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Posted By Stephen M. Walt
Monday, February 8, 2010 - 4:24 PM
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Probably the most controversial claim in my work with John Mearsheimer on the Israel lobby is our argument that it played a key role in the decision to invade Iraq in 2003. Even some readers who were generally sympathetic to our overall position found that claim hard to accept, and some left-wing critics accused us of letting Bush and Cheney off the hook or of ignoring the importance of other interests, especially oil. Of course, Israel's defenders in the lobby took issue even more strenuously, usually by mischaracterizing our arguments and ignoring most (if not all) of the evidence we presented.
So I hope readers will forgive me if I indulge today in a bit of self-promotion, or more precisely, self-defense. This week, yet another piece of evidence surfaced that suggests we were right all along (HT to Mehdi Hasan at the New Statesman and J. Glatzer at Mondoweiss). In his testimony to the Iraq war commission in the U.K., former Prime Minister Tony Blair offered the following account of his discussions with Bush in Crawford, Texas in April 2002. Blair reveals that concerns about Israel were part of the equation and that Israel officials were involved in those discussions.
Take it away, Tony:
As I recall that discussion, it was less to do with specifics about what we were going to do on Iraq or, indeed, the Middle East, because the Israel issue was a big, big issue at the time. I think, in fact, I remember, actually, there may have been conversations that we had even with Israelis, the two of us, whilst we were there. So that was a major part of all this."
Notice that Blair is not saying that Israel dreamed up the idea of attacking Iraq or that Bush was bent on war solely to benefit Israel or even to appease the Israel lobby here at home. But Blair is acknowledging that concerns about Israel were part of the equation, and that the Israeli government was being actively consulted in the planning for the war.
Blair's comments fit neatly with the argument we make about the lobby and Iraq. Specifically, Professor Mearsheimer and I made it clear in our article and especially in our book that the idea of invading Iraq originated in the United States with the neoconservatives, and not with the Israeli government. But as the neoconservative pundit Max Boot once put it, steadfast support for Israel is "a key tenet of neoconservatism." Prominent neo-conservatives occupied important positions in the Bush administration, and in the aftermath of 9/11, they played a major role in persuading Bush and Cheney to back a war against Iraq, which they had been advocating since the late 1990s. We also pointed out that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and other Israeli officials were initially skeptical of this scheme, because they wanted the U.S. to focus on Iran, not Iraq. However, they became enthusiastic supporters of the idea of invading Iraq once the Bush administration made it clear to them that Iraq was just the first step in a broader campaign of "regional transformation" that would eventually include Iran.
At that point top Israeli leaders from across the political spectrum became cheerleaders for the invasion, and they played a prominent role in helping to sell the war here in the United States. Benjamin Netanyahu visited Washington, DC in April 2002 and spoke in the U.S. Senate, telling his audience "the urgent need to topple Saddam is paramount," and that the campaign "deserves the unconditional support of all sane governments." (It sure sounds like he was well aware of the discussions in Crawford, doesn't it?) In May, foreign minister Shimon Peres said on CNN that "Saddam Hussein is as dangerous as bin Laden," and that the United States "cannot sit and wait." A month later, former Prime Minister Ehud Barak wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post recommending that the Bush administration "should, first of all, focus on Iraq and the removal of Saddam Hussein."
This chorus continued through the summer and fall, with Barak and Netanyahu writing additional op-eds in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal, each calling for military action to topple Saddam. Netanyahu's piece was titled "The Case for Toppling Saddam" and said that "nothing less than dismantling his regime will do." Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's official spokesman, Ra'anan Gissen, offered similar statements during this period as well, and Sharon himself told the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee in August 2002 that Iraq was "the greatest danger facing Israel." According to an Aug. 16 article by Aluf Benn in Ha'aretz, Sharon reportedly told the Bush administration that putting off an attack would "only give [Saddam] more of an opportunity to accelerate his program of WMD." Foreign Minister Peres reiterated his own warnings as well, and told reporters in September 2002 that "the campaign against Saddam Hussein is a must." (For sources, see pp. 233-38).
If that's not enough evidence of where Israel's leaders were in the run-up to the war, consider that former President Bill Clinton told an audience at an Aspen Institute meeting in 2006 that "every Israeli politician I knew" (and he knows a lot of them) believed that Saddam Hussein was so great a threat that he should be removed even if he did not have WMD. Nor is this testimony at all surprising, given that we are talking about the leader who had fired Scud missiles into Israel during the first Gulf War in 1991 and had been giving money to the families of suicide bombers. If the Bush administration was bent on taking him out and then turning its gun-sights on Syria and Iran, one can easily understand why Israelis would welcome it.
Now, what about key groups in the lobby itself? If the neoconservatives deserve the blame for dreaming up the idea of invading Iraq, key groups and individuals in the lobby played an important role in selling it on Capitol Hill and to the public at large. AIPAC head Howard Kohr told the New York Sun in January 2003 that one of the organization's "success stories" over the previous year was "quietly lobbying Congress" to approve the resolution authorizing the use of force, a fact confirmed by journalists such as Nathan Guttman of the Forward, Michelle Goldberg of Salon.com, John B. Judis of the New Republic, and even Jeffrey Goldberg in The New Yorker (see p. 242). Pundits at pro-Israel think tanks like the Brookings Institutions's Saban Center were openly backing war by the fall of 2002, with Martin Indyk, the head of the center, and Kenneth Pollack, its director of research, playing especially prominent roles.
Moreover, in this same period both the Jewish Council on Public Affairs and the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations voted to endorse the use of force "as a last resort." Mortimer Zuckerman, a well-connected businessman and publisher who was then the chairman of the Conference of Presidents, was especially convinced about the futility of U.N. inspections and the need to topple Saddam, and wrote several editorials making that case in his magazine (U.S. News and World Report).
Still skeptical? Consider the following passage from an article by Matthew Berger of the Jewish Telegraph Agency, published just after President Bush's September 2002 appearance at the United Nations, where he threatened military action if Iraq did not comply with U.N. resolutions:
Despite their caution and without specifying a formal policy, Jewish leaders predominantly expressed support for Bush's words at the United Nations.
They said he detailed a strong case that Saddam has consistently ignored U.N. resolutions, that he was seeking to obtain weapons of mass destruction and that Saddam has shown a propensity towards using them.
"Iraq is the single most important threat right now to world peace and to our safety," said Dr. Mandell Ganchrow, executive vice president of the Orthodox Religious Zionists of America. He described Saddam as a "maniac" who "has proven that he will gas his own people."
"The fanaticism that exists throughout the Middle East is best addressed by first dealing with Iraq," agreed Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Reform movement's Union of American Hebrew Congregations.
Many American Jewish leaders expressed the fear that Saddam has not been quiet for the past decade because of a loss of will, but because he has been using the time to garner weapons for an eventual attack on U.S. interests and allies.
"Do we have to wait until a target is hit, and the world says, 'Ah, yes, he did have weapons of mass destruction,'" asked David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee."
Not to be outdone, the editor of Jewish Week, Gary Rosenblatt, wrote an editorial in mid-December 2002 saying that "Washington's imminent war on Saddam Hussein is . . . an opportunity to rid the world of a dangerous tyrant who present a particularly horrific threat Israel." He went on to say "the Torah instructs that when you enemy seeks to kill you kill him first. Self-defense is not permitted; it is commanded." Even the relatively liberal Rabbi David Saperstein of the Union of Reform Judaism's Religious Action Center told journalist Michelle Goldberg that "the Jewish community would want to see a forceful resolution to the threat that Saddam Hussein poses." "Forceful resolution" means war, and Saperstein also offered comparisons to the Bosnian conflict and the Nazi era to reinforce his call for military action.
Finally, consider the following passage from an editorial in the Jewish newspaper Forward, published in 2004:
As President Bush attempted to sell the war .. in Iraq, America's most important Jewish organizations rallied as one to his defense. In statement after statement community leaders stressed the need to rid the world of Saddam Hussein and his weapons of mass destruction. Some groups went even further, arguing that that the removal of the Iraqi leaders would represent a significant step toward bringing peace to the Middle East and winning America's war on terrorism"
The editorial also noted that "concern for Israel's safety rightfully factored into the deliberations of the main Jewish groups."
The Forward, it is worth noting, is well-connected and has a well-deserved reputation for probity in its reporting on the American Jewish community. It is hard to see how its editors could be mistaken about such an important issue or why they would lie about it. And they never issued a retraction. We can therefore assume that the writers of this editorial knew what they were talking about: key groups in the lobby supported the war. Reasonable people can disagree about how important their influence was, of course, but at a minimum these groups reinforced the Bush administration's resolve and made it less likely that other politicians or commentators would conduct a serious debate about the wisdom of the invasion.
Finally, it bears reiterating that I am talking about key groups and individuals in the Israel lobby, and not about the American Jewish community in toto. Indeed, my co-author and I have repeatedly pointed to surveys showing that American Jews were less supportive of the decision to invade Iraq than the American population as a whole, and we have emphasized that it would be a cardinal error (as well as dangerous) to try to "blame the Jews" for the war. Rather, blame should be reserved for Bush and Cheney (who made the ultimate decision for war), for the neoconservatives who dreamed up this foolish idea, and for the various groups and individuals -- including those in the lobby -- who helped sell it.
Nor am I suggesting that these individuals advocated this course because they thought it would be good for Israel but bad for the United States. Rather, they unwisely believed it would be good for both countries. And as we all know, they were tragically wrong.
That misconception helps us understand why the Israelis and their American friends who promoted the Iraq war didn't do a better job of covering their tracks and obscuring their enthusiasm for the endeavor. I suspect it is because they genuinely believed that the war would be easy and would bring great benefits for both Israel and the United States. If the war was a smashing success, then they would reap the credit and no one would spend that much time probing the war's origins. And even if someone did, its proponents would be hailed as strategic geniuses who had conceived and planned a stunning victory. Once the war went south, however, and numerous people began to probe how this disaster came about, an extensive dust-kicking operation to veil the role of Israel and the lobby was set in motion.
This campaign won't work, however, because too many people already know that Israel and the lobby were cheerleaders for the war and with the passage of time, more and more evidence of their influence on the decision for war will leak out. The situation is analogous to what happened with the events surrounding the infamous Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in August 1964. The Johnson administration could dissemble and cover its tracks for a few years, but eventually the real story got out, as will happen with Iraq. Indeed, Blair's testimony is evidence of that process at work.
For sure, many Israelis and their friends in the United States will continue to maintain that the Sharon government actually tried to stop the march to war and that groups in the lobby - including AIPAC -- stayed on the sideline and did not push for war. But these post hoc fairy tales will be increasingly hard to sell to the American people, not only because there is a growing body of evidence which directly contradicts them (see pp. 261-262) , but also because the internet and the blogosphere is allowing the word to spread. Thankfully, we no longer have to rely on the mainstream media to get the story straight.
Finally, let's not forget that while the Iraq war has been a disaster for the United States, it has also been very bad for Israel, not just because its principal patron has been stuck in a quagmire in Iraq, but also because the biggest winner from the war was Iran, which is the country that Israel fears most. All of this shows that despite the lobby's openly-stated commitment to promoting policies that it thinks will benefit Israel, it did not work out that way with the Iraq war. Nor is it working out that way with its unyielding support of Israel's self-destructive drive to colonize the Occupied Territories, a process that is turning Israel into an apartheid state. And the same warning applies to its efforts to keep all options-including the use of force -- "on the table" vis-à-vis Iran.
Given all the problems that the lobby's prescriptions have produced in recent years, you'd think U.S. leaders would have learned to ignore its advice. But there's little sign of that so far, which means that these past errors are likely to be repeated. Don't say I didn't warn you.
BEN STANSALL/AFP/Getty Images
EXPLORE:MIDDLE EAST, BUSH ADMINISTRATION, BUSH'S LEGACY, DISASTERS, IRAQ, ISRAEL/PALESTINE, MILITARY 
The role of the Israel lobby in engineering the Iraq War
What a crushing and devastating rebuttal to the absurd claim that the Israeli government and the Israel lobby -- especially the neoconservative wing of the Israel lobby -- weren't key players in engineering the Iraq War -- arguably the worst foreign policy disaster in American history. The truth is that the neocons were the ringleaders of the war, as anyone noticed who read the op-ed pages of the Washington Post, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal during that era.
And of course we now see many of these same neoconservative (and neoliberal) ideologues striving mightily to engineer even a worse disaster in Iran.
Why do they even bother to try to deny what they are up to when they have left such a massive documentary trail behind themselves? Do they presume that everyone besides themselves is stupid? Historians will be exploring this rich collection material and evidence in depth for decades and centuries to come.
I don't think there's any reasonable debate over whether pro-Israel groups in this country supported the war against Saddam Hussein. Nor is there any shame for this. I certainly supported it myself. But bear in mind that this support came at a time when many -- including many democrats who have since tried to distance themselves from their votes -- also supported military action, based on what many believed was accurate intelligence regarding the dangers posed by Iraq under SH. (Keep in mind the point Walt touches on but downplays; that Israeli leaders tried initially to get the U.S. to focus on Iran, not Iraq, and came around to strong support for the war in Iraq only when it became clear that that was to be the U.S./British focus). Pro-Israel groups were certainly not alone in either advocating for the war or supporting it. Nor is it surprising that Israeli leaders would ultimately welcome efforts by more powerful countries to remove one of their sworn enemies (and a man who had launched missles against Israeli cities with no provocation from that country and openly supported terrorism against Israel). And it is entirely possible (perhaps even likely) that the vehemence with which pro-Israel groups supported the war was solicited by the neo-cons in the Bush administration, and not the other way around. The fact is, a lot of people purportedly "got it wrong" on Iraq vis a vis WMD (although not regarding SH's open support for terrorism and his oft-declared intentions to one day finish what he had started with Israel. As Israeli leaders say often, they take maniacs seriously when they talk about "genociding" us, and with good historical reason). The Israel lobby and Israel supporters are far from alone in this, and, as Walt indicates, there is no indication that the war was undertaken for Israel's benefit. To the contrary, he states clearly that the intention of these groups was pure; to benefit both the United States and Israel (and presumably the rest of the Western aligned world) once the decision was made to go to war.
All that having been said, and without the benefit of full context, I don't think Blair's statement is much evidence in this regard. He mentioned the "Israel issue" in the context of the considerations in going to war, but that could just as easily refer to the effect launching the war would have on other Mideast peace prospects (his comments suggest they were concerned with broader Mideast issues) and how it would "play" in the rest of the region, as well as whether there would be a repeat of attacks on Israel as a result of a coalition attack against Iraq, and what to do with Israel in terms of its potential response. THAT would be a more logical interpretation of what Blair meant and why he and Bush would consult with the Israelis, i.e., to make sure they would play ball in terms of staying on the sidelines as they did in Gulf War I and thereby avoid turning the opinion of other Arab states against the U.S./British efforts. Blair's comments do not on their face suggest that the Israelis or pro-Israel groups were consulted as to WHETHER to go to war, or that the war was undertaken on Israel's behalf.
Just remember, Bush and Cheney only had to walk down the hall to consult with Israel, considering how many in their cabinet and appointees have dual citizenships with Israel and were already actively involved with the Israeli government.
All roads lead to PNAC, AIPAC, JINSA, ZOA, AEI, etc.
This isn't rocket science.
Blair the British Neocon:
http://TINYURL.COM/BLAIRTHEBRITISHNEOCON
Israel's Voice on the UK Iraq war inquiry:
http://TINYURL.COM/ISRAELVOICEONIRAQWARINQUIRY
Steve Walt feels vindicated by Blair confession
Phil Weiss has the following entry as well at his Mondoweiss.net blog:
Steve Walt feels vindicated by Blair confession (as well he should):
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/02/steve-walt-feels-vindicated-by-blair-confession-as-well-he-should.html
Phil had the following entry about Steve Sniegoski's 'The Transparent Cabal' book as well:
Will Stephen J. Sniegoski’s Dissection of the Neocons Get ‘Boycotted’?:
http://mondoweiss.net/2008/06/douglas-feith-refused-to-appear-before-a-congressional-committee-yesterday-apparently-because-col-lawrence-wilkerson-was-al.html
Martin Kramer Offers This "Rich Collection . . . Evidence"
From Martin Kramer's "Sandbox" Weblog
February 9, 2010
Chronologically-challenged Professor Walt
In the past, I’ve demolished Stephen Walt and John Mearsheimer’s claim that Israel and its friends drove the United States to war with Iraq. I did it when they published their article, and did it again when they published their book, The Israel Lobby. It’s a conspiracy theory, pure and simple. And because Walt is a conspiracy theorist, he does what they all do: he rips evidence out of context. Here’s his latest grasp at a straw: his claim that Tony Blair has “revealed” that “Israel officials were involved in those discussions” on Iraq held between Blair and George Bush in Crawford, Texas in April 2002. Walt brings as evidence this quote from Blair’s testimony to the U.K. commission investigating the Iraq war:
As I recall that discussion, it was less to do with specifics about what we were going to do on Iraq or, indeed, the Middle East, because the Israel issue was a big, big issue at the time. I think, in fact, I remember, actually, there may have been conversations that we had even with Israelis, the two of us, whilst we were there. So that was a major part of all this.
Walt’s conclusion: “Blair is acknowledging that concerns about Israel were part of the equation, and that the Israeli government was being actively consulted in the planning for the war.” Walt goes on to declare that “more evidence of their influence [of Israel and the Israel lobby] on the decision for war will leak out,” and that “Blair’s testimony is evidence of that process at work.”
When people who don’t know much about the Middle East, like Stephen Walt, pose as experts, they make basic mistakes of chronology. So let me remind him of exactly what coincided with the Crawford meeting of April 6-7, 2002.
Israel launched Operation Defensive Shield in the West Bank on March 29. Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon ordered the operation in response to a wave of Palestinian suicide bombings. Its objective was the reoccupation of West Bank cities, dismantling the infrastructure of terror, and laying siege to Yasser Arafat in his Ramallah HQ. On April 2, Israeli forces battled their way into Bethlehem and secured Jenin city, and on April 3, they began to clear out the Jenin refugee camp. When Bush and Blair sat down in Crawford, Israel was laying siege to terrorists holed up in the Church of the Nativity, and the Battle of Jenin was in full swing. The Arab propaganda mills exploited the fog of war to make the operation seem like Sabra and Shatila redux, replete with massacres and mass graves. Arab leaders bombarded Bush and Blair with demands for action to stop Israel.
Bush succumbed to the mounting pressure, and on April 4 told Sharon to pull Israeli forces out of West Bank cities. On April 6, the first day of the Crawford meeting, Bush sharpened that message in a press conference with Blair, calling on Israel to withdraw “without delay.” He said the same in a 20-minute phone call to Sharon that very day. It was the lowest point in Israeli-American relations during the Bush years, and a crisis of massive proportions. Here is the chronology.
So Blair was right to recall that at Crawford, “the Israel issue was a big, big issue,” and that there were conversations with the Israelis. But these weren’t “active consulting” over plans for the Iraq war (and nothing in Blair’s testimony suggests they were). They were urgent negotiations about an ongoing war in the West Bank, and consisted of full-court pressure on Israel to end it. That Walt doesn’t say so—that “April 2002? doesn’t immediately trigger a mention of the historical context—is evidence either of ignorance or deception. Take your pick.
And while we’re on straws, Walt grasped at another one which left me smiling. Walt:
Consider that former President Bill Clinton told an audience at an Aspen Institute meeting in 2006 that “every Israeli politician I knew” (and he knows a lot of them) believed that Saddam Hussein was so great a threat that he should be removed even if he did not have WMD.
I never trust Walt to represent a source accurately (see past example), so I checked it. The quote was reported by James Bennet, who puts it in context:
[Clinton] segued into a discussion of Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman’s position in favor of going to war, noting how it squared with the view of Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and others that Saddam Hussein was such a menace he should be removed regardless of whether he had WMD. Then, out of the blue, came this: “That was also the position of every Israeli politician I knew, by the way.”
So Clinton attributed the idea that Saddam should be removed regardless of WMD to Cheney, Rumsfeld, Lieberman, and “others”—all of the usual suspects—and only then to Israeli leaders, “by the way.” As far as Walt’s thesis, this proves… well, what does it prove, Professor Walt? The amusing sequel comes when Bennet notes that even “I knew some Israeli politicians with doubts about the war,” and then relays this explanation:
One longtime and acute observer of Clinton, whom I won’t name here, suggested to me that, as is his tendency, Clinton was looking to please people he spotted in the crowd before him—in this case, seated in the front rows, several representatives of Arab nations, including Queen Noor of Jordan.
So Clinton wasn’t just speaking to “an audience” in Aspen. He had Queen Noor in the front row! Could Bill Clinton have been pandering? Naw, couldn’t be.
--Posted By Martin Kramer, February 9, 2010
http://www.martinkramer.org/sandbox/2010/02/chronologically-challenged-professor-walt/
Britain’s Inquiry into the Iraq War and the Israel Lobby Taboo
Britain’s Inquiry into the Iraq War and the Israel Lobby Taboo
http://america-hijacked.com/2010/02/12/britains-inquiry-into-the-iraq-war-and-the-israel-lobby-taboo/
http://tinyurl.com/IsraelLobbyTaboo
Britain’s Inquiry into the Iraq War and the Israel Lobby Taboo
Britain’s Inquiry into the Iraq War and the Israel Lobby Taboo
http://america-hijacked.com/2010/02/12/britains-inquiry-into-the-iraq-war-and-the-israel-lobby-taboo/
http://tinyurl.com/IsraelLobbyTaboo
Is this really surprising? Everybody knows that many (not all) Jewish Americans care more about the security and preservation of the Israeli state than they do about the safety of American citizens. It's the same reason why the US has idiotically taken the Israeli side of the Israeli/Arab conflicts, even though the Israelis have no strategic benefit whatsoever when compared with the Arab states. They just can't seem to get it into their minds that the goals of Israel conflict with the goals of America, and until our leaders realize it, expect more conflicts and more terrorist attacks against US citizens. But of course such opinions will not gain ground, because the moment they're written or spoken, the calls of anti-semitism ring out and silence all opposition.
Wow, on the same day that Walt pushes Mein Kampf, he comes out
with a self promotional view of his own political screed.
Nice.
Inside the mind of the Israel lobby in real time
If you are interested in following Mideast news and discussion from across the entire Internet in a single convenient stream, I've set up a collection of nearly 100 feeds on the subject here:
If you are curious to see which items have caught my attention, use this URL:
Friendfeed: Mideast Politics: Liked Items
Feel free to add your own likes and comments to items in the stream.
Are there any suggestions for feeds that I have overlooked? I have tried to provide a well-rounded selection of sources from all across the political spectrum, from the far left to the far right.
My main Friendfeed feed (more concerning technology issues than Mideast politics) is here:
Dr. Walt's argument is a SLAM DUNK!
Jacob Blues: Israel and the Iraq War
Walt was eloquent in his condemnation of Mein Kampf, and you failed to rebut any of his factual points concerning the role of Israel and the Israel lobby in promoting the Iraq War.
Well Sean, Walt defends the right for all to read Mein Kampf and
wants us to read his own anti-Jewish political screed.
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Sorry, I'm not going to go into a minutia nit picking of the Iraq war. The fact is Walt screams from the headlines "BEWARE THE JEWS".
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He then decides to go down the conspiracy route that Jew after Jew, sneakily pushed their own personal JEWEY agenda . . . at the cost of those good NON JEW Americans, and Walt's own United States of America.
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But hey, at the end of this scorched earth polemic, we're told, that hey despite that "JEW LOBBY", not all Jews are bad. Really, some are even halfway decent Americans... but they get drowned out by "THE JEWISH LOBBY", to hell in a handbasket, and that those non-Jews should BEWARE!! so Walt warns us.
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I considered myself warned when Walt and Mearsheimer's original magazine article came out. That he has decided to turn his anti-Jew rhetoric into an annuity for his FP blog, doesn't turn his hate-mongering thesis into truth, regardless of how many op-eds he posts on the blog.
Sorry Balanced, I hadn't realized that
Rabbi Yoffe, the Forward, Gary Rosenblatt, and the liberal Rabbi mentioned were now part of the small 'right wing' group.
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So too the Brookings Group and Saban center.
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The only consistent thread in Walt's screed is "JEW".
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Nothing clever about that, and little that needs to be clever in exposing.
You claim that the most radical part of the Israel lobby are non-Jewish extremists.
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Of course, if you look at my list below, you find that there isn't a single non-Jew mentioned.
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Walt has made his position quite clear.
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In the book Hitler's Willing Executioners, the argument is made how a citizenry of normal people, could take up the Nazi party's call to exterminate the Jews. How could an educated body, with doctors, lawyers, professors, go down the path towards such violence and hatred.
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Walt's polemic here, shows the same base hatred from such an educated platform from which ethnic hatred arises.
Yes it's a real shame that so many Jews have bought into pushing wars on Israel's 'behalf' - it certainly doesn't look good on the Jewish community.
But that, Mr.Jacob, isn't the fault of Walt for drawing attention to it. It needs to change, and you'd be much better off working towards that(joining up with a significant amount of other anti-Zionist Jews), than making silly, grade school level arguments, and making stuff up.
Don't you think?
Stop whining and make your point?
People come here to read intelligent commentary and debate. If you think Walt is wrong, by all means make your case. But, this mindless rant that "Walt hates Jews, whaaa whaaa...!" is ridiculous (and I'm Jewish). Besides wasting everybody's time, you diminish those in opposition who actually have reasoned critiques. (Not to mention giving Jews everywhere a bad name.)
Jacob Blues: Free, the Israel lobby, etc.
1. Most educated and enlightened people I know oppose censorship and support free speech. Free speech is a fundamental Enlightenment and American value.
2. It is important to have a thorough understanding of the belief systems with which one most disagrees.
3. You have conflated "the Jews" with the Israel lobby and neoconservatives, a very dangerous game to play. Walt and Mearsheimer have strongly condemned that formulation, repeatedly. A large majority of Jews opposed the Iraq War, and many leading members of the Israel lobby are not Jews -- in fact, quite a few of them are antisemites.
The new Foreign Policy interface
Looks like we've lost the ability to edit posts after they've been posted (unless I've overlooked the button). I wish FP would bring that back.
In any case, the last subject heading should read: Jacob Blues: Free speech, the Israel lobby, etc.
Well Sean, let's see who Prof Walt lists above:
Ehud Barak,
Benajamin Netanyahu,
Ariel Sharon
" Top Israeli Leaders across the political spectrum"
"Every Israeli politician who Bill Clinton knows... and he knows 'a lot".
Howard Kohr
Nathan Guttman of the Forward
Michelle Goldberg of Salon.com,
John B. Judis of the New Republic,
and even Jeffrey Goldberg in The New Yorker.
Pundits at pro-Israel think tanks like the Brookings Institutions's Saban Center
Martin Indyk,
Kenneth Pollack,
the Jewish Council on Public Affairs
Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations
Mortimer Zuckerman,
Matthew Berger of the Jewish Telegraph Agency, wrote "Despite their caution and without specifying a formal policy, Jewish leaders predominantly expressed support for Bush's words at the United Nations"
Dr. Mandell Ganchrow, executive vice president of the Orthodox Religious Zionists of America
Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Reform movement's Union of American Hebrew Congregations.
David Harris, executive director of the American Jewish Committee."
Not to be outdone, the editor of Jewish Week, Gary Rosenblatt
relatively liberal Rabbi David Saperstein of the Union of Reform Judaism's Religious Action Center
the Jewish newspaper Forward
"The Forward, it is worth noting, is well-connected and has a well-deserved reputation for probity in its reporting on the American Jewish community"
.
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Sorry Sean, but reading the list here it goes "Jew, Jew, Jew, Jew, Jew, and Jew".
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Walt's and your claim that its not really, the Jewish community, falls flat on its face.
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Walt's "I'm not really on an anti-Jew witch hunt falls flat on its face. The disengeneous "and we (Mearsheimer) have emphasized that it would be a cardinal error (as well as dangerous) to try to "blame the Jews" for the war" is false, as Walt does just that not only in his headline, but in the large body of his blog.
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His claim that "blame should be reserved for Bush and Cheney (who made the ultimate decision for war), for the neoconservatives who dreamed up this foolish idea, and for the various groups and individuals -- including those in the lobby -- who helped sell it." is, in all honesty, Bullshit.
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If Walt really meant to go after Bush and Cheney, you would have seen their names up on the headline and Walt and Mearsheimer would have written a book about the abuse of power in the White House.
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So too, the idea that Walt's really going after the neo-con's. It wasn't the Neo-con lobby Walt was dreaming up here, but the "Jewish" one.
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Walt's going after the Jewish community the same way Hitler did before his rise to power.
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It is as disgusting and evil today as it was then.
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As I stated before, Walt can provide sound bites and cut quotes ad infinitum, it doesn't change his and Mearsheimer's underlying hate-mongering thesis. It's that charge, that needs to be confronted. The rest is just detail.
Well Sin, if Walt is going to make the argument that AIPAC is
the "Israel Lobby", then that is something entirely different. But you provide only half a soundbite on Mr. Kinsley's comments. Here is an another quote from that same commentary that provides the issue of concern:
.
.
"As others have noted, Moran's (Rep. James P. Moran of Virginia) words are less alarming for their own direct meaning than for their historic association with some of the classic themes of anti-Semitism: the image of Jews as a monolithic group suffering from "dual loyalty" and wielding nefarious influence behind the scenes. When someone touches even lightly on these themes in public, it's only natural to wonder whether his or her actual views are a lot darker. "
.
http://slate.msn.com/id/2080027/
.
One only need go as far as the above talkback comments to see those words "dual-loyalty" attributed to the Jewish community.
.
But that's underlying context of Walt's thesis. It's not AIPAC that has caused the problems of America, but the wider community of Jews. Indeed, one need go only to your own blog to see how you view the Jewish community.
What is disgusting and evil is the Lobby
It's evil and disgusting for Walt to draw attention to the FACT that the Israel Lobby pushes for America to fight it's wars? The Iraq War was a straight out war crime by any standard that probably killed close to 2 million Iraqis and left the Middle East in ruins.
You are a sick puppy.
And you are, unfortunately, indicative of the sickness called Zionism that has perverted the Jewish community. And for you the only thing that matters is that Walt has made "the Jews" look bad by posting FACTS. Anti-semitism, you'd have us believe, is absolutely ANY critical reference to Jews at all - regardless of these FACTS. It's time to start to take RESPONSIBILITY for the actions of YOUR community - and stop blaming people who care about you for necessarily pointing out YOUR failings.
Get some help, Jacob. It you think THIS is antisemitism you won't believe your lying eyes when it REALLY becomes an issue - which it will if the pro-Israel crowd continue to insist on one standard for themselves and another for everybody else...
Looks like the JIDF (Jewish Internet Defense Forces) are out in full sail today.
Well Sean, let's see who Prof Walt lists above:
Ehud Barak,
Benjamin Netanyahu,
Ariel Sharon
" Top Israeli Leaders across the political spectrum"
"Every Israeli politician who Bill Clinton knows... and he knows 'a lot".
Howard Kohr
etc, etc
....
Sorry Sean, but reading the list here it goes "Jew, Jew, Jew, Jew, Jew, and Jew".
-----------
.
Selective Amnesia ? You missed this part of his article :
.
"Indeed, my co-author and I have repeatedly pointed to surveys showing that American Jews were less supportive of the decision to invade Iraq than the American population as a whole, and we have emphasized that it would be a cardinal error (as well as dangerous) to try to "blame the Jews" for the war"
.
"I am talking about key groups and individuals in the Israel lobby"
.
Again, he blames extremists, elites, the lobby. Only a few.
Not all Jews.
.
How thick really is your skull ? I know that extremists are storming various articles criticizing Israel & Zionists and try to portray them as anti-semites, but frankly you're among the worst I found.
.
Try harder next time :)
Looks like the JIDF (Jewish Internet Defense Forces) are out in full sail today.
-------
.
First time I heard about this, thanks :
.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Internet_Defense_Force
.
Isn't hacking other people's websites a crime ?
And, while they criticize the "Israel is not a country" Facebook group & anti-Israel movements - they themselves are against Palestine being listed as a country.
.
Talk about irony & hypocrisy. The Internet would be a much nicer place without these extremists.
Two questions to test your thesis.
I am generally sympathetic with your arguments, but you're not addressing significant issues.
1. would the invasion have occurred if Iraq's main export was asparagus and tomatoes rather than oil? Minimizing the importance of energy resources for geopolitical strategy (not only for the oil lobby) only hurts your argument.
2. Would the neocons exist independent from the Lobby? The US have always had a hawkish (and naive) sector that has pushed for interventions seeking regime change to benefit the US. You admit the neocons perceived the Iraq war was in the US national interest. Would it have occurred without the Israeli factor? Your answer here seems to rely more on assertion.
Jacob Blues: The role of the Israel lobby in engineering the Ira
You still haven't rebutted a single one of the dozens of tightly packed factual assertions in Walt's article -- you have simply complained that Jews featured prominently in the propaganda effort for the war. All of those assertions are, to the best of my knowledge, true and important facts.
Does it come as any great surprise to you that leading positions in the Israel lobby are occupied by Jews? What else would you expect? Are they to escape all responsibility for their role in agitating for what is probably the worst foreign policy disaster in American history simply because they are Jewish? Should the topic be censored because it offends your sensibilities?
The majority of Jews did not support the pro-war efforts of this relatively small group of organizations within the Israel lobby, a point that has been made repeatedly by Walt and Mearsheimer.
By the way: did you support or oppose the Iraq War, and on what grounds? I strongly opposed it long before it started and predicted that it would be an enormous and costly failure. I even predicted that American oil companies would be unlikely to benefit from the war. Quite a few oil industry leaders also made that prediction, based on their long experience in operating in the region. You perhaps noticed that the Bush 41 inner circle, including major figures in the oil industry like James Baker, opposed the war. But pro-Israel activists and militants were all over the mainstream clamoring for war.
Jacob Blues: Your recommended Mideast news sources
Which sources of news and discussion on Mideast politics do you recommend that we read?
Holybrother: Reality-based political analysis
Neither you nor Jacob Blue have rebutted a single factual statement in Walt's article. You know, it's not good for the cause of Israel to insult our intelligence in your efforts to defend it.
1. Many oil industry leaders opposed the Iraq War on the grounds that it would injure their interests. American oil companies traditionally have sought friendly relations with Arab and Muslim oil-producing nations in the region, for all the obvious and common-sense reasons. You can't extract oil profitably from territories in which the inhabitants hate you.
Pro-Israel activists and militants in the Israel lobby, however, have long dreamed of smashing OPEC and seizing control of oil resources in the region for the benefit of Israel. See Henry Kissinger's and Robert Tucker's essays on that subject from the 1970s. This project (the Iraq War and other wars) has been on their minds for decades.
2. There is no conceivable way that the Iraq War would have occurred without the clamorous propaganda efforts in the mainstream media of neoconservatives, who have been obsessively focused on the interests of Israel from their founding. Try reviewing a few decades of their lead journal, Commentary, to understand just how prominently Israel looms in their thinking. Their entire program revolves around Israel.
I have no problem with W&M's argument that pro-Israel groups in the U.S. and Israeli leaders made prominent statements supporting the invasion of Iraq. But I think Walt is reading a lot into Blair's statement. It is hard to understand how Israeli input could have figured into decisions regarding Iraq at the Crawford meeting if the discussions really weren't about specifics of "what we were going to do on Iraq or, indeed, the Middle East." Let us see, what else was happening with Israel at the time... oh, right. Israel had just attacked Arafat's compound in Gaza; the IDF had engaged in large scale operations in Ramallah and was being accused of war crimes at the Jenin camp; scores of Israelis and Palestinians were dying in March and April of 2002. Now, nothing in Blair's statement shows concretely that this was the Israel was the "big, big issue at the time," but it is certainly just as plausible as Walt's interpretation. Perhaps more so, given Blair's odd wording and the peculiarity of Blair coming out and saying that Israel was driving so much of the U.S./UK calculus on Iraq at the time, even 7+ years after the case. If I were trying to make Walt's case, I don't think I would add Blair's vague comment to the list of evidence in favor of my argument.
You made my point more concisely than I did. I think that makes more sense based on what Blair actually said, as opposed to what someone who is focused like a vise on the big, bad "Israel lobby" is reading into it.
Danke cowboy--your comment and mine dovetail nicely. This is pretty clearly an instance of Walt's theory coloring his interpretation of evidence.
Jewish support basically put Tony Blair in power. And that debt has to be repaid. And it did through his unconditional support for Israel - this is how Israel factored into the discussion at Crawford(not literally, of course). There is no way any Western politician can make a move in the Middle East without the consent of the Israel Lobby - and that means following orders from Tel Aviv.
I would have thought that was pretty obvious. Maybe you boys need to read Walt's book.
Or Jeff Gates, "Guilt by Association" - and excellent work that demonstrates how the Lobby
'grooms' our future politicians(like Obama). The extent to which the Lobby corrupts the democratic process in America and in all the major(and minor, really)Western nations is truly astounding - a thoroughly relentless pursuit for power. Americans really don't know the half of it. But hey - it sounds to much like the 'Protocols' even if it is true, so we should completely ignore it . Even as it leads us to total destruction and war.
Right Jacob?
Now the Israel Lobby controls UK foreign policy, and that of all "Western" politicians as well? I don't remember that when reading W&M, but perhaps I didn't check the footnotes closely enough. I guess they really understated their case. Please excuse me while I attempt to dislodge my tongue from my cheek.
I should point out that the Lobby
and it's leaders and operators specifically, act as agents between the Israeli government and the American government(yes, agents. Often real agents). That is they, through the known 'interests' of the 'Jewish state', represent the Israeli government(whether it be Likuud or Labor - although the Lobby has always been Likuud. And there's hardly any difference between the two in reality). And they do have regular correspondence with the Israeli government. That might be confusing for some, but that's the way it is. And that's not a 'conspiracy theory' - that's just what can be ascertained from the public record let alone what we know about Israel's on going spying concern(also on the record but not very public): Israeli intelligence, Mossad operations in America including espionage, following around Saudi suicide bombers around until they end up blowing up the WTC( at which point it's party time)the wholesale on ongoing theft of the newest U.S military equipment design etc etc.
The 'defense' of Israel has become - through the increasing power of the Israel lobby - the number one foreign policy issue for the U.S government in the Middle East. There is no evidence - NONE - that the Oil lobby had any input into the Iraq war. If the Oil Lobby was half as powerful as the Israel lobby there would have been no war; it was not in the interests of Big Oil for Iraq and the Middle East to be so badly destabilized(they had it good with Saddam - he kept his people quiet and accepting); But it was for Israel(as it has been articulated by many an Israel leader and military general - divide and conquer. And radicalize.) Also note that American oil companies have been left out of loop in Iraq by the current Iraqi government.
Congress is owned by the Israel Lobby. It is well argued that the POTUS is owned by the Lobby. Only an idiot would deny the influence of Lobby on the media - not to mention the issue of media ownership. Between this and Stephen Walt's revelations there really is no serious argument against. What should be happening, when you are able to look at the bigger picture in regards to Israel, is a very deep concern for the future of Western democracy and by extension the world if we are to be ruled by fanatical nationalists legitimized by a very confused western intelligentsia. All because Zionism is able to make the conversation about anti-semitism. Whatever they may think, it is certainly not a good situation for 'the Jews'.
Holy Bro
You loose all credibility when you throw in EVIL as one of the guys you are battling. It is sooooo 2001. Your memories of Scud attacks carry a little more weight but not as much as IDF scum shooting toddlers at point blank range. Stick to the point and ease up on the histrionics.
Colin Powell on "the JINSA crowd"
I agree that not too much emphasis should be placed on Blair's words, which are subject to multiple interpretations. In any case, Colin Powell is a more reliable source than Blair on the political dynamics within the Bush/Cheney administration with regard to the propaganda campaign to invade and occupy Iraq:
"Colin Powell Blamed Iraq War Plans on ‘Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs’"
by Philip Weiss on October 20, 2008
In Karen DeYoung's bio, Soldier, Colin Powell said that Truman's Sec'y of State George Marshall–a former Army chief of staff–was his "revered" role model, especially in his principled opposition to Truman's '48 decision to recognize the new state of Israel in defiance of the Arab world. In that book, Powell also twice refers to the Iraq war as being the product of Donald Rumsfeld's absorption in the "JINSA crowd," the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. In a word: Defense Under Secretary Douglas Feith, neocon, son of a Holocaust survivor, who helped cofound One Jerusalem, and whose former law partner is living in a settlement in the West Bank.
http://mondoweiss.net/2008/10/and-much-of-mccains-braintrust-has-ties-to-jinsa-so-this-is-a-pro-jinsa-anti-jinsa-election-remember-when-cool-waspy-hubs.html
The "JINSA crowd" = the neocons at JINSA, AEI, WINEP, CSP, FDD and other neocon think tanks and policy centers.
Interesting comment on this page:
Dick Cheney was on JINSA's Board of Advisors before becoming vice president, where he was joined by Ledeen, Feith, Perle, James Woolsey, and John Bolton. JINSA's stated policy aims included regime change in "rogue" nations such as Iraq.
Jacob - you really are quite tedious - and frankly to many of us around the world - and I am both British & Australian - the underlying hair trigger approach you adopt with knee jerk response to any attempt by others to analyse rationally any issue associated with Israel simply personifies exactly why openness & sympathy degenerate into irritation, dislike, dismissal, disgust - and despair of there ever being any chance of resolving problems in the Middle East.
But maybe it's just that you cannot behave other than the younger spoiled brother to Esau hey and that you expect your birthright to be the big welcome home party and life continuing without an ounce of responsibility on your part?!
To label Stephen Walt and his partners original treatise as anti-semitic - and indeed almost even discussion of anything Israeli by the same label is infantile and ineffably sad and frankly makes a complete mockery of your relationship with Jehova
Toodle Pip
Sin - I must thank you for your thoughtful and though provoking response to my comments above.
My own view has always been that the solution in the end can only logically and fairly be a return to the 1967 borders and and a Palestinian State based on these - and that this is such a blinding obvious solution that it should be taken as read - and that negotiations should always have started from that point back towards such a result - in the interests of humanity, security and honour all round.
By the way we are familiar over here with just how long it can take - it has been now some 320 years since the Battle of The Boyne in 1690 to the present day - and we are almost there with a solution in Northern Ireland!
However - I fear Sin may be more on the money than I when he suggests that a two-state solution may not be possible anymore.
Add to this that in the 'Smart Decisions' stakes the US seems wedded to continue play a blindingly stupid game on the foreign policy front in every direction - and perhaps the pain & cost has to force change there first before change can take place in Israel?
"Rather, they unwisely believed it would be good for both countries. And as we all know, they were tragically wrong."
And so, almost to the exact name, the same groups advocate unconditionally for sanctions and eventual war against Iran - despite the almost unanimous prediction of an eventual collapse of the American economy and massive loss of American and Iranian lives.
When it comes to the Israel Lobby there is only one consideration - what is 'good' for "the Jews". America doesn't figure into the equation.
Or Canada, Britain, France, the Netherlands, Germany etc etc....
Philip Weiss on the Walt essay
http://mondoweiss.net/2010/02/steve-walt-feels-vindicated-by-blair-confession-as-well-he-should.html
"What’s always intrigued me about the argument that American Zionists/the lobby/American Jewish leadership had no responsibility for the war is that I grew up being told that Jews were the smartest people in the world and our ideas had changed history– Einstein, Freud, and Marx were the triumvirate my parents cited– and then the Iraq war happens, and basically it’s our ideas, or Zionist neocon ideas, and when the thing is a disaster everyone says that Bush and Cheney came up with it."
Two state solution is dead. Israeli lobby is stronger than it was during the Bush era. We can continue to argue about their relative strength or their role, but we can agree that they have been effective. Barak Obama is a weak president, not because of his intellect, sincerity or commitment but because of his inheritance. The effectiveness of the lobby is also a function of the strength of the executive.
Single state solution is an eventuality. Absorbtion of the territories will create strains of apartheid but will eventually resolve itself with time. We have to accelerate this process in order to minimize collateral damage from our current policy of "dormant participation in the peace process" and eventually strengthening the security of Israel.
We are at a critical juncture in our history, considering our fiscal problems and the emergence of China and India as competing powers, and can not afford to continue to bear the devastating brunt of our policy. We continue to alienate the new generation in the middle east, which will be much more radical than their predecessors due to enhanced awareness of the events in their neighborhood. US policy is perceived as "buying time for Israel and being dishonest" and this is the core of radicalization.
I've watched the Chilcot Inquiry at length. Both SKY News and Al Jazeera ran the testimonies of the more important members of Blair's government in total. Blair's reference to the Israeli influence was perhaps the least emphatic, but in line with what other members of his government had said at the Inquiry. Jack Straw, Blair*s Foreign Minister at the time, went into much more detail on the involvement of Israeli interests in the run-up to the Iraq War. He described how Israeli interets worked to undermine the US State Dept. and Sec. State Powell -- to the point that one of the panelists asked him "So you were pushing on one side and the Israelis on the other?" Jack Straw answered, "Yes". Claire Short, another member of Blair's government, also described Israeli involvement.
When Prof. Walt prepares a new edition of his book, he will find lots of new and substantiating material in the transcripts of the Chilcot Inquiry.
Perhaps read Straw's transcript
Straw is adamant about Israel's influence on the U.S. stance on policy in the occupied territories, not on the decision to invade Iraq. It was in this regard that Powell and State were being undermined, according to Straw. See http://www.iraqinquiry.org.uk/media/44190/20100121pm-straw-final.pdf, pp. 44-50. He argues that pro-Israel groups have a significant influence in Washington, and that there are electoral consequences for going against their wishes. This strikes me as more or less correct, for what its worth, though I think economic conditions in the U.S. far outweigh any of the other factors behind Bush 41's defeat in 1992. But to read Straw's comments as direct, concrete evidence that Israel was pushing for war for in Iraq is, again, quite a reach. Maybe the smoking gun's out there, but I haven't seen it yet; in fact, I've seen some very convincing arguments (none involving the oil lobby) that indicate that important Israeli officials were at best neutral about the war, and perhaps even wary.
Of course we'd be in touch with Israel before attacking Iraq. Last time we went to war with Iraq, they launched dozens of SCUDs against Israel (who didn't retaliate, at our request!). Like it or not, think it's beneficial or not, Israel is a political ally of the US, and it is entirely unsurprising that we'd consult them before putting them at risk. Nothing to do with the Israel lobby.
Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University.
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