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Why Does the U.S. Get All the Tornadoes?
Posted By Stephen M. Walt
Monday, January 19, 2009 - 5:00 PM
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Many supporters of Israel will not criticize its behavior, even when it is engaged in brutal and misguided operations like the recent onslaught on Gaza. In addition to their understandable reluctance to say anything that might aid Israel's enemies, this tendency is based in part on the belief that Israel's political and military leaders are exceptionally smart and thoughtful strategists who understand their threat environment and have a history of success against their adversaries. If so, then it makes little sense for outsiders to second-guess them.
This image of Israeli strategic genius has been nurtured by Israelis over the years and seems to be an article of faith among neoconservatives and other hardline supporters of Israel in the United States. It also fits nicely with the wrongheaded but still popular image of Israel as the perennial David facing a looming Arab Goliath; in this view, only brilliant strategic thinkers could have consistently overcome the supposedly formidable Arab forces arrayed against them.
The idea that Israelis possess some unique strategic acumen undoubtedly reflects a number of past military exploits, including the decisive victories in the 1948 War of Independence, the rapid conquest of the Sinai in 1956, the daredevil capture of Adolf Eichmann in 1960, the stunning Israeli triumph at the beginning of the 1967 Six Day War, and the intrepid hostage rescue at Entebbe in 1976.
These tactical achievements are part of a larger picture, however, and that picture is not a pretty one. Israel has also lost several wars in the past -- none of them decisively, of course -- and its ability to use force to achieve larger strategic objectives has declined significantly over time. This is why Israelis frequently speak of the need to restore their "deterrent"; they are aware that occasional tactical successes have not led to long-term improvements in their overall security situation. The assault on Gaza is merely the latest illustration of this worrisome tendency.
What does the record show?
Back in 1956, Israel, along with Britain and France, came up with a harebrained scheme to seize the Suez Canal and topple Nasser's regime in Egypt. (This was after an Israeli raid on an Egyptian army camp in Gaza helped convince Nasser to obtain arms from the Soviet Union). Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion initially hoped that Israel would be allowed to conquer and absorb the West Bank, parts of the Sinai, and portions of Lebanon, but Britain and France quickly scotched that idea. The subsequent attack was a military success but a strategic failure: the invaders were forced to disgorge the lands they seized while Nasser's prestige soared at home and across the Arab world, fueling radicalism and intensifying anti-Israel sentiments throughout the region. The episode led Ben-Gurion to conclude that Israel should forego additional attempts to expand its borders -- which is why he opposed taking the West Bank in 1967 -- but his successors did not follow his wise advice.
Ten years later, Israel's aggressive policies toward Syria and Jordan helped precipitate the crisis that led to the Six Day War. The governments of Egypt, Syria, the USSR and the United States also bear considerable blame for that war, though it was Israel's leaders who chose to start it, even though they recognized that their Arab foes knew they were no match for the IDF and did not intend to attack Israel. More importantly, after seizing the West Bank, Golan Heights and Gaza Strip during the war, Israeli leaders decided to start building settlements and eventually incorporate them into a "greater Israel." Thus, 1967 marks the beginning of Israel's settlements project, a decision that even someone as sympathetic to Israel as Leon Wieseltier has described as "a moral and strategic blunder of historic proportions." Remarkably, this momentous decision was never openly debated within the Israeli body politic.
With Israeli forces occupying the Sinai peninsula, Egypt launched the so-called War of Attrition in October 1968 in an attempt to get it back. The result was a draw on the battlefield and the two sides eventually reached a ceasefire agreement in August 1970. The war was a strategic setback for Israel, however, because Egypt and its Soviet patron used the ceasefire to complete a missile shield along the Suez Canal that could protect Egyptian troops if they attacked across the Canal to regain the Sinai. American and Israeli leaders did not recognize this important shift in the balance of power between Israel and Egypt and remained convinced that Egypt had no military options. As a result, they ignored Egyptian President Anwar Sadat's peace overtures and left him little choice but to use force to try to dislodge Israel from the Sinai. Israel then failed to detect Egypt and Syria's mobilization in early October 1973 and fell victim to one of the most successful surprise attacks in military history. The IDF eventually rallied and triumphed, but the costs were high in a war that might easily have been avoided.
Israel's next major misstep was the 1982 invasion of Lebanon. The invasion was the brainchild of hawkish Defense Minister Ariel Sharon, who had concocted a grandiose scheme to destroy the PLO and gain a free hand to incorporate the West Bank in "Greater Israel" and turn Jordan into "the" Palestinian state. It was a colossal strategic blunder: the PLO leadership escaped destruction and Israel’s bombardment of Beirut and its complicity in the massacres at Sabra and Shatila were widely and rightly condemned. And after initially being greeted as liberators by the Shiite population of southern Lebanon, Israel's prolonged and heavy-handed occupation helped create Hezbollah, which soon became a formidable adversary as well as an avenue for Iranian influence on Israel's northern border. Israel was unable to defeat Hezbollah and eventually withdrew its troops from Lebanon in 2000, having in effect been driven out by Hezbollah's increasingly effective resistance. Invading Lebanon not only failed to solve Israel’s problem with the Palestinians, it created a new enemy that still bedevils Israel today.
In the late 1980s, Israel helped nurture Hamas -- yes, the same organization that the IDF is bent on destroying today -- as part of its long-standing effort to undermine Yasser Arafat and Fatah and keep the Palestinians divided. This decision backfired too, because Arafat eventually recognized Israel and agreed to negotiate a two-state solution, while Hamas emerged as a new and dangerous adversary that has refused to recognize Israel's existence and to live in peace with the Jewish state.
The signing of the Oslo Accords in 1993 offered an unprecedented chance to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict once and for all, but Israel's leaders failed to seize the moment. Prime Ministers Yitzhak Rabin, Shimon Peres, and Benjamin Netanyahu all refused to endorse the idea of a Palestinian state -- even Rabin never spoke publicly about allowing the Palestinians to have a state of their own -- and Ehud Barak's belated offer of statehood at the 2000 Camp David summit did not go far enough. As Barak's own foreign minister, Shlomo Ben-Ami, later admitted, "if I were a Palestinian, I would have rejected Camp David as well." Meanwhile, the number of settlers in the West Bank doubled during the Oslo period (1993-2001), and the Israelis built some 250 miles of connector roads in the West Bank. Palestinian leaders and U.S. officials made their own contributions to Oslo's failure, but Israel had clearly squandered what was probably the best opportunity it will ever have to negotiate a peace agreement with the Palestinians. Barak also derailed a peace treaty with Syria in early 2000 that appeared to be a done deal, at least to President Bill Clinton, who had helped fashion it. But when public opinion polls suggested that the Israeli public might not support the deal, the Israeli Prime Minister got cold feet and the talks collapsed.
More recently, U.S. and Israeli miscalculations have gone hand-in-hand. In the wake of September 11, neoconservatives in the United States, who had been pushing for war against Iraq since early 1998, helped convince President Bush to attack Iraq as part of a larger strategy of "regional transformation." Israeli officials were initially opposed to this scheme because they wanted Washington to go after Iran instead, but once they understood that Iran and Syria were next on the administration's hit list they backed the plan enthusiastically. Indeed, prominent Israelis like Ehud Barak, Benjamin Netanyahu, and then-Foreign Minister Shimon Peres helped sell the war in the United States, while Prime Minister Sharon and his chief aides put pressure on Washington to make sure that Bush didn’t lose his nerve and leave Saddam standing. The result? A costly quagmire for the United States and a dramatic improvement in Iran's strategic position. Needless to say, these developments were hardly in Israel's strategic interest.
The next failed effort was then-Prime Minister Sharon's decision to unilaterally withdraw all of Israel’s settlers from the Gaza Strip in August 2005. Although Israel and its supporters in the West portrayed this move as a gesture towards peace, "unilateralism" was in fact part of a larger effort to derail the so-called Road Map, freeze the peace process, and consolidate Israeli control over the West Bank, thereby putting off the prospect of a Palestinian state "indefinitely." The withdrawal was completed successfully, but Sharon's attempt to impose peace terms on the Palestinians failed completely. Fenced in by the Israelis, the Palestinians in Gaza began firing rockets and mortars at nearby Israeli towns and then Hamas won the Palestinian legislative elections in January 2006. This event reflected its growing popularity in the face of Fatah’s corruption and Israel's continued occupation of the West Bank, but Jerusalem and Washington refused to accept the election results and decided instead to try to topple Hamas. This was yet another error: Hamas eventually ousted Fatah from Gaza and its popularity has continued to increase.
The Lebanon War in the summer of 2006 revealed the deficiencies of Israel's strategic thinking with particular clarity. A cross-border raid by Hezbollah provoked an Israeli offensive intended to destroy Hezbollah's large missile inventory and compel the Lebanese government to crack down on Hezbollah itself. However worthy these goals might have been, Israel's strategy was doomed to fail. Air strikes could not eliminate Hezbollah's large and well-hidden arsenal and bombing civilian areas in Lebanon merely generated more anger at Israel and raised Hezbollah's standing among the Lebanese population and in the Arab and Islamic world as well. Nor could a belated ground attack fix the problem, as the IDF could hardly accomplish in a few weeks what it had failed to do between 1982 and 2000. Plus, the Israeli offensive was poorly planned and poorly executed. It was equally foolish to think that Lebanon’s fragile central government could rein in Hezbollah; if that were possible, the governing authorities in Beirut would have done so long before. It is no surprise that the Winograd Commission (an official panel of inquiry established to examine Israel’s handling of the war) harshly criticized Israel's leaders for their various strategic errors.
Finally, a similar strategic myopia is apparent in the assault on Gaza. Israeli leaders initially said that their goal was to inflict enough damage on Hamas so it could no longer threaten Israel with rocket attacks. But they now concede that Hamas will neither be destroyed nor disarmed by their attacks, and instead say that more extensive monitoring will prevent rocket parts and other weapons from being smuggled into Gaza. This is a vain hope, however. As I write this, Hamas has not accepted a ceasefire and is still firing rockets; even if it does accept a ceasefire soon, rocket and mortar fire are bound to resume at some point in the future. On top of that, Israel's international image has taken a drubbing, Hamas is probably more popular, and moderate leaders like Mahmoud Abbas have been badly discredited. A two-state solution -- which is essential if Israel wishes to remain Jewish and democratic and to avoid becoming an apartheid state -- is farther away than ever. The IDF performed better in Gaza than it did in Lebanon, largely because Hamas is a less formidable foe than Hezbollah. But this does not matter: the war against Hamas is still a strategic failure. And to have inflicted such carnage on the Palestinians for no lasting strategic gain is especially reprehensible.
In virtually all of these episodes -- and especially those after 1982 -- Israel's superior military power was used in ways that did not improve its long-term strategic position. Given this dismal record, therefore, there is no reason to think that Israel possesses uniquely gifted strategists or a national security establishment that consistently makes smart and far-sighted choices. Indeed, what is perhaps most remarkable about Israel is how often the architects of these disasters -- Barak, Olmert, Sharon, and maybe Netanyahu -- are not banished from leadership roles but instead are given another opportunity to repeat their mistakes. Where is the accountability in the Israeli political system?
No country is immune from folly, of course, and Israel's adversaries have committed plenty of reprehensible acts and made plenty of mistakes themselves. Egypt's Nasser played with fire in 1967 and got badly burnt; King Hussein's decision to enter the Six Day War was a catastrophic blunder that cost Jordan the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and Palestinian leaders badly miscalculated and committed unjustifiable and brutal acts on numerous occasions. Americans made grave mistakes in Vietnam and more recently in Iraq, the French blundered in Indochina and Algeria, the British failed at Suez and Gallipoli, and the Soviets lost badly in Afghanistan. Israel is no different than most powerful states in this regard: sometimes it does things that are admirable and wise, and at other times it pursues policies that are foolish and cruel.
The moral of this story is that there is no reason to think that Israel always has well-conceived strategies for dealing with the problems that it faces. In fact, Israel's strategic judgment seems to have declined steadily since the 1970s -- beginning with the 1982 invasion of Lebanon -- perhaps because unconditional U.S. support has helped insulate Israel from some of the costs of its actions and made it easier for Israel to indulge strategic illusions and ideological pipe-dreams. Given this reality, there is no reason for Israel's friends -- both Jewish and gentile -- to remain silent when it decides to pursue a foolish policy. And given that our "special relationship" with Israel means that the United States is invariably associated with Jerusalem's actions, Americans should not hesitate to raise their voices to criticize Israel when it is acting in ways that are not in the U.S. national interest.
Those who refuse to criticize Israel even when it acts foolishly surely think they are helping the Jewish state. They are wrong. In fact, they are false friends, because their silence, or worse, their cheerleading, merely encourages Israel to continue potentially disastrous courses of action. Israel could use some honest advice these days, and it would make eminently good sense if its closest ally were able to provide it. Ideally, this advice would come from the president, the secretary of state, and prominent members of Congress -- speaking as openly as some politicians in other democracies do. But that's unlikely to happen, because Israel's supporters make it almost impossible for Washington to do anything but reflexively back Israel's actions, whether they make sense or not. And they often do not these days.
AFP/Getty Images
EXPLORE:INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS, MIDDLE EAST, DIPLOMACY, ISRAEL/PALESTINE, LEBANON, MILITARY, SECURITY, U.S. FOREIGN POLICY 
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...at other times [Israel] pursues policies that are foolish and cruel.>
Cruel policies can still be effective, I don't see that Israel has suffered or is getting weaker in any tangible way relative to it's enemies.
Connor Cruise O'Brian said in relation to Ireland it is not a 'problem' that calls for a solution. It is a conflict and they have outcomes, not solutions
Mostly a pretty good post. From what I've heard from people who worked with the upper levels of the IDF, institutional arrogance is a huge problem, and most of them were not very impressed with said military. There's definitely a myth of Israeli power going around, helped by the fact that the Israelis mainly look good in comparison to the unbelievably bad militaries of the neighboring states.
As for Hezbollah, whether or not Israel made blunders (and they did), the important thing is that Hezbollah hasn't tried to either bait or provoke Israel since 2006 in the ways they would do before - like launching rockets on to Israel's northern towns, or staging raids to kidnap Israeli soldiers. That's something that the Israeli government can live with, and if the Gaza situation reaches an equilibriam like that (although I doubt it will unless the Israelis get the Egyptians to lift the blockade on their side, and lighten the barriers to sending stuff into Gaza on their boundary with Gaza), then the Israeli government will have won. At least in the short term.
You have admitted that countries do not always behave as realism predicts they will (pursuing their national interest regardless of internal politics, ideology or moral concerns). There's nothing wrong with admitting the limits of a theory, but in order to avoid the sort of unfalsifiability Karl Popper liked to attack you should explain in what situations realist predictions apply or to what extent realism is realistic. With the United States you have given the plausible explanation that it is so powerful and safe from any threat that it can afford to behave foolishly. I find that a very plausible explanation. Here you seem to be saying that foolish decisions are not simply an aberration for the Israeli government but something of a pattern for some time. Is it the case that undemocratic states pursue their national interest in a more straight-forward and clearheaded manner?
Young generation supports One State - end of segregation regime
From the new article by Ali Abunimah. Link:
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10215.shtml
excerpt:
"Israel simply cannot bomb its way to legitimacy. Israel was founded as a "Jewish state" through the ethnic cleansing of Palestine's non-Jewish majority Arab population. It has been maintained in existence only through Western support and constant use of violence to prevent the surviving indigenous population from exercising political rights within the country, or returning from forced exile.
"Despite this, today, 50 percent of the people living under Israeli rule in historic Palestine (Israel, the West Bank and Gaza Strip) are Palestinians, not Jews.
"For years, the goal of the so-called peace process was to normalize Israel as a "Jewish state" and gain Palestinians' blessing for their own dispossession and subjugation. When this failed, Israel tried "disengagement" in Gaza -- essentially a ruse to convince the rest of the world that the 1.5 million Palestinians caged in there should no longer be counted as part of the population."
See full article at:
http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10215.shtml
Whats after the war, the new awakening
Professor Stephen, the more I read what you write about the Middle East the more I show my respect for you. Well done.
Here is my intake of the situation in Israel and Gaza.
Israel has been attacking Gaza nonstop for 22 days, after having carte blanche from the current Bush Administration to go ahead with its plan, and after using all kinds of conventional and non conventional banned military weapons against Hamas militias and Palestinian civilians.
22 days of diplomacy, protests and a UN resolution failed to pressure Israel to cease fire and end the bloodshed. So what made Israel announce a unilateral ceasefire, knowing that Gaza is still under Hamas rule, rockets are still falling in Israel? (Hamas agreed to the ceasefire, when this post was published, and Israel said it listened to Husni Mubarak appeal to cease fire and later said that it is doing the pullout because of Obama!)
So far, Gaza is still under siege, and Israel is still controlling its skies, land, sea and power supplies. So far the dead are more than 1,300 civilians and the number is rising and there are more than 5,300 injured where half are children.
So did Israel achieve anything?
Did Hamas win the war?
The answer is simply NO.
Israel has lost its credibility as the third most advanced military power in the World, which failed to crush Hamas which is not an army. Israel did not succeed in entering highly populated cities in Gaza and kept a safe distance by targeting Hamas and civilians from the sky above using banned White Phosphorous bombs. This war has changed the equation of power in the Middle East. Hamas has proved to the World that it is a power that should be dealt with care.
Israel’s image was deeply hurt around the world, as the images of dead and burned children in the name of defending Israel’s security cannot be easily ignored or justified. This country was acting like a bully and not paying any attention to the peace initiatives of Turkey, France and Egypt and finally the UN Resolution. Voices calling for Peace from inside Israel and the Arab World were ignored, and the everyday protests across the World (From Brazil to New York, LA, Europe, Asia, Australia and the Muslim World) were totally ineffectual in stopping this bloodshed. And finally cutting diplomatic ties and relations did not do Israel any good.
Hamas has not only lost some of its leaders but has caused Gaza 1.5 Trillion Dollars of damage and a catastrophic situation within the population that was caused by the Israeli assault. While many people in the Arab World will consider Hamas a resistance group that was able to stop Israeli aggression the past 3 weeks, it should be held accountable for foolish acts against its people as they made many mistakes during the past few years. Hamas has failed diplomatically and politically but gained popularity as a resistance group. Last what we need today is an Islamic Political Influence in the Middle East.
But Hamas and Israel were not the only losers. The big losers were the ailing regimes of the Arab World like Husni Mubarak of Egypt, King Abdallah of Saudi Arabia and unfortunately Mahmoud Abbas of the Palestinian Authority. They have let their people down, ignored their calls for opening the borders with Gaza for humanitarian aid and refused to meet in an Arab Summit in Qatar after 18 days of the war. Mahmoud Abbas failed to represent the Palestinians as their president and failed to express even one condemnation of the war. He has let his people down. Most of Arab leaderships were quiet during the war. It is suggested that Mahmoud Abbas who is known as a corrupted thug submit his resignation along with Fatah leadership and call for new elections. Palestine needs a new leadership and it should be neither Hamas nor Fatah.
In the last day of the war, Israel has signed an agreement with the US to prevent weapons from entering Gaza, and Europe and the UK showed their readiness to co-operate. But even if Israel signed tens of agreements with any country, this will not make it any safer knowing that Palestinians are living in a situation of injustice for the past 60 years. How can you be safe when you know that your neighbors are dying from poverty, have an ailing economy and you are imposing a land, sea and air embargo on them?
I believe that only with negotiations and the withdrawal of troops and giving Palestinians the right of movement, self determination and democracy will Israel have peace of mind. The solution is simple: End the Occupation.
Economically, it is less expensive to end the occupation instead of building an apartheid wall, electric fences, and battle ships monitoring the ocean and spying satellites. What we need to do is build bridges between nations and plant seeds of co-existence between people who are fed up from 60 years of Diaspora and wars.
Here is a list of things that we need to push for:
•Israel, Arab countries and the International community should send money and help in re building Gaza.
•Israel, Arab countries and the International community should help Palestinians who are not only in Gaza but the occupied West Bank, to improve their economy, education system, and healthcare.
•Financial aid should NOT be sent thru the Palestinian Authority who has been known over the years of not delivering money.
•Enforce an investigation of War Crimes in Gaza
•Branding Gaza. For people and especially Arabs not to forget this unjust war, Gaza should be branded and stop using the term “Gaza Holocaust” is it has already been used.
•End the occupation in Gaza and the West Bank and end the restriction of movement on Palestinians and let them control their sea port, airport and border crossings.
•Put International monitors inside Israel to protect the Palestinians from Israeli aggression and targeted assassinations
•Give Muslim and Christian Palestinians the freedom of practicing their religion in Jerusalem and Bethlehem and anywhere in Israel / Palestine
•Give Palestinians a chance for self determination and let them chose who they want by having fair elections monitored by the UN and EU.
•Work on achieving a One State solution. You can’t have two states when an apartheid wall is cutting into Arab towns and villages and illegal settlements are scattered all over the West Bank. Other issues like the refugees, Jerusalem status and the Arab Israelis will be solved by having One State for all, but naming that country will remain a question!
Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza however, live under a brutal military occupation, and it’s all up to Israel. The Palestinians are more than ready.
This war had a great impact on Arab youth and the future generations of this region. Israel was successful in awakening the Nationalism and Patriotism in every Arab, just when everyone thought Nationalism has been long dead. Those generations have never witnessed Jamal Abdel Nasser, the Nakbah of Palestine in 1948 & 1967, or the Suez Canal crossing in 1973.
Those millions of Arabs were able to take their anger to the streets in their countries, and the hallways of their parliaments. I have never seen such protests across the Arab World for any cause. We had a few during the US invasion in Iraq, the war on Lebanon in 2006 but nothing was like this. I have never seen teenagers, children, men, women; Christian & Muslim who went to the streets to protest the silence and the negativity of their leadership and to denounce the unjust war against Palestinian civilians. People started boycotting Israeli products, cancelling New Year’s Eve parties, donating their clothes, blankets, mattresses, jackets and money. One teenager told me “I can’t help with money but I can help with my sweat” in reference to his participation in organizing the donations given, “This is the least I can give to Palestine” he added. Donation centers were put everywhere in Jordan and the Arab World, sending money, canned food and blood donations to the UNRWA in Gaza. People were carpooling to go to warehouses to organize the donations. Companies and employees were donating money, ambulances and even sending doctors to Gaza. Those are not Pro Hamas or Pro Fatah they are simply awakened Arabs who feel the pain and sorrow of their brothers and sisters in Gaza!
During my 35 years in this part of the world, I have never seen such union and bond between different ethnic backgrounds, religions within the Arab community. Of course I have to give credit to many Americans and Europeans and other NGOs who have donated and helped so much during this crisis and showed sympathy to Palestinian civilians.
I have seen Arab youth, from Morocco in the West, to Egypt, Jordan and Kuwait in the East, who were moved and angered by the Israeli brutality. And it is not religion that is uniting them but the language, the Arabic culture and history of this region that was invaded by Romans and Greeks thousands of years ago. Arab Christians and Muslims worked hand in hand to help Palestinians thru this tough time and I would really like to congratulate Israel in bringing awareness to our Youth on the danger of occupation and oppression. And just like two months ago, when many Arabs were hopeful about Obama's election inspite of the United States' blind support of this unjust war, I also see more and more Arabs becoming increasingly conscious about their one and only cause, the end of occupation in Palestine.
While I respect Stephen Walt's criticisms of Israel, it's difficult not to notice that there isn't a balancing in the form of revealing the powerful Arab lobby in the US, spearheaded by Saudi Arabia.
Israel's legitimacy and the Jewish people have experienced a massive negative campaign on multiple levels. This is in part done through the funding of academic institutions and departments of Islamic Studies with the unmistakable bias towards laying the blame of all Middle East problems on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
There have been demonstrable cases of politicians, Jimmy Carter the most visible example, who have become virtual mouthpieces for anti-Israel maneouvering.
Some believe that the Israel spectre serves the needs of autocratic regimes in the Middle East in deflecting responsibilities by persistently using Israel as the primay cause of domestic and economic strife in many Muslim countries.
Much more I could say on this. My overall feeling is that Israel has not only their hostile neighbours to contend with, but what's been called a 'Silent Jihad' involving academics and politicians with a built in interest in undermining Israel and it's legitimacy.
MF
mmlicheal,
As an American citizen, I've long been conflicted over this conflict. The years of shocking, deplorable actions by both sides have sickened me. Harboring such sentiments has caused me to be variously called a "Zionist" and an "anti-Semite." (Most recently the former but more frequently the latter). If you knew me you'd know just how silly either charge is.
I find your comments about the "powerful Arab Lobby" curious. In light of the strength and breadth of Israel's lobbying efforts, it's disingenuous to complain about Arab influence on American opinion and foreign policy. According to OpenSecrets.org pro-Israel PACs have given over $9 million dollars to federal political candidates since 2004. For the corresponding time period, Arab PACs gave $315,000.
Arab lobbies are more loosely knit. Some are informal. As there are 21 distinct Arab states many of these groups have differing or competing goals. One of the largest Arab-American groups is of Lebanese Christian stock and thus do not support traditional Arab causes.
In contrast the pro-Israel lobby is far more organized and singular of purpose. You cannot get elected to higher office here without speaking to AIPAC. The Jewish voter block is one of the most powerful in our country. In our most recent election, the GOP sought to influence this constituency by repeatedly focusing on Barack Hussein Obama's Arabic middle name.
US-based Arab think tanks do exist but I cannot speak knowledgeably about their effectiveness. There are no widely syndicated Arab-American columnists in the US. Historically Arab-Americans have had nominal representation in Congress and in The White House.
Pro-Israel American-based think tanks are legion. Charles Krauthammer and William Kristol are but two widely syndicated pro-Israel columnists. The National Review and other influential publications share their view. Pat Robertson and John Hagee, two of our prominent Evangelical Christian leaders, have expressed their unconditional support of Israel. There has been any number of Jewish Senators and Congress people. Former President George W. Bush's team was stocked with Israel boosters from Dick Cheney on down.
The ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict is an emotional one. One that will take a increasingly dispassionate, objective and truthful approach if we are to hope to ever reach a solution. This applies equally to all sides.
-AF
Your thesis (enunciated at the outset and reprised at the close) is that some will not criticize Israeli moves because they believe in Israel's alleged strategic genius. Did I say "thesis"? I should have said "straw man." You provide zero evidence about the sociology or psychology of people with whom you disagree. You quote no-one and indicate no survey research (even) to establish that anyone or any number of people think in the way of your straw man. Do you permit your grad students such scholarly "license"? Ah, but your argument is transparently a pretext for you to rehearse a tendentious historical "analysis" and set of thumb-on-the-scale policy judgments remniscient of your "scholarly" work with Mearsheimer, which was picked apart by Dershowitz and Benny Morris (who referred to the absence of first person interviews, absence of consideration of scholarship with which you disagree, quotations presented falsely or out of context, etc.), among others. Walt, you are a very successful hack.
Your erudite criticisms are wasted in this media.
It's obvious that this article was not written as a scholarly work and is an opinion piece, so the rules are a bit more relaxed.(It is his blog after all!) And I would personally think twice about citing either Dershowitz or Morris as unbiased sources of criticism for the work done by Walt and Mearshimer. Both of those scholars have drawn plenty of criticism in their own right for mistakes of scholarship of which you now accuse Prof. Walt.
I retract and apologize the "hack" comment, which was not called for.
Minding the difference between scholarly work and a blog, a straw man remains a straw man. At best, the shadow Walt was boxing distracted from the substance of his article (Israeli strategic suboptimalization, to put it blandly). At worst, the straw man was a loaded-up and unfounded characterization intended to de-authorize his supposedly blinkered adversaries. As for the W/M reply to critcs, I agree with its counterblows on what they term "guilt by association" critiques by AD and others, which made me wince when I first saw them. Nevertheless, I remain more pesuaded by Morris' defense of his own work and Dershowitz's chapter and verse presentation of the often tendentious scholarship underlying "The Israel Lobby" (paper). W/M tend to load up their case by quoting out of or with insufficient context, and mostly avoid engaging the strongest arguments of opposed points of view. In many ways, their back and forth with critics is more edifying and carefully-crafted than their original work. While in my prior comment I may have mistakenly applied scholarly standards to a blog, it seems to me that W/M veered toward applying blog standards to their recent controversial scholarship.
People don't criticize what they don't have a basis of knowledge about.
The recitation of Israel's failings are utterly incomplete in analysis and mostly speculative interpretations. They may be accurate, or they may not.
It would be more useful to intellectuals and policy makers to disclose that a conclusion is a thesis, and not a fact.
It is impossible to conclude that Israel's actions in either Lebanon or Gaza have been inneffective. There are clearly consequences that will work against Israel, but there are also likely consequences that Israel regards as success, with the result of reduced or stopped shelling of civilians.
If that condition remains, then it is likely that border traffic can be normalized, and that a whole gamut of intrusions on Palestinians can be relaxed and eliminated.
If it were clear that Hamas would fold into the PA (a government), then Israel could move on from regarding Hamas as enemy. In Israel's independance movement, the Irgun and Stern Gang were TOLD (and accepted) to take orders from the IDF, and NOT remain as independant militias.
Every relationship remains unresolvable so long as Hamas is renegade (rejecting joining the Palestinian government in good faith).
The most that can occur for Gaza Palestinians is cease-fire, AND isolation. It is impossible for Israel, a state, to accept a militia shelling civilians.
Professor Walt knows that. He also must be aware that Hamas CHOSE to adopt a military approach following the ending of the cease-fire. Israel did not use military for a week following the ending of the cease-fire agreement, but Hamas escalated daily, unilaterally.
One of the questions I would ask in regards to who was responsible for breaking the cease-fire is how did you arrive at choosing the point in time of Hamas resuming rocket attacks? What I am driving at is that I could, for the sake of argument, go back just a little earlier in time and point to Israel's continued blockade of Gaza by land, sea and air as an act of war as well as a violation of the ceasefire agreement. (Most nations would interpret a blockade of that scope as being an act of war and historically the US has gone to war for less.) What makes your choice of starting the conflict with rocket attacks by hamas more compelling than if I chose to start earlier and assign blame to Israel?
Now, to really throw this into a blender, how useful is apportioning blame to actually achieving a lasting settlement between Israelis and Palestinians? I think one of the mistakes that is made is assigning a different value to the suffering of one group versus another. i.e Israeli suffering in Sderot from rocket attacks has more weight then Palestinians suffering from privation due to an economic blockade. As long as one side is more deserving of it's fate then another and we continue to significantly support the 'right' side over the 'wrong' side there will never be a peaceful solution.
I hear your concerns. They've been described at long length by many.
The reason that I describe Hamas as intending the cease-fire to remain broken and conflict to escalate without limit is:
1. In early November, Israel attacked a tunnel that it claimed it had intelligence was infrastructure for another abduction attempt. I think six Hamas militia were killed. It was described as a violation of the cease-fire, and for a very short time Hamas resumed shelling Sderot and Ashkelon.
But, that quieted down. BOTH sides publicly indicated that they preferred the cease-fire to escalation at that time. I'm sure that there was internal discussion among Hamas whether to resume the cease-fire or to consider it permanently broken.
2. Towards the end of November, before the cease-fire ended, Hamas allowed Islamic Jihad and possibly others to resume shelling. The day following the formal end of the cease-fire, Hamas itself resumed shelling. The shells for the first two days hit only the desert. It was noted by Israel, and did not retaliate militarily.
They verbally (public statements and through intermediaries) conveyed that shelling civilians would result in a military response. Hamas gradually escalated their shelling, first at Sderot, then longer range to Ashkelon, and later Beersheva (both multi-cultural cities).
They misinterpreted Israel's restraint at that point. Who knows what they thought, or whom within Hamas thought what?
My personal sense was that Israel should have acknowledged that Hamas did keep the cease-fire quite closely for the six months, even with some testing of the waters (when Islamic Jihad first refused to go along with the cease-fire in July, and Hamas played with whether to ask them to abide by it).
Israel should have gradually relaxed their border management towards more normalization.
It is irrational to expect Israel or Egypt to normalize borders with a proto-state with whom it is at war, long-term and short-term.
It is one reason that a real state, or an aspiring state maintains good relationships with its neighbors, as frustrating as it is.
I suppose I might point to dependence on American aid as one final strategic failing -- to the point that a state exists in a precarious situation, military and logistical dependence seems only to exacerbate weakness.
Given the politics of unbalanced alliance, tactical and strategic initiatives may reflect electoral politics abroad rather than local facts on the ground.
W B, instead of a yellow star we could pass a Identity Card Carrying and Displaying Act of 2009, which contains a recognizable clue to your possible dual loyalty. Although it sounds alarming, I have it on good authority that this is in fact completely compatible with a modern democracy.
Talking about Israel and it's relationship with the United States almost guarantees an emotional response as is evidenced by some of the messages posted here. Without being overly wordy, I think that it is important to try to stick to debating the pros and cons of a position without resorting to speculation about a person's character or motives when making your argument. 'So and so is a zionist' or 'so and so is an anti-semite' are actually not very useful or illuminating statements and will likely only win you points with people who already agree with you anyway.
I'll be honest when I say that the special relationship between Israel and the United States should be examined. I find it troubling that our legislature can find almost complete unanimity in it's support for Israel's campaign in Gaza, unanimity that has not been approached by other votes. I'm not going to suggest a zionist plot, or any other kind of conspiracy quakery. In fact, I don't have an answer. What I do suggest is that inquiries be allowed without the usual shrill denunciations that seem to follow whenever someone has one shred of criticism for our ally.
Professor, Your articles are always well researched and well written. But why do you accept as a given Israel's "right to exist as a Zionist state"? The idea of Zionism, which not all Jews accept, is anti-Democratic, contrary to what you write. There is no democratic country that has to make sure a particular religion always remains in the majority so as to avoid tainting it's "democracy". Anti-Zionists are not given a fair representation in such a scheme. To many Jews, Zionism is a crackpot notion. Why not listen to those who challenge this idea? Zionism needs anti-Semitism since without it there is no need for Zionism. Zionism in fact breeds anti-Semitism. Perhaps this is what the atrocities in Gaza are all about.
WHAT IS BEHIND ISRAELI GAZA OPERATION?
Few seem to have noticed. Maybe because it has been slow in coming and imperceptible to observers with short memories.
Gaza outrage is essentially a delayed Israeli reaction to a growing frustration.
Israelis are being hemmed in yet again, and it is not at all to their liking.
Israelis have over the recent years, been progressively losing their freedom for military action in their neighborhood.
And they are hopping mad about it.
Thrashing insanely at the nearest object of their fury, is one way of letting out pent up steam of frustration.
On the eve of the New Year, A new US Presidency and of course the impending Knesset elections; Israeli ruling parties had a choice to make among three temptations:
--- Carry out a bombing raid on Iranian nuclear facilities …
--- Attack Hezbollah in Lebanon…
--- Clubber Gazans for their support of Hamas.
Undertaking one of the first two choices involved many unforeseen consequences and likely great cost to Israel itself.
That left Gaza as the only and easy choice for Israelis to show what they are still capable of.
A campaign in Gaza would hopefully also provide Israel with more freedom for future military actions and strike awe in the heart of Palestinians for some time to come.
Let us look back and check on recent history.
Only a few years back Israel was in south Lebanon basking in a self-declared 10-mile Security Zone. From there they could and did carry out deadly forays deep in Lebanon whenever it suited the Israeli Army.
Imagine. They even had local helpers – The South Lebanon Army – to do most of the dirty work for them.
IAF pilots had the Lebanese skies all to themselves. They often found it amusing to smash windows and frighten people out their wits by creating sonic booms over Beirut.
It was all fun in those days, and an essential component of demonstrating Israeli military muscle for all to see and watch out for.
The crushing Israeli military and diplomatic superiority was so great that the jewish State did not brook any interference from international players impinging on its freedom of action.
A test of this status quo came early in 1996.
It was a heartening event for the hapless Lebanese, when In the spring of 1996 President Chirac of France made an official visit to the country and inaugurated a French-built power plant there.
Surely, the Lebanese thought with France as an ally of Lebanon, Israelis would have to think twice before wreaking havoc in the country at the merest whim.
But Israel fearing a less compliant Lebanon and an election on the horizon, promptly took to the wings; and Operation Grapes Of Wrath was launched right on the heel of Chirac visit.
In a sixteen-day military blitz against Lebanon. Israel conducted more than 1,100 air raids and extensive shelling . A UN installation at Qana was hit by Israeli shelling causing the death of 118 Lebanese civilians.
For good measure the newly built French power plant was also reduced to rubble.
This was a simple exercise in demonstrating Israeli might in the region. It all went to show the Lebanese who calls the shots in the neighborhood. To make clear to them who is the boss there; Israel and not France.
Compare the situation on the Israeli northern border then with what it is now.
In 2006 Israelis tried to reassert themselves in Lebanon.
After suffering a steady and growing claustrophobia in their freedom for military action on the northern front IDF wanted air to breathe again.
The 2006 military campaign – Third Lebanon War - which was to put things right again for Israel, ended in Israel being forced to swallow a new and unpleasant reality. That any future military adventure in Lebanon would come at an unacceptably high price to Israeli citizens.
Any violation of Lebanese territory will now be met with a harsh response from the Hezbollah. Pretty soon IAF will even be forced to abandon its increasing rare small intrusions over southern Lebanon skies.
There is then no question that Israel, much to its frustration, has lost the great freedom of action it once had on its northern front.
With the Hezbollah getting stronger both politically and militarily as time passes, Israelis, who never had to think twice before launching military expeditions, now find themselves increasingly beleaguered and insecure on the northern front.
Utterly frustrated on the Lebanese front, Israelis have been in no mood to suffer similar indignity in the south.
That Hamas and Gazans would dare retaliate for military operations and assassination of their leaders by throwing back rockets came as an unpleasant surprise to the Israeli leadership. That Gazans should dare retaliate by launching rockets at southern towns was too much for Israelis to bear.
To put to an end this state of affairs, a mad military campaign had to be launched. With an election coming up, it did not matter how it would turn out in the long run. It did not matter that the short-lived military success will come at enormous cost to Israel’s carefully nurtured international image.
The process of Israel being hemmed in is ongoing and irreversible.
Hamas will sooner or later recover. Hamas will soon regain its strength, while Israel would no longer be in a position to make arbitrary incursions in Gaza, or commit targeted killings. The international community will now see to that.
The new situation emerging from the pile of ruins in Gaza indicates that Hamas will survive and prosper in an environment that will be relatively free from Israelis military intervention.
Hamas has no need to fire rockets at Israeli towns if it is left alone to build up its base in Gaza and the West Bank.
Hamas has the potential to become strong enough to be the source of great irritation to Israeli settlers on the West Bank. The last haven yet left, after Gaza, affording freedom of military action to Israelis.
The looming and bloody conflict in the West Bank is the spectacle the world should look out for.
That struggle will pretty much determine Israel’s future.
Asking Israel to solve the Palestinian crisis is a fool's game
OK, say you believe that Hamas is no good and terrorist and Fatah is moderate and better…Wouldn’t it make sense for Hamas enemies—America and Israel, to defang Hamas by supporting the moderate Palestinians? (i.e. Fatah and Mr. Abbas).
Israel can do this by removing the settlers from the West Bank, ending the Gaza blockade, invest in rebuilding and guaranteeing an Independent Palestinian state.
Why doesn’t this happen?
It is difficult to explain.
Dissenters end up concluding that Israel doesn't intend to allow a viable Palestine.
I consider it still an open question.
It is not difficult to explain.
It took a Sharon and a deep national trauma to evacuate Gaza of 7000 settlers.
How do you propose a weak Israeli government throw out half a million prosperous settlers from the West Bank and East Jerusalem?
it simply cannot be done.
I don't propose that.
I propose the 67 borders with the settlers remaining where they are as Palestinian citizens.
The question of title to land still remains. I oppose forced removals of either Palestinians or Jews, and propose that color-blind law be established in both Israel and Palestine based on common bases of title substantiation and remedy.
In MOST western locales, forced removal is also discouraged, and means of perfecting title is preferrable.
In the case of MANY individual Palestinians in Israel and in Palestine, the basis of title is relative, based on residence only. In a world in which all land is titled (rather than resided on by communal consent), MANY Palestinians would face a similar legal bind of coming up with the cash to perfect their title.
To apply a nationalistic, rather than color-blind, basis of determination would be to approve of ethnically based screens in the effort to protest and remedy ethnically based screens.
Israelis live under Palestinian law?
You must be joking.
What you are proposing, in all innocence, is a future West Bank as Hebron writ large.
Take a good look at Hebron first, before proceeding any further with this line of thought.
What about Hebron are you concerned about?
That Jews will be suppressed, or that Jews will attempt to suppress?
Pogroms are the order of the day in Hebron
Well, is it not obvious? Make a guess.
I ask you.
Who in his wildest dream imagines that hapless Palestinians are going to supress Jews of Israel who possess nuclear weapons?
Sir,
You state that "after seizing the West Bank, Golan Heights and Gaza Strip during the war, Israeli leaders decided to start building settlements and eventually incorporate them into a "greater Israel." Thus, 1967 marks the beginning of Israel's settlements project".
Your colleague Prof. Mearsheimer, in his Jan 26 article in the American Conservative (1), talked about the "real goals of Operation Cast Lead", and described them thus: "The actual purpose is connected to Israel’s long-term vision of how it intends to live with millions of Palestinians in its midst. It is part of a broader strategic goal: the creation of a “Greater Israel.” Specifically, Israel’s leaders remain determined to control all of what used to be known as Mandate Palestine, which includes Gaza and the West Bank."
Prof Avi Shlaim, Fellow of St. Anthony's College, Oxford and the British Academy stated in his January 07 article in the UK Guardian newspaper (2): "The Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the June 1967 war had very little to do with security and everything to do with territorial expansionism. The aim was to establish Greater Israel through permanent political, economic and military control over the Palestinian territories. And the result has been one of the most prolonged and brutal military occupations of modern times."
Prof. Noam Chomsky in his recent article informs us of the methods the Israelis use and the coverage given to these methods by even Israeli rabbinical authorities: "They are not marginal figures. On the contrary, they are highly influential in the army and in the settler movement, who Zertal and Eldar reveal to be "lords of the land," with enormous impact on policy. Soldiers fighting in northern Gaza were afforded an "inspirational" visit from two leading rabbis, who explained to them that there are no "innocents" in Gaza, so everyone there is a legitimate target, quoting a famous passage from Psalms calling on the Lord to seize the infants of Israel's oppressors and dash them against the rocks. The rabbis were breaking no new ground. A year earlier, the former chief Sephardic rabbi wrote to Prime Minister Olmert, informing him that all civilians in Gaza are collectively guilty for rocket attacks, so that there is "absolutely no moral prohibition against the indiscriminate killing of civilians during a potential massive military offensive on Gaza aimed at stopping the rocket launchings," as the Jerusalem Post reported his ruling. His son, chief rabbi of Safed, elaborated: "If they don't stop after we kill 100, then we must kill a thousand, and if they do not stop after 1,000 then we must kill 10,000. If they still don't stop we must kill 100,000, even a million. Whatever it takes to make them stop." (3)
Last February, according to Haaretz (4), Israeli "Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai went as far as threatening a “shoah,” the Hebrew word for holocaust or disaster."
In August 2006, Edward S. Herman and Grace Kwinjeh wrote (5): "Back in 1948, David Ben-Gurion was clear that "We must use terror, assassination, intimidation, land confiscation, and the cutting of all social services to rid the Galilee of its Arab population." Fifty years later, in 1998, Ariel Sharon made the same point about the centrality of ethnic cleansing in Israeli policy: "It is the duty of Israeli leaders to explain to public opinion, clearly and courageously, a certain number of facts that are forgotten with time. The first of these is that there is no Zionism, colonization or Jewish state without the eviction of the Arabs and the expropriation of their lands." On May 24, 2006, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a joint session of congress that "I believed and to this day still believe, in our people's eternal and historic right to this entire land."
Curiously enough in neither Prof. Mearsheimer's, Prof. Shlaim's nor your own article do we find the word 'genocide' even once. Why not sir? Everything I have read about Israeli methods concur with the description in the Genocide Convention.
Edward S. Herman and Grace Kwinjeh make another point: "This drive to "redeem the land," requiring the takeover of land in the possession of others by force, also constitutes a model case of a quest for a "Greater" entity - here a Greater Israel - a drive which in the case of Milosevic's and the Serbs' alleged drive for a "Greater Serbia" was presented as a prime element of illegal activity in the ICTY indictment of Milosevic"
On March 24, 1999, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) began Operation Allied Force against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. That evening, President Bill Clinton explained to the American people that the NATO air campaign was intended to avoid "an even crueler and costlier war"; "to prevent a wider war in Europe"; and to "seriously damage the Serbian military's capacity to harm the people of Kosovo."
Describing the Serbian Army's assault, he stated: "This is not war in the traditional sense. It is an attack by tanks and artillery on a largely defenseless people...Our mission is clear: to demonstrate the seriousness of NATO's purpose so that the Serbian leaders understand the imperative of reversing course; to deter an even bloodier offensive against innocent civilians in Kosovo and, if necessary, to seriously damage the Serbian military's capacity to harm the people of Kosovo. In short, if President Milosevic will not make peace, we will limit his ability to make war."
(6)
Tony Blair had said much the same the day before, on 23 March 1999: "We must act to save thousands of innocent men, women and children from humanitarian catastrophe." Blair described the emergency: "Let me give the House an indication of the scale of what is happening: a quarter of a million Kosovars, more than 10 per cent of the population, are now homeless as a result of repression by Serb forces... Since last summer 2000 people have died." (7)
No mention was made of Serbia's right to defend its ethnic population from attacks by the KLA, described by President Bill Clinton's special envoy to the Balkans, Robert Gelbard, as, "without any questions, a terrorist group." (8)
Indeed George Robertson, then UK Defence Secretary and later NATO Secretary General, stated before the House of Commons that until mid-January 1999, "the Kosovo Liberation Army [KLA] was responsible for more deaths in Kosovo than the Serbian authorities had been". (9)
What is the difference between Serbia and Israel? One is forced to accept Ed Hermann & Prof. Chomsky's thesis that "when terrorism is seen by U.S. officials as highly advantageous to U.S. interests, it is treated by those officials, and hence by the media, as a positive development and hence "constructive...When the terrorism is not especially helpful to U.S. interests but is carried out by an ally or client that U.S. officials want to placate or protect, the killing of large numbers of civilians is treated as of little interest and no evident moral concern-it is "benign" (10)
Presumably therefore we can expect you to support an ad-hoc international war crimes tribunal to judge past and present Israeli leaders - at least those still alive for genocide and war crimes... and denounce the hypocrisy of NATO actions against Serbia if they are not prepared for a similar military blitz on Israel...
(1) Another War, Another Defeat By John J. Mearsheimer
January 26, 2009 Issue The American Conservative
http://www.amconmag.com/article/2009/jan/26/00006/
(2) How Israel brought Gaza to the brink of humanitarian catastrophe By Avi Shlaim, The Guardian, Wednesday 7 January 2009
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/jan/07/gaza-israel-palestine
(3) "Exterminate all the Brutes": Gaza 2009 By Noam Chomsky January 20, 2009 ZNet
http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/20316
(4) Barak: Hamas will pay for its escalation in the south
By Yuval Azoulay, Haaretz Correspondent and News Agencies
Salman / Jini) Last update - 00:00 29/02/2008
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/959532.html
(5) 'Ethnic Cleansing: Constructive, Benign, and Nefarious (Kafka Era Studies, No. 1),' Edward S. Herman and Grace Kwinjeh, ZNet, August 9, 2006;
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/3419)
(6) President Bill Clinton, address to the nation, Washington, D.C., March 24, 1999
http://millercenter.org/scripp...etail/3932
(7) Blair: 'We must act - to save thousands of innocent men, women and children,' The Guardian, March 23, 1999
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/1999/mar/23/balkans.tonyblair
(8) Terrorist Groups and Political Legitimacy
Prepared by: Michael Moran, Executive Editor, Council on Foreign Relations March 16, 2006
http://www.cfr.org/publication/10159/terrorist_groups_and_political_legitimacy.html?breadcrumb=%2Fbios%2F11490%2F%3Fgroupby%3D2%26page%3D1%26hide%3D1%26id%3D11490
(9) Quoted, Noam Chomsky, Hegemony or Survival, Routledge, 2003, p.56
(10) 'Ethnic Cleansing: Constructive, Benign, and Nefarious (Kafka Era Studies, No. 1),' Edward S. Herman and Grace Kwinjeh, ZNet, August 9, 2006;
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/3419)
34th US President IKE suspended AID TO ISRAEL
“Ike” = Dwight David Eisenhower American general & the 34th President of the United States (1953-1961). As far as WAR & PEACE issues; IKE had the richest experience of all US presidents!
In WWII he was the commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force (1943-1945) he launched the invasion of Normandy (June 6, 1944) and oversaw the final defeat of Germany (1945).
Ike cared about the STRATEGIC WELL BEING of Israel because HE was aware that the creation of Israel was the ultimate answer to European anti-Antisemitism.
On October 31, 1956 Ike’s presidency was marked by SUSPENSION OF US AID to ISRAEL in protest at its invasion of Egypt in the Suez Crisis.
In an emergency session of the United Nations (UN) November 1-2 1956 General Assembly was called to consider the Suez Crisis. U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE John Foster DULLES, ATTACKED the British–French–Israeli ACTION, and the Assembly votes for a cease-fire!
Britain & France complied promptly, but ISRAEL did not; until January 22, 1957 when Israeli forces completed their withdrawal.
The myth of Israel's strategic genius
Since Israel's invasion of Lebanon in 1982, a very subtle and unnoticed shift with extremely important long term strategic implications has been taking place: The Arab man is becoming ever less fearful of facing Israel's military might whilst the Israeli soldier is increasingly fearful of engaging his opponent on the battlefield. The 2 intifadas followed by Lebanon 2006 and Gaza 2009 are its clearest signs yet.
In that respect Israel is losing its strategic edge.
It may be true for non-states, but at some point they have to adopt the logic of states.
What does Professor Walt conclude about the relationships of containment between states and non-states?
That inquiry could include the relations between militias and states, or bi-lateral or multi-lateral relations.
Two elements occur to me.
The relationship of entities at different social scales. A state to a state (Israel to Egypt), vs a state to a federation (Israel to EU) vs a state to a militia.
How do those different institutional algorythms interact in some order? (One description of "chaos theory" is the interaction of materials for example that have entirely different underlying algorhythms and rule structures. Ice and water.)
It is most ironic that a man who on Sept 22, 2008 stated the unthinkable (for an Israeli public official) "that Israel must withdraw from nearly all the West Bank as well as East Jerusalem to attain peace with the Palestinians..." should preside over such brutal suppression in Gaza. How will his current actions help to attain that much more permanent objective?
Or does he in fact realize that a withdrawal is impossible, and that only periodic bouts of extreme brutality will "keep the peace". It worked well, for quite a time, for Genghis Khan and his progeny.
The statements early in the military action of "enough is enough" make sense.
Hamas does not propose reconciliation. The most that it proposes is temporary cease-fire.
Israel can live with cease-fire, if practised in fact.
"Back in 1956, Israel, along with Britain and France, came up with a
harebrained scheme to seize the Suez Canal and topple Nasser's regime
in Egypt"
----
Israel's Border Wars, 1949-1956 By Benny Morris
(Fedayeen attacks and the 1956 Sinai War)
The following year, forty- eight were killed and 144 wounded. In 1954
there were nine mining attacks against Israel along the Gaza border;
in 1955, forty-nine.
The August 1955 Fedayeen Campaign- About a dozen Fedayeen squads, some
sixty men in all, were sent across the Gaza border with orders to kill
and to sabotage targets.
Six Day War: Shaping the Modern Middle East
by Eric Westervelt
NPR
(Israels aggressive policies???)
In the spring of 1967, Israel grew increasingly alarmed by threats
from Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser.
The popular leader threatened to close the straits of Tiran, a vital
passageway that would cut off Israel's southern water link to the
outside world
"This he proceeds to do. He puts 100,000 of his men into Sinai, with
several thousand battle tanks and war planes - and makes defensive
pacts with Iraq and Syria - and declares intention to wage a war of
destruction against Israel"NPR
But on the morning of June 5, Israel struck first. The devastating
pre-emptive attack destroyed most of the Soviet-supplied Egyptian air
force before the MiG jets ever got off the ground.
In the meantime, Syrian artillery units in the Golan Heights began
shelling Rosh Pina and other towns in Israel's north.
Israel largely ignored the artillery at first.
While the offensive in Egypt was going far better than planned, Israel
was reluctant to use ground forces against Syria and badly wanted to
avoid a wider fight with Jordan,
at the same time, Jordanian jets attacked the coastal cities of Hadera
and Netanya, and Jordanian long-range guns just outside the West Bank
city of Jenin began shelling the outskirts of Tel Aviv. Throughout
this, the orders held firm: Israel did not return fire.
The "don't fire" orders collapsed, however, when Jordanian infantrymen
swept up on to a strategic ridge on the north side of Jerusalem.
Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University.
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