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Posted By Stephen M. Walt
Thursday, December 15, 2011 - 2:09 PM
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Many of you probably saw Tom Friedman's startling column in yesterday's New York Times, where he attacked the Republican presidential candidates for pandering on the subject of Israel. He also informed his readers that all those standing ovations for Netanyahu in Congress were "bought and paid for by the Israel lobby," and he correctly noted that this blind and unconditional support for Israel was not really "pro-Israel" at all. Why? Because it was leading Israel away from a two-state solution and toward one of three disastrous options from Israel's perspective: 1) apartheid, 2) ethnic cleansing, or 3) a binational democratic state which would eventually be dominated by the more numerous Palestinians.
Of course, his column has provoked the usual firestorm of denunciations (Phil Weiss has a quick rundown here). Hopefully Friedman will stick to his guns in the weeks and months ahead, because he is making arguments and advocating positions that are not only in America's interest, but in Israel's as well. The new Tom Friedman is a friend of Israel, not an enemy.
I would like to say a few words about a key theme running through some of the attacks on Friedman, most notably in an angry blog post by Elliott Abrams, who, by the way, is no friend of Israel. According to Abrams and others, the real reason that politicians pander and that Bibi got all those standing ovations in Congress is because the vast majority of Americans really love Israel, and therefore politicians are just giving the people what they want.
This is a common talking point among Israel's defenders, most of whom
intensely dislike or are at least uncomfortable with the claim that the
lobby is the driving force behind the special relationship. The
problem, as Jim Lobe points out in a recent post,
is that's its not true. To be sure, Americans have a much more
favorable view of Israel than they do of the Palestinians (which is
partly, though not entirely, due to differences in media coverage over
time). But more importantly, there is abundant survey evidence showing
that the American people favor the United States taking an
"even-handed" position on the conflict and not favoring Israel. Lobe
cites recent surveys by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and by the Brookings Institution
that demonstrate this point (in the former, two-thirds of the
respondents, including the GOP respondents, thought the United States should favor
neither side). Even a 2005 survey by the Anti-Defamation League found
that 78 percent of Americans believe that the U.S. government should
favor neither Israel nor the Palestinians. For more support for this
basic point, go here.
Indeed, the evidence shows clearly that many Americans would be
perfectly willing to play hardball with Israel when it acts in ways
that are not in the U.S. national interest. For example, back in 2002,
a Time/CNN poll found that 60 percent of Americans supported cutting
off aid to Israel if it did not respond to Bush administration demands
that it withdraw from areas it had occupied (during the Second intifada).
One year later, a survey by the University of Maryland reported that
over 60 percent of Americans would be willing to withhold aid to Israel
if it resisted U.S. pressure to settle the conflict.
So when Congress passes various "pro-Israel" resolutions by amazingly lopsided votes, when its members rise as one to give Netanyahu standing ovation after standing ovation, and when U.S. presidents feel compelled to backtrack from efforts to advance a two-state solution before it is too late, it is not because the "American people" are demanding these responses. As in many other cases (such as financial regulation, gun control, health care, or farm subsidies), politicians are ignoring the will of the people because a well-organized minority (comprised of some but not all American Jews and some but not all Christian evangelicals) is making its support conditional on support for its hardline views.
It's the classic story of interest-group politics: If a small minority cares passionately about an issue and the rest of the population cares less, politicians will pander to the few and ignore the many, even as evidence accumulates that the resulting policy is wrongheaded. In this case, our present policy towards Israel is harmful to the long-term interests of both the United States and Israel.
That, ladies and gentlemen, is what Tom Friedman has figured out and has had the good sense and courage to point out to his many readers. Good for him, and good for the United States and Israel too.
A very clever friend sends over today's Tom Friedman column edited down to nothing but mixed metaphors and cliches:
A wake-up call’s mother is unfolding. At the other end is a bell, which is telling us we have built a house at the foot of a volcano. The volcano is spewing lava, which says move your house. The road will be long and rocky, but it will trigger a shift before it kicks. We can capture some of it. IF the Middle East was a collection of gas stations, Saudi Arabia would be a station. Iran, Kuwait , Bahrain, Egypt, Libya, Iraq, and the United Arab Emirates would all be stations. Guys, here’s the deal. Don’t hassle the Jews. You are insulated from history. History is back. Fasten your seat belts. Don’t expect a joy ride because the lid is blowing off. The west turned a blind eye, but the report was prophetic, with key evidence. Societies are frozen in time. No one should have any illusions. Root for the return to history, but not in the middle.
My friend could have published this himself, but he was between a rock and a hard place with no easy answers.
sniperman, the post by Grant below suits you
perfectly! "Loud, opinionated maniac [going] wild..." Your presence on this blog most definitely has added "credibility" to the Israeli position!
If this turns into yet another space for loud, opinionated maniacs to go wild I will be neither surprised nor disappointed. I've come to expect that on this subject*.
On the polls I'm not especially surprised, after all who would want to say that they do not favor being even-handed? However I have to wonder how the person being interviewed would see different issues between Palestinians and Israeli Jews? Would the American see matters of fairness the same way the people on the ground would?
Arguments and Reality are two different things
Grant, since to date I am the only one up on the threads, just tell me one thing factual or realistic that I purport that is not correct.
Just take a look for yourself at any map of Israeli "settlements" in the West Bank, and tell me that they would go to make way for any two state settlement. Or alternatively, that they would peacefully stay under Palestinian sovereignty. Not gonna happen.
You can if you wish maintain that the Palestinians did not accept the much qualified offers in the past for a two state solution. Where they could not control the water, the borders, the air traffic, the border accesses. Where they did not have the right of return. etc.
Israel in its own self of long term security should have offered such a solution. Did not happen. Its too late now. It is not just another argument, it is reality.
"after all who would want to say that they do not favor being even-handed?"
Yet when Howard Dean in the 2004 presidential primary used the word even-handed he was pilloried by the press and his opponents. There is a major disconnect between what the average person desires and those who rule. This kind of dissonance is, I believe, inherently unstable and I think Friedman is finally starting to "get it".
This blog has some serious problems
I cannot answer the responses I want to so I will respond to this one.
There is the usual hasbara from the Zionists - and as usual full of totally unsubstantiated and usually false statements.
Let me answer just one - the Soviet Union was among the first countries to recognize the newly established state of Israel in 1948 (indeed the first to give it de jure recognition) and stayed with it until about 1953 when it switched to the Arab countries because of Israeli violations of the armistice. I apologise using Wikipedia for my reference - its pages are heavily edited by the Zionists, but in this case it is more or less right.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_Union_and_the_Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_conflict
"True friend of Israel" or "true Israeli"?
I am not quite sure, whether "true friend of Israel" of Israel is the appropriate label for Tom Friedman.
Does Tom Friedman have no Israeli citizenship? If so, I would find "true Israeli" would be a more appropriate label.
Out of a pantheon of dumb things Walt has said..
...this has to be one of the dumbest.
""To be sure, Americans have a much more favorable view of Israel than they do of the Palestinians (which is partly, though not entirely, due to differences in media coverage over time). "
Media coverage to blame? Suuuuuure.
Never mind:
- a long history of terrorist attacks by Palestinians against Americans and Western allies.
-Blatant rampant corruption of Palestinian leaders.
-A large number of them under the control of Islamic Fundamentalists
-the ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Christians
-the desecration of Christian and Jewish historical sites
The only reason anyone here bothers to stump for the Palestinians is because they oppose Israel.
Umm, SPOOD, might you tell us just what determines when it's okay to ascribe to an entire people (such as you do with "the Palestinians") the actions of just some of their members?
You are making a bullshit argument.
One judges a people by what their leaders and those who follow them say and do. Realistically nobody has to give a damn about what the entire people think if their leadership doesn't either. Palestinian leaders are autocrats. There is no expression of free political will there. So its a nullity.
For Israel, a democracy its easy to gauge what they think. An open press and free elections. Their leadership does at some level speak for the majority of the population. For the Palestinians, who the hell knows? Nobody seems to care. Least of all Hamas and Fatah.
"Just as an example, the fantastically murderous Bolshevik regime was for a goodly amount of time pretty widely supported by jews, and that regime was of course equally fantastically hostile to America and its Western allies, and desecrated untold numbers of Christian historical sites."
Of course you have to use the old canard of equating of Communists with the Jews. Who writes your material, Joseph Goebbels?
Its clear you are not someone to be taken seriously.
You are making a phony, dishonest strawman argument
"Once again SPOOD you read too fast. I didn't do that; I simply asked you *how* doing that differed from *your* equating of all Palestinians ("the Palestinians" in your original post) with the actions of a few Palestinians."
Bullshit. You made a perfectly phony and often-used canard as part of a strawman argument. You did it in a deliberately provocative manner. The vitriol is warranted. There is no reason to take you seriously.
As I said, you evaluate the people by what their leaders do and say and by those who are following them.
You seem to not understand the concept.
Not once was I referring to any group involved beyond their political leadership. Besides, you are engaging in rhetorical fallacy anyway. [look under "No true scotsman"] Those "few" Palestinians wield the power over the group or are acting under the assent of those who do. So there is no need to make such a distinction in this discussion.
"And, needless to say, I don't think you answered that and indeed are wiggling."
I thought your question was loaded, infantile and irrelevant.
You (and US Marinesniper) I think can't have it both ways: You can't go broadbrushing "the Palestinians" but then cry "antisemitism" at those who broadbrush jews.
Bullshit again. You are the one trying to justify your own broadbrush silliness by accusing us of doing something which wasn't done. You are arguing a point which was never made by me, USMC, nor was actually relevant to the point. I am not the one who deliberately is using language and remarks associated the rhetoric of bigotry. You were.
"If it's racist or otherwise evil in the latter circumstance then it's racist or otherwise evil in the former."
No, you were just being a bigot. You are trying to pretend I said anything resembling a bigoted remark even through I did not. You want to claim others who disagree with you doing the same so you can claim false moral equivalence. Its dishonest.
I won't even comment on the "friend of Israel" shlock as, like most Israeli's, I don't share our US brethren's obsession with being liked.
Regarding Friedman, he wrote a mildly interesting book about 20 (30?) years ago and has mass producing meaningless shlock ever since.
The Saudi Peace initiative (the so-called Arab Peace Plan)?
As I wrote elsewhere, when the plan was floated, Mubarak was running Egypt, Qaddafi was running Libya, Tunisia by Ben Ali, etc... etc...
Not to mention Syria and Assad (who will likely be ousted within weeks).
How much would a document signed by Mubarak, Qaddafi, Assad, etc.. be worth to Israel today? Not much, I suspect.
Both Friedman nor Walt strike me as two people frustrated by their own irrelevancy and both are more then willing to use sensationalism to compensate.
As the US sinks further into debt and general malaise, the more it is beginning to sound like our Arab neighbors - constantly shrieking about Jews and Israel and how, magically, we are somehow responsible for their self-made misery.
Enjoy your day,
Scott
As the US sinks further into debt and general malaise, the more it is beginning to sound like our Arab neighbors - constantly shrieking about Jews and Israel and how, magically, we are somehow responsible for their self-made misery.
...the daily grumbling of an academic frustrated because people his ideas have only gained traction with a small (but passionate, if the invective in these comment sections is any indication) part of the population or the so-called "anti-Zionists" and anti-Semites[1] commenting on this blog, with the US population in general.
There is a reason we see the Republican candidates are tripping over themselves to declare themselves more pro-Israel than their peers, and in the main it's not because of any "Lobby" or lobby. It's because they know this is very important to the people deciding the race. Steve Walt and crew try to dismiss this most simple of explanations as they grasp at alternative reasons for why their ideas don't win the day, but don't let yourself be fooled into thinking they are speaking for most or even many of us here in the US.
[1] Yes, there is at least one person here who didn't bother to use the "Zionist" code word.
Thomas Friedman, in The N Y Times, September 17,
The Times published an OP-ED by Mr Friedman, "Israel: Adrift at Sea Alone". In that article, Mr Friedman says just about the same as in his latest column, which however is more outspoken. Anyway, Mr Friedman is a very interesting example of people who actually take the occurring facts in consideration, and adjusts his preferences and views accordingly.
Of course, both Mr Friedman -- and certainly professor Walt -- are quite right. Only thing I am amazed of is, how come so many people reading Walt's blog deliver such rancid criticism, professing the opposite (wrong) views? Dear friends, you should study Mr Friedman, and others, and make the same ideological, sobering journey that he has done. Leave the Bibi-Israeli trenches, get up and breethe some fresh air.
to his "A" game! Finally, instead of having to listen to pretenders like Walt and his supporters, we have the "real picture" of the I-P conflict not to mention, of the rest of the world. But Sniperman, could you plese explain one more time why Israel has failed to return the Golan Heights and why it has needed to settle Palestinian territory following the 1967 war, and why it continues the Gaza Blockade once more for me? Thanks, good buddy!
"Israel has failed to return the Golan Heights"
Has Syria made any pledges to a peaceful border with Israel? No.
Did Syria have a history of attacking Israel from the Golan, yes.
Until Syria wants to bother with recognizing Israel and making concessions to peaceful co-existence, they don't get the strategically important conquered territory on the border.
Maybe a post-Assad government might be more reasonable.
"and why it has needed to settle Palestinian territory following the 1967 war"
Those can go. I doubt the results will be as satisfying as you hope. Without some form of negotiated withdrawal between both parties, it will lead to a landlocked version of Gaza. Nothing would keep Israel from walling up the border and just declare it a hostile border between two sovereign states. Jordan doesn't seem to be overly warm to a Palestinian state. So the real choice is either talk to Israel or instant failed state-dom.
"why it continues the Gaza Blockade once more for me?"
The weapons smuggling, indiscriminate katushya attacks, and a stated desire of its leadership to eternal hostility with Israel comes to mind.
Plus we can Hamas's desire to keep its population under siege in order to maintain its Islamcist terrorism of the Gazan population and justify their total lack of governance. Gaza has no settlements, it is a de-facto Palestinian state. The problem is Hamas has no desire to actually run a government. Their sugardaddy Iran certainly doesn't want them to have such independent aspirations.
It is very difficult to see why the Palestinians would wish to accept a two state solution on any terms acceptable to any possible Israeli government. That only leaves one long term outcome that would be regarded as legal in international law. The realistic choice for Israel is to accept a one state solution or become an international "outlaw".
Israel, along with its best friend the United States, is already an "international outlaw" in the eyes of much of the world.
At what point was the international community ever allegedly friendly to Israel in an obvious manner?
It was always about treading lightly and privately with Israel worrying about upsetting the rest of the Arab world.
Frankly its very difficult to see where the Palestinians have made real good faith attempts to negotiate a peaceful solution. At this point its really a 3-state solution. Maybe you forgot that 40% of the Palestinian population is already in a de-facto state in Gaza, completely at odds with those in the West Bank. Negotiations aren't going to happen with Hamas anytime soon.
Israel is not going to go away and the Palestinians do not want to be absorbed within that state. Its safe to say a "one state solution" is really just a euphemism for ethnic cleansing at this point.
So the only alternative is a sovereign West Bank state, free of settlements and pledged to a peace treaty with Israel. The alternative is a West Bank walled in from both sides by hostile neighbors. Nobody realistically wants that (except maybe Hamas). The only reason "hawks" are in control of Israel at the present is because there is no belief that the Palestinians will negotiate in good faith. There is no reason to disavow the notion at the present.
A blogger on the Jerusalem Post Web site lamented that Israel had its hands tied by a need for the United States. A commenter pointed out that the blogger should be more worried that the United States might not need Israel.
Talk of alliance between Israel and the US is belied by the absence of treaties formalizing one. Israel's conduct is (perhaps temporarily) held hostage to its own perceived need for whatever support the US will give, but US support is hostage to the political whims of US Evangelical Christians, who seem for religious reasons to believe supporting Israel is consistent with millenarian prophecies. How reliable that is remains to be seen.
With Friends Like These Who Needs Enemies?
It is no surprise that Stephen Walt, one of the most anti-Semetic voices in the American academia, who blamed the Jewish Lobby for controlling American Foreign policy, is gloating about the dispute between the true friends of Israel and Tom Friedman. As to Tom Friedman, he might have been a friend of Israel long time ago, but he has not expressed a single pro-Israel view in many years. When Tom Friedman wrote as he just did, that the resounding ovation Netanyahu received in Congress when he spoke there in May had been “bought and paid for by the Israel lobby,” he sccuses the Israeli Lobby of bribary. He has shown hiimself to be not only not a friend of Israel, but also to join the crowd of journalists who are willing to spew inflammatory unsubstantiated accusations to get attention.
Tom Friedman is way too enamoured with his own "clever" one-liners and has developed an ego that leads him unfortunately to write this nonsense. Years of writing for the lefty NYT, the paper that 19 of its 20 op-ed pieces on Israel since September were negative, has rubbed on him. Today is is just another liberal Jews who think the role of the Israeli government is to follow the views of the American left!
. . . could top the efforts Netanyahu, Lieberman and the other right-wing neofascists that run Israel to destroy it.
The statements and measures they've taken to alienate American Jews are perhaps the most remarkable examples of a death wish gone compulsive. The place is deflating, Jews are leaving, ever fewer arrive (moving into a bull's eye has never seemed too rational) and their response is to beat the war drums -- prompting more to leave.
Amazing.
Here's just one example
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4157152,00.html
I agree with Mr Friedman, and could go on with countless reasons, my comment is for Mr abrams' claim that the only reason politicians applaud and give standing ovations to the likes of "bibi" is because the American people love israel "so much", if Mr. abrams believes this to be true, he believes in fantasy. This, if ever there was a survey taken should be taken again, Mr. abrams would be very much surprised. A very large part of the American people have come to realise that israel has been a most costly foreign policy and strategic liability for the U.S. for over 40 years, costing us in prestige and wealth as well as countless American lives in military misadventures, trying to maintain an israeli need and want. The American people are well aware that the darling state of israel today is a manipulative state that for the most part was most responsible for our costly war in Iraq and today is again threatening us and the world with another catastrophic war, this time with their most existential "enemy of the day" Iran. Mr. abrams has spent a lot of time catering and being entertained or financed by the israelis and their lobbyists and wholeheartedly probably believes what he claims but he is dead wrong. The American people see israel for what it truly is, an apartheid and racist state created by and for northern european and slav non-Semite jews at the expense of the Semite people of Palestine, who quickly throw their bad european history, to justify any crimes commited against the Palestinians and the trump card of bigotry at anyone who questions anything they do.
...and special interest groups have "captured" the U.S. government, then what is the solution to this problem?
Israel is a love-junkie -- we all know that. It's a condition caused by a couple thousand years of enduring the on-again, off-again contempt of the gentiles they lived among.
Love-junkies do not discriminate: they will take it wherever they can find it. Israel has a bad habit of making common cause with antisemites, as long as they cover their antisemitism with a thin veneer of Islamophobia. But tough love doesn't count: in Israel's view, that's only disguised antisemitism.
Israel's debilitating condition makes it very hard for people who really do care about Israel's future. Tom Friedman, for example. He has finally figured out that he will have to stick his neck out if he really wants to be of some service to Israel.
As for me, I was just astonished and happy to see someone of Friedman's stature make such a simple yet profound statement of truth about the Israel Lobby, which continues to damage Israel by purchasing Congresspeople to support its misguided agenda.
Friedman never a friend of Israel
My history with Mr. Friedman indicates his writing was a means the Anti-Arab Discrimination Committee (ADC) used repeatedly as a means to promote its pro-Palestinian agenda. He is also complicit in the illegal extradition of Robert J. Manning, illegal because it was politically motivated and according to expert witnesses I personally examined while employed at The Jerusalem Post, hinged on counterfeit fingerprint evidence and trumped-up charges. Friedman targeted Manning because he was the body guard of the late Rabbi Meir Kahane, who was the first M.K. in Israel to advocate a transfer of the Palestinian population, which is in accord with the plan alluded to by the prophet Zechariah. For more see the website that has my name and
Torah Voice in Exile.
“Or that the risk of no two-state solution is okay because there's some *other* alternative/situation that will come about *other* than one state or apartheid or expulsion? If so, what?”
Israel has insensibly manoeuvred into a blind alley. There is no longer anything any Israeli individual or group can do, or anyone else for that matter. Those who see, like Gideon Levy, can only cry in the wilderness. It is a time for faith and fatalism, like when Apollo 13 lost power and we all watched helpless, and Nixon besought us to pray.
. . this is all going to end very badly, with breathtaking loss of life. Israel's destruction will also cost the US dearly in both treasure and loss of influence -- and possibly lives if we try to stop the inevitable.
Israel is a walking corpse, its politics in the hands of the real end-of-everything nut-cases, who believe in the next Masada more fervently than the mullahs believe in the 12th Imam.
Its military has already warned that the next major war wil create massive damage in the nation's heart -- which will leave the place mostly inhabited by the old and the fanatical.
I just hope our military is tracking their nuclear weapons and will be prepared to intervene before they act out their self-loathing death wish.
If there is one thing that's unchanging in the region, it's the hatred of Israel by its neighbors.
Leaderships like Mubarak may be bought off, but among the flesh and blood of the people there is absolute, irretrievable hatred. All those displaced Palestinians aren't going anywhere, just increasing. Turkey, once an ally, is now a hair away from enmity. Egypt is no longer dependable servile.
As Israel pays more games with the temple Mount, it arouses people not even in the region.
If Assad collapses, and some kind of Sunni government takes over, this will be favorable to Israel?
The little Hashemite king may be overthrown, and Jordan may cease to be Israel's butt-boy. Yes, think of its Palestinian population, so near. All those secrets to reveal, all those American weapons.
Nothing is written in advance.
But these trend lines are perfectly clear.
Our country has been bound to an aggressive, impulsive corpse walking ever faster nto its own grave.
USMARINESNIPER is right!
Any complicated issue has a simple, elegant,WRONG solution
The "two-state" solution to the Jewish - Arab conflict is such one.
Anyone who believe that the millions of the descendants of the 1948 Palestinian refugees will live peacefully in the Palestinian State (supposing that they will drop their "right of return" to Israel, which they refuse), just because Abu-Mazen signed a "peace treaty", does not live in the Middle East and does not know that even inter-Arab treaties are never honored.
there will be a one-state solution
It will be called "Palestine." The phony state of Israel will disappear, like the Crusader kingdoms that once rule there. It's a just a case of antibodies expelling a foreign body.
http://dotsub.com/view/3ded8dbc-6612-4822-9d91-e605b59d05fd
Israel has "blind nationalism"? Wow, if only you could read the newspapers in Hebrew or listen to Israeli news. But you can't so you make idiotic comments and bring up Nazi Germany GarrisonSanders as an analogy ( the true sign of a fool and sycophant). You would then see that Israel is a place with diverse opinions and a highly thinking, contemplating society, with many views on all issues.
Stephen M. Walt is the Robert and Renée Belfer professor of international relations at Harvard University.
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