Last night I went to a Hallowe’en party and met the mother of a Marine in Iraq. I pulled her into a corner to grill her about Middle East policy. She said the decision to invade was a great mistake, and that U.S. support for Israel was a factor in that decision. I told her that on Charlie Rose the other night IAEA boss Muhammed ElBaradei said that "The Palestinian issue is a red flag of humiliation across the Muslim world." The sooner we deal with the inequity the better. We must show Arabs that they "are part of the human family."
These are the most important underdiscussed issues in U.S. policy in the Middle East. They loom over that mother’s life today as the Israel-centric neoconservatives push for a military strike against Iran, and as George Bush foolishly says that the U.S. stands for freedom, from Beirut to Baghdad to Tehran.
To me this is common sense, and the only ground on which to consider the latest review/attack of Walt and Mearsheimer, a triumph of Oxford-Union-debate-style condescension by Walter Russell Mead, in Foreign Affairs. A vizier of the Council on Foreign Relations, Mead commits himself to nothing in the review. Nothing–when our country is in crisis. Yes: U.S. policy in the Middle East is not well-understood. No: the Israel lobby has not received the attention it merits. Yes: the U.S. needs "to find ways to bridge the gap between its current policies and the national aspirations of Palestinians and other Arabs," whatever that means. Yes: the authors have helped to start an important conversation. Oh but they have only made things worse through their terrible slipshodness.
"Rarely in professional literature does one encounter such a gap between aspiration and performance as there is in The Israel Lobby."
Note that phrase "professional literature." Mead imposes a professional literacy test. He says that this kind of performance is "methodologically complex." He doesn’t like the authors’ "use of evidence" and their sloppy definitions. What upsets him? When Walt and Mearsheimer go from saying the U.S.
has given Israel "extraordinary" support in one line to saying in the next line that it is "uncritical and unconditional" support, Mead cries out, "Note the slippage." And the Syria Accountability Act passes the House by 398 to 4 even as the Iraq Study Group urges our gov’t to engage Syria and is ignored. This is the real, horrifying situation. But Walt and Mearsheimer are showing slippage!
On the handling of evidence:
The authors’ credulity never ceases to inspire. A
group of 76 senators signed a pro-Israel open letter to President
Gerald Ford. One of the signers, Senator Dick Culver (D-Iowa), later
said that he "caved" and signed only because "the pressure was too
great." Mearsheimer and Walt are uncritically enthralled and accept the
retraction as revealing the true, inner Culver. Perhaps, but all one
knows here is that Culver, by his own admission, was willing to say
things he did not believe to gain a political advantage. When was he
speaking the truth, and when was he seeking approval? Washington is
unfortunately well supplied with loose-lipped opportunists…
Mead is clever. "The true, inner Culver." The inspiring naivete of the authors. That is wit, and pure captiousness. There are countless testimonials to the lobby’s muscle-flexing on the Hill to support Culver, from Paul Findley to Fritz Hollings to the torpedoing of Cynthia McKinney (as well as my own experience with a possible congressional candidate). Supporting the hateful Israeli settlements is a price of admission to Congress. This represents a great moral fault in our politics. Walt and Mearsheimer earnestly engage that problem. Mead is scoring performance points.
On the authors’ definition of the Israel lobby:
If everyone from AIPAC to Americans for Peace
Now is part of the lobby, what, exactly, is the political agenda the
lobby supports?…What is the relationship between the internal dynamics of this divided
lobby and the politics and policies of both Israel and wider American
society?When it comes down to it,
Mearsheimer and Walt do not seem to know who, exactly, belongs to this
amoebic, engulfing blob they call the lobby and who does not. Take
their own case. They describe themselves as pro-Israel, in that they
believe in the state’s right to exist…
Aha, got them there! I myself have faulted Mearsheimer and Walt for not being more precise about the lobby’s borders. But how easy is it to be precise in such uncharted territory? It’s not. Mead himself makes a fascinating mistake in his indictment. He crows that W&M have included "everyone from AIPAC to Americans for Peace Now". In fact, APN is part of AIPAC. APN is a member of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, and all the members of the Conference of Presidents are on the AIPAC executive committee. This is one of the marvels of the Israel lobby: it is a loose coalition. When I learned as much earlier this year, I wondered why APN doesn’t resign from AIPAC to protest AIPAC’s role in the Iraq war, or in the Syria Accountability Act, or in defending the settlements, or in supporting the Lebanon War. But APN doesn’t resign. And no one starts an alternative lobby (and when George Soros notions it, the lobby suggests he was a collaborationist in Hungary during the Holocaust and Soros bows out). This is modern Jewish history. My sense is that Jewish organizations, fearful for Israel’s existence, tend to close rank when it comes to speaking to the U.S. government–and thereby allow the rightwing hardliners to be the court Jews. This cultural/political/institutional mystery is not fully understood by Walt and Mearsheimer, no, but they have done a wonderful job under the circumstances.
Mead (a supporter of the Iraq war) says that they should have waited– what, a year or five?– so as to conform to his professional performance standards. He is completely out of touch with the reality of that Marine mother, whose son is going where next, Iran? Our policy is a galloping troika. Walt and Mearsheimer want to shift the debate and try and rein that policy in. Theirs is a much higher standard for writing than Mead’s criteria of punctilious dressage.
That dumb bitch probably voted for Bush.
The president of the Council on Foreign Relations is Richard N. Haass. Before him it was Lesley Gelb. No one on the staff is ever going to write a piece discussing the power of the Jewish lobby.
BTW, notice how, like most of the critics, Mead refuses to bring up the subject of UNCONDITIONAL support. This is at the center of M&W's argument and is repeated on almost every page of the book. But most critics — particularly from the left — don't want to see it because it is so embarrassing. Why is AfPN no different from the ZOA in insisting that American support never be made conditional on Israel ending the occupation? Does it have something to do with a fear of allowing the gentile community into the decision-making process? That all will be lost if control is taken out of exclusively Jewish hands?
Of course it does. (Go back and read the comments of poor ToughDove if you need a refresher on mentality of the frightened tribalist.)
The reason the review described the research as shoddy, was because it was.
And, the reason it is relevant is that Walt/Mearsheimer promote their credentials as some basis of reliability.
You set your intellectual bar too damn low, Phil.
Concise examination of political interactions is NOT new territory Phil.
You yourself are as fixated on defending Walt/Mearsheimer as you complain about neo-conservatives defending Israel right or wrong unconditionally.
Is Americans for Peace Now part of AIPAC?
If so, then AIPAC is a big tent.
Mead is touted as the 'Henry A. Kissinger Senior Fellow for U.S. Foreign Policy …'.
Somebody has a weird sense of humour.
Would you like to end all this craziness? Do you want to change the world within weeks? Here's how– Ron Paul's first action as president:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDM8US25xXg
I have to say that I thought the review was quite good in its own ways, it is pushing to advance the discussion via constructive criticism. I think that Walter Russell Mead does point of a few things that aren't really issues, but he accepts a lot of the aspects of the book and calls out for more study of these issues to illuminate them. The Israel Lobby is a pioneering book and thus it is expected that it will get some connections wrong, and weight the importance of various aspects incorrect, especially when it strays from the area of expertise of the authors. We need more studies of this topic area, and Mead is basically calling for them.
I think that Mead comes across as unnecessarily harsh, but behind some of the surface tone, he is actually furthering the discussion in a productive direction. I hope that foreign policy scholars take Mead up on some of his recommendations for additional research on this topic that can further illuminate the subject. Mearsheimer and Walt can't singlehandedly change the nature of the relationship between Israel, American Jewry, and U.S. Foreign Policy in the Middle East.
Phil sounds like a real pill at a party.
Richard Witty – Mead claims that some limited aspects of the book are shoddy, not the whole thing as you appear to be interpreting thing. You seem to be lacking the precision that you call for in others. Just saying.
The editor of a premier pan-Arab daily newspaper is warning with the eventual departure of American forces from Iraq, the vacuum will be filled by Syria and Iran, and "with friends like these, who needs enemies?"
The commentary comes from Tariq Alhomayed, editor-in-chief of Asharq Al-Awsat, the Arabic-language newspaper that is printed in 12 cities on four continents and also features an English-language website.
The editorial was highlighted by the Middle East Media Research Institute, which monitors media reports throughout the Middle East.
"In an editorial titled '[The] American Withdrawal and the Second Stage,' … Alhomayed warned of what might happen after the U.S. withdraws its forces from Iraq," MEMRI said. "He argued that Iraq would be taken over by Iran and Syria, which are seeking to dominate the Middle East, and that the result would be the spread of extremism and violence throughout the region."
Both Iran and Syria are "getting ready" for the American departure, he said.
"Iran has, in fact, been present in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime. As for Syria, it has been one of the disrupters of the Iraqi project however from afar," he said. "Nevertheless, what is new today is Damascus's endeavor to reorganize the Baathist rather than the Sunni elements as is commonly believed, in order to ensure Syrian influence in Iraq."
He said while Syrian President Bashar Assad, "stated that his country has influence over Lebanon; an influence that he described as positive … we all know that this is not true."
The commentary noted Syria wants the Golan Heights without war and wants to win America over "without having to adopt a moderate approach or refrain from interfering in Lebanon or Iraq."
"Damascus, like Iran, is playing the Hamas card, a movement that is affiliated to the Muslim Brotherhood…" he continued. "Iran, by imposing fait accompli or reaching an agreement with the United States, wants to dominate the Arab world and to resume exporting the Islamic revolution."
"This is the main problem. America will leave the region and we will find ourselves opening a new chapter that is no better than where we are today. After the devouring of Iraq and Lebanon at the hands of Iran and Syria, the Gulf region will be under the siege of the Islamic revolution and under pressure from Syrian meddling," he said.
"We do not know where this will all end. Therefore, in light of the American exit and the lack of Arab activity, the region will witness its second stage of downfall; however, this time, it will be in the hands of Tehran and Damascus," he said.
In its own editorial, the International Herald Tribune said U.S. voters are becoming increasingly convinced it is time for a troop withdrawal, forcing them then to focus their attention on the "likely consequences" in the region.
"Washington's presence in Iraq will gradually diminish over the next five years, leaving in place a weak, decentralized system of warlords with some foreign supporter," the IHT said. "The central government appears certain to weaken over time, but the proposal of a new al-Qaida haven arising in the Sunni triangle is not the most significant threat that would emerge from a post-U.S. Iraq. Rather, it is the galvanizing effect that a U.S. troop pullout would have on Islamist radicals in the Maghreb, the Palestinian territories, Jordan and beyond."
Syriacomment – Just be aware that MEMRI is a special interest group that translates and publicizes articles that suits its general pro-Israel agenda. Baathists are not going to come back in Iraq, the era of pan-Arab socialism that inspired the Baathist movement long past. Also, US troops are unlikely to truly pull out of Iraq for decades (think South Korea.) It is also not feasible for the US to perpetually interfere in Iraqi politics to prevent regional alliances that the US may find inconvenient, we can't force Iraq to be our puppet state forever unless you are willing to replace Iraq's democratically elected government with a US-compliant dictator.
I do agree with Philip when Philip writes "Our policy is a galloping troika. Walt and Mearsheimer want to shift the debate and try and rein that policy in. Theirs is a much higher standard for writing than Mead's criteria of punctilious dressage."
Mead comes across as an anti-activist who does support the current policy and doesn't want to rock the boat, while at the same time advocating that we understand this area better. I am unfamiliar with Mead's previous writings, thus I can't tell whether this anti-activist stance of his is consistent or whether he only roles it out when it is convenient. That is a topic that may, in the spirit of Mead's review, require further serious study to understand.
W&M wrote this book for the PUBLIC. They wanted it readable and not too heavy for the PUBLIC. So the PUBLIC would buy it and read it.
Mead knows this, all the usual suspects attacking the book know this. They are fully aware that W&M have the intelluctual firpower to have given them a scholarly, detailed 2000 pages, up the ass if that had been their goal with the book.
W&M did what they set out to do.
99% of the public who read "The Israel Lobby" aren't reading Mead's opinion of "The Israel Lobby" so Mead is just preaching to his own select choir and having no impact on the majority of people who read the book. It's all just more dafty hackery.
mearsheimer and walt have done america a great Favor by elevating the foreign policy argument into the intellectual arena. they let genie out of the bottle, making it acceptable to be able to discuss aipac and israels influence in directing americas foreign policy.
history will judge zionism to have been a morally bankrupt system devoid of compassion for the palestinians. israel doesnt need zionism to exist, it may have needed it to have been born but certainly not to move forward.
if you notice and compare the way american zionist like dershowitz operate here in america via intimidation as in the finkelstein case, it is very similar to how they have operated in the middle east…its signature has been arrogance and bullying and full of contempt and disdain for laws and those they oppress.
there really isnt any other way to describe their modus operandi.
jimmy carter, desmond tutu, mearsheimer and walt, and the academics now signing a letter to keep the politics of zionism out of academia, along with the brave jewish american bloggers who have the moral backbone to stand up in the spirit of those who stood side by side with the black liberation movement in the sixties here in the states will one day be recognized for the great work they are doing in our day.
Samuel Burke — I don't agree with your characterization that Zionism will be remembered as a "morally bankrupt system devoid of compassion for the palestinians." My impression is that Zionism will be remembered much an outgrowth of 19-century European nationalist movements, which the Jews of Europe were excluded from at the time, and an overreaction to the shock of the Holocaust. I think history will be understanding of Zionism, both the original 19-century European colonial mindset that dominated it in its early days and the fears that underlie its modern existence. I find that Zionism and hard-core Zionists to be fully understandable and I can empathize with the current situation. This doesn't excuse or justify what has happened to the Palestinians, but I think much of this will be remembered as a tragedy for all involved, with only a few truly morally bankrupt villains, the rest just caught up in historical trends larger than themselves and that they were unable to transcend.
Isn't it wonderful that the more the grey eminences of the Jewish & foreign policy chattertariat pan this book the better it sells? I think it's a delicious irony.
Next thing you know it'll be made into a movie. But who will they get to play Honest Abe Foxman?
I find it hard to believe that Josh Landis (who writes Syria Comment) would be quoting MEMRI in the comment above labelled "Syriacomment." But who knows?
Ben, It's true that Zionism can be understood partly in terms of 19th century nationalism and colonialism. But the Holocaust came much later, and although it played a role, its contribution was more to harden attitudes already present in the original intentions.
But you're leaving something out. You can't fully explain Zionist behavior without also introducing the concept of choseness. Remember that "Zionist behavior" is more than just Israeli behavior; it also includes everything done in the diaspora community on behalf of the Jewish state by people with no intention of ever living there, but quite willing to treat the Palestinians as less than human.
"W&M wrote this book for the PUBLIC. They wanted it readable and not too heavy for the PUBLIC. So the PUBLIC would buy it and read it."
Thats the tragedy. The PUBLIC is ill-served by poor logic and "good sense" that is only good sense for the converted, and NOT for the inquiring.
What is the conversion to? "National interest"?
I thought that was one thing we should have learned from the idiocies of the Bush policies, from the idiocies of the neo-conservative invocations (their analysis is just impression, the actions are the idiocy). That "national interest" should be ready, but not imposing.
Instead we "learn" to commit to our oil addiction, requiring that the US be imposing in the middle east.
The only possible area of debate that can then occur, is what is the chosen method that we can impose, and who are the chosen allies.
That is a dumb question, of which the "Israel Lobby" is a small answer to a big question.
And, as a small answer to a big question, it encourages arbitrary scapegoating.
In the book, there is so much wrangling over the $3 billion/year given to Israel annually. (I'll take for granted that the number is proportional, if not precise.)
And, yet, the United States is spending between $100 billion to $200 billion in Iraq annually.
They are of different proportions, for different missions.
And, NOONE is investing in serious transportation alternatives which are possible, mostly social and commercial rather than technological. Nor, in improvements in conservation of space heating, nor in any social planning of settlement patterns.
Though Deborah Lipstadt has, predictably, been crowing on her blog that Mead has written a ‘devastating critique’ of Walt and Mearsheimer, the piece looks considerably less convincing to somebody who is not encumbered by her prejudices.
But let me start with some faint praise. Mead has not resorted to the canard that the Walt and Mearsheimer book constitutes an anti-Semitic tract. On the other hand, one can only call his defense of these authors on this point decidedly half hearted. ‘This may be’, he says somewhere, ‘a book that anti-Semites will love, but it is not necessarily an anti-Semitic book.’
‘Not necessarily’, huh? Well, no, says Mead, because the offences the authors can be accused of here were committed ‘unwittingly’ and ‘innocently’ (Mead refers to the ‘unwitting and innocent use of certain literary devices that trigger unhappy memories’ ).
Quite a few paragraphs further down the tone has become a bit more severe. There Mead claims that Walt and Mearsheimer did ‘what anti-Semites have always done: they overstate the powers of Jews’. And his defense of these authors against this, his own charge, has here, if anything, become even more condescending: now we are told that these authors ‘have come honestly to a mistaken understanding of the relationship between pro-Israel political activity and US policy and strategic interests.’
Yes, Your Honor, these juveniles have made an honest mistake.
It is, one would think, not the tone one would expect in a review of work by two senior academics in major universities.
Leaving that for what it is one can also note it as a halfway positive point that Mead has at any case not followed the herd of hostile reviewers in remarking that W.& M. should have interviewed (some of) the actors in this drama. But here he goes to the other extreme. Where W. & M. quoted some of the actual sayings of some of these actors this is, rather surprisingly, deemed to be an unreliable method. ‘Washington’, says Mead, ‘is unfortunately well supplied with loose-lipped opportunists who will say anything an audience – any audience wants them to say’. That is not how one gets at the ‘true, inner man’ as Mead remarks about a statement of the hapless Culver.
That leaves open the question how, if personal statements by individual actors are out of bounds, political history can ever be written. Disraeli said . .., Roosevelt said …, Churchill said … Are we dealing here with the ‘true, inner’ Disraeli, Roosevelt or Churchill ? Who knows. The political scientist doesn’t have to double as a shrink. When statements by the same actor are conflicting he takes the most credible one.
Mead is also not happy about the alleged lack of logical rigor in W. & M’s discourse. The authors claim, he says, that Israel’s security would not be undermined if the military and economic aid that the US offers this state would be reduced or even eliminated. But if that is so ‘the efforts of the Israel lobby to extract more aid from the U.S. Congress are not really that important’. So, the conclusion must be, says Mead, that the Israel lobby ‘plays no significant role in determining the course of events in the Middle East’. In other words, what do W. & M. make such a big song and dance about?
All right, let me try to answer that question by starting with a quote. A Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations wrote some three years ago:
‘For the last five weeks I have been traveling through the Middle East, meeting diplomats, officials, policy experts, military leaders, students and ordinary citizens. I learned something very important: the greatest single cause of anti-Americanism in the Middle East today is not the war in Iraq; more surprisingly, it is not even American support for Israel, per se. Rather, it is a widespread belief that the United States simply does not care about the rights or needs of the Palestinian people.
''The Palestinian issue is really what discredits the United States throughout the region,'' a senior Western diplomat with years of experience in the Middle East told me. Or, as one student after another put it after the university lectures I conducted across the region: ''Why do Americans have to be so biased?'' ‘
The ‘Senior Fellow’ who wrote this was … Walter Russell Mead. So the question he could have asked himself is how this ‘widespread belief’’ came about? Were American economic aid or weapon deliveries at the bottom of this or was it, rather, that single American finger that is invariably put up when the UN Security Council tries, for the umpteenth time, to get a vote of censure through on Israeli policies versus the Palestinians? Wasn’t that what W.&M. were referring to when they did not only talk about material but also ‘diplomatic support’, an aspect of the matter that Mead now prefers to quietly overlook when he criticizes W’&M’s views on American assistance to Israel?
Does Mead really believe that the Israel lobby has nothing to do with American bloody mindedness on this point? And if it does isn’t it then at least in part responsible for the ‘greatest single cause of anti-Americanism in the Middle East’ (to use Mead’s own words) and doesn’t that play ‘a significant role in determining the course of events in the Middle East’ ?
Instead of even hinting, on this occasion, at this particular damage the Israel-Palestine matter is doing to the US’s standing in the Middle East, Mead goes out of his way to argue the importance of the Israel connection to American interests. In the process he engages in the same type of ‘slippage’ he accuses W. & M. of.
Let me go back a bit.
This particular censure of W. & M. comes early in the piece. Mead quotes the following line: ‘The United States provides Israel with extraordinary material aid and diplomatic support, and this uncritical and unconditional support is not in the national interest.’ Look, says Mead, at the ‘slippage’. “The ‘extraordinary’ support of the first clause quietly mutates into the ‘uncritical and unconditional support ‘ of the last.”
Yet in spite of Mead’s remonstrance against W. & Mr.’s alleged ‘slippage’here, I fail to see why support cannot both be ‘extraordinary’ and ‘uncritical and unconditional’. One could, in fact, argue that it is ‘extraordinary’ exactly because it is ‘uncritical and unconditional’. But Mead insists on seeing here an example of the book’s problems that ‘start very early and run very deep’.
Whatever the case may be here I have a problem with some ‘slippage’ on his side. In arguing the importance for the US of the relationship with Israel Mead refers to the fact that this country is the ‘dominant military power in the world’s most vital and crisis-ridden region’, but a few lines further down it is already elevated to ‘an indispensable local power’. Military prowess has here ‘quietly mutated’ into ‘indispensability’. Well, there is of course no logical contradiction between being militarily powerful and being indispensable, as there was no contradiction between being ‘extraordinary’ and being ‘unconditional’. The problem here is with this statement’s credibility (the W. & M. statement that Mead castigated I found, by contrast, very credible).
We better watch it, says Mead, that no other power seeks to replace us as partner in a relationship with this ‘indispensable’ power. ‘Israel has changed partners before: it won the 1948-49 war with weapons from the Soviet bloc, partnered with France and the United Kingdom in 1956, and considered France (the source of Israel's nuclear technology) its most important ally in 1967.’ The suggestion here that Israel has unilaterally jilted all these suitors for her more powerful present lover and that these suitors had cause to deplore their fate is ludicrous, especially as far as France is concerned. It was France that turned its back on Israel and not the other way round.
In the press conference President De Gaulle gave on 27th November 1967, a few months after the Six Day War, he indicated France’s reasons for this new distance from its erstwhile ally, after having first pointed out why his country had initially looked with sympathy at this state. De Gaulle said:
‘Unfortunately a drama occurred. It was brought on by the very great and constant tension resulting from the scandalous fate of the refugees in Jordan, and also by the threat of destruction against Israel. On 22 May the Akaba affair unfortunately created by Egypt* would offer a pretext to those who wanted war. To avoid hostilities, on 24 May France had proposed to the other three Major Powers to jointly forbid both parties from initiating the fight. On 2 June, the French Government had officially declared that it would condemn whoever would take up arms first. I myself, on 24 May, had stated to Mr. Eban, Israel’s Foreign Minister, whom I saw in Paris: "If Israel is attacked we shall not let it be destroyed, but if you attack we shall condemn your action.”
Israel attacked, and reached its objectives in six days of fighting. NOW IT ORGANISES ITSELF ON CONQUERED TERRITORIES, THE OCCUPATION OF WHICH CANNOT GO WITHOUT OPPRESSION, REPRESSION, EXPULSIONS, WHILE AT THE SAME TIME A RESISTANCE GROWS, WHICH IT REGARDS AS TERRORISM. Jerusalem should receive international status.’ (emphasis added AB).
Well we don’t know, of course, whether we are dealing here with the ‘inner’ De Gaulle, which was probably even harder to reach than the ‘inner’ Culver. But at any case for Arab countries the ‘outer’ De Gaulle was good enough and France was perceived as doing the right thing.
And being perceived as doing the right thing is important. Presently, as Mead has told us in his earlier guise, the US is however not being perceived as doing that, as being in fact terribly one eyed when it comes to the Palestinians.
It was Phil, I think, who judged Walt and Mearsheimer’s book to be as politically epoch making as was, half a century ago, George Kennan’s treatise on the necessity of ‘containing’ the Soviet Union. (Kennan, as is well known, came to bemoan the belligerent interpretation of this article).
Well it was Kennan who laid a great deal of emphasis on the importance of being perceived as doing the right thing. His reasoning was that policy goals are often not that important because quite frequently actions have totally unintended consequences. Therefore, he said in The Atlantic Monthly of May 1959:
‘All this is quite different when we come to method. Here, in a sense, one can hardly go wrong. The government cannot fully know what it is doing, but it can always know how it is doing it; and it can be as sure that good methods will be in some way useful as that bad ones will be in some way pernicious. A government can pursue its purpose in a patient and conciliatory and understanding way, respecting the interests of others and infusing its behavior with a high standard of decency and honesty and humanity, or it can show itself petty, exacting, devious, and self-righteous. If it behaves badly, even the most worthy of purposes will be apt to be polluted; whereas sheer good manners will bring some measure of redemption to even the most disastrous undertaking.’
The US has emphatically not shown ‘a high standard of decency and honesty and humanity’ in dealing with the Middle East and that is in part because it has failed to use its influence to compel Israel to observe basic decency in its dealings with the Palestinians and has prevented, by using its veto power in the UNSC, other powers from doing so. Mearsheimer and Walt have at any case signaled this problem and attempted to analyze its causes. Mead doesn’t even ask the question about possible causes, as he failed to do three years ago when he pointed to the nefarious effect of the perceived American bias in the Palestinian question.
Well indeed, such questions can only land you in hot water. It is much safer to pontificate about the ‘methodological’ and other failings of those who ‘unwittingly and innocently’ make ‘honest mistakes’ in these matters.
Israel Lobby is at #40 right now on Amazon; was #20 on New York Times bestseller list two weeks ago. Anybody have a clue
what this means in terms of how many people have bought the book? Considering the current consumer trend down, it's a considerable investment towards informed consent, no?
Charles Keating – there is something called BookScan which if you have a subscription, you can get the actual sales numbers. My estimate based on Amazon.com ranking is between 20,000 and 45,000, which is considerable given that the book is clearly targeted at elite, scholars and graduate students. It doesn't have wide audience that an Ann Coulter book would have.
Ben – thank you so much. BTW, I agree with you and Phil on this latest thread. I appreciate the efforts of everyone here, especially Phil for starting it up and maintaining it. He's not a party pooper, I'm sure you'd agree. I bet he's viewed The Jerk more than once and I bet that Marine mother was glad to see someone cared enough to actually think beyond Medved.
I think the impact of the book is entirely exagerated.
I’ve read similar criticism from Alan Dershowitz: the quotations wrenched out of context, the shoddy research, the poor logic, the flawed scholarship, the unsound thesis, the conspiratorial theme, etc. OK, but in the end it comes to whether Walt and Mearsheimer were right when they perceived the entity of a widespread behavior they called “the Lobby.” I only try to get acquainted with this issue regardless of stances and ideologies, and now and then I stumble on dementia, like when they call “anti-Semitic” Jews who oppose the clean-break mainstream. It bothers me.
Arie, that was a great quote you found from Mead.
It reminds me of an interview Karen Hughes gave to the World Service last year. She was the Bush sidekick appointed to win Middle Eastern hearts and minds. But when questioned it emerged that the idea Zionism was THE dominant issue on the Arab street was a startling revelation to her.
Just as an FYI, Joshua Landis of the real Syria Comment writes to me that he had nothing to do with the link to philipweiss.org
comment posted above which takes the name of his blog in the signature. Sock puppets beware! Why would someone want us to think that Josh Landis is quoting favorably from MEMRI reports? Hmmm.
It's not surprising that Debbie Lipstadt would crow at a nasty review of Israel Lobby. Considering what Finkelstein has had to say about her, I can't imagine that Walt Mearsheimer are any more favorably inclined toward her.
Witless Witty
Last I heard you hadn't read W&M. You didn't want to spend the money. You were waiting for it to get to your library or buy it wholesale.
So did the shoddy research permeate into your witty brain by osmosis or what?
I've read half of it now.
It has effected my views, in the sense of reinvigorating my contention that the Palestinians deserve a genuinely sovereign state at roughly the green line, and it should happen in the very near future (now).
At the same time, I share the view that Walt and Mearsheimer did a mediocre job, adopting faulty, even prejudicial reasoning, with the wrong focus.
I don't believe that national interest as a fetish, a focus, is a virtue. (It certainly is the responsibility of those in office. They swear an oath. As I mentioned earlier, my sense is that the neo-conservatives adopted too much national interest, rather than misguided or not enough.)
And, the specific set of alliances, and dollar amount contributed, PALE compared to the waste, corruption and aggression that results from our addiction to fossil fuels, without ANY modification or real interest (except PR).
I find it hard to believe that Josh Landis (who writes Syria Comment) would be quoting MEMRI in the comment above labelled "Syriacomment." But who knows?
Posted by: Richard Silverstein | November 02, 2007 at 12:09 AM
Gee Mr. Silverstein, why didn't you just check out Mr. Landis's blog and see for yourself if he posted that piece. It's right here:
link to joshualandis.com
Zogby states:
A majority of likely voters — 52% — would support a U.S. military strike to prevent Iran from building a nuclear weapon, and 53% believe it is likely that the U.S. will be involved in a military strike against Iran before the next presidential election, a new Zogby America telephone poll shows. The survey results come at a time of increasing U.S. scrutiny of Iran. According to reports from the Associated Press, earlier this month Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accused Iran of "lying" about the aim of its nuclear program and Vice President Dick Cheney has raised the prospect of "serious consequences" if the U.S. were to discover Iran was attempting to devolop a nuclear weapon. Last week, the Bush administration also announced new sanctions against Iran. Democrats (63%) are most likely to believe a U.S. military strike against Iran could take place in the relatively near future, but independents (51%) and Republicans (44%) are less likely to agree. Republicans, however, are much more likely to be supportive of a strike (71%), than Democrats (41%) or independents (44%). Younger likely voters are more likely than those who are older to say a strike is likely to happen before the election and women (58%) are more likely than men (48%) to say the same — but there is little difference in support for a U.S. strike against Iran among these groups.
WTF – Thank you for the link to Mr. Landis's blog. It appears that Mr. Landis did indeed post the said article on his blog, which it turns out is originally from link to worldnetdaily.com
There is no author listed for the article on this 'controversial' news website. Note that on the link you left for Mr. Landis's blog you need to scroll up to see the original posting by "Joshua". You can avoid scrolling by simply going to link to joshualandis.com
While Mr. Landis may not have posted this on Mr. Weiss's blog it would appear whoever did was seeking to direct people to Mr. Landis's blog. Perhaps Mr. Silverstein can speculate on the reasoning for this and whether Tariq Alhomayed is a card carrying member of the Israeli Lobby.