Haaretz’s Anshel Pfeffer on the Israel lobby, lately exposed by Channel 4 in Britain. The piece overall is unpersuasive. Pfeffer is talking about something he doesn’t know well, American and British politics, but he knows this is a real issue. And not, as elsewhere asserted in Haaretz, an antisemitic trope.
But the real problem with today’s Israel lobby, in Britain and the United States, is not with its finances and their lack of transparency but with its entire mind-set. The basic fact is that by its actions, the lobby is now causing Israel more harm than good. That’s the point Oborne almost totally missed. On every level – moral, political, diplomatic, economic, military and religious – this country is being rapidly corrupted and damaged by the continuing occupation of the West Bank. By granting blanket support to all policies of whatever Israeli government happens to be in power, and by branding critics of these policies as either self-hating Jews or anti-Semites, they’re contributing to Israel’s siege mentality and delaying the day when Israelis will finally realize that there’s only one practical and ethical alternative.
In this sense at least, Oborne was right to make the connection between the political lobbying and the relentless pressure on the media which has totally blurred the lines between legitimate criticism and real bias. These knee-jerk reactions to any form of criticism have become so second nature to the Israel lobbyists that they’re now trying to stifle debate even within the Israeli media. Their shrill reactions to the eyewitness accounts of soldiers who fought in Gaza and were brave enough to say that the IDF did not always act there as "the most moral army in the world" are a good example.
Anshel Pfeffer, in his Ha’aretz article cited by Phil, has this to say about the Israel Lobby:
“But the real problem with today’s Israel lobby, in Britain and the United States, is not with its finances and their lack of transparency but with its entire mind-set. The basic fact is that by its actions, the lobby is now causing Israel more harm than good.”
That’s not the essential problem with the Lobby in the minds of most Americans who are familiar with its workings. Rather, it is the hideous fact that the Israel Lobby subverts the normal workings of American democracy, contorts US foreign policy in a way profoundly injurious to our national interests, and thereby threatens American democracy itself.
…contorts US foreign policy…
I don’t agree, in general, as far as our foreign policy is concerned.
1. In regard to the middle east, this is true, in many (not all) respects.
1. Our foreign policy (as far as human rights are concerned) have been terrible prior to the lobby’s existence; and would continue to be terrible if the lobby disappeared tomorrow.
What did the Israel Lobby have to do with Viet Nam, or the Phillipines, for that matter. Or any number of places we have supported the suppression of human rights.
I am no fan of the lobby, but there is little value in blaming it for everything (and absolving us of our own responsibilities).
Nothing I said implies that I blame the Israel Lobby for “everything” – not for Viet Nam, not for the Philippines, not for the Mexican War, etc. Nor did I mean to give you the idea that I admire US foreign policy sans Lobby influence.
Pfeffer goes on to say:
“In effect, Israelis voted for Benjamin Netanyahu hoping that he’d go against his party’s manifesto. All the signs point to a prime minister on the brink of a decision. He could take the plunge or he could retreat back into his ideological and political comfort zone. International pressure will play a major role in persuading him to make a necessary decision, but the message emanating from the Israel lobby is that should he decide to hold out and play for time, he will continue to receive their unreserved support.”
I think this is a misreading of both Netanyahu and the Israeli public. The visible signs are that both the PM and his people, by and large, want to take complete control of “Judea and Samaria” and don’t care a hoot about peace with the Arabs, Iran, or the world beyond. Israel needs external enemies to justify its fortress mentality, which is what protects it from the enemy within: the unpleasant truth that too many (Israeli) Jews of various persuasions living in too small a space are going to get into violent quarrels with one another unless they can take it out on someone else.
As for the Israel Lobby in America, it will continue to be a well-unified bunch of Zealots because it has a very large nation within which to roam about and vanquish its enemies.
…the unpleasant truth that too many (Israeli) Jews of various persuasions living in too small a space are going to get into violent quarrels with one another unless they can take it out on someone else. …a well-unified bunch of Zealots because it has a very large nation within which to roam about and vanquish its enemies.
These sound like racist statements to me. The implicit meaning I take from your words is that you think that Jews are somehow intrinsically more violent and aggressive than other people. Please support these assertions with some evidence or retract them.
I won’t retract the statements, and I don’t regard them as racist because they weren’t intended as such (though I certainly grant you the right to your own view). My statement you quoted about Israeli Jews is based on my understanding of the deep tensions that exist among disparate groups within Israeli society. It comes from a great deal of reading from Israeli and other Jewish sources, as well as conversations with ex-Israelis whom I know well. As for my statement about the Israel Lobby and its activities in America, I admit to having an exceedingly low opinion of these – but I don’t think my opinions are based on racism.
CMI is absolutely right that internal rifts between “too many (Israeli) Jews of various persuasions” are a disaster waiting to happen, held at bay only by the existence – real and imagined or exaggerated – of an external enemy. It is a truism that Jewish Israeli society is deeply fragmented, openly stated by Israelis of all political orientations. The reason they cannot live together is because they are at odds with one another, not because they are Jews. That is how I understood CMI’s message, and I am sure that is how he meant it.
I would add that I don’t “think that Jews are somehow intrinsically more violent … than other people.” Concerning aggressiveness, leaving out the “intrinsic” part, I do think that on the whole Jews do tend to be more aggressive than most other people. That seems to be a view shared by a great many Jews, and I wouldn’t consider the quality to be an “intrinsically” bad thing.
Aggressiveness is intrinsic to Israeli society. It is evident from the early school years, where rudeness and bullying are epidemic. This is one reason I say that “Israel is bad for the Jews” because of the corrupting effect it has had on the Jewish people who live there, but it permeates the entire culture.
Sayed Kashua had a piece this year about returning from a trip abroad, resolved to be more considerate to others, less belligerent and aggressive. He started out from the airport on his return practicing courtesy to other drivers, but by the time he got home, he was laying on the horn, yelling and cursing them, just like all the other Israelis.
The place is toxic.
Colin, I am still fretting over your reaction to my comments above and think I should say a bit more. Sometimes on this blog I choose to express certain widely-held views provocatively. There is a central purpose behind my deliberate provocativeness, but in all honesty the reasons for it do not include anti-Jewish feelings.
CMI: Concerning aggressiveness, leaving out the “intrinsic” part, I do think that on the whole Jews do tend to be more aggressive than most other people.
That actually strikes me as a stereotype (the “pushy” Jew) and, incidentally, is not my personal experience at all.
I would agree with Schmuel and add my own commentary that, generally speaking, staunchly Zionist Jews are aggressive but most Jews are not, in fact, staunchly Zionist. But then again, Zionist Christians are aggressive too, so I’d be more apt to say its a characteristic of Zionism — which makes sense, when you think about it, because at its core Zionism is the belief that Jews have a divine mandate to Palestine, and everyone else is supposed to stand aside and make way for that.
As with the feminist movement and civil rights movement (and for that matter, the current gay rights movement), I believe Jews on average, like any other group of human beings, yearn to be treated as equals, not as privileged. While there is a lot of tacit support for Zionism among American Jews, I sincerely believe (and yeah, it is a prognostication but still) that if they were confronted with the full truth about what Zionism is and what it does, support would drop. That’s why the media has to be almost completely snowed out in the US on Israel for Zionism to continue surviving.
Shmuel and Chaos, when I used the term “aggressiveness” I meant only the disposition to work intensely toward achievement of one’s goals, NOT physical aggression. This may be a stereotype, but I do believe that the empirical evidence would support the notion that Jews on the whole score greater than average in this trait. The term was introduced by Colin, and I was only replying to his use of it.
Well, I don’t think we read it as physical aggression either (I certainly didn’t) but rather social aggression. And to be fair, yeah, “aggressiveness” will have different meanings than aggression especially in the context you intended.
Yes it is that stereotype. Incidentally, my experience is contrary to yours, Shmuel.
Where I live, such behaviour is generally associated with Americans of all faiths – also a stereotype, but everyone I know has some personal experience to back it up.
Yep, I don’t doubt it.
Actually, I think Pfeffer (a former Mancunian) knows British politics and the Israel lobby in the UK quite well. His mistake is to judge everything in terms of the age-old question “Is it good for the Italians?” (thanks Don). He is a liberal Zionist who sees everything through liberal- Zionist-tinted glasses. He perceives only the damage the lobbies are doing to his vision of Israel, and cannot see the much much larger picture. The damage that the lobbies are doing to Pfeffer’s Israel may be ironic, but it is entirely beside the point.
It’s certainly not beside Pfeffer’s point, but it’s less relevant to those of us who live in the countries where the legislatures are corrupted by these lobbies. It’s like the truism that slavery morally corrupts both the slave-owner and the slave. While it is true, the slave doesn’t give a shit that the master’s morals are corrupted – the slave is rightly concerned about the fact that he is in chains.
Beside Ch.4′s point that is, which Pfeffer was commenting on.