We’re beginning to see the Walt and Mearsheimer effect. Not in coverage of their book or celebration of their ideas in the mainstream. No, that is a ways off. Actually we are seeing their effect in a far more pervasive manner, and one they had hoped for: they have licensed criticism of Israel in venues that might have felt uncomfortable in the past. They have sent a signal. Everyone has heard it. Progressives who have long bitten their tongues are feeling that they can speak. It is only a matter of time before a mainstream politician ventures out on the limb.
The latest evidence? In today’s Harvard Crimson, a piece that is sure to upset Harvard Square. Professor J. Lorand Matory earnestly begs to be allowed to criticize Israel, and warns that a failure to grant this freedom could cause the world to hate Jews…
In my country, people tremble in the fear of losing their friends,
jobs, advertising revenues, campaign contributions, and alumni
donations if they question Zionism or Israeli policy—despite the
billions of our tax dollars paid annually for Israel’s defense and
sustenance. Even the Israeli military hosts freer debates about this
issue than any U.S. university does.My position is difficult not just because I have colleagues
and friends who disagree but because I have no Palestinian friends. For
every five Jewish people I have loved, I hardly know one Arab. Indeed,
I am troubled by the insouciance of the Arab and Muslim world in the
face of unjust suffering by people who look like me [i.e., black]….Thus, my concerns about Zionism are motivated by neither
pro-Arab nor anti-Jewish bias, but by the fear that those who dismiss
all anti-Zionism as anti-Semitism—or, equally often, as Jewish
self-hatred—risk creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. If Israel’s
defenders convince the world that all legitimately Jewish people are
Zionists and that Jewish people are uniform in their opinions about
Israel and its policies, then the convinced will conclude that
condemning Israel or its policies requires them to hate Jewish people. [my emphasis]
Holey moley, the floodgates have opened…
