57-58
Waging Peace
Mearsheimer and Walt Speak at Politics and Prose Bookstore
THE DAY AFTER the Sept. 4 release of their controversial book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy, John J. Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen W. Walt of Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government spoke at Politics and Prose Bookstore in Washington, DC to a crowd of well over 400 people. Hours earlier the professors had addressed a packed luncheon at Washington’s prestigious Cosmos Club.
Although their book (which is flying off the shelves of the AET Book Club) goes into extensive detail about many different aspects of how the lobby operates, the two well-respected scholars of the “realist” school of thought chose to focus on two questions: Is there an influential pro-Israel lobby in the U.S.? Is its impact positive or negative on U.S. foreign policy?
Speaking first, Walt launched into the heart of their discussion by explaining how difficult it is to debate the issue of the pro-Israel lobby in the U.S.: “If we were to talk about an issue like gun control, it is not controversial to talk about the gun lobby,” he noted. “But when the subject is the Israel lobby it is like grabbing the third rail.”
Talking about the lobby, he added, is considered tantamount to questioning the Holocaust, or believing secret Jewish world domination conspiracy theories like those in The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, and Jewish control of the media. Both speakers emphasized frequently their rejection of all these anti-Semitic theories, and repeated throughout the evening that they both support Israel’s right to exist whatever its (or the Israel lobby’s) policies.
Walt also pointed out that the actions of the Israel lobby are not outside the boundaries of the American political process, describing what the Israel lobby is attempting to do “as American as apple pie.”
Walt defined the Israel lobby as “a loose coalition of organizations and individuals that actively work to shape American foreign policy in a pro-Israel direction. It is defined by its political agenda, not by ethnicity or religion.” Specifying that the coalition includes both non-Jewish and Jewish Americans, he argued that the lobby affects all Americans, and thus warrants a fair and honest debate. U.S. taxpayers provide $500 per year in aid per Israeli, he noted, in a country with a ranking of 29th in per capita income.
Americans should be especially concerned with the lobby’s power because of the upcoming presidential election, Walt continued. While no one can predict who will win the elections, one issue is predictable, he noted: “Each candidate will emphasize that he or she fully appreciates the multitude of threats facing Israel,” and that, if elected, “the United States will remain firmly committed to defending Israel’s interests under any and all circumstances.”
That’s ironic, Walt said, because it is U.S. unconditional support for Israel and its policies that helps to fuel our terrorist problems. “On the whole, Israel is more a liability than a strategic asset,” he told the audience, adding that U.S. support for Israel is at odds with this nation’s sense of fair play, especially when it comes to its backing of what he described as “Israel’s brutal occupation” of the occupied territories. The U.S. supports Israel even though it continues to build and expand Jewish settlements in the region, despite the fact that they are deemed illegal by the international community.
Walt was quick to point out, however, that “Neither side [Israeli nor Palestinian] owns the moral high ground.”
Even though the lobby appears to be acting in the name of the American Jewish community, this is misleading, according to Walt. He noted that a recent Washington Post poll found that the majority of American Jews “can’t justify giving Israel a blank check” and that one-fourth of American Jews don’t care about Israel’s plight.
In order to accomplish its goals, Walt continued, the lobby operates on two tracks. It tries to elect candidates who are sympathetic to its cause, and gives politicians clear incentives to support and rally behind the lobby’s efforts. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), which has an annual budget of $50 million, drafts legislation and provides talking points to elected officials. According to Walt, in the last election cyclepro-Israel political action committees (PACs)spent $3 million, and has spent $50 million since 1992. By contrast, between 1990 and 2004 Arab- and Muslim-American PACs contributed less than $80,000 to candidates.
To illustrate the lobby’s power, Walt cited the example of Rep. Roger Jepson (R-IA), who was targeted by the lobby after then-President Ronald Reagan persuaded him to support the 1981 sale of AWACS planes to Saudi Arabia. During the next election, the lobby contributed more than $100,000 in PAC money to Jepson’s Democratic opponent, Tom Harkin. Harkin won that year. Sen. Alan Cranston (D-CA) would later comment that the outcome of that election “has sort of struck terror into the hearts of senators about switching” any vote concerning the Middle East.
Walt also quoted Sen. Daniel Inouye’s (D-HI) explanation of why he signed a letter to then-President Gerald Ford on behalf of AIPAC. Commented Inouye: “It’s easier to sign one letter than to answer 5,000.”
Former AIPAC official Steven Rosen, who has been indicted for allegedly passing classified government documents to Israel, once placed a napkin in front of Jeffery Goldberg of the New Yorker magazine and proudly stated, “In 24 hours we could have the signatures of 70 senators on this napkin.”
It was no wonder, Walt said, that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert remarked, “Thank God we have AIPAC, the greatest supporter and friend we have in the whole world.”
The lobby discourages discussion, Walt stated, and will “smear and malign anyone who wants to be a serious player in American Middle East Policy” if they try to divert from the course that the lobby has set. After former President Jimmy Carter published his book, Palestine: Peace Not Apartheid, the lobby claimed that he would go down in history as a “Jew hater,” comparing him to to David Duke. This despite the fact that, according to Walt, “Carter did more for the state of Israel than any other U.S. president.”
Walt concluded his remarks by noting that there is a perception that the U.S. supports Israeli policies because there is broad public support for Israel. “True, America has a favorable image of Israel (mostly due to the U.S. media),” he acknowledged, “but most Americans think there should be a fair outcome for both sides.”
Eighty percent of Americans, Walt maintained, favor a two-state solution.
Mearsheimer then took the floor and proceeded to answer the second part of the debate: whether the Israel lobby’s impact on U.S. foreign policy is positive or negative. “The lobby has largely a negative influence,” he stated, and its activities are in neither the U.S. nor Israel’s interest. Noting that there are many reasons this is true, as explained in their book, Mearsheimer focused on the argument that U.S. support for Israeli policy has fueled terrorism.
The terrorist acts on 9/11 were related to U.S. support of Israel, he stated. As a result of their research, the authors believe that one of the factors—but not the only one—that led Osama bin Laden and al- Qaeda to attack this country was Israel’s actions against the Palestinian people in the occupied territories and Washington’s full support of Israel. Even as a young man, Mearsheimer noted, Bin Laden was outraged by Israel’s abuse of Palestinians. In fact, Mearsheimer stated, Bin Laden twice wanted to conduct the operation well before September 2001: first in September 2000, just after Ariel Sharon led a delegation of Israelis onto Jerusalem’s Haram al-Sharif, and again in July of 2001, when Sharon, then Israeli prime minister, was visiting Washington.
A second example of why U.S. backing of Israel’s policies instills terrorism is the war in Iraq, Mearsheimer said, noting that Israel was a major driving force in the U.S. decision to invade. “It’s hard to imagine the war happening in their absence,” he said. “Sharon pushed the U.S. very hard to go to war and then played down the rhetoric so the war wouldn’t be seen as war for Israel.”
Mearsheimer again stressed that this was not the only reason for going to war, but it was one of the reasons.
Before the U.S. attack, Mearsheimer pointed out, 77 percent of Israelis wanted the U.S. to invade Iraq, and both Israeli and U.S. leaders thought a war against Iraq would make Israel more secure. “This was a controversial claim before the war started,” he stated, “but it is even more controversial now that Iraq has turned into a strategic disaster.”
Now, Mearsheimer noted, there are reports that Israel wanted the U.S. to invade Iran first, as Iran was perceived as its biggest threat in the region. According to Mearsheimer, “Israel came to realize they should deal with Iraq first, then deal with Iran and then Syria.”
In May 2004, he added, it was reported that Israel was against the war in Iraq, while AIPAC was for it. “This is an urban legend,” he said. “It’s not a reliable argument.”
With the election of George W. Bush, however, the neoconservatives became a key component of the lobby—more important, according to Mearsheimer, than Israel. The neoconservatives worked with the lobby to make the war on Iraq a reality—this despite the fact that the majority of American Jews were against the war.
Before President Bush came to power, Mearsheimer said, President Bill Clinton rejected the idea of going to war with Iraq. Clinton’s former special Middle East coordinator, Dennis Ross, “said to us if former Vice President Al Gore had been elected, we would not have gone to war,” Mearsheimer told an applauding audience.
Mearsheimer ended his argument by reiterating that unconditional U.S. support for Israel is not in America’s interest nor in Israel’s. “When Israel is not acting in our interest, we should play hardball,” he argued, repeating that the “U.S. cannot support colonial expansion.”
Calling for the establishment of a viable Palestinian state, Mearsheimer urged the U.S. to “support Israel’s right to exist within the 1967 borders with some minor modification.”
Finally, he stated, the U.S. should treat Israel as it treats any other ally.
The authors’ remarks were met with great applause, as well as some hissing.
A very lively question-and-answer period followed, with the professors expertly tackling both hostile and friendly fire with humor and ease. Judging from the debate—and from the fact that The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy was holding steady at number five in the Sept. 9 and 16th Washington PostBook World nonfiction/general best seller lists—Mearsheimer and Walt have realized their goal for Americans to begin openly discussing Israel’s lobby.
—Jamal Najjab
