It’s been clear to me for about ten years that the primary problem the United States faces in crafting Middle East policy is not so much the Arabs or the Israelis. It is the Israel lobby (led by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee or AIPAC but consisting also of all the major Jewish organizations that include Israel in their portfolio.
Writing about the lobby’s influence (from the perspective of someone who had spent 20 years dealing with AIPAC as an aide to a senator and several House members), I initially felt like a voice in the wilderness. Yes, there were always people pointing to the power of the lobby but many of those had no use for Israel to start out with. For them, attacking the lobby is a subset of attacking Israel in general.
Don’t get me wrong. Although I support a secure Jewish State of Israel, I despise the policies of the Netanyahu government and any and all Israeli policies that are designed to either preserve the occupation or (and this is most relevant now) prevent a diplomatic resolution of the stalemate over Iranian nuclear development. Even if the lobby didn’t exist, I’d be vehemently condemning those policies.
Of course, if the lobby didn’t exist, the United States government would not have to spend much effort getting a country that is the largest recipient of U.S. aid in line, just as the bank who holds the mortgage has considerably more say than a property’s nominal owner. Not only do all other foreign recipients of U.S. aid have to comply with conditions set by Washington, so do all states and municipalities here in the United States. Only Israel gets what it wants, no strings attached.
All this is obvious. The problem is that virtually no media figures or politicians have the nerve to say it. Politicians depend on the lobby for campaign cash while media figures are rightly afraid that talking about the lobby will lead to advertiser and front office complaints and ultimately to the loss of their jobs. Even the usually outspoken Chris Matthews and Chris Hayes on MSNBC only hint at the lobby’s power while Rachel Maddow, on the same network, has never acknowledged its existence. To put it simply, they like their jobs and want to keep them.
That is why, this week, the one media figure to speak out against the lobby’s efforts to sink a negotiated agreement with Iran is Thomas Friedman of the New York Times. Not coincidentally he is, by far, the most influential journalist on matters relating to the Middle East. Also, not coincidentally, he is Jewish, pro-Israel, has a raft of Pulitzer Prizes and makes a lot of money for the New York Times. He is, as the phrase goes, “too big to fail” or to be fired because he offends the powers that be.
And offend them he does, regularly, and most recently this week.
Here is what he wrote the other day about the effort of Democrats and Republicans in both houses of Congress to “stymie” President Barack Obama’s Iran initiative. “Never have I seen more lawmakers – Democrats and Republicans – more willing to take Israel’s side against their own president’s. I’m certain this comes less from any careful consideration of the facts and more from a growing tendency by many American lawmakers to do whatever the Israel lobby asks them to do in order to garner Jewish votes and campaign donations.”
There it is. Friedman is saying what everyone knows but no one (of any stature) but Friedman has the nerve to say. The opposition to an Iran deal in Congress represents “tak[ing] Israel’s side against” the American president’s but also that it’s about campaign contributions.
He uses the phrase “never have I seen” twice in his column to stress that the lobby’s campaign to defeat an American president on an American security issue is unprecedented. These negotiations are not about the West Bank or Gaza, they are about the U.S. effort to prevent development of Iranian nuclear weapons without resorting to a war that would jeopardize American lives.
And yet the lobby believes, perhaps correctly, that legal bribes will cause both Democrats and Republicans to put the lobby’s interests above this country’s. Knowing this Congress and our major politicians, they may prevail, if not now than later in the process.
The only thing that can stop them is to have more Tom Friedmans step forward. If a significant number of figures in Congress or the media came forward and said that the lobby is using the influence of its cash to prevent a U.S.-Iranian deal, the lobby would back down.
And it’s not like there would be anyone to take their place on this issue. The only interest opposing an Iran deal it is the lobby and its euphemistic cutout, the neocons. The Christian right opposes it too but, unlike Team AIPAC, it does not give campaign contributions based on this issue and it has zero influence among Democrats. On matters related to Israel, only the lobby matters.
This is not a case of being pro-Israel or anti-Israel. A nuclear agreement with Iran, one backed by safeguards and intrusive inspections, will protect Israel even more than it does the United States. (Nuclear armed Israel’s concern with Iran is almost purely about its potential economic and geopolitical clout, not about its theoretical nuclear bombs).
The bottom line then is whether the American government can pursue a strategic goal in the Middle East that is clearly in the interests of the American people. Or can it be thwarted by a lobby that is using its almost unlimited funds to advance other interests. Like the NRA, AIPAC pursues it agenda at the expense of the American people. How long can this go on?
We’ll have at least a partial answer before this week ends.
Postscript:In Salon today,Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) reveals himself as a wholly owned subsidiary of AIPAC. Bought and paid for.
1. It seems like the Arab gulf States are opposed to a real with Iran, enen more do than Israel. 2. France is taking a harder line against Iran and it has nothing to do with AIPAC. Too bad you just want to make American Jews targets of society’s wrath
How blinded one can be and how far does one need to go to support Israel and the meddling of other countries and people’s affaires? Isn’t there any decency left ? Is it to the point were you totally disregard all of the evidence that are presented here and many more else where ,just for the sake of defaming a man who chose to tell the truth and be honest about the facts as he sees them,just to falsely clear Israel and its American IPAC lobby from any wrong unethical doing, even by the very familiar methods of corruption by intimidation and bribing Americans against their country’s interest? And you are talking about Rosenberg stirring the wrath against Jews? Look in the mirror, and you will see who is doing that.
Just because we oppose this lobby and Israeli government policies does not mean we have wrath against American Jews. Do you have wrath against anyone?
Tim it starts with accusations that a Jewish organization has control of foreign policy. You think the Jewish influence card has not been plsyed before?
Honestly Tikkkun, you can eat a fat dick. Every time I post a reasonable critical comment here it gets censored.
Haha, hilarious! My reasonable critical comment got censored but this one made it through.
What an amateurish operation!
See Mark Baverman’s books for the challenge facing Christians trying to overcome actual, historical guilt for two millennia of wrath against Jews and the need to also care for Palestinians today. There is a double bind faced by Christians. When folks accuse us of “wrath,” this has certainly been the case. And, in the meantime, there is real injustice against Palestinians.
Baverman is Jewish. Lerner is Jewish. Freidman is Jewish. Rosenberg is Jewish.
They all see a problem the lobby. We need to find a way for different peoples to exist without wiping out others. In other words, the Hebrew scriptures had it right. Abraham had a new way to hold a tribal identity as a being for and blessing others. I wish that all human tribal groups would learn this great Jewish insight. May we recovery this gift given to all humanity.
Him Israel has every right in the world to worry about the nuclear weapons development of a country thstvhsd threatened yo incinerate it. Iran is being tested with the knowledge that that have failed to live up to commitments of the past. As for Rosenberg. he has aired tonyje public his dispute with AIPAC, his former employer. Friedman has been known to have been wrong. He supported the invasion of Iraq. Lerner wants the US and Israel to go to its knees and apologize to Iran.
Let’s see…Israel has about 80 atomic bombs, refuses to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), refuses to allow IAEA inspectors in to inspect israel’s nuclear facilities and occupies her neighbor’s homeland. Iran has no nukes, has signed the NPT, is making progress with IAEA inspections and does not occupy her neighbors’ homelands. And people complain about Iran? What hypocrisy!
Gene, you could not possibly be more wrong. Reasonable people can disagree as to whether the Iran deal is in fact an effective first step toward ensuring that Iran does not posses nuclear weapons, but you seem to suggest that everyone should look the other way at — and ignore — Iran’s attempts to create nuclear weapons, simply because Israel has purportedly had them for decades. Your comments suggest a total ignorance about even the most basic concepts of nuclear proliferation. It is also a knee-jerk anti-Israel reaction, and as such adds nothing to the serious debate over this issue.
As far as know, Israel has never threatened to incinerate another country.