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Exposure of ‘Israeli lobby’ triggers controversy

* United States giving Israel $3 billion every year

By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: The United States has poured $140 billion into Israel since its formation, and continues to spend one-fifth of its total foreign assistance budget – or $3 billion – annually on its closest ally in the Middle East, which translates into $500 for every Israeli.

According to an essay ‘The Israeli Lobby’ published in a London journal by two American academics, the US has provided Israel with a level of support since October 1973 that outstrips what it has given to any other country. Israel has been the largest recipient of direct economic and military assistance since 1976, and the largest in terms of total aid, since World War II.

The essay in the London Review of Books by John J Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen M. Walt of the Harvard University has set off a storm of protest in the United States among the supporters of Israel and the Israeli cause. Accusations of anti-Semitism have been hurled at the two academics and if past record is any guide, the heat on them is going to get even more intense. One Harvard law professor has called their research “ignorant propaganda”, while Dennis Ross, Clinton’s envoy to the Middle, has dismissed it as work “masquerading as scholarship”. Another writer has called the research done by the two academics as an attack on the American public itself which “now supports Israel with higher levels of confidence than ever before.” The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in the Media finds the research “riddled with errors of fact, logic and omission” besides “inaccurate citations”, and “poor judgments regarding sources and contrary to basic scholarly standards.”

The 83-page, 35,000-word paper in the London publication was available on the website of Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, but since the uproar, the School has had its logo removed from the article and dissociated itself from the positions the two authors have taken on Israel.

The facts are that Israel is the only country that receives the entire money in one single package, while others only receive it in quarterly instalments. Most recipients of military aid are obliged to spend it in the US but Israel is permitted to spend 25 percent of what it receives to subsidise its own defence industry. Unlike other recipients, Israel is not obliged to account for the money and how and where it was spent. Washington has also given Tel Aviv $3 billion to develop weapon systems and also provided it with access to advances systems. Israel is also given intelligence that America denies to its NATO partners. Last but not least, the US has never said a word about Israel’s acquisition of nuclear weapons, an acquisition that would not have been possible without American acquiescence, involvement or technical assistance. Since 1982, the US has vetoed 32 Security Council resolutions which were critical of Tel Aviv, a number that exceeds the total number of vetoes exercised by all other permanent member states put together.

Mearsheimer and Walt write, “Instead, the overall thrust of US policy in the region is due almost entirely to US domestic politics, and especially to the activities of the ‘Israel Lobby.’ Other special interest groups have managed to skew US foreign policy in directions they favoured, but no lobby has managed to divert US foreign policy as far from what the American national interest would otherwise suggest, while simultaneously convincing Americans that US and Israeli interests are essentially identical.” Israelis, they argue, tend to describe every threat in the starkest terms, but Iran is widely seen as their most dangerous enemy because it is the most likely adversary to acquire nuclear weapons. Virtually all Israelis regard an Islamic country in the Middle East with nuclear weapons as an existential threat. The Bush administration has responded to the Lobby’s pressure by “working overtime” to shut down Iran’s nuclear programme. “It is not surprising that Israel and its American supporters want the United States

to deal with any and all threats to Israel’s security. If their efforts to shape US policy succeed, then Israel’s enemies get weakened or overthrown, Israel gets a free hand with the Palestinians, and the United States does most of the fighting, dying, rebuilding, and paying. But even if the United States fails to transform the Middle East and finds itself in conflict with an increasingly radicalised Arab and Islamic world, Israel still ends up protected by the world’s only superpower,” they write.

The two academics are of the view that the Lobby’s influence causes trouble on several fronts. It increases the terrorist danger that all states face – including America’s European allies. By preventing US leaders from pressuring Israel to make peace, the Lobby has also made it impossible to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This situation gives extremists a powerful recruiting tool, increases the pool of potential terrorists and sympathisers, and contributes to Islamic radicalism around the world. The Lobby’s campaign for regime change in Iran and Syria could lead the United States to attack those countries, with potentially disastrous effects. “Thanks to the Lobby, the United States has become the de facto enabler of Israeli expansion in the occupied territories, making it complicit in the crimes perpetrated against the Palestinians. This situation undercuts Washington’s efforts to promote democracy abroad and it look hypocritical when it presses other states to respect human rights. US efforts to limit nuclear proliferation appear equally hypocritical given its willingness to accept Israel’s nuclear arsenal, which encourages Iran and others to seek similar capabilities,” they argue.

Mearsheimer and Walt believe that the Lobby’s influence has been bad for Israel. Its ability to persuade Washington to support an expansionist agenda has discouraged Israel from seizing opportunities, including a peace treaty with Syria and a prompt and full implementation of the Oslo Accords that would have saved Israeli lives and shrunk the ranks of Palestinian extremists. Denying the Palestinians their legitimate political rights certainly has not made Israel more secure, and the long campaign to kill or marginalise a generation of Palestinian leaders has empowered extremist groups like Hamas, and reduced the number of Palestinian leaders who would be both willing to accept a fair settlement and able to make it work.

They write, “Ironically, Israel itself would probably be better off if the Lobby were less powerful and US policy were more evenhanded. What is needed, therefore, is a candid discussion of the Lobby’s influence and a more open debate about US interests in this vital region. Israel’s well-being is one of those interests, but not its continued occupation of the West Bank or its broader regional agenda. Open debate will expose the limits of the strategic and moral case for one-sided US support and could move the United States to a position more consistent with its own national interest, with the interests of the other states in the region, and with Israel’s long-term interests as well.”

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