I’ve often argued that our journalism has done our country a real injury by marginalizing Walt and Mearsheimer. I say this anew because of two pieces I just read in (as usual) Haaretz. 1, Haaretz essentially echoed much of what Walt and Mearsheimer wrote about the stranglehold on policy in this interview with Haim Saban, the Israeli-American financier of the Brookings Institution and of the Democratic Party.
You said once that you are a one-note person, and that note is Israel. Why?
"You can’t explain love."…
Do you still feel, as you once did, that America’s attitude toward Israel is liable to deteriorate?"At
the moment there is no sign of a crisis. But we must not be complacent.
The two pillars of the state are the Israel Defense Forces and the
U.S.; Dimona [the site of Israel’s nuclear reactor] and Washington. We
must do all we can to maintain the alliance with America. A major
crisis at the wrong time could be a disaster, a disaster." [emphasis mine]
Do you feel that as an Israeli-American of influence your mission is to prevent that crisis?
"You said it."
You
can’t be more explicit. Washington is a pillar of the Israeli state.
The only reason Walt and Mearsheimer were attacked as antisemites is
that they threatened the status-quo by saying, heaven forfend, that
this intimacy wasn’t in the American interest.
2. Now we have Gideon Levy in Haaretz,
enraged by the scandal involving P.M. Olmert and an American
businessman, savaging the intimacy between nations, and also the Israel Lobby, from the standpoint of Israel’s
national interest:
It is time to say to the American Jews directly, as
is customary among relatives: Leave us alone. Take your hands off
Israel. Stop using your money to buy influence in Israel. Stop
"contributing" to advance your interests and views, some of which are
at times delusionary and extremely dangerous to the future of the
country you’re supposedly trying to protect.
No thank you, we’re doing all right. No thank you, some of you are
causing us great damage. If you want to wield influence, do it in your
own country. You have a lot of power and influence there. Perhaps too
much; it’s none of our business. You are American, not Israeli
citizens, and no amount of money can or should change this fact. [Beautiful Gideon!] …Dozens of Jewish associations foster and finance the
most nefarious project we’ve ever had here, from the One Israel Fund to
the Hebron Fund, from American Friends of Ateret Cohanim to Shuvu
Banim. They are all fattening the settlements, some openly and others
under the table.
By so doing the Jews are helping to shape and mutilate another
state. It’s not only money: The loud, blatant Jewish right wing, which
crushes any display of a different opinion in America, is trying to do
the same in Israel. Camera, a McCarthyist group that persecutes
journalists in the United States, is directing its absurd persecution
and slander campaigns against the Israeli media as well. That is also
part of the distorted relationship.
Notice
Levy talking about "the Jews." Oh my. Imagine if for one second Walt and Mearsheimer had said, "The Jews." The ADL would have served their livers on crackers. Haaretz understands that these ideas are simply too important to continue to be bound by post-World-War 2 prohibitions. It’s time to get Walt and
Mearsheimer into the mainstream of American discourse, and try and move our society forward–and maybe Israel’s too…
(Thanks to Leila Abu-Saba, who is praying for Lebanon, for the tip.)
