[Peace-discuss] U.S. interests & Israel Lobby (continued)

[David Green]

In an earlier article, I made the case for a leftist critique of realists who exaggerate the power of the Israel Lobby. I claimed that this fallacy, combined with accusations of “dual loyalty,” ideologically and crassly employs “national interests” as a euphemism for U.S. hegemony in the Middle East and Southwest Asia . The conclusion of such realists is that our support for Israel undermines U.S. interests. That is, realists support American hegemony in these regions, just not the way our leaders are going about it. I argued that for those who support Palestinian human rights and self-determination and support leftist principles, the realists’ denial of a fundamental identity between U.S. and Israeli state interests means that those so-called interests will never be directly and fundamentally challenged, and the Palestinian cause will be betrayed. I believe that so far that has indeed been the case.
My article also claimed that mistaken beliefs about the Israel Lobby and dual loyalty seem to bear some affinity to one-state and BDS approaches to strategy and tactics. I would obviously not assert a global correlation regarding these practical issues, but I would say that one-state/BDS has proven to be inconsequential for very good reasons: it doesn’t challenge American policy, and it doesn’t have the support of the international community—including the Palestinians. Basically, it is tactics—and disparate tactics at best—in search of a strategy.
My criticism was directed at Jewish-American blogger Philip Weiss and his website, where such notions constitute an oppressive and dogmatic conventional wisdom. Weiss’s response to me was typical in its condescension; he first titled it “reductionism sucks” (still reflected on the url), before changing it. He alternates between triviality and ignorance, with a kind of facile college freshman Weberian analysis of human motivations, and with no attempt to relate these observations to the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. He reveals his shallowness by accusing Noam Chomsky and me of being “materialists.” By the way, I never mentioned Chomsky in my article. Nor will I mention him again in this one. Weiss had to rush in writing this particular post because he was on his way to ski. I’m surprised he didn’t run straight into a tree.
But the Israel Lobby/dual loyalty approach has become the party line, the doctrine, the conventional wisdom, and one never knows where it will strike next. This morning (3/15), it was the blog of the usually reliable Glenn Greenwald. Such claims really shouldn’t consume his valuable time:
“Yet here we have a major split between the  U.S. and Israel , with key American military and political leaders explaining that the opposite is true:  that Israeli actions are directly harming U.S. interests and jeopardizing American lives.  And what is the reflexive, unambiguous response of virtually every American Israel-centric neocon?  To side with Israel over the  U.S. ” 
Does Greenwald really think that those who spend their lives grasping for power within the American system are more loyal to Israel ? Moreover, has Greenwald become a realist? Does he side with military realists against neocons, the ones who just want a more effective way to dominate the region? Weiss isn’t smart enough to know better. Greenwald is.
As is usually the case, Norman Finkelstein has been on target: 
“The historical record strongly suggests that neither Jewish neo-conservatives in particular nor mainstream Jewish intellectuals generally have a primary allegiance to Israel , in fact, any allegiance to Israel . Mainstream Jewish intellectuals became "pro"- Israel after the June 1967 war when Israel became the U.S. 's strategic asset in the Middle East , i.e., when it was safe and reaped benefits. To credit them with ideological conviction is, in my opinion, very naive. They're no more committed to Zionism than the neo-conservatives among them were once committed to Trotskyism; their only ism is opportunism. 
“As psychological types, these newly minted Lovers of Zion most resemble the Jewish police in the Warsaw ghetto. ‘Each day, to save his own skin, every Jewish policeman brought seven sacrificial lives to the extermination altar,’ a leader of the Resistance ruefully recalled. ‘There were policemen who offered their own aged parents, with the excuse that they would die soon anyhow.’ Jewish neo-conservatives watch over the U.S. "national" interest, which is the source of their power and privilege, and in the Middle East it happens that this "national" interest largely coincides with Israel 's "national" interest. If ever these interests clashed, who can doubt that, to save their own skins, they'll do exactly what they're ordered to do, with gusto?”
The ZNet website has also lapsed, with an article by the often informative but nevertheless realist political scientist Jerome Slater. “American and Israeli Peace Organizations” are defined as JStreet, Americans for Peace Now, Israel Peace Now, and B’Tselem. First, B’Tselem doesn’t belong in this category. Second, these are not “peace” organizations, except in the sense that everyone wants peace—on their own terms. Neither are they serious advocates of Palestinian human rights and self-determination. Slater, like Weiss, is disappointed in the post-Gaza and post-Goldstone behavior of people like Jeremy Ben-Ami. Why should he be? As I stated in my previous article, these are political climbers and triangulators. They are concerned about American and Israeli “interests.” So is Slater. So why should I be surprised? But I am disappointed with ZNet. Their readers deserve better than realist assumptions.
Slater writes: “Even those who deny the existence of an Israel lobby that dominates U.S. policies towards Israel are not likely to deny that the Jewish community is the most important sector of American public opinion on all issues pertaining to Israel . Consequently, domestic politics ensures that there will be no change in American government policies in the absence of strong Jewish support for sustained pressures on Israel . And if they are to have any chance of success, those pressures must include making U.S. diplomatic, economic, and military assistance of Israel conditional on major changes in its policies.” 
“Conditional?” Why not just withdraw it, and see what happens? But that might endanger our interests.
This is what passes for tough realist talk, but reveals only conceit—the Jews will make it happen. Whatever the influence of the Jewish community regarding Israel and U.S. foreign policy (again, exaggerated as a primary cause), let’s not wait for that to change. The Palestinians can’t afford it. We will have to address and challenge the assertion of U.S. and Israeli state, military, and corporate interests, regardless of the tactical differences between our generals and theirs.
I well understand the power of the Israel Lobby and its apparatchiks in Chicago and Urbana-Champaign to influence the media, public opinion, academic institutions, and politicians. I’ve challenged it for 13 years, at synagogues, at Jewish Federations, on campus, and in the community. I’ve especially challenged it in my local newspaper and campus newspaper, with dozens of published letters and articles, as well as previously in the Chicago Tribune and Philadelphia Inquirer. Over the last dozen years, I have seen a sea change in the manner in which the Lobby operates in a community like Urbana-Champaign, including in relation to Jews themselves. In the post-Gaza and post-Goldstone era, the Lobby and the Jewish community are quiescent, because they no longer are unified in their shamelessness, and non-Jews (or dissident Jews) are greatly more informed and less easily intimidated.
If principled supporters of Palestinian rights will proceed with their political business in relation to the public, the media, and the electoral process, I suspect that they will find that the already-exaggerated influence of the Lobby is in decline. But for unprincipled supporters (i.e., realists), the Lobby and dual loyalty serve as a convenient excuse to throw up their hands and do nothing (except write endlessly about the Lobby and dual loyalty). But as realists who identify themselves with state interests, what should one expect? The Palestinians and their advocates deserve much better, especially from those who claim to be on the left. Let’s dispense with this misguided and counter-productive analysis, and the creeping and obnoxious Stalinism that’s gone along with it.


      
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