Here's a piece called "The Dreamer goes down for the count," Walter Russell Mead writing about Obama and Israel in The American Interest.
You can safely ignore the first half of this. But starting at: "The President is now wandering across Europe..." Mead sketches a portrait of America's soul that shows how events are unfolding with the inevitability of a Greek tragedy. America has dithered for decades, and now events are moving and we're trying to play catch up with the cards stacked against us, boxed in by a Congress that is beholden to the Israel lobby to such an extent that every President has his hands tied by the blind fanaticism not only of the Lobby and the Christian Zionists but also by the stubborn ideological and spiritual bankruptcy of Protestant America.
I say "Protestant America" because America is still a Protestant country, as Huntington famously maintained shortly before his death. To save you time, I'll paste in the second half of the article. The harsh blame of Obama is, of course, largely undeserved--what president any longer has the ability to "control" the relationship with Israel?
The President is now wandering across Europe seeking to mend fences with allies (Britain, France, Poland) he had earlier neglected and/or offended; at home, his authority and credibility have been holed below the waterline. Everyone who followed the events of the last week knows that the President has lost control of the American-Israeli relationship and that he has no near-term prospects of rescuing the peace process. The Israelis, the Palestinians and the US Congress have all rejected his leadership. Peace processes are generally good things even if they seldom bring peace; one hopes the President can find a way to relaunch American diplomacy on this issue but for now he seems to have reached a dead end — and to have allowd himself to be fatally tagged as too pro-Israel to win the affection of the Europeans and Arabs, and too pro-Palestinian to be trusted either by Israel or by many of the Americans who support it.
Internationally, this matters a great deal; domestically it matters even more. The President has significantly less capacity to act than he did a week ago. The Bin Laden dividend, already cruelly diminished by what The Daily Caller said was the administration’s “victory lap in a clown car”, is now history. The GOP, in trouble recently as voters recoil from what many see as Republican extremism on issues like Medicare and public unions, will be able to use the national security card in new and potent ways.
As the stunning and overwhelming response to Prime Minister Netanyahu in Congress showed, Israel matters in American politics like almost no other country on earth. Well beyond the American Jewish and the Protestant fundamentalist communities, the people and the story of Israel stir some of the deepest and most mysterious reaches of the American soul. The idea of Jewish and Israeli exceptionalism is profoundly tied to the idea of American exceptionalism. The belief that God favors and protects Israel is connected to the idea that God favors and protects America.
It means more. The existence of Israel means that the God of the Bible is still watching out for the well-being of the human race. For many American Christians who are nothing like fundamentalists, the restoration of the Jews to the Holy Land and their creation of a successful, democratic state after two thousand years of oppression and exile is a clear sign that the religion of the Bible can be trusted.
Being pro-Israel matters in American mass politics because the public mind believes at a deep level that to be pro-Israel is to be pro-America and pro-faith. Substantial numbers of voters believe that politicians who don’t ‘get’ Israel also don’t ‘get’ America and don’t ‘get’ God. Obama’s political isolation on this issue, and the haste with which liberal Democrats like Nancy Pelosi left the embattled President to take the heat alone, testify to the pervasive sense in American politics that Israel is an American value. Said the Minority Leader to the Prime Minister: “I think it’s clear that both sides of the Capitol believe you advance the cause of peace.”
President Obama probably understands this intellectually; he understands many things intellectually. But what he can’t seem to do is to incorporate that knowledge into a politically sustainable line of policy. The deep American sense of connection to and, yes, love of Israel limits the flexibility of any administration. Again, the President seems to know that with his head. But he clearly had no idea what he was up against when Bibi Netanyahu came to town.
As a result, he’s taking another ride in the clown car, and this time it isn’t a victory lap. I hope I’m wrong, but I think the next intifada got a lot closer this week.
Mark Wauck blogs at meaninginhistory.
This is such a stupid reading of Christianity, both Protestant and Catholic, that once again, one sees how badly served we are by our public intellectuals. To be as brief as possible, one of the most important tenets of Christianity is that God does not treat any one people or any one land or place as more holy than any other. There are tons of verses in the NT about this issue. Just one here, the most famous one from Galatians 3:28: “There is no Jew or Greek, servant or free, male or female: all are equal before Christ.”
Now it is true that some Protestants, considering stories of the Old Testament, seem to find in some of those stories a notion that those stories are more important than the more philosophical, universalist, Greek notions of the NT. Moreover, that those stories are not located in a theological-historical past, but have a kind of present-day application. But any cursory understanding of Christianity, which is after all about Christ, would have to understand this understanding of OT stories as an error. For 1000 of years, the OT was simply used to confirm that Jesus was who he said he was– there was no other real investment in the OT, except as important stories proving God’s uniqueness and his power– the ten commandments, the creation story etc. The OT and the NT together were seen as a theological history of the relationship between God and man, in which man has a better and better understanding of hte nature of God as history unfolds.
For myself, I wonder why these televangelists are so popular– given that their readings of scripture are so patently literal and ignorant. Is it a sign of how stupid and ignorant Americans are and how bad American religious education is, or are these the kinds of ministers the networks are willing to put on TV?
‘For 1000 of years, the OT was simply used to confirm that Jesus was who he said he was– there was no other real investment in the OT, except as important stories … the ten commandments, the creation story etc.’
Descriptively, this is quite correct. But keeping the OT as canonized holy writ rather than downgrading it to an appendix comes with a terrible price.
Most Christians and Jews would agree that the ten commandments are still the law. But mighty few would go to bat for the levirate marriage mandated in Deuteronomy, which explains that if a man refuses to carry out this sexual ‘duty’ with his brother’s widow, she must spit in his face, take one of his shoes, and the others in the town must always call him ‘the one without a shoe.’ [Howdy, I'm 'Barefoot' -- pleased to meetcha!]
So you end up with textual quicksand, in which any passage can be characterized as either ‘historical’ or ‘mandatory,’ according to one’s fancy. It should be no surprise that this ancient obscurantist tract leads to calamities such as the biblically-induced ‘love for Israel’ which roils our politics, as Mead points out.
In Christian churches, hymns and scripture readings invoke the biblical ‘Israel,’ which is not synonymous with the modern state of Israel, since it didn’t exist until 1948. Yet the vague impression sinks in that the modern state is being lauded; the chants and the songs and the incense bypass the reasoning faculties. Many Christians could no more make the distinction than they could explain the difference between ‘affect’ and ‘effect.’
Fourth-century canonization councils could have performed the wholesale editing needed, after the OT’s supposed role of presenting prophecies that were fulfilled in the NT has become less significant. But they wimped out; we’re stuck with the unedifying dog’s breakfast they left behind; and Israel (the state) collects a fabulous but undeserved goodwill bounty from the historical confusion.
“But keeping the OT as canonized holy writ rather than downgrading it to an appendix comes with a terrible price.”
Agreed. Too bad the whole stinking lot, old testiment and new, isn’t just tossed in the trash and people learned to use reason and humanity.
For harmful influences on most low-church “Zionists” (i.e., millennialists) in the American Southern Bible Belt – predominantly Southern Baptist (Evangelical) and Assembly of God (Pentecostal) denominations – I think all the stories and prophesies of the Old Testament are outweighed by weird modern interpretations of a single book, the Book of Revelations, a late addition to the New Testament canon. At least, that is how I have observed it in rural Texas.
For non-millennialist low-churchers (including many Southern Baptists who have a less-scripted idea of a “second coming” someday), I certainly agree that undue emphasis given to the Old Testament in Sunday-school lessons and sermons leads to mystic concepts of “Israel” and the “Chosen People” that help create all kinds of social and political mischief.
tying the idea of a nation to the idea of god is a long standing trick… america and god…right… if israel ties itself to this combo, all the better for israel according to the same silly thinking… american and israel and god…. the emptiness of this idea on a spiritual level is in direction proportion to its value on a material level… suckers are born every minute.. whether it takes some meaningless reading of the bible to keep them in ignorance matters very little… israel is capitalizing on the ignorance (plenty to profit off of) by perpetuating an extended myth that includes them.. so much of what they do is pure propaganda…i am sure israel will realign with another country when necessary( that is if they haven’t destroyed the planet in a 3rd world war), but for now the usa congress, religious idiots and more generally the usa is happy the protectorate of israel… it is really a screwed up situation! the public isn’t benefiting from this…
madrid – yes (it is a sign of how stupid and ignorant Americans are and how bad American religious education is) to your question in the last paragraph.. funny how the politicians like to be seen going to and from church… a friend of mine used to say, people go to church on sundays to wash their hands for all the other days of the week… the usa is the religion of money… god is hard to find in all of it… politicians are all about the religion of money and don’t give a rats ass about god……
Netanyahu’s speech was a final testament to who is the slave and who is the master in the middle east when it comes to America and Israel.
In one sense, it’s a great testament to the success of Jews, who largely control organisations like AIPAC and stand for about 50 % of all donations to the DNC.
I’m reminded of a heated phone conversation between Sharon and Peres:
“Peres warned Sharon that refusing to heed incessant American requests for a cease-fire with the Palestinians would endanger Israeli interests and “turn the US against us. “Sharon reportedly yelled at Peres, saying “don’t worry about American pressure, we the Jewish people control America.”
This was reported by Israeli radio, but, of course, never made it to America.
How much this is boasting and how much there is truth to this is another matter, but there’s no doubt that as long as the Jewish community in America is blindsided on this issue, there can never be peace.
In the end, neither Obama nor Netanyahu(or Abbas or Hamas) holds the key. It’s the U.S. Jews. And judging by the recent AIPAC conference, it’s probably finished by now.
The next intifada is a question of when, not if, and there might be war too. The Lobby and the staunch support of establishment U.S. Jews have made it certain that they are going to the very, very end with this blind, largely uncritical support, no matter what the cost.
That’s perhaps the greatest tragedy with all of this, those who care so much about Israel will assure it’s destruction(or at the very least a bloodbath).
I say “Protestant America” because America is still a Protestant country
I cannot recommend “exporting the American gospel” highly enough. In the 60s at the height of the Vietnam war a number of mainstream Protestant churches expressed reservations about the role of the US in the war. This was unacceptable to many of the less sophisticated adherents. How could the US do anything wrong ? Wasn’t the US chosen by God ? cue the breakaway movement to a new landscape of make up your own Protestant church. Prosperity protestants – Jesus wants you to be rich , Zionist Protestants -Jesus loves the settlers – and many more.
Walter Russell Mead says in reply to comment 3 on his article page:
“Myself, I think it is better to reflect that God must also have a special place in his heart for all.”
Something members of Congress might also wish to reflect on.
Here’s a direct and urgent appeal from Cecilie Surasky, Deputy Director of Jewish Voice for Peace to get on the phone, fax, email, and snail mail and lay into these disgusting Congress people.
link to jewishvoiceforpeace.org
I’ll do that but gotta tell you I’ve been doing it for years and it has had no effect.
I even wrote Reid and Peliso and asked them to give me quote on how much it would take to buy the US back from the Israeli Jews….they must not have thought I was serious because I never did get a suggested price from them.
i recommend noura erakat’s excellent article Constructing the Prototypical Terrorist in America: Arab, Muslim, and Palestinian .
It is interesting to note that post 1922 Northern Ireland and pre Mandela south Africa were both run by communities of Protestants who believed they had been chosen by God. The Afrikaners and Unionists were also settler colonialists who developed a story built around the divinity of the race that paid no attention to the civil rights of the ruled, the factor that ultimately brought both houses down. Israel is headed for the same failure.
“Being pro-Israel matters in American mass politics because the public mind believes at a deep level that to be pro-Israel is to be pro-America and pro-faith”
If this is so —why have the Presbyterian, the Episcopalians, the Methodist leaders urged for BDS and many divested themselves of any thing to do with Israel?
Mead and others make these statements all the time but never offer any proof that the majority and the majority religions believe this stuff.
Any simple search on the internet will show you thousands of christian religious groups and churches and even evangelical sects and churches that condemn Israel and I/P occupation.
This is just propaganda repeated over and over again in an effort to make anyone who doesn ‘t agree think they are somehow missing the boat and to promote the idea that Israel and the US are some kind of ‘family”.
Same old –’US and Israel are one and the same’ meme connnected by religion and values.
Has anyone noticed btw that this sort of “US and Israel are a family” , “we are just alike” propaganda has multiplied a thousand fold over the past few years?
Is this their final push in US mindwarping or is it a sign of desperation?
All objective sources and obsrvations show Americans have become more and more anti Israel and anti the US Israel relationship–is this their way of trying to counter that?
If so, it isn’t working very well.
American writes,
“Has anyone noticed btw that this sort of “US and Israel are a family” , “we are just alike” propaganda has multiplied ….?
Yes, I have noticed the trend. It’s all part of the multi-pronged Apologia for Israel effort. Walter Russell Mead, a curiosity if there ever was one, owes his media eminence to his faithful service in behalf of that cause. He’s a Lobby groupie.
Mead’s Wikipedia entry claims he is “recognized as one of the country’s leading students of American foreign policy.” (Wonder who wrote that?) As an actual student, he apparently ended his formal education with a B.A. in English. Well, whatever. He often serves as the token goy in televised panel discussions of U.S. foreign policy in the Mideast. He’s a useful goy-guy.
You know I often wonder about the Mead types…are they actually delusional religous types or are they paid by Israeli interest?
Probably some of both.
Thanks for the thought provoking comments.
I think we all recognize that the sentiments and ideas that Mead is attributing to “Americans” may not represent a majority view, but that they are the views (held with varying degrees of fervor) by some significant portion of Americans. The political importance of that segment of Americans is pointed out by Mead when he notes Pelosi’s willingness to throw Obama under the bus rather than cross them. That was, of course, an utterly cynical move on her part, as also on the part of the vast majority of Senators and Representatives, both Democrat as well as Republican. It’s not as if many of them (perhaps not even Netanyahu himself) actually believe the Biblical Fundamentalism that Netanyahu was offering up.
Jim Haygood touches on an important issue. Speaking as a Catholic, I see the problem–that of the misuse of “scripture”–as one that is caused by the absence of what I would call a coherent theory of revelation. A coherent theory of revelation would need to address such issues as, just what is being revealed, how is it being revealed, and what is the relation between the Israelite scriptures and the early Christian writings that Christians regard as authoritative. A good starting point for such considerations (for Christians) would be an examination of what use Jesus makes of the Israelite scriptures in his own words–as opposed to the theological use of those scriptures by the authors of the various gospels. My view is that such an examination would undercut Biblical Fundamentalism generally and Christian support for Zionism as a particular example.
It is a fact that Christian theologians are attempting to come to grips with these issues. At its recent Synod on Scripture, a prominent cardinal of the Catholic Church explicitly stated that Catholics are not “people of the book” in the sense that Jews, Muslims or many Protestants are. The well known CofE theologian N. T. Wright (who was a guest speaker at the Synod) has written on both the issue of the authority of Scripture generally as well as on the issue of Zionism, so the political ramifications of these theological issues is not lost on serious people. However, politicians will inevitably be behind that curve.
One last thought. I suspect that these issues are coming more to the fore as a result of the higher level of education among modern believers. Reflective believers are being forced to consider what their beliefs mean with regard to concrete issues of justice, such as we see in Palestine.
Mark, thanks for your reflections on the state of Catholic thinking wrt Christian “Zionism.”
But I think you are inaccurate in referring to “Pelosi’s willingness to throw Obama under the bus rather than cross” that “significant portion of Americans” that Mead was evoking. Pelosi cannot retain her position as House Minority Leader without the support of the Israel Lobby spearheaded by AIPAC, whose very impressive annual convention we recently beheld – representing, in numerical terms, not a significant portion of the American population. Pelosi knows she must dance to the tune of that well-organized Lobby, and she does.
Mead is dead wrong and more importantly irrelevant.
seafoid, with regard to your observations, it may interest you that the well known Neocon “Spengler” (David Goldman) has consistently maintained that Protestantism is “a Judaizing heresy” of Christianity. Obviously there is more that could be said, but that characterization does fit in with your comments.
Also, Eric Voegelin, in his The New Science of Politics (written c. 1950), uses what he calls the “symbol” Koran to describe the use made of the Bible by what could be termed right wing Protestants of the 17th century. IOW, Voegelin is saying that their use of or approach to the Bible is, in principle, essentially no different than that of Muslims to the Koran/Quran–a more controversial view, perhaps, in 1950 than now. The same could be said with regard to fundamentalist Jewish interpretations of the Israelite scriptures as well as those of modern Christian fundamentalists.
Mark:
Really interesting contribution. The same observation is made by both Catholics and moderate Protestants during the 16th century in England, namely that certain forms of Puritanism seemed closer to Islam than they did to Christianity. They did not make this charge on the basis of personal morality or fervor, since Islam was not known at that time as being particularly puritanical in terms of personal morality. Rather Puritanism was said to be like Islam with respect to its views on high church iconography, worship of the saints, and its relationship to the Book, for Puritanism, like Islam, was said to be a religion solely of the book.
I would have thought that mainstream Protestant churches have been more critical of Israeli behaviour than most people in their societies have been. The American Presbyterian Church has made some relevant statements and my own religious gang, the Church of England, has done some disinvestment – rather timidly, I admit. There has also been a Zionist streak within Protestantism, but then Protestantism is very diverse. Protestantism, surely no less than Catholicism, has promoted critical study of the Bible – on which people like Shlomo Sand draw – just as much as it has cherished fundamentalism.
Madrid, yes, Voegelin quotes Richard Hooker’s critique of the Puritans extensively–Hooker, of course, being a famous Anglican divine back then.
MHughes976, I agree re the diversity of Protestantism and I agree that Protestantism has promoted critical study of the Bible–as you can probably tell from my citing Wright (to whom I could add others). Catholics have been somewhat slow in recognizing the benefits of those critical studies, which is part of what the Synod was about. As a result of the Catholic Church’s backwardness in that regard, “traditional” minded Catholics these days are often uncritically accepting of fundamentalist tinged interpretations of the Bible, along with the Zionism that often goes with it.
You’re wrong about Catholics accepting Zionism. Not sure where that comes from– Catholics are the least Zionist of all Christian adherents, all the way from still having an investment in traditional replacement theology, which is essentially Catholicism, to the fact that Israeli officials have targeted old Jerusalem monasteries like the Sisters of Charity hospice for eviction to the fact that most Palestinian Christians are Catholics. The Vatican has been among the most vocal about the Holy Land and especially Jerusalem needing to be shared by all faiths, and wanting to make Jerusalem an international city. The high church protestants have been more activist towards Palestinians, but that is because they have a history of political activism, which the Catholic church has been less enthusiastic about.
Zionism is just plain antithetical to Catholic universalism as well. It is also antithetical to C of E theology, but in the early years there is a flirtation with seeing England as the new Israel.
“You’re wrong about Catholics accepting Zionism.”
Madrid, can you supply any references for this statement? Are there papal bulls for instance, or other materials of that sort?
I don’t mean to suggest that I doubt your word.
The question deserves both a non-theological answer and a theological answer.
Here is an article where the Pope is criticizing the security barrier:
link to washingtonpost.com
There are plenty of other articles like this– just look them up– where the Pope and various Bishops are trying to administer to Palestinian Catholics.
As for the theological answer, look up replacement theology, which is the traditional Christian belief that God’s new covenant through Christ supercedes any prior covenants that were based on nation or land ownership. The current pope has said repeated that Christians owe an enormous debt to Judaism, and should keep Judaism dear to their hearts, but he seems to mean the Jews of the Bible. Some non-Catholic critics of the Church have taken him to be rejecting replacement theology, which some consider anti-semetic, but that is a misreading of his comments on this point. To reject replacement theology completely would be to reject Christianity itself.
Traditional Christian thought, ofwhich Catholicism is the best representative, teaches that Christ is the only way, which would abrogate prior convenants with the nation of the Israelites.
Im not now speaking by the way of my own beliefs– just summarizing the basic tenets of Catholicism.
Yes, Wright is an interesting (though for my money very reactionary) theologian. I was once in his spiritual care when he was Bishop of Durham. Durham became, thanks to Wright and Jimmy Dunn, the New Testament Professor, a bit of a centre for the ‘New Perspective on Paul’, which rejects Luther’s anti-Jewish intepretation of Paul and sees, convincingly or not, significant continuity between the Jewish idea of covenant and the Christian idea of election.
Neocon James Taranto at Best of the Web (WSJ) has an amusing take on Mead’s article (which he likes very much from a Neocon perspective). He’s got us Americans neatly sorted out into three categories:
“To be sure, not all Americans feel this kindredness with Israel. 1) Some see it as just another country, the way Obama seems to; 2) others, like Helen Thomas, seethe with a hatred for the Jewish state that boils over into outright anti-Semitism. 3) In between are people who, while not anti-Semitic and perhaps not quite antipathetic to Israel per se, are jealous of it for its claim on American affection. That is the emotion behind the oft-heard claim of “dual loyalty”–a charge that is absurd in light of Mead’s insight “that Israel is an American value.”" [my numbering]
Imagine the un-Americanness of seeing Israel as “just another country!” And the pathetic jealousy of others, based on the “absurd” inability to see “that Israel is an American value!” And then there’s the middle group, of course–blinded by Jew hatred. Taranto is unable to concede even the possibility that Palestinians could even have the shadow of a grievance or a claim on anyone’s sense of justice.
Taranto sees nothing to discuss here. It’s just a question of American values–and some Americans who don’t have any. Easy.
Madrid, I agree with you entirely regarding official Catholic theology. In addition, I believe that that theology has influenced the formulation of Vatican foreign policy in its concern for the rights of Palestinians. What I’m saying is that, in my experience, a fair number of individual “traditionally” oriented Catholics–often influenced by participation in Evangelical run or Evangelical influenced Bible Study groups–end up being receptive to Zionist ideas. I can tell you from my own experience that I’ve met with that attitude repeatedly. If you haven’t encountered that, that’s all to the good.
MHughes976, my understanding is that Wright’s position is actually rather close to the Catholic position, as it has been enunciated several times by Benedict XVI. That position is simply that the Church is the continuation of Israel–children of Abraham are those, whether Jew or Greek, who put their faith in Jesus. Benedict has been very careful to avoid invidious anti-Semitic interpretations of Paul (as has Wright), but each has refused to buy into political interpretations that link Israel to specific Middle Eastern real estate.
That, by the way, was Spengler/Goldman’s personal crusade for quite a while–to try to convince Catholics that Zionism is somehow hardwired into Catholic theology.
“The existence of Israel means that the God of the Bible is still watching out for the well-being of the human race.”
He hasn’t done much for me lately.
Congress is hopeless. It seems, however, that awareness is growing among Americans with a more critical understanding of the real dynamics of I/P and the U.S.-Israel relationship. BDS, protests, flash mobs – these are the best methods we have right now to let others know that Israel and America are dead wrong. Justice will prevail – we have to believe that. Zionist dreamers can’t hide forever.
W. R. Mead is not merely an accomplished Apologist for the Israel Lobby, he is a professional Lobby-denier. That explains his strange, otherwise inexplicable prominence.
He had an earlier lengthy piece this week in his organ, The American Interest. The bulk of it was devoted to the theme that America loves Israel, there’s no daylight between Americans and Israelis, etc. Below, I have excerpted the concluding portion of his tome. You can judge for yourself whether the man makes much sense. Note that he erects a convenient straw man by saying that people who think that there is a powerful Jewish lobby for Israel believe that ALL Jews are part of that lobby. Also, American Jews could not support a Likud-type government in Israel because, mostly, they are liberals. I give you Walter Russell Mead himself:
“Given that Obama is making a strategic shift away from his old Middle East policy (get tough on Israel and sweet-talk the Iranians, Syrians and Palestinians to get them on side), I suspect that the White House welcomes Netanyahu’s attacks. They help rather than hurts — especially among American Jews.
“Virtually all Arabs, most Europeans and a surprising number of Americans who ought to know better carry a delusional and ultimately anti-Semitic stereotype around in their heads: that American Jews as a bloc are hard line pro-Likud Zionists; that those Jews ruthlessly and relentlessly use their vast and hidden media power to shape US opinion on the Middle East; and that the irresistible financial might of the united Jewish Israel lobby buys Congressional acceptance of their evil designs.
“I suppose there is a way that someone could believe all these things and not be a card carrying anti-Semite, but I am not ingenious enough to find it. This is a racist and evil set of beliefs; those who hold them should be ashamed of themselves, and these deserve to be mocked and scorned at every possible opportunity.
“These beliefs are also delusional and soft-headed. If American Jews were as powerful as the anti-Semites think, US policy toward Israel would look much more, well, European. The overwhelming majority of American Jews of all income groups are more liberal about US-Israel relations than much of the gentile population. This is true of the almost 80 percent of American Jews who voted for the President, most of whom continue to support him today; it is even more true among the wealthy liberal Jews who have been among President Obama’s strongest backers. Think of Jewish donors in Hollywood, liberal Jewish writers for the mainstream media, and socially liberal Jews working on Wall Street: what do most of these people think of Netanyahu?
“Most of the people who object to any talk of the 1967 borders are closer to Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity than to Rahm Emanuel, Barbra Streisand, Hendrick Herzberg and George Soros. The majority of American Jews dislike Netanyahu and disapprove of continuing Israeli settlements on the West Bank. The driving force pushing a super-hawkish, pro-Likud American foreign policy in the Middle East comes from gentile conservatives rather than from the predominantly liberal and instinctively dovish American Jewish community. The O’Reilly hawks never were and never will be Obama supporters; let them rage, the President presumably reasons as he jets to more high profile fundraisers where liberal Jewish backers, energized by his ‘courage’ on the Middle East, will help him reach the $1 billion mark for the re-election campaign.
“From President Obama’s point of view, criticism over the boundary issue is the gift that keeps on giving. If George W. Bush had given this speech, European political leaders would be up in arms about America’s outrageous and one-sided support for Israel. But when Obama gave it, Europeans swooned for joy. At last, an American President with the guts to stand up to those all-controlling, all-manipulating Jews!
“This would be funny if it weren’t so ugly and sad, but from the White House point of view it is useful. Whether by luck or design, the often fumble-fingered White House has found a way to force its enemies and opponents into doing its job. Much as the ‘birther’ controversy discredited some Obama critics and turned them into self-parodying loons (yes, Donald Trump, I mean you), so the bitterest critics of Obama’s Middle East speech are advancing his agenda. By reacting to a pro-Israel speech seasoned with platitudinous and meaningless sweeteners tossed to the Palestinians as if it were a major pro-Arab shift in American foreign policy, Obama’s critics in Israel and the US are helping him relaunch his peace efforts.
“The volcanic response to the speech helps the White House in other ways. The attention to Obama’s alleged pro-Palestinian shift has taken attention away from the truly controversial elements of the President’s speech: the harsh rhetoric towards Syria and Iran, and the open breach with Saudi Arabia over the crackdown in Bahrain and indeed over the future political direction of the Middle East. The relative absence of attention on these points is helping the Saudis swallow their anger over the rhetoric about Bahrain and democracy as they focus more constructively on the signs that the president at long last is coming around to their point of view on Iran. The commentariat’s obsession over the not-news border declaration also reduced what might well have been a major domestic and international brouhaha over the President’s references to Iraq as a model of democratic development that the rest of the region should emulate. For a President facing an increasingly tough re-election fight, a speech about how the war in Iraq might have important and positive results that could affect the whole region is probably not the best message to send to the base.
“But if the White House has rather neatly finessed the politics of the moment, it is still a long way from managing the turbulence in the Middle East. Peace between Israelis and Palestinians will almost certainly not come on Obama’s watch; he can forget about peace — he will be lucky if he can get a peace process of some kind back on track. The economic meltdown in Egypt darkens prospects for the Arab spring. President Obama’s endorsement of the democratic revolutions could come back to haunt him if the ultimate beneficiaries of the revolution are the radicals. The death spiral of America’s Pakistan policy continues to accelerate. The American response to the Syrian turmoil still looks weak and unconvincing given the stakes. The engagement in Libya (‘days not weeks’ said our Prognosticator-in-chief) has stretched out into months with no end, and no democratic alternative in view. It is still true that American interests are served by a peace process, almost any peace process, while Israel would prefer to put the whole thing off for a while.
“The criticism and the doubts coming from the hawkish pro-Israel camp at the moment have much more to do with doubts about Obama himself than with anything he said this week. He is like a man who left his wife at home for a night on the town with another woman. The woman spent all his money, mocked him in front of her friends, and turned him down flat when e asked her to share a hotel room. Now he’s come home, sincerely sorry he ever tried to stray. The man is ready to make up and move on; not so the wife. She is angry and embarrassed; she doesn’t trust him and she is not about to let him have a quiet night’s rest. He’s going to have a hard time for a while as he tries to make it up to her without letting all the neighbors think he’s a hen-pecked wuss. I see a lot of ‘honey-do’ in his future, a lot of concessions in ours.
“Having the world think Obama is a brave Jew-defying President wrestling the almighty lobby even as he shifts policy back toward the approaches taken by his immediate Republican and Democratic predecessors is a best-case outcome for President Obama at this point. Luckily for him, that looks like the way things are going — and the more heat he gets from the right the more likely it is that the world will keep its eyes fixed on his non-existent contest with the awesome but illusory Elders of Zion.”
That’s the conclusion of Mead’s article. For the whole thing, here’s the link:
link to blogs.the-american-interest.com
Thomson Rutherford, yes, more amusement from Mead, but with a cynical, nasty edge this time. Consider his claim:
OK, tell me the number or provide me some approximate percentage and I’ll tell you how surprised I am. But then again, maybe there are other Americans who have a rather more nuanced understanding of The Israel Lobby. How about something along these lines:
Which sounds more like the America you’re familiar with?
Yeah, I like your version better, Mark.